•••• Shatter the Mind
No description can be given to this level of Nightmare mastery other than inhumane brutality. And yet, the power is horribly insidious for affecting only a victim’s mind, leaving the body untouched. The vampire confronts a subject with her greatest fear, driving her mad.
Effect
Dramatic Failure: The vampire is incapable of using Shatter the Mind for the remainder of the scene.
Failure: Successes rolled for the subject exceed or tie those rolled for the vampire. There is no effect.
Success: The most successes are rolled for the user of the power. The victim loses her next action as she reels from the vision with which she is confronted. Her Defense still applies, but she cannot perform a dodge maneuver. All other actions for the remainder of the scene are performed at -1, and she loses one Willpower point. The victim is subject to a mild derangement (see the World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 97) for a number of weeks equal to the successes rolled for the Discipline user. The Storyteller decides what the derangement is. If the victim already has a mild derangement, the Storyteller can upgrade it to a severe one for the duration.
Exceptional Success: The roll made for the vampire wins the contested roll and gets five or more successes. The victim falls unconscious and remains so until the end of the scene. Upon waking, she loses one Willpower dot and is subject to a severe derangement of the Storyteller’s choosing. This ailment is permanent unless the victim can overcome it through treatment (addressed in the World of Darkness Rulebook on p. 96)
By use of this power, a vampire actually inflicts no physical harm upon the subject. He simply awakens her thoughts to the most horrific thing that she can imagine befalling her, and her subconscious mind proceeds from there. The victim imagines that a doomed fate befalls her, regardless of how implausible or nonsensical it might be under the circumstances — drowning while walking down a city street, for example. And yet, she imagines and is convinced that the situation occurs all the same.
Failure: Successes rolled for the subject exceed or tie those rolled for the vampire. There is no effect.
Success: The most successes are rolled for the user of the power. The victim loses her next action as she reels from the vision with which she is confronted. Her Defense still applies, but she cannot perform a dodge maneuver. All other actions for the remainder of the scene are performed at -1, and she loses one Willpower point. The victim is subject to a mild derangement (see the World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 97) for a number of weeks equal to the successes rolled for the Discipline user. The Storyteller decides what the derangement is. If the victim already has a mild derangement, the Storyteller can upgrade it to a severe one for the duration.
Exceptional Success: The roll made for the vampire wins the contested roll and gets five or more successes. The victim falls unconscious and remains so until the end of the scene. Upon waking, she loses one Willpower dot and is subject to a severe derangement of the Storyteller’s choosing. This ailment is permanent unless the victim can overcome it through treatment (addressed in the World of Darkness Rulebook on p. 96)
By use of this power, a vampire actually inflicts no physical harm upon the subject. He simply awakens her thoughts to the most horrific thing that she can imagine befalling her, and her subconscious mind proceeds from there. The victim imagines that a doomed fate befalls her, regardless of how implausible or nonsensical it might be under the circumstances — drowning while walking down a city street, for example. And yet, she imagines and is convinced that the situation occurs all the same.
Material Components
Cost: 1 Willpower
Gestures & Ritual
Related Discipline
Effect Casting Time
Contested; resistance is reflexive
Level
4
Applied Restriction
Once used successfully on a victim, Shatter the Mind cannot be applied against her again in that scene by any vampire.