In Plain Sight

2
You possess an ability to partially hide from sight.
Used by Fletcher Graves, Created by alpacafarms.

You already knew how to not draw attention to yourself. Now you fade into the background almost entirely. Most people don't notice you unless you want them to, their gaze just skips right over you. Like the blurred backdrop of a photo outside the camera's focus, people will miss what's right in front of them.


You gain the following benefits at all times.

You are obscured in one of the following manners. You may Spend an Action to change the way in which you're concealed.

  • Sight:You are partially obscured from being noticed by sight. All attempts to detect you using sight are rolled at a -3 dice penalty, and all attempts to detect you where sight would assist are rolled at -1 penalty. Anyone who detects you cannot determine any visual details about you beyond your general shape.

While this Effect is active, any Effect that would obscure you from other, additional senses fails automatically. If someone discovers you, this Effect will not help you hide from them for the next minute. Activating a targeted or obvious Effect, attacking, or being Injured ends the Effect. When the Effect ends, it is disabled for one minute.

You may turn this Effect on and off at will during its duration.

Possession of this Power grants the following Battle Scar: Disconcerting: Your unnatural presence puts people at unease. All social rolls are at +1 difficulty.

  • You may only switch this Effect on or off once per Round on your initiative as a Free Action.

Community Power Gifts

You gain the following benefits at all times.

Your Intellect rating is increased by 0. You may Exert your Mind to automatically gain an Outcome of 5 on any roll that uses Intellect (Cannot be used on combat rolls or Power activations).

You also gain the following effects:

  • Multithreaded: Instead of being unable to take Actions while maintaining Concentration, you may now take Actions at a -2 dice penalty. You may maintain Concentration from two different Effects, but you are unable to take Actions when doing so.

  • Being Injured or interrupted in some way can still break your Concentration.
  • Attribute bonuses from multiple sources do not stack. Instead the highest bonus is used.

A towering, monstrous figure, its massive form grotesque and unnatural, crafted through various experimental. The body is a patchwork of exaggerated muscle, each bulging and swollen to the point of deformity, unnatural strength that goes far beyond what any living thing normally should possess. Every movement is heavy and awkward, as if this abomination was never meant to exist in its current state.

The most horrifying feature is its warped and disfigured appearance. Its head, a mess of distorted flesh, looks like it was brutally reshaped by a force that cared little for balance or symmetry. The skin on its face is stretched unevenly across its skull, with some parts pulled so tight they seem ready to tear, while others sag loosely, creating a disturbing mismatch of textures. One eye is disturbingly enlarged, bulging grotesquely out of its socket, while the other is small, sunken, and almost lifeless, giving the creature an eerie, lopsided expression that seems permanently frozen in agony.

Metal staples and thick, crude stitching cover its flesh, crisscrossing its entire body in a patchwork. These rough repairs hold together sections of skin that don't seem to belong on the same being, as if pieces were violently fused. The seams are jagged, and in some places the skin appears torn, revealing layers of sinew and exposed muscle underneath, as though the body is barely holding together, threatening to unravel with every move.

Its jaw is a wide, gaping maw filled with jagged teeth that protrude unnaturally, as if too large to properly fit inside its mouth. The jaw itself seems locked in a permanent snarl, unable to close completely, giving the creature a look of endless hunger. The teeth, uneven and sharp, stick out at grotesque angles.

You gain the following benefits at all times.

You are permanently and visibly transformed: Grotesque Body. You are considered to be a Sapient, Living being when targeted. Your Brawn is increased by 1 and your Dexterity is increased by 1.

No single organ in your body is critical for life. If any of your body parts are separated from your body, you may take Actions with the severed part for three hours. You may reattach severed body parts by spending an Action and Exerting your Mind.

Your appendages can reach an additional 30 feet.

Possession of this Power grants the following Battle Scar: Grotesque Body.

You cannot be mistaken for a normal human. You cannot always use standard human clothes, equipment, vehicles, and facilities, and when you can, you suffer an increased Difficulty.

  • Detached parts move at 5 feet per Round. You may activate awareness Effects through detached sensory organs. This does not grant extra Actions.
  • You may stretch or retract your limbs once per Round on your Initiative.
  • Attribute bonuses from multiple sources do not stack. Instead the highest bonus is used.

You gain the following benefits at all times.

Your senses are enhanced in the following way.

  • Hearing: You may hear sounds of sub- and hyper-sonic frequencies, allowing you to hear tiny things (mice, insects, etc) better, and pick up on the vibrations of massive things (earthquakes, atmospheric disruptions, etc) long before others.

Any senses which have been heightened cannot be overloaded. Battle Scars you receive cannot affect these senses.

Any heightened senses require you to maintain Concentration to use, and do not apply to any passive Perception checks.

  • Examples of overloading a sense include: an explosion causing temporary deafness, a bright light causing blindness, a sedative causing numbness, etc.

Spend one minute. Select a Sapient target within arm's reach. You must actively converse with the individual in question for one minute in order to gather any information. At the end of your investigation, roll Perception + Alertness at Difficulty 6. The target resists by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7.

You learn all the following information about your target:

  • Determine if this target is Alien in origin or whether it has any Alien energy or outside influences. You receive information about the type of energy, including the name of the relevant Source pool or equivalent. You determine the effect of any active Alien energy detected, and you get an idea as to the sorts of ways that latent Alien energy may be channeled by the target.

The quality and specificity of information gained depends on your Outcome.

This Effect is not obvious, and the only sign you are using an Effect is a brief moment where zir eyes turn black. If someone suspects that an Effect was used, they must roll Perception + Alertness, Difficulty 8 to pick up on your Tell.

This Gift's Cost is capped at 2 and cannot be increased further.

  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.

Spend an Action. Select a Animate target within arm's reach. You must use up An offering made in Leon's name in order to activate this Effect.

For the next week, your target does not require any food, water, or air. Any roll to resist an Effect dependent on any affected requirement is made at -1 Difficulty.

This Gift cannot have more than 3 Drawbacks, and its Gift Cost is capped at 2.

  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.

Stock Power Gifts

You gain the following benefits as long as as long as you are visibly dressed head to toe in black with hardly any skin showing.

You and everything you are carrying is obscured in one of the following manners. You may Spend an Action to change the way in which you're concealed.

  • Hearing: You are completely obscured from hearing. You produce no sounds while this Effect is active. All attempts to detect you via hearing fail. Attempts via other senses where hearing would assist are rolled at -2 dice.

While this Effect is active, any Effect that would obscure you or your equipment specifically from other, additional senses fails automatically.

If someone discovers you, this Effect will not help you hide from them for the next minute. Activating a targeted or obvious Effect, attacking, or being Injured ends the Effect. When the Effect ends, it is disabled for one minute.

You may turn this Effect on and off at will during its duration.

Possession of this Power grants the following Trauma at all times: compulsion to test the awareness of allies by sneaking up on them with a weapon.

  • You may only switch this Effect on or off once per Round on your initiative as a Free Action.

Spend a Quick Action. You must actively and obviously use a burlap sack to activate this Effect.

You may withdraw an item from your stash, or add an item that is within arm’s reach to your stash. You may only stash targets which are in your possession, grappled, or otherwise controlled by you.

You may store Objects in your stash, each no larger than something which could fit inside a briefcase (15 liters), and you may store up to 3 things at a time.

You may choose to equip any equipment you withdraw at no additional cost.

  • "Equip" refers to drawing a gun, putting on a piece of armor, etc. You may store or withdraw a maximum of 6 items in a given Round. Reminder: you may perform up to two Quick Actions for -2 dice each or 3 if you use up your Action, unless a different Effect grants you additional Quick Actions.
  • Containers which hold multiple things may count as a single item so long as the things within are generally packaged together. For instance, you may stash a clip full of bullets, a medical kit full of medical supplies, or a box of crackers, but you cannot stash a backpack full of miscellaneous equipment.
  • You may only attempt to store Objects which are free-standing and disconnected from other things. The use of this Effect will not allow you to sever any connections holding an Object in place.
  • The Maximum Object Size parameter is intended to roughly capture the weight / size restriction of items and isn’t intended to restrict shape. GM discretion is advised. A human being is level 4 in the Maximum Object Size parameter.

Exert your Mind and spend an Action. You must make a Trauma roll when you use this Effect. Its Difficulty cannot be reduced by any means. If you fail or Botch, you receive one Mind Damage and a new Trauma.

You transform into a vampire bat or a wolf until you transform into something else or choose to return to your original form. See the Extended System text for stats.

While transformed, you cannot use any equipment (including Artifacts and Consumables), and you do not have access to any of your Powers. Any equipment you are wearing transforms with you.

Injuries and Wound Level are carried over between forms. However, transforming can never kill you; you merely remain Incapacitated until your Injuries are sufficiently healed.

Possession of this Power grants the following Battle Scar: A disfigured face with bat-like ears.

  • Creature Stats
    • Large (larger than human, smaller than elephant) Body: 8. Brawn 6. Dexterity 2. Fall damage increased by 2. Armor: 1
    • Small (mouse up to regular house cat) Body 1. Brawn 0. Dexterity 4. Cannot injure others with attacks. Cannot die from falling damage. +3 dice to Stealth rolls.
    All creatures get +3 dice to any non-combat Action that they are naturally adapted for. All creatures Medium and larger may attack by rolling Body, dealing +0 Damage (+1 for “predators”). Gms and Playgroup leaders can apply other bonuses and effects to specific animals.
  • Animals that are quicker than humans (like dogs) have 50 feet of Free Movement. Animals that are very slow (like turtles) have 0 feet of Free Movement.
  • You cannot transform if there is not enough room to do so.
  • The form you take must have the same stats and abilities as a single, extant animal of the relevant size.

You gain the following benefits at all times.

Any Injury you receive from a source other than silver or fire. heals quickly, reducing its Severity by one level every 6 hours. Any Injuries you receive while this Effect is active do not deteriorate over time. However, any Battle Scars caused by such an Injury will remain unless it is Properly Stabilized as normal.

You may Exert your Mind and spend an Action to reduce the Severity of one of your Injuries by 2. Does not affect Injuries suffered as an activation cost for Effects.

Injuries you receive from silver or fire. are increased in Severity by 1.

  • The increase in Injury Severity stacks with any similar effects, such as the Vulnerable drawback on Inhuman Physiology.

You gain the following benefits at all times.

Your Stress from Injuries is reduced to 0. Does not reduce Stress from Mind Damage.