Book: Immortals, p. 82
Prerequisite: Status •+ in the group
Effect: With this Merit, the character has access to a number of likeminded individuals who share in a particular depraved act. This support network offers sympathy that most could not. This Merit allows the character to spend a Willpower point to gain the usual three-dice bonus on the roll to resist gaining a derangement, if the action causing the roll is acceptable to the members of the group.
Drawback: The group expects the character to act as support for other members, and the group may call her in to perform other perverse acts in kind, such as body disposal. This can lead a character to an even quicker path to moral degradation.
Sworn Officer (• to ••••)
Book: 13th Precint, p. 81
Prerequisite: The character must meet the basic requirements to be an officer in the department she selects.
See p. 36 for the minimum requirements for an MPD officer.
Effects: You character is a sworn law enforcement officer, with all the rights and duties thereof. She is empowered within her jurisdiction to make arrests, use department equipment and resources, view confidential information, request assistance from other agencies and use force during the course of her duties.
She may legally carry a concealed deadly weapon anywhere in the United States not prohibited by federal law, even when off duty. When in another agency’s jurisdiction, she also can expect professional courtesy (see p. 60), subject to local customs and policies.
This Merit differs from Status (see the World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 116) in that Status represents a character’s standing within an organization, while Sworn Officer indicates that the character actually is a duly empowered law enforcement officer. The civilian director of the Midway Forensic Science Center may be an MPD employee with Status (MPD) ••••, but he’s still a civilian, not a sworn officer.
The number of dots purchased in this Merit determines the extent of the jurisdiction of the agency for which your character works. One dot indicates a small to mid-sized town or a rural county. Two dots indicate a major city (such as Midway) or a densely populated county. Three dots indicate a statewide agency. Four dots indicate a federal agency with national jurisdiction.
Note: For a police-centered story in which most or all of the characters are officers, the Storyteller is strongly encouraged to provide this Merit free. In such a case, being a cop is an intrinsic part of the story and players should not be charged points for playing characters that fit the game’s concept. However, an individual player who wants to play a cop character in a non-police-focused chronicle must still purchase this Merit.
Tunnel Rat (• to •••)
Book: Chicago, p. 54; Invite Only, p. 34
Homeless or investigative vampires who have spent all or most of their Requiems in Chicago (The Lost City) may have gained some knowledge of the vast and complicated system of connected el tunnels, abandoned freight tunnels, deep tunnels, sewers and commuter train tunnels that riddle the land beneath the city. This Merit indicates how well the character knows this interconnecting suite of tunnels. Characters may add their dots in this Merit to Survival dice pools made within the Undercity, in addition to the effects described below. It should be noted that any Kindred who starts bringing unwanted visitors into the Undercity makes enemies of his fellow tunneld wellers in no time, not the least of whom is Max Maurey.
This Merit was originally printed in World of Darkness: Chicago, p. 54. Characters may add their dots in this Merit to Survival dice pools made within The Lost City, in addition to the effects described below.
• The character has ventured into the tunnels once or twice. He’s safe so long as he stays on the biggest and busiest passageways. Getting from one place to another strictly through the tunnels may take up to twice as long as it would on the surface. Penalties to dice pools for navigation and survival in the Undercity are reduced by one (e.g., from –3 to –2).
•• The character has a solid, but imperfect, understanding of Chicago’s (The Lost City) tunnels. He may specialize in one kind of tunnel (el tunnels or freight tunnels, for example), or he may stick to primary and secondary tunnels. Traveling from one place to another through the Undercity is no more time-consuming than surface travel. Penalties to dice pools for navigation and survival in the Undercity are reduced by two (e.g., from –3 to –1).
••• The character knows the Undercity in an up-close and personal way. She has personally explored dozens of tunnels down to the smallest service conduit and probably spends most of her active time down in the Undercity. She can tell her location in the tunnels by one or two subtle landmarks and knows the fastest routes
to get anywhere. A character with this level of knowledge need never fear getting lost in the Undercity and cuts travel time by 25% when traveling between any two points in Chicago (The Lost City) via the tunnels.
Penalties to dice pools for navigation and survival in the Undercity are reduced by three (e.g., from –3 to 0).
S S p p e e c c i i a a l l T T e e m m p p l l a a t t e e ’ ’ s s M M e e r r i i t t s s
The merits on these list couldn’t fill, normally, in a standard World of Darkness’s character or game, unless with Storyteller's permission.
Abyssal Resonance (• to •••••)
Book: Banishers, p. 39
Effect: All Sleepers have a shard of the Abyss within them, but characters with this Merit resonate strongly with the Abyss. The character has little or no control over this Merit, but any mage around her certainly feels its effects.
Dots in this Merit allow access to various effects based on the Abyss’s growing intrusion into the character’s soul. This Merit is progressive, that is, a character can and does find that her Resonance with the Abyss increases the more contact she has with Awakened magic. In game terms, each level of the Merit is a prerequisite for the next. A character can’t have Skin of the Abyss without first purchasing Eyes of the Abyss.
Eyes of the Abyss (•): The character can automatically sense Paradoxes and even potential Paradoxes.
Whenever a mage casts a vulgar spell within 100 feet of the character, she senses it. No roll is required. The character might perceive this information as a scent of saltwater and smoke, or a cold shudder down her spine or the sounds of wailing and screaming as if from a great distance. If the player makes a reflexive Wits + Composure roll, the character can pinpoint a direction. If she is in the presence of the mage who cast the spell, this roll allows the character to identify him.
Skin of the Abyss (••): The Abyss protects the character from attempts to identify or analyze him. Any Unveiling or Knowing spell cast directly on the character is considered vulgar in aspect, as is any other spell designed to gain information about or otherwise analyze the character (including Scrying).
Beacon of the Abyss (•••): Merely being in the presence of this character invites Paradox. All mages within a 50-foot radius of the character increase their Paradox pools whenever any mage casts a vulgar spell. For example, if one member of the cabal casts a vulgar spell (Paradox base dice pool of one), the next mage to do so, no matter who it is, has a Paradox base dice pool of two. If the character with this Merit is a mage, she is not immune to the effect, and neither are any allied mages in the area. The Abyss does not discriminate.
Claws of the Abyss (••••): Containing a Paradox within one’s own body is often a wise decision ó better a few points of bashing damage than an hour’s worth of insanity or the chaos of an Anomaly. A character with this Merit, though, can worsen the damage thus inflicted. This requires the character to grapple the mage (see p. 157 of the World of Darkness Rulebook) and the player to spend a Willpower point. The mage’s player rolls Resolve + Stamina + Gnosis – (the number of vulgar spells the mage has cast during that scene, regardless of whether a Paradox occurred). If this roll fails, any damage from containing a Paradox upgrades to the next category (bashing becomes lethal, lethal becomes aggravated). The damage remains resistant.
Abyssal Warden (•••••): The character unconsciously understands and can manipulate the gateways between the Fallen World and the Abyss. Whenever a mage suffers a Paradox within view of the character with this Merit (that is, the character doesn’t absorb the Paradox within his own body), the character can try to force a Manifestation. The player rolls Resolve + Presence + Gnosis in a contested action against the mage’s Resolve + Stamina + Gnosis (resistance is reflexive). If the mage fails to equal or exceed the character’s successes, the Paradox becomes a Manifestation, no matter what type was indicated by the Paradox roll.
Using this power requires the expenditure of a Willpower point.
Drawback: So much exposure to the Abyss is dangerous for the character’s sanity. Every time the character increases the rating of this Merit, she must check for a new derangement as if she had just failed a degeneration roll (dice pool is Morality or Wisdom). Also, mages with this Merit always have nimbuses that relate to or call to mind the Abyss ó shadows darken, objects grow cold to the touch, etc.
Alternate Identity (•, •• or ••••)
Book: Immortals, p. 110 Note: Purified
Effect: As beings that live for centuries and can die and later return to life, purified regularly require new legal identities. All purified are assumed to have a single legal identity and need pay no Merit dots for this privilege. However, if the purified has lived in a single legal identity for more than two decades, your character has almost certainly begun to have to use various minor forms of disguise to change his appearance so that it better matches his legal age.
Having a second identity allows purified to have an identity that matches his apparent age and it also allows him to easily vanish if any legal questions arise surrounding his activities. In addition, if your character’s
body dies in such a way that others notice his death, he can use this alternate identity if there is no way for him to explain his perceived death. However, modern background checks, paper trails and bureaucratic scrutiny make acquiring a new identity far more difficult than it was in the past. Few characters have the skills to create a new identity for themselves. The vast majority must look for help, either from older and more experienced purified or from some mortal or supernatural source who is skilled in the various complex and highly illegal methods of acquiring such documents.
The number of dots spent on this Merit determines how convincing and in-depth the documentation surrounding this new life actually is. Alternate Identity (•) represents an identity that passes casual inspection, but not much else – a character can go shopping and get around in most daily situations, but any kind of trained scrutiny such as from a police officer or bureaucrat immediately identifies this identity as a fake.
Alternate Identity (••) creates an identity that will pass most forms of relatively cursory professional inspection, but cannot stand up to a sustained investigation. A police officer that pulls your character over will not automatically pick up anything unusual if she runs the character’s license plates or calls up his name in a database. However, if your character is arrested and the police begin a formal investigation his identity will quickly unravel. Alternate Identity (••••) represents an identity that is essentially as real as any identity can be – it takes a truly dedicated, competent and time-consuming search by trained professionals to uncover any hint that the purified isn’t exactly who he claims to be, at least as far as his documentation is concerned.
This Merit may be purchased multiple times at multiple ratings, each time representing a different identity.
Also, an identity may also be upgraded later with the appropriate in-game explanation and experience expenditure. In the case of certain Merits such as Resources or Status, it might also be worth noting to which identity these Merits are tied, since a character may not easily be able to access or maintain them if that identity is compromised.
Drawback: Although one-dot Alternate Identities require no maintenance, both of the more thorough versions do. If someone checks on a legal identity, they will immediately become suspicious if the person has no legal address or magazine subscriptions, pays no taxes and has no phone number. Similarly, if all of this data exactly matches your character’s primary legal identity, many people soon realize both of these identities belong to the same individual. Therefore, your character must take time and spend money to maintain any two or four-dot Alternate Identities.
Having the identity make frequent trips to remote locations and similar inventive dodges can reduce the frequency of this maintenance. The amount of maintenance needed to keep a two-dot identity looking legitimate is fairly minimal, requiring only a few hours of work every month. However, keeping a four-dot identity believable requires at least several hours of work every week. Failure to perform this upkeep on an identity causes it to be reduced to the next lowest level. However, alternate identities never fall lower than one dot. Paying Experience Points to upgrade an identity represents the effort needed to build it back up.
Characters can also pay criminal organizations to maintain alternate identities, but doing so causes its own problems, including both the cost and the possibility of blackmail.