Adversary Knacks

Adversary Knacks let you understand a person’s weakness and turn it against them, whether to destroy them or force them to change. Adversary knacks are based around opposition and betrayal

Adversary Knacks Master

Adversary Heroic

• All Those Lovely Enemies

You sniff out enmity. Pick one target in a scene; you know anyone who they have serious negative feelings for (an Attitude of at least –2 or worse), and anyone else present who has negative attitudes towards your target. If your target has an Attitude of 2 or higher towards you (negative or positive), this works automatically. If not, make a Knack Skill roll, with a Difficulty equal to their Tier.

• Antagonistic Lessons

Whenever the results of your actions cause a target of your antagonism to fail, you may do one of the following:

• Adjust their Attitude to whatever level you prefer.
• Cause the target to instead succeed at an action you determine.
• Instantly create a Fatebinding with the target

• Can’t Kill the Rooster

Spend Momentum during combat to gain Enhancement to your Defense equal to the Attitude targets have towards you for the scene. (A general Hatred of Scions would not apply, but a specific hate of your character would, for example.)

• Corrupted Creation

Your knowledge of creation allows you to break down constructed objects. By touching an object you can degrade its quality. Spend 1 Momentum to gain Enhancement equal to your Creator dots to turn objects into raw material. For each Injury Condition you receive from a weapon, you can spend 1 Momentum to weaken the weapon, causing it to lose 1 weapon tag. A mundane weapon can lose up to your Creator dots in tags. Relics lose half your Creator dots (rounded up). The Storyguide decides which weapon tag is lost. Mundane weapons are destroyed if reduced to zero tags, while Relics can never drop below 1.Regaining the weapon’s tags follows Making Repairs rules (Scion: Origin, p. 77).

• Enemy of My Enemy

You automatically know when you meet a character who shares one of your negative Attitudes towards a specific person or group, and a successful Read Attitude action reveals useful or interesting memories about the reasons for that dislike. Characters of a higher Tier can conceal this with a Clash of Wills

• Familiar Wounds

When you make an attack against a target with a weapon owned by someone with at least a +2 Positive attitude towards the target, you may choose to change the damage type between Bashing, Lethal, and Aggravated freely, and you may give the weapon the Brutal or Piercing Tag. If you are the owner of a weapon you use with this Knack, the weapon is destroyed after a causing an Injury, Fate recoiling on it.

• Jeering Taunts

Once per scene, you may taunt and mock a target, either increasing your Defense against their attacks by your Adversary Calling for the duration on the Round, or penalizing the cost of all their stunts by your Adversary Calling for the duration of one action. You must choose which penalty to apply when you activate this Knack. You may not choose the same penalty twice in a row.

• Let’s Contain Multitudes

You may possess both positive and negative Attitudes towards an individual or organization and choose which applies for any given intrigue roll. You may choose to create corresponding Attitudes in a target when using the Shift Attitude roll, in which case a successful roll creates an additional Attitude rather than shifting their existing feelings. For example, if a character had an Attitude –2 of serious loathing towards you, you use Shift Attitude to create a matching Attitude +2 for being strangely compelling or too annoying to kill. If you do this, your target may not use their Attitude enhancement when trying to resist your Shift Attitude roll.

• Lingering Presence

When you spare the life of a defeated enemy who has a negative Attitude towards you, you gain the Condition “Force of Opposition.” This grants you +2 Enhancement to any rolls related to thwarting that enemy’s plans or aiding their other enemies, applied before you roll. You may resolve this Condition at any time to heal all damage conditions they or their allies have dealt to you. Otherwise, it resolves at the end of the story.

• My Misfortune is Your Misfortune

Spend Momentum when a character imposes a Complication on you, redirecting it to themselves or someone they care about in the scene. Your first use of this Knack in a scene is free.

• No Champion Unchallenged

Once per scene, spend Momentum when you challenge a character with an Attitude of 2 or higher or -2 or lower toward you to a contest or fight. If the Storyguide decides they are categorically unable to accept or compete, regain the Momentum. If they accept, gain your Adversary rating in Enhancement to opposed or Complex actions to defeat them outside of combat, or to your Defense against characters other than the challenged character in combat. If they refuse, choose one:

• Regain 1 Legend.
• Cause other characters present to gain a 1 point Attitude of shame toward your target, or increase one if it already existed.
• Increase or decrease an attitude your target holds to you by 1.

• Nothing Is Inevitable

When you spare the life of a defeated enemy who has a negative Attitude towards you, you gain the Condition “Force of Opposition.” This grants you +2 Enhancement to any rolls related to thwarting that enemy’s plans or aiding their other enemies, applied before you roll. You may resolve this Condition at any time to heal all damage conditions they or their allies have dealt to you. Otherwise, it resolves at the end of the story.

• Perfectly Symmetrical Violence

When a character injures you, spend 2 Momentum to make an immediate attack against them. This does not require a mixed action, and you can use it even if you’ve already acted in the round.

• Pride Before a Fall

When a character you have a negative attitude towards takes an action with Enhancement, you may spend Momentum to inflict a dice penalty equal to the Enhancement (to a maximum of your Adversary rating). If this causes them to fail, they do so in an especially ironic, embarrassing, or tragic way. Your first use of this Knack in a scene is free.

• Spluttering Incoherence

When in a scene with a target who has a negative Attitude towards you, you may spend Momentum to prevent them from making any social action until you have acted again, driving them into a frothing, violent rage. You may only do this once per scene.

• Sudden but Inevitable

When you attack a target who has a positive Attitude towards you, whether physically in combat or socially in intrigue, you may add that Attitude’s rating as Enhancement. In many cases, this will result in the target removing that Attitude, and replacing it with a negative Attitude.

• Sweet and Sour

Make a Knack Skill roll. With any successes, you may curse a meal or drink consumed by your target with the poison of spite. This functions as the Poisoned condition but rather than inflict Injury, it inverts the Attitudes of other characters who interact with the poisoned target — transforming boon companions into bitter enemies and hated rivals into fair-weather friends. The Storyguide and player should work together to determine how this impacts the character as they progress through the story. This costs Momentum if you witness the character partaking of food or drink and is free if you successfully serve the refreshments to them yourself.

• Theft of Luck

While in the same scene as a target with a negative Attitude toward you, after seeing the result of any of their rolls, you may spend Momentum and take any number of their successes (before applying Enhancement and before purchasing Stunts) and add them as Enhancement to your next roll. If this causes the target to fail, get the spent Momentum back.

• True Friendship

During intrigue, you may treat positive Attitudes towards an individual as Enhancement for encouraging the belief “acting against my friend’s desires is in their best interest” or encouraging the behavior “I will oppose my friend’s desires as soon as I possibly can,” instead of your target gaining that Attitude as Enhancement to resist your roll.

• You Need Haters

Haters keep you sharp, and you make sure your enemies have plenty of haters. On a successful Knack Skill roll, increase the difficulty for one target to shift attitude in their favor up to your Adversary dots. You may spend 1 Momentum to affect multiple characters. You don’t need to spend Momentum if the additional targets are trivial characters.

Adversary Immortal

•• A Wicked Idea

Spend Momentum to suggest a dangerous, outlandish, or malicious course of action, passing it off as just a joke. The next time the target has a good opportunity to follow your suggestion, they suffer a +2 Complication to all actions for the rest of the scene as they’re distracted by mustering their self-control. If not bought off, these Complications lead them to slip unintended information, waste opportunities, overlook obvious details, or reveal what they’re thinking of at the worst moment in their distraction. Characters of a higher Tier can resist with a Clash of Wills, pitting their Composure + Legend against your Manipulation + Legend.

•• Another Price to Pay

Against targets with an Attitude of 2 or higher towards you, you gain access to the following stunts in combat:

• Blood Like Wine (variable): Immediately resolve this as an Influence action with the number of successes spent on it against the target.
  And the following stunt in intrigue:
• Tears Like Honey (variable): Immediately resolve this as an Inflict Damage stunt with the number of successes spent on it against the target. Bystanders must successfully Clash of Wills against you to understand the nature of what transpired in either case.

•• At Your Side, In Your Way

Whenever someone you have a negative Attitude towards is in mortal peril, or someone you have a positive Attitude towards is about to succeed at a major goal, you know that it’s occurring — though not the details of the event. You may spend Momentum to appear in their scene, as long as you are both in the same World or within five days travel in the same Otherworld. Note: This may apply to other players’ characters (especially if they’re about to achieve a Deed) with that player’s permission.

•• Contra Mundum

Opposing the World is easy, because the World always opposes itself. Pick an individual, organization, or thing. Your actions to rally characters or items against that target increase their Scale for leadership purposes by your Tier or your target’s Attitude towards you, whichever is higher. You may spend Momentum to change your target for Contra Mundum once a session.

•• Enemies Forever

Pick a target who has at an Attitude of –2 or worse towards you. Neither you nor your target can die unless the other does the killing, or you are both somehow killed simultaneously. This Knack can target only a single target at a time, which you may change once per session.

•• Evil Appearing

When you initiate combat or intrigue with an unsuspecting target, all characters of a lower Tier must either abandon them, refuse to intervene, or suffer +2 Difficulty on all their rolls in the Scene. If the target has a positive Attitude towards you, they suffer the Complication “Collateral Betrayal” at a rating of their Attitude for the scene. It turns lower Tier characters against them until bought off. If the target has a negative Attitude towards you, they suffer the Complication “Blinded by Anger” at a rating of their Attitude for the Scene. It reduces their Defense in Combat or resistance pool in intrigue for the next roll by the remaining rating if not fully bought off.

•• Fever-Ridden (Bogovoi-Specific)

Likhoradka is known to possess others in the form of a spiritual disease. Spend Momentum to transform into an infectious cloud, inhabiting a character within Short range. For the duration, you share all of their senses. Once per scene while infecting them, you may make an influence roll to convince them to do something; if they don’t know you’re inside them — because you afflicted them in their sleep — you gain +2 Enhancement. Because you exist as a fever inside of them, powers that heal diseases exorcise you; otherwise, characters roll Integrity + Stamina after a day’s rest; once they’ve accumulated your Legend in successes, you are forced out. Characters of your Tier or higher can resist infection with a Clash of Wills.

•• From Hell’s Heart

The distance your combat or in trigue actions can affect a target increases based on their Attitude towards you. At Attitude 2, your combat actions can target them up to long range in combat and your intrigue actions can affect them at any distance they could normally perceive you from, without penalty. At Attitude 3, you can target them from anywhere within extreme range. At Attitude 4, anywhere on the same continent. At Attitude 5, anywhere in the World, or anywhere within five days travel in an Otherworld. They may attempt a counterattack or social action at the same range after you make an attack, however, and after you have successfully attacked or influ enced a target at this range, you can’t use this power again against the same target for the rest of the session.

•• Inside Their Heads

Once you’ve wormed into someone’s heart, you’re always in sync with its beats. Characters who have Attitudes towards you of +2 or higher suffer your Adversary rating in additional Difficulty when trying to lie to or deceive you. In Divine Rule play, you can always detect their actions within a given realm unless their approach is subtle or stealthy.

•• Lovely Plans and Wicked Plots

Few things bring people closer together than bringing down someone everyone hates. Imbue Legend to consecrate a dire plot, fiendish plan, or foul conspiracy. Those taking part gain additional Scale for epic or grandiose measure taken against the target of the plot. Pick a Purview when taking this Knack; when you create a Realm Condition with that Purview that would benefit from a sprawling conspiracy or intricate plot, increase its effect by 1.

•• My Best Enemy

You can have a number of temporary Fatebindings equal to your Adversary rating in addition to your usual limit. These temporary Fatebindings can’t be raised above 3. Characters of your Tier or higher can resist with a Clash of Wills. For the Fatebinding’s duration (based on its Strength), see Scion: Hero, p. 197.

•• Nothing Is Forbidden

Against targets with an Attitude of 2 or higher towards you, you gain access to the following stunts in combat:

• Blood Like Wine (variable): Immediately resolve this as an Influence action with the number of successes spent on it against the target.
  And the following stunt in intrigue:
• Tears Like Honey (variable): Immediately resolve this as an Inflict Damage stunt with the number of successes spent on it against the target. Bystanders must successfully Clash of Wills against you to understand the nature of what transpired in either case.

•• Opposition Without Limit

When you command, rally, or intrigue enormous forces to oppose another character, imbue, rather than spend, a point of Legend to invoke your Legendary Title as a Feat of Scale

•• Pawns for My Desire

When socially interacting with a target who has a negative attitude toward you, you may spend Momentum during any Encourage Behavior roll and have it succeed as though you achieved exactly the number of successes required.

•• Ruin Your Life (Netjer-Specific)

With cunning like Isfet, you adopt an enemy’s identity to ruin their life. Gain Enhancement equal to their negative attitude towards you on any roll to convince others you’re them, with access to the following Stunts:

• Not a Trace (1s): Any physical and electronic evidence you leave behind is flimsy at best — fingerprints are incomplete, security footage is too grainy to make an ID, and so on.
• The Wrong Trace Entirely (3s): A piece of evidence you leave behind magically changes to implicate someone else — putting their prints on the gun or their metadata on the file.

•• Spitting Curses

You gain the ability to layer curse upon curse on a target, until they have no choice but to do as you ask. Choose one of the curses below at the time this Knack is purchased. This Knack can be purchased a number of times equal to your Adversary Calling, choosing a different curse each time. While this is your active Knack, you gain access to any two
curses you know, and the following stunt:

• Sling Curses (2s): Apply this stunt to any Encourage Belief or Behavior roll or any attack action. The target must be within Close range. When you purchase this stunt, apply one of your curses to the target.
• Incompetence Curse: This curse condition imposes an increased Difficulty to the target’s actions equal to your Adversary Calling. This persists until the curse causes the target to fail a roll. If the target botches, gain Momentum.
• Curse of Ill Fortune: Impose this curse condition which applies a Complication to all of your target’s actions with a rating equal to your Adversary rating which lasts until the target cannot buy it off. Failing to buy off the Complication results in an ill fortune of your choice.
• Curse of My Presence: This curse condition increases the Difficulty of all of your target’s rolls by 1. You may choose to end the condition and appear in the same scene as the target. Your sudden appearance also causes the target to automatically fail their next roll, regardless of the result on the dice.

•• Stab the Giant from Atop Their Shoulders

When directly opposing a character or their plans who possesses a positive Attitude toward you, you may spend Momentum. Increase the Scale of your actions to oppose them by the rating of their attitude, up to a maximum of their own relevant Scale. This includes any Scale they benefit from due to outside sources, such as equipment or favorable conditions.

•• That Venom, Deception (Pālas-Specific)

Spend 1 Momentum to gain +2 Enhancement on rolls to spread gossip about someone. Anyone who believes the gossip is compelled to share it with others. Characters of your Tier or higher can resist with a Clash of Wills (your Manipulation + Legend vs their Composure + Legend). If the subject of the gossip has a negative attitude towards you or is trivial, this Knack is free.

•• Wrath is Sustenance (K’uh-Specific)

Like VucubCaquix, you can subsist on enmity alone. You reduce penalties based on fatigue, hunger, and other needs by your highest negative attitude. You may add your Adversary rating as an Enhancement to a contested roll against a character to whom you have a negative attitude. Your first use of this Knack in a scene is free.

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