Monster Knacks

Monster Knacks unleash your inner beast, often transforming your flesh to match. They are powered by the concepts of transformation and predation. Characters with any dots in Monster gain access to a Monstrous Urge — a condition that reflects the beast that dwells within them. You can activate your Monstrous Urge anytime you are injured, threatened, or embarrassed.

Monster Knacks Master

Monster Heroic

• Apex Myth

Gain your Monster dots in Enhancement to all Encourage Behavior rolls involving another monster — hether a non-human character, or another character with the same Monster Calling.

• Appetite for Victory

When a non-trivial enemy is Taken Out by you, spend Momentum and heal one Injury, starting with the most severe. This cannot heal any Injuries taken to Armor, except the natural armor granted by the Chimera Hide Knack. While under the effects of your Monstrous Urge, the Momentum cost is waived the first time this Knack is used.

• Blood-Drinker

Gain Enhancement to attacks against a wounded target for each of the Health they’ve lost, or equal to the severity of their highest Injury Condition, whichever is higher or applicable.

• Chimera Hide

While under the Monstrous Urges Condition, your flesh transforms, becoming chiton, blubbery hide, scales, or some other form of natural armor. When you take this Knack, you may spend up to your Monster rating on tags to determine the effects of your armor. If you take Hard armor, any damage dealt to it heals as if it were your own flesh; if you invoke Chimera Hide again before it has a chance to heal, the damage still remains. This Knack replaces any other form of natural or worn armor as your monstrous hide bursts through anything that might contain it.

• Contagion

Your Natural Tag attacks are virulent, dripping with disease. You inflict a Disease Condition of your choice when you choose the Inflict Injury Stunt. This disease must be chosen when you purchase this Knack. Contagion can be purchased a number of times equal to yourMonster dots, conferring a new disease each time.

• Debts Paid in Blood (Teōtl-Specific)

You automatically know the distance, direction, and shortest path to any character who is indebted to you financially, socially, or otherwise. They suffer a Complication equal to your Monster Calling on any attempts to evade you, defraud you, or refuse repayment; unless bought off, they suffer a messy Injury, and you detect their intentions regardless of distance, their sweet blood flowing from your lips.

• Fear Made Flesh

When you interact with someone, you learn their biggest fears and phobias. You can subtly change your features to evoke those fears, gaining +1 Enhancement to intimidate, frighten, or coerce them, which applies before you roll. The target suffers +1 Difficulty to any action they take against you while in your presence.

• Implacable

When you would be Taken Out, spend Momentum. This allows you to continue fighting for your Monster dots in Turns, after which you fall into a deep sleep until the end of the scene. When you wake, increase the Complication value of your Monstrous Urge by 2 until you fail to buy it off.

• Keeper of Taboos

Once per session, you may get away with a social taboo that would otherwise cause problems or consequences. This cannot be anything violent, such as assaulting or killing someone but should otherwise be subversive. This might be insulting a person in power or violating oppressive cultural taboos. A character may ignore any Complication or Condition that would inflict social consequences. If none are present, the character may instead walk away from a scene and ignore any narrative consequences, such as a response from authorities, or enemy characters seeking vengeance or repayment. If this would cause a shift in Attitude, the shift cannot go below 0. If the character’s Attitude is already negative, it does not change at all. If you have spoken truth to power through an act of violence or destruction, increase the Attitude of all friendly witnesses by 1, and increase the Bond of all present players’ characters by 1. Note that monsters afflict the comfortable and speak truth to power; this is not a Knack for getting away with harassment or making the other players uncomfortable.

• Nightmare Stalker

When you injure, intimidate, or frighten someone, you may mark them as your prey. If you do, roll your Knack Skill and bank the successes. You gain access to the following Stunts, which can only be used by spending these banked successes. If you declare another character to be your prey, you lose any previously banked successes.

• No Rest for the Wicked (2 successes): Your prey is unable to fall asleep naturally, inflicting the insomnia Condition, which prevents a character from sleeping and inflicts +1 Difficulty on complex mental action, or +2 if they haven’t slept in more than two days. This Condition resolves in 72 hours, or after eight hours of rest under the effects of pre- scription-grade narcotics.
• Under the Bed (4 successes): You appear near your prey the next time they enter a place of refuge and safety.

• No Close-ups, Please

Your visage is a nightmare — and like a nightmare, details quickly fade even when the fear remains. Characters suffer a +2 difficulty to remember or describe you after the end of the scene or to recognize you on sight. Trivial characters can’t do so at all unless you’ve deliberately threatened or frightened them. In that case, they remember your face vividly but are utterly incapable of describing it.

• Red of Claw and Fang

You gain a monstrous Natural weapon, like a stinger, horns, or spines. It has the Natural tag, and a number of additional tags equal to your Monster Calling. Attempts to conceal this feature have a +1 Difficulty, but you can spend Momentum to hide it, causing it to retract into your flesh; it may then be released as a reflexive action. You can take this Knack (Monster) times, creating a new Natural weapon each time.

• Run Riot

Increase the cost of buying the Critical stunt against you by 1, increasing to 2 when your Monster rating reaches 3. When succumbing to your Monstrous Urge, you don’t suffer the effects of any Injury Complications until you resolve your Urge..

• Seizing Jaws

You may make grapple attacks without needing to use your hands, instead ensnaring your target with another part of your body. It might be your wicked maw or sticky tongue, or writhing hair — whatever it is, your hands remain free, adding your Monster dots in Enhancement to apply to grapple and other combat Stunts while maintaining a hold on your target.

• Stinging Stink (Manitou-Specific)

Like Aniwye, your presence is a nasal assault. As an action, you may spread a cloud of noxious musk that inflicts the Noxious Condition on everyone within Short range. This takes hours of vigorous scrubbing to remove and inflicts a +2 Complication on social influence rolls to avoid causing offense or Stealth rolls to avoid leaving an obvious trail for the remainder of the scene.

• Taste for Blood

The first time that you injure or are injured by an enemy in a scene, roll your Knack Skill and bank the successes. You gain access to the following Stunts for the rest of the scene, and may spend banked successes to activate them after a successful attack.

• Frenzy (2 successes): You may inflict an additional injury condition. You cannot stack this with the Critical Hit Stunt. Until the end of your next turn, the Difficulty to hit you is reduced by one. This Stunt can only be bought once per fight.
• Trouble the Wound (2 successes): Until the end of their next turn, the target increases their Difficulty penalty from Injury conditions by two, to a maximum of five. Toxic Blood: Your blood (and saliva) changes to suit your whims, allowing you to transform it into either poison or medicine. You gain a library of mundane compounds equal to your Monster dots, and may reflexively shift the effects of your blood between them. Most are treated as inflicting the Poisoned Condition (Scion: Origin, p. 125) but can include choices like soporifics, paralytics, or even relatively benign substances like aspirin.

• Tell-Tale Heart

When using the Q&A procedural Stunt, you may always ask an additional question pertaining to the target’s fears, insecurities, or vulnerabilities. When leveraging these against the target, gain +2 Enhancement.

• The Face of Fear

Spend Momentum to intuit one of a character’s primal fears — for example, spiders or drowning. You may transform your appearance to become a monstrous embodiment of that fear, granting you +1 Enhancement for terrifying others in general and +3 against the specific target. Your first use of this Knack in a scene is free, as are uses against trivial characters.

• The Monster Within

By purchasing this Knack you gain a monstrous form. To shift into your monster form, spend Momentum. This may be activated for free if you have succumbed to your Monstrous Urge. You transform into a terrible beast, a reflection of your true self. All unarmed attacks gain the Natural Tag if they don’t have it already and two more Tags of your choosing. If you know Red of Claw and Fang, your natural weapon appears in this form as well, and gains +2 Enhancement to attacks made with it. While in this form, you cannot be perceived as anything other than a threat. Attempts to seek peaceful or thoughtful resolution to conflict have their Difficulty increased by your Monster rating. Additionally, you gain a unique combat-focused Stunt specific to your Monster form, which is created by you and the Storyguide at the time of purchase.

• Unearthly Appetite

You are capable of safely eating anything, so long as it fits in your mouth, and gain nutritional value from it. If you consume something that has been intentionally poisoned, spend Momentum to negate any harmful effects. This cost is waved while under the effects of your Monstrous Urge.

• Won’t Go Down

You gain an additional Bruised Injury level and reduce the penalty of Maimed Injuries to +3. If you have three or more Monster dots, gain another additional Bruised level.

Monster Immortal

•• Behind the Veil

Once per session you can spend 1 Momentum to prevent witnesses from connecting you to actions you performed under your Monstrous Urge. Witnesses fully remember the event; they just don’t remember you being the culprit. They might remember another monster doing the deed, attribute your actions to someone else, or just be unable to recall who or what was the source of the incident. Characters of equal or higher Tier resist with Legend + Composure vs. your Legend + Charisma.

•• Bestial Gifts

You may gift your monstrous nature to the worthy and the unwilling alike. One target you touch immediately succumbs to your Monstrous Urge and takes on aspects of your inhuman form, gaining your Monster rating in Enhancement to actions that would benefit from your form. The transformation ends when they resolve the Monstrous Urge condition. Automatically affect willing or lower Tier characters; succeed on an opposed Knack roll to affect unwilling high-tier targets

•• Birth by Blood

Spend Momentum and suffer a +2 Injury condition to use your flesh and blood to create a monstrous creature. This creature must be something you are familiar with and have a rating equal to or less than your Monster dots. Your spawn serves you loyally but not sacrificially; if pressed to the verge of death, it will flee and return when healed. It lasts as long as the Injury Condition that created it, but once that has healed, it will waste away over the course of a few hours unless bought with experience, granting it true, independent life.

•• Compelling and Repulsive

Your appearance inspires fear and disgust yet onlookers cannot tear their gazes away. You gain the following Stunt which applies to social actions involving face to face interaction and close combat attacks.

• Reviled (2s): The target gains the Complication “Revulsion” at a rating equal to your Monster Calling. This Complication applies to any other social action or attack roll the target makes that does not target you. If not bought off, the character’s next action suffers a+2 Difficulty as they cannot shake the horrifying, compelling memory of you.

•• Drawn to Virulence

Spend Momentum and instantly appear next to any target you can perceive that is suffering from a Poison or Disease Condition. Any attack or Encourage Behavior roll you make immediately following this movement receives your Monster dots in Enhancement.

•• Evolving Threat

At the start of your turn, you gain the Resistant armor tag against a type of damage you received last turn or add a 1 point tag to one of your Natural weapons. You may bank unspent points over multiple turns to purchase more expensive tags. You may gain a total of new tags equal to your Monster rating. At the end of the scene, they slough off, and your form returns to normal.

•• It Was Me All Along

Once per scene, you can reflexively have a trivial character reveal that they were you all along, ripping off their form to reveal your own underneath. The Storyguide can veto this declaration if it is literally impossible for you to be there — such as a sanctuary anathema to your kind, or a prison with no entrance or exit.

•• Lifeblood Buffet

You gain a close combat attack with the Natural, Melee, Lethal, and Concealable tags, such as retractable fangs, extending talons, or a touch that absorbs body heat. When you purchase the Inflict Damage Stunt with it, you may spend Momentum to heal a Bruised or Injured Condition; if you also purchase the Critical Stunt, you can heal a Maimed condition instead. Feeding on trivial characters can only heal Bruised Conditions.

•• Monsters in the Mirror

Your monstrosity is infectious, allowing you to draw forth the worst instincts in others. Spend Momentum to inflict the Monstrous Urges Condition (Scion Player’s Guide: Saints & Monsters, p. 93 or Titanomachy, p. 153) on your target; if they fail to buy off the condition, the character’s actions risk inflicting collateral damage or offending and frightening others around them. Characters of your Tier and higher can resist with a Clash of Wills.

•• Predator’s Instincts

When you give in to your animalistic urges on an epic Scale (hunting dragons as prey, devouring a paramilitary force, or rampaging through the Metropolitan Museum of Art), imbue, rather than spend, a point of Legend to invoke your Legendary Title as a Feat of Scale.

•• Ravenous Force

Your drive to consume is a legendary hazard. You may reflexively damage and consume up to five points of cover within close range without consuming your action on each turn; if you destroy a piece of cover in this way, you gain +1 Defense for the rest of the round. In Divine Rule, if you attempt to destroy a Realm Condition or similar permanent feature, gain an additional point of effect.

•• Sacrificial Spawn (Tengri-Specific)

As Atai Ulaan’s body spawned monsters from every part, so too may a Tengri Titan. You may harmlessly remove a body part — an eye, limb, or so on — and transform it into a titanspawn for the rest of the scene. It is created as a Creature with a rating equal to (2 + the Complication inflicted by the loss of the part, chosen by you to a maximum Complication of 3).`

•• Skulking Horror

While you are concealed, and no other character knows your exact location, you can move to another location you can see within Long range without crossing the intervening space. Your first use of this Knack in a scene is free.

•• Sloughing Form

When you would be Taken Out, spend Momentum. Instead, you leave behind a steaming, empty meat shell and reappear within Close Range of where you were Taken Out, glistening and fresh. Recover your Monster dots of Injuries. This may only be used once per session unless reset by succumbing to your Monstrous Urge.

•• Source of Doom

Hordes respond to your howls and creeping legions seethe forth at your command. When you spread your monstrous urge on an epic scale, imbue rather than spend to invoke your Legendary Title as a Feat of Scale.

•• Strange Skins

You can shapeshift into a number of alternative forms. These forms are built as creatures, none of which can have a rating higher than your Monster dots, and you may have up to twice your Monster dots in forms overall. When in an alternate form, you can use their primary dice pool instead of your own. You suffer +2 Complications when your animal form interferes with your actions. Changing your shape is a simple action, or reflexive if you spend Momentum. You may purchase this Knack up to (Legend) times, each time adding a number of dots to your form library equal to your Monster rating. These repurchases do not take up additional Knack slots.

•• Terrifying Roar

You unleash a blood-curdling roar that sends even the bravest into retreat. Spend Momentum and roll your Knack Skill. With any successes, characters out to long range suffer a +2 Complication. Trivial characters flee automatically, while characters of lesser Tier add your Monster dots to the Complication. If not bought off, affected targets must flee the scene.

•• Titanic Stature

When you are under the Monstrous Urges condition, you grow to more than twice your normal size and take on a fearsome mien with throbbing veins and corded sinew. Your size provides you +1 size Scale, and you can spend Momentum to apply the Shockwave tag to any attack that leverages your giant form.

•• Zenith of Creatures

Spend Momentum; your form briefly turns massive and dangerous, causing you to gain +1 size Scale for the rest of the turn, and any attacks you make benefit from the Reach tag. If you’re in your Monstrous Urge Condition, you may choose to stay enlarged for the rest of the scene instead. In Divine Rule play, gain an additional point of effect when creating a Realm Condition with the Personal Aura Stunt if it includes shifting into a monstrous form.

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