The Imbued all have the potential to be mighty warriors, some of their legends say this is why they were created -- to fight. Regardless of the truth of this legend, any of the Imbued who choses to take up serious study of the arts of war gains the same inhuman competance as they do with study in any other area.
The five Battle Arts are named after five aspects, and embody the principles of that aspect as applied to war. Rather than being tied to a single weapon, the Arts are a more all encompassing style that the true master can apply to any weapon. Scale is also not an issue to a practitioner of the Arts and she may direct tank platoons with the same lethal grace she she applies with her sword.
Gaining the first dot in an Art lets you apply you skill through your body for unarmed attacks, and through one weapon of your choice. Each additional dot gets you competance in an additional weapon. The current thinking is that 'weapons' will be fairly broad categories, 'Swords' for example rather than 'Straight Swords'. You can cross combo across the Arts if you can use your current weapon with both arts.
Each of the five abilities has a different defence, and a character may abort to defence with the first action at full pool, the second at -1 and so on. If the Imbued wishes to mix defences, each additional type of defence means that the pool steps down by an additional -1. For example if a Glass stylist wishes to dodge and counter, the dodge would be at -0 dice, the counter at -2. If the next action were a dodge it would be at -4 dice, but if it were a parry (a 3rd defensive action) then it would be at -5 dice.
Finally, the universe resonates with beauty and elegance in combat, as it does with all things and so each Imbued recieves her Apperance in motes each turn as the universe repays them for their grace.
Where a defensive addon is specified (like 'Redirect to attacker') then this is a reflexive charm that modifies an existing action, rather than generating an action all on it's own.
Blood is flexible and fluid.
Blood defends by redirection. A Redirection works in a similar manner to the ability granted by the Exalted Dragon Blooded charm Safety Amongst Enemies. The defender rolls Manipulation+Blood against a difficulty of the attackers combat ability. If she succeeds, the attack may be redirected to someone within her Essence in yards who is not the attacker. If there is no-one to redirect the attack too, the Redirection fails.
Glass is transparent and sharp
Glass defends via cutting the attacker. This ability is a Counter. A Counter is resolved like a normal attack, but the damage from the Counter and the incoming attack is applied simultaneously.
Star is bright and shining
Star defends by blinding the attacker. The Star may Blind attacker as a standard defensive action, and this raises the diffculty to hit him by half dicepool he has, rounded up. The dicepool for Blinding is the character's Charisma+Star
Steel is solid and dependable
Steel defends via parrying the blow. This is resolved as a normal Parry. The pool for a parry is Wits+Steel.
Void is strange and mysterious
Void defends with its cold. This is resolved as a Drain. Draining pulls dice from the attack, one dice for every dice in the Draining pool, equal to the characters Perception+Void. An attack reduced to 0 dice fails.
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