Fortitude
All vampires possess a preternatural constitution that makes most normal damage inconsequential. Fortitude bestows a
resilience and vigor far beyond even normal vampiric toughness. Kindred with this power ignore the mightiest punches and
barely feel hails of bullets. This Discipline also helps protect against sources of damage even vampires fear, such as
sunlight, fire and terminal falls.
Gangrel, Ravnos and Ventrue possess this potent ability. Gangrel enjoy the benefit of Fortitude as a matter of course, but
Ravnos and especially Ventrue delight in the power's psychological effects. It's not unusual for a Ventrue to take a "fatal"
blow, giving his opponent just enough time to register the vampire's smile before the Ventrue finishes off the shocked
victim.
System: A character's rating in Fortitude adds to his Stamina for the purposes of soaking normal damage (bashing and
lethal). A character with this Discipline may also use his dots in Fortitude to soak aggravated damage (Kindred cannot
normally soak things like vampire bites, werewolf claws, magical effects, fire, sunlight or massive physical trauma). So a
vampire with Fortitude 3 has three dice to soak aggravated damage.

 

OOOOO O Personal Armor
Nobody likes to get hit (or shot, or stabbed for that matter), not even Cainites. The easiest way 
to ensure that one is not hit (or shot, or stabbed) repeatedly is to take the weapon with which one 
is assaulted away from one's attacker and break it. That's where Personal Armor comes in. This 
application of Fortitude, derived from one popular in the 12th century, causes anything that strikes 
a Kindred who employs Personal Armor to shatter on impact.

System: With the expenditure of two blood points, a vampire can add preternatural hardness to his 
flesh. Every time an attack is made on the Kindred using Personal Armor (one which he does not dodge), 
his player rolls Fortitude (difficulty 8). If the roll grants more successes than the attacker rolled,
 then the weapon used to make the attack shatters against the vampire's flesh. (Fetishes, klaives, 
"magical" swords and so on may be resistant to this effect, at Storyteller discretion.) The vampire 
still takes normal damage if the attack is successful, even if the weapon shatters in the process; 
this damage may still be soaked. If the attack roll botches, any normal weapon automatically shatters. 
A hand-to-hand attack causes the attacker equal damage to that suffered by the defender when Personal 
Armor comes into play. On a miss, the attacker takes one level of bashing damage.

The effects of this power last for the duration of the scene.

OOOOO O Sensory Shield (Fortitude level 6)
 A Gangrel using this power supernaturally hardens his senses against injurious input. 
The vampire cannot be blinded by spotlights or sudden burst of radiance, or deafened by 
explosions or gunfire; even his capacity to withstand pain is improved. His eyes, ears, nose, 
and open wounds glow with an eerie light while this power is active.
SYSTEM: Spending two blood points activates this power for a scene. Mundane sources of 
overwheling sensory input, such as searchlights, muzzle flash or pepper spray have no effect, 
even if sensory-enhancing powers like Heightened Senses are in use. The effects of supernatural 
sensory attacks or unusual circumstances (like being at ground zero for a massive explosion) 
May be soaked w ith teh vampire's Fortitude dice, with each success reducing the effect or 
duration of the sensory damage, or negating it all together. In addition, the Gangrel's wound 
penalties are reduced by two; he feels no pain whatsoever until he  reaches the Crippled level, 
when he runs into only a three-dice penalty. At the end of the scene, wound penalties for all 
accumlated damage are applied as normal.
 The phosphorescent glow streaming from the vampire's orifices and wounds is nearly impossible 
to hide, and inflicts a two-dice penalty on social interaction with mortals (other than 
intimidation).

OOOOO OO Resilient Mind (fortitude level 7)
 At this level of accomplishment, the Gangrel extends her preternatural resistance to the very 
depth of her personality. Upon acquireing this power, the vampire may suddenly shed centuries 
of paranoia, tics, quirks and other perturbations that have accumulated in the cobwebby 
recesses of her brain. Additionally, it becomes more difficult to use mental Disciplines 
against the vampire. Unfortunately, this mental stability comes at a cost to the Gangrel; upon 
learning this power; the vampire must acquire  physical animal flaws exclusively.
SYSTEM: Upon learning this power, the Gangrel makes a willpower roll (diff. 7). For each 
success, the vampire  may choose to eliminate one derangement or two animal behavior flaws 
(any Social Attribute points lost due in whole or part to these flaws remain lost). This 
effect of the power occurs only once and is immediate.
 The vampire permanently gains three extra dice to resist the effects of any mind-altering 
Disciplins or magic. This bonus does not apply to PResence or other Disicplines that affect 
the emotions.
 Finally, if the vampire gains a derangement for any reason after learning this power, the 
player may immediately make a willpower roll (diff. 6). If she achieves three successes, the 
derangement persists through the night and the following day, but is sloughed off as the 
vampire rises with the sunset. Willpower may  not be spent on this roll.

 

OOOOO OO Curse the Laurel (Fortitude level 7)
  This fearsom power allows the kindred to overcome one of the traditional banes of the undead: 
the feared stake. With this matery of Fortitude, the Ventrue may subsume a stake that perces 
her heart, reshaping that dead organ slowly and insulating it from the offending wood. Once a 
given stake has been turned away with this power, it remains within the Kindred's body, and it 
may even be visible beneath layers of clothing.
SYSTEM: The player spend a permanent Willpower point and rolls Stamina + Survival (diff. 9). 
The number of successes indicates the length of time that elapses before the Kindred's body 
rejects the stake, allowing her to rise from immobilization.
  Each use of this power affects only one stake. If the Kindred suffers the same fate again, 
she may make a new attempt if the player chooses to spend the Willpower again. If the roll to 
use the power is a botch, the body does not expel the stake, and no further attempt may be made 
against that particular stake.
one success     One year
Two successes   six months
three successes one month
four successes  one week
five successes  one night
  After the stake has been turned away from the heart, it remains in the Kindred's body, 
overgrown by dead flesh and probably protruding at an unsettling angle. The Kindred may cut the 
stake out at any time she wishes thereafter, suffering two health levels of aggravated damage 
in the proccess.

 

00000 00 Shared Strength
It's one thing to laugh off bullets, rather another to watch the ricochets mow down everyone around you.
 Many Kindred have wished, at one time or another, that they could lend their monstrous vitality to 
those around them. Those few vampires who have mastered Shared Strength can - if only for a little while.

System: Shared Strength transfers a portion of a vampire's Fortitude (one dot for every point of blood 
the vampire spends) to another being. Activating the power requires a Stamina + Survival roll 
(difficulty 8, increased to 9 if the target is not a normal mortal), and the expenditure of a point of 
Willpower. Furthermore, the vampire must mark his target by pressing a drop of his blood onto the 
target's forehead. This stain remains visible as long as the power is in effect, which is in turn 
determined by the initial roll.

No. Of Successes    Duration
    1        One turn
    2        One scene
    3        One hour
    4        One night
    5        One week
    6        One month
    7        One year

The target of this power need not be willing to accept the benefit to receive it. Particularly sadistic 
Kindred have come up with any number of ways in which a target's "devil's mark" and supernatural 
endurance can be used to land him in a great deal of trouble.

A vampire can never bestow more levels of Fortitude than he himself possesses on another.

OOOOO OOO Adamantine
Adamantine functions as a more potent version of Personal Armor.

System: This power mimics the effects of Personal Armor, save that the vampire who uses it takes no 
damage from attacks that shatter on her skin.

King of the Mountain (fortitude level 8)
 The most formidable opponents are not only hard to hurt, they are also hard to even touch. 
This power combines some of the effects of the Peronal Armor power with an aura of resistance 
that impedes attackers, making it trivially easy for the Gangrel to block the incoming attacks 
of numberous opponents.
SYSTEM: The Gangrel spends three blood points to activate this power, which lasts for a scene. 
The vampire does not gain the benefits of this power when he atively attacks. Instead, the 
vampire must block or dodge all incoming attacks, and may use his full dice pool against each 
attack. Every time an attack is made with a weapon against the Gangrel, his player rolls 
Fortitude (diff. 6) in addation to the dexterity + brawl roll to block. If the Fortitude roll 
grants more successes than the attacker rolled, the weapon used in the attack shatters on 
contact with the vampire (mystically imbued weapons may be resistant to this effect at the 
Storyteller's discretion). If the roll to block succeeds, the vampire suffers no damage from 
the attack (if the block fails, the vampire may soak the damage normally, using fortitude).
 Hand-to-hand attacks may also be blocked. Successful hand-to-hand attacks inflict the 
attacker's damage on both the attacker and the vampire using this power. Blocked hand-to-hand 
attacks inflict the attacker's damage only on herself. In both cases, the damage may be soaked 
normally. Additionally, the defending vampire does not suffer the standard multiple-attacker 
penalty, no matter how many assailants he faces.