Kindred scholars claim Oblivion pollutes everything it touches, with this power as a prime example. Through touch alone, a vampire might poison a mortal victim’s blood, imbuing them with a disease that wracks and ravages their body. Most dangerously of all, this disease runs the risk of being contagious, and might inflict the same harm to other mortals. Necromancers schooled in medicine have enough talent to make this power appear in the form of specific illnesses, sometimes including those that died out in decades or centuries past. Regardless of how it manifests, the symptoms will eventually disappear even without medical treatment, whether or not the victim survives.
Cost: One Rouse Check, Two Stains
Dice Pools: Intelligence + Oblivion vs. Stamina + Medicine or Fortitude
System: The user makes a Rouse Check and then rolls Intelligence + Oblivion while touching their victim. If the victim is weak (a baby, elderly, unwell, recovering from an illness, dying, or with 3 unmarked Health boxes or less), they are automatically infected. If the victim is healthy, they roll Stamina + Medicine (those with Fortitude may use it in place of Medicine), resisting the disease if they roll more successes than the vampire. This power cannot be used on vampires. Storytellers may decide spreading such a horrific disease warrants Stains. Victims of the disease take one Aggravated Health damage at the start of every scene following their infection. The victim suffers from the disease for a number of scenes equal to the user’s Oblivion rating. The sickness cannot be medically treated, as it is supernatural in origin, but it is healed through drinking vitae. If the player rolls a critical win when activating this power, they can choose to make the disease communicable via touch, with subsequent recipients suffering the disease for one turn fewer than the victim by whom they were infected. If the player rolls a total failure, the vampire’s own vitae convulses as if poisoned. They suffer three Aggravated Health damage as the infected blood pours out of them and must make a Rouse Check.
Duration: One turn to activate, variable length of condition