Temporis

The True Brujah bloodline claims a peculiar Discipline that allows them some control over the flow of time. Masters of Temporis often grow ever more detached from the passage of ages. This, combined with the natural tendency for Sages to grow emotionally and spiritually distant, makes True Brujah elders exceptionally dangerous. They know that all life is finite, and so they feel no compunction about ending it.

## **Powers**

### **• Hourglass of the Mind**

Masters of Temporis value patience and clarity. Time is too complex and dangerous to manipulate incautiously or on a whim. Thus, the first power of Temporis focuses entirely on perception and serves as a permanent alteration of a vampire’s senses.

System: Once purchased, this Discipline gives a vampire a perfect sense of time. The vampire knows events to the nearest second or better. Moreover, the Cainite knows whenever the flow of time is mystically disturbed by use of Celerity, greater levels of Temporis, mortal wizardry, or stranger things. Sensing disturbances is instinctive and reflexive, though it requires a successful Perception + Awareness roll (difficulty 6 for most phenomena, as modified by the Storyteller for distance and intensity).

### **•• Recurring Contemplation**

A vampire with this power may trap a target’s mind into reviewing a set of events over and over until interrupted. This power is extremely subtle and ill-suited to combat or other situations rich in sensory stimuli. However, a cunning vampire can trick a sentry into reliving the tedium of his uneventful watch even as the Cainite draws close enough to strike or slip past. Other uses include the maddening infliction of déjà vu to induce paranoia or make a victim question her senses and her sanity.

System: The vampire concentrates on a single victim in his line of sight. The player rolls Manipulation + Occult (difficulty equal to the victim’s current Willpower). With any successes, the victim falls into a light trance and relives the most recent experiences that preceded her fugue. Alternately, the vampire may evoke another set of specific memories and circumstances from the victim’s past, provided that he has some means of telepathically drawing them forth. The recurring events must be relatively benign, insofar as nothing noteworthy happens or nothing happens that would demand the victim’s immediate action. Thus, in the example of the sentry, the vampire could entrance him and walk past unobserved, but not if the sentry spotted him before invoking the power. Ordinarily, the fugue lasts one minute per success. If the vampire’s player spends a blood point to fuel this power, determine the trance’s duration according to the following chart:

Successes Duration

1 success one minute

2 successes 10 minutes

3 successes one hour

4 successes six hours

5+ successes one day

Entranced victims are oblivious to their surroundings and the actual flow of time around them. However, the fugue ends immediately if the victim suffers any damage or experiences a sudden jolt to her senses, such as a thunderclap or even a gentle nudge. Normal conversation does not break the trance, although shouting does.

### **••• Leaden Moment**

With this power, a vampire may begin to alter the flow of time itself rather than mere perception of events. The vampire gestures and slows the desired object almost to a dead stop. This power can slow incoming bullets to the pace of drifting clouds, or cause an enemy warrior to see the battlefield quicken to a blur of dizzying carnage even as his every motion slows to a crawl.

System: The player spends one blood point and rolls Intelligence + Occult. The difficulty depends on the size and nature of the target: a single thrown brick is only difficulty 4, while a crazed ghoul has a difficulty of 9. Targets larger than an adult human cannot be affected with Leaden Moment. It is possible to affect small, closely grouped inanimate objects of the same nature as a single object, though this increases the difficulty by two or more at the Storyteller’s discretion (a hail of bullets might be difficulty 9). This power may be activated reflexively as a defensive action against projectiles, but otherwise requires a full action on the vampire’s initiative. Though failure carries no special penalty apart from wasting blood, a botch means the vampire mistakenly slows himself rather than the target, counting every 1 as a success for that purpose. If the vampire succeeds, the object slows to one-half its true speed. Every two successes beyond the first reduce this speed by one additional factor, so three successes slows the target to one third its speed, five successes yields quarter speed, etc. The actual mechanics of such slowing depend on the situation. For projectiles, multiply any successes to hit and final damage by the speed factor, rounded down. Similarly apply the speed modifier to the successes of other actions involving Dexterity, Wits, or Strength for slowed characters. Characters with Celerity may spend one blood point to negate one factor of speed reduction at the expense of the usual extra action provided – for example, one blood point cancels a reduction to one half speed, two blood points cancel one third, etc. Leaden Moment lasts one turn for every two successes rolled, rounded up.

### **•••• Patience of the Norns**

The vampire can now suspend an inanimate object in time, keeping it frozen in perfect stasis as time passes at normal speed around it. As with lesser Temporis powers, this stasis has both combat and non-combat applications. True Brujah warriors may halt bullets outright rather than merely slowing their approach or casually sidestep a collapsing building. Higher-level variations on this power preserve precious scrolls and artifacts without risk of mold or decay. If any solid object or nontrivial volume of liquid touches a frozen object that did not touch it at the moment of suspension, the item re-enters time with the same properties and velocity as when it stopped. Thus, touching a suspended object with anything more substantial than a raindrop releases it exactly as it was before it stopped.

System: The player spends two blood points and rolls Intelligence + Occult (difficulty 6). The vampire must be able to perceive the object that he’s suspending, so the player may need to make a Perception + Alertness roll at a difficulty determined by the Storyteller in order to freeze fast-moving objects. If an object exceeds the speed of mortal perception, superhuman perception such as Auspex is required in order to see and stop it (as such, bullets can be stopped with this power, but only if the vampire has at least a dot of Auspex). Objects frozen by this power remain halted according to the number of successes rolled:

Successes Duration

1 success one turn

2 successes one minute

3 successes 10 minutes

4 successes one hour

5 successes one day

6+ successes one week per success over 5

Suspended objects retain all energy in their suspension, releasing none to the outside universe. A suspended knife has no kinetic energy as far as the rest of the world is concerned and hangs suspended in mid-air until the power is interrupted or the duration expires.

Suspended alchemical or chemical processes also halt, including fire. However, any physical contact more substantial than a falling raindrop breaks the suspension.

### **••••• Clotho’s Gift**

With this power, a vampire momentarily accelerates time through himself. In this brief instant, he moves with the preternatural speed of Celerity. Unlike that Discipline, however, the time dilation of Clotho’s Gift permits any type of action. A vampire may still move or strike faster than the eye can see, but also think, plan, and even invoke other Disciplines that require full concentration. Only the last presents a danger, as it overtaxes the vampire’s unliving stasis.

System: The player spends three blood points and rolls Intelligence + Occult (difficulty 7). For a number of turns equal to half the vampire’s Temporis rating, rounded up, the character may take a number of extra actions at her full dice pool equal to the number of successes rolled. These actions follow the timing rules associated with Celerity, but may be used to take any action. A vampire may use the actions granted by Clotho’s Gift to activate Disciplines multiple times, even Disciplines that cannot be used more than once in a turn (such as Dominate or Thaumaturgy). However, for every action spent activating a Discipline, the vampire suffers one level of unsoakable lethal damage.

Only one important exception exists: Any attempt to stack extra actions through Celerity, subsequent applications of Clotho’s Gift or other powers results in immediate Final Death, as the vampire collapses into ash as though burned by the sun.

### **••••• • Insight**

Insight allows the Brujah to step forward in time a little and see how certain actions are going to play out. This allows them to return to the present and use this information to perform their next action with greater skill and ability. As they return a moment before they set off, the only evidence of this power is a shimmering around the character as they return.

System: The character spends a Willpower point and makes a Wits + Alertness roll (difficulty 8) to see how much they can remember and understand of what they saw. Each success they make grants them an additional die to their dice pool for their next action.

### **••••• • Kiss of Lachesis**

True Brujah with this power gain limited mastery over the physical age of objects and individuals. It is a trivial matter to accelerate time in a compressed rush, aging a target decades or even centuries in the blink of an eye. It is far more difficult to absorb and unweave entropy, lessening time’s hold. This power does not reverse history in any way; it merely reverses or accelerates the effects of time in terms of wear and tear. Moreover, a target cannot regress to an earlier or incomplete state of being. For inanimate objects, this is the point at which they were assembled. For living beings, it is either adult maturity or the time of birth (or its equivalent). For the undead and other corpses, it is the moment of death.

System: In order for the vampire to age a target, the player spends two blood points and rolls Manipulation + Occult. The difficulty equals the target’s true physical age in decades or effective physical age in the case of target’s that have aged unnaturally, such as by means of this power. This difficulty cannot rise higher than 10 or drop below 4. The vampire touches the target and concentrates for a turn. The Cainite may age the target a maximum number of years as determined by the following table, although his player may choose to apply a lesser effect. The Storyteller remains the final arbiter of time’s effect on an object, but living beings aged past their natural lifespan quickly perish.

Successes Elapsed Time

1 success up to one year

2 successes up to five years

3 successes up to 10 years

4 successes up to 50 years

5 successes up to 100 years

6+ successes up to one century per success over 5

Removing the effects of time requires greater effort, increasing the difficulty of the activation roll by one. In addition, the vampire suffers one level of unsoakable lethal damage for every success her player chooses to apply. As noted, objects cannot return to an earlier or incomplete state. A silver coin may lose its tarnish and seem newly minted, but it will not revert to an unformed block of metal. Likewise, while an adult may revert to the cusp of his adulthood or a child to a newborn, neither could regress to a prenatal state. Also, this power only accounts for damage and wear due to time. A child amputee reverted to a baby will not regenerate her missing arm, nor will a broken sword become anything but finely crafted shards. In either application, this power does not change a subject’s mental or mystical properties. Sentient beings retain all memories and any derangements. A vampire regressed to the point of death remains a vampire, not an inanimate corpse — and the regressed Cainite still remembers all Disciplines and keeps any changes in Generation due to diablerie. However, a vampire aged far enough pales considerably or loses any signs of diablerie from his aura.

### **••••• •• Cheat the Fates**

Where a vampire with Clotho’s Gift may accelerate with respect to the world, a vampire with this power may step outside of time entirely. During this brief sojourn, the Cainite perceives the world frozen at a standstill. He can walk about at a leisurely pace to sidestep blows or retreat without being observed. He may even exert force, such as by striking a blow, though no damage is resolved until he re-enters time. However, this power wreaks terrible destruction on a vampire’s unliving body. Used incautiously, a vampire may saunter out of time, only to fall to ash when he returns.

System: The player spends one Willpower point and three blood points, and then rolls Wits + Occult (difficulty 7). This power may be activated reflexively as a defensive action; however, such hasty use reduces the maximum duration to a single turn. Failure does nothing apart from wasting effort and blood, while a botch inflicts one level of aggravated damage for every 1 rolled.

If successful, the vampire steps out of time for a number of turns equal to the successes rolled (outside of combat, a turn still only lasts three to five seconds for the purposes of this power). These turns occur for the vampire only while the rest of the world stands still. He may take any action or actions during this time, as many as desired, but he has no access to Disciplines — even innate or perpetual Disciplines such as Potence. The vampire must direct every aspect of Caine’s Curse toward holding back time. If the vampire attacks someone in this state, the target cannot dodge or parry.

Resolve the attack normally but do not apply damage. However, if the vampire suffers injury, such as by exposure to sunlight or walking through a frozen flame, apply this damage immediately.

The vampire may end his sojourn at any point or wait until the full duration of the power passes, at which point time resumes. Before anything else happens, including resolution of damage inflicted by the vampire, roll one die for every turn the vampire moved out of time. The difficulty is equal to the vampire’s Temporis rating. For every success, the Cainite suffers one level of unsoakable aggravated damage. Apply this damage concurrently with damage suffered by halted victims and continue play on the same turn and initiative the vampire stepped out of time.

### **••••• ••• Clio’s Kiss**

One of the most subtle manifestations of Temporis’ higher levels, this power allows a vampire to reach into the past and summon events, objects, or even individuals. Clio’s Kiss, named for the muse of history, is the power to bypass the flow of time and bring something — or someone — forward to the present. Some True Brujah scholars use this to observe history as it truly occurred, while others look to the past for aid or to retrieve lost possessions. At least two coordinated attempts by the True Brujah to summon their Antediluvian progenitor have met with catastrophic failure. No one knows if a Sage capable of this power remains. The hope is that Clio’s Kiss faded from knowledge — the bloodline cannot afford a third attempt.

System: The player spends half of the character’s current blood pool, rounded up, and rolls Stamina + Occult (difficulty 8). This power automatically fails if the player spends fewer than five blood points. The number of successes determines the maximum amount of time through which the character may reach:

Successes Time

1 success 24 hours

2 successes one month

3 successes one year

4 successes 10 years

5+ successes one century per success over 4

When a vampire uses this power successfully, the scene she seeks to retrieve materializes around her, briefly supplanting the current environment. This change extends to a maximum volume of a ballroom or similarly proportioned outdoor space (at Storyteller’s discretion). The power affects everyone inside this area by granting them awareness of the summoned events, but the vampire is the only person who may choose to interact with the scene (though he may remain invisible and disembodied). All others must remain incorporeal observers until time reasserts itself and the scene fades. They may move about to change their vantage point, but can take no other action. If the vampire wants to remove an object or individual from the scene, bringing them forward to the present, the player must spend a dot of Willpower. Once this is done, the conjured scene fades away and present reality returns. Only the summoned object or person remains. This power can never alter the course of history in any significant manner. Should an object or person have a meaningful role yet to play at the time it is removed, the weight of time crashes upon the vampire and he vanishes in its current. Whether such folly results in destruction or propels the vampire far into the future remains unknown and likely unknowable. Likewise, any changes the vampire makes to a summoned scene unravel as soon as he departs. Like a play, time may be altered by the removal of extras, but the script stays the same — however cruel a fate, Carthage must be destroyed.

As always, the Storyteller remains the final judge of what this power can achieve and need not reveal all limitations until a vampire attempts a change. It is possible to summon a person from a point close to his death, assuming he perished without observers. Likewise, a manuscript destroyed when the Library of Alexandria burned can be called after it is last read.

Calling the very library from Alexandria would be impossible, not only for its size but also the necessity and significance of its ruins. Finally, the previous form of a currently existing object cannot be summoned, if only because its continued existence validates a role in history.

Storytellers need not consider every ramification of paradox, but this power has tremendous potential for abuse and should be adjudicated accordingly.

### **••••• ••• Rewind**

The True Brujah usually use this power to confirm historical events, but many find it useful to discover the secrets of their peers and their enemies. When this power is used, it appears as if time is moving backwards at the character’s command. But in truth the True Brujah is only seeing images of what has happened here before. The ability only works in the area the character is in, and cannot show anything happening through walls. Ghostly images of what occurred in the area can be seen as far as anyone can normally see. So they can look out of the window and see what happened outside, but not see past a wall, even if it wasn’t built until recently. Nothing is taken away, only added to. However, if you made a hole in wall you could see what was on the other side of it through the hole.

System: To activate this power the True Brujah needs to make a Stamina + Occult roll (difficulty 9) and spend a blood point. The result of the roll shows the maximum time they can rewind their view to.

Successes Result

1 success One week

2 successes One month

3 successes One year

4 successes One century

5 successes One millennia

Within this limit, they can look at any time they like, but they have to focus on a particular and specific time to go back to. If they don’t know when they are looking for they will have to watch the images as they flash past and make a Wits + Alertness roll. The difficulty is equal to 5 + the amount of successes. It takes an hour to review every ten years, and after an hour, the character must spend another blood point to maintain the power. To conserve blood when looking into the deep past, the True Brujah might shift their view back 50 years, for instance, before starting to make Wits + Awareness rolls as they know what they want to see happened 50-100 years ago. In this way, visions of the ancient past might take several attempts before the True Brujah finds the right area of time to focus on.

### **••••• ••• Temporal Understanding**

With this power, the True Brujah steps further ahead in time to follow the actions and consequences for a lot longer. Thus, when he returns to the present, he has a greater understanding of how to best resolve his actions.

System: This ability works in a similar way to Insight (above). The character spends a Willpower point and makes a Wits + Alertness roll (difficulty 8) to see how well they understand what they saw in the future. Each success grants them 1 temporary Willpower point. These points can be used in the same way as (and in conjunction with) Willpower points, except more than one can be spent on any roll. These points are gone once used, and also vanish at the end of the scene.

### **••••• •••• Tangle Atropos’ Hand**

This manifestation of Temporis is at once the most flagrant and subtle twist of time — the power of second chances. The existence of such power is only a theory and a fearfully whispered rumor, for who can ever know when or how time itself unraveled and changed?

System: The player spends a dot of Willpower and three blood points and rolls Wits + Occult (difficulty 8). Every additional point of permanent Willpower spent beyond the first adds one automatic success to the roll. Use of this power is reflexive and may be done at any moment, even on a turn in which the vampire has used other Disciplines. If successful, the Cainite’s mind flashes back to his earlier self with full memory of the events that transpired and now only might transpire.

This rewind encompasses one turn for every success rolled, and inflicts an equal number of levels of unsoakable aggravated damage. Assuming the vampire does nothing, every event plays out exactly as before. Once the vampire takes a new action of any sort, time shifts to encompass a new future and fate is no longer fixed.