Confer with the Blade
Discipline Power · Vampire · Level 1
Although few Assamites claim to have actually spoken to a weapon’s soul, blacksmiths and warriors alike have ascribed spiritual qualities to hand-forged blades for centuries. Practitioners of Auspex are familiar with the manner in which inanimate objects can bear impressions of their own history. Confer with the Blade allows a weapon’s wielder to delve into the events that have occurred around his weapon. Some practitioners of this power claim this makes the weapon feel more “comfortable” in their hands, while others speak of the sense of history that an ancient blade bears. The actual impressions only take an instant to gain, though many prefer to spend much longer in contemplation if time permits.
System: The number of successes determines the amount of information the sorcerer gains regarding the blade’s history and its present state, as well as all information yielded by a lesser number of successes. With three or more successes, the sorcerer may lower the difficulty on his next attempt to apply a blood-magic ritual to the weapon by one.
| Successes | Result |
|---|---|
| One success | Physical information only: precise length and weight (to the micrometer and milligram), chemical composition (assuming the character understands metallurgy), number of damage dice and type of damage (lethal or aggravated). |
| Two successes | Historical overview: when and where the blade was forged, the name and face of its smith, brief glimpses of significant events in its existence. |
| Three successes | Sorcerous understanding: the type and relative level of power of any enchantments or supernatural enhancements that the blade possesses as well as the name and face of the individual who laid them. |
| Four successes | Subliminal synthesis: comprehensive knowledge of the sword’s history. For the next seven nights, the character recognizes the taste of any blood that has ever stained the blade if she tastes it herself. |
| Five successes | Total communion: The sword and the wielder become linked at a level deeper than the physical and more enduring than the immediate. The Storyteller determines what information the sword holds for the character, but it may include any event in the blade’s history or any aspect of its present existence and condition. |
Part of Awakening of the Steel