Drowning Stuggles
Back in the bad old days, when the Cult of the Drowned Girl
used to live up to their name in order to cement the bond between Vallard and
the River, the priestesses got a lot of practise at dealing with recalcitrant offerants.
Those skills were refined into a set of exercises taught to junior priestesses
and preserved as a health regimen even as the archaic ceremonies that got them
their name died out.
Since Enigma instituted her back-to-basics revivalist coup,
she and her acolytes have been refining the exercises involved with a view to
bringing them back into regular use.
These arts have also been used in Vallard’s underground pool
fighting scene where young women wrestle to the submission in thigh-deep pools
of water for the entertainment of gamblers. Any speculation that Enigma might
have any experience with or familiarity with such entertainments is merely the
basest scurrilous rumour and should be discounted by all right thinking people.
Waves round the knees (1 point)
The priestess doesn’t lose a dice from her pools for remaining standing
while attempting to pin an opponent.
Fighting the current (2 points)
Being familiar with the right ways to put pressure on a limb or joint means
that someone who knows what they are doing can steer a pinned person around with
a surprising degree of ease.
This means that a priestess can still parry while pinning an opponent, by
using the opponent as a shield. If the attacker desires they can choose instead
to inflict damage on the pinned opponent as if the unlucky victim had been hit
with a width 2 attack.
Riding the eddies (3 points)
When a fighting style relies upon closing with a foe with your bare hands,
getting the first blow is critical more often than not. This technique involves
a quick dart forward rolling under an opponent’s guard to get the first strike,
and is practiced by training in a pool of water up to the waist and learning to
work against the resistance the water provides.
This technique is the most likely to have originated in the fighting pools
of Vallard rather than the ritual quays of the city.
In game terms the width of grapples is one higher for initiative purposes.
Twist like an eel (4 points)
Reaching the higher levels of this technique involves training against your
fellow priestesses and experiencing both victory and defeat in these bouts.
The priestess has spent enough time being grappled that she has learnt how
to escape; she gains a +2d bonus to
rolls to escape from a grapple, takes 2 less damage from strangle attempts and
can hold her breath underwater for twice as long.
Release the last breath (5 points)
There is a moment of calm that comes over the face of someone held beneath
the surface as they release their last breath. Their body has given up the
fight against the inevitable and their brain is about to begin the process of
easing the mind into darkness. An experienced priestess of the cult knows the
look, and prolong the moment for as long as she needs.
Mechanically this move requires the priestess to be pinning an opponent
while standing in water deep enough to reach her knees. The priestess can strangle her foe with the benefit of Fighting the Current, while
getting a +1 bonus to width for both result and speed. If her victim fails an escape roll this round
they cannot act in the following round as the rush of endorphins overwhelms
them in the moments before death.
In that round in which they are unable to act, the victim sees visions
conjured from the depths of their subconscious, often of profound personal meaning.
At the end of the second round the priestess can choose either to drown her
sacrifice, dedicating their life to the river, or to release them, in which
case all but of the hit boxes in each of their head and body is filled with
shock damage.
A victim so spared will have undergone a transformative experience. They
may either eliminate an appropriate Problem (yes to Misplaced Confidence, no to
Missing Hand) or allow a player to change one of the character’s Passions.
