Obfuscate

Expend a simple action to conceal a weapon or other object you possess; the item must be no longer than three feet. Objects hidden with Conceal remain invisible as long as they are physically on your person. Conceal cannot be used to hide living or undead beings (or parts thereof). Conceal cannot be used to hide negative space; it can hide a chair, but not a doorway. If another individual is looking at an item when you Conceal it, the observer automatically sees through this use of Obfuscate. However, if the observer looks away for more than a few seconds, one turn in combat, she will lose track of the object and it will be concealed. Conceal can be used to maintain the invisibility of up to three objects at once. You may end an object's Conceal at any time. If you interact with a Concealed object, use it to attack someone, or otherwise draw attention to the object, it will become visible. If you place other characters in a position where they must logically acknowledge the object's existence, the Conceal will fail and the object will become visible to all. For example, no one will notice a shotgun hanging in a back-holster, but if you reach back and obviously draw that shotgun, it will appear. People might not notice you carrying a book, but if you are struggling under the weight of a handheld anvil, it will become visible to all.

Expend a standard action to become invisible, taking with you all inanimate items on your person. Unseen Presence cannot be used to make another character invisible, even if the character is unconscious or dead. While under the effects of Unseen Presence, small sounds, fragrances, or other minimal effects of your presence will be ignored by others. If you talk, touch someone, produce an outlandish odor, or take any action that requires a challenge, your Unseen Presence will immediately end. If another individual is looking at you when you activate Unseen Presence, the observer automatically sees through this use of Obfuscate. You will be invisible to anyone who was not looking at you when you used Unseen Presence, and if an observer looks away for more than a few seconds, one turn in combat, she will automatically lose track of you. If you interact with the environment, speak with another character, or draw attention to yourself, your Obfuscate will break and you will become visible. If you place other characters in a position where they must logically acknowledge your existence, the Unseen Presence will fail, and you will become visible to all. No one will notice an individual casually standing in a room, even if they must walk around her, as long as they can do so easily. However, if that invisible vampire blocks the exit to a room when others wish to leave, her invisibility will fail.

Expend a simple action to wrap yourself in the veil of Obfuscate, changing all sensory aspects of your appearance: visual, as well as audible and olfactory. You may use Mask of a Thousand Faces to appear as a generic-looking and generally forgettable person, or to specifically mimic the appearance of someone you've studied. Mask of a Thousand Faces can be used to mimic anything that generally matches your form. A vampire in human form could look like an old man, a child, or a soccer mom, but she cannot appear to be a horse. Similarly, a vampire who uses Shape of the Beast to transform into a wolf can use this power to appear as a large dog, but not as a man. To believably mimic a specific individual's appearance, you must have at least 2 dots of the Subterfuge skill, and you must study that individual from multiple angles, for at least five minutes learning her facial expressions, how she moves, and other distinctive qualities. You might be able to mimic someone's face after studying a photograph, but your disguise will not fool people who have previously met your target, as you do not know enough to successfully replicate that person. To believably mimic another character's voice, you must have at least 3 dots of the Subterfuge skill, and you must listen to her talk for at least five minutes as she uses a variety of words and phrases. Listening to a recording of that voice is not enough for a true replication; your disguised voice would not have the variety necessary to fool anyone who has ever spoken directly to your target. Mask of a Thousand Faces can be used to change the appearance of your clothing and equipment in minor ways, so long as your equipment does not change significantly in size or shape. A dinner jacket could be made to appear as a windbreaker, or a ribbon around your neck could appear to be a fancy tie, but this power cannot make that dinner jacket look like a floor-length trenchcoat, nor could it make a pistol look like a pencil. Mask of a Thousand Faces cannot be used to make an object invisible or partially invisible. You might make a hoodie and jeans look like a suit and slacks, but you cannot reduce them to appear as if you were wearing a bikini. Mask of a Thousand Faces can only affect objects that you are holding or that are on your person.

If you activate Conceal or Unseen Presence while someone is watching, Vanish from the Mind's Eye allows you to make an opposed challenge against any observers, using your Obfuscate test pool. If you succeed, your power takes hold despite their alertness, and you or the object you are targeting becomes invisible at the end of the everyman round. To use Vanish From the Mind's Eye against multiple observers, you must test against each observer. If you spend a Willpower to retest, you gain a retest against each observer. If you succeed against some observers but not others, only those who fail the challenge will be unable to see you. Those who succeed can continue to see you (or the object you're attempting to Conceal) as though you had not used Vanish From the Mind's Eye. As with other Obfuscate powers, if an individual who has seen through your Obfuscate looks away for more than a few seconds, one turn in combat, she loses track of the item or individual covered by Obfuscate. Once you've purchased Vanish From the Mind's Eye, characters with Heightened Senses cannot pierce any of your Obfuscate powers unless they have the 5th dot of Auspex. Additionally, characters without 5 dots of Auspex do not automatically notice your presence, no matter how close you stand. Vanish From the Mind's Eye can be used every turn, even if you failed to vanish in a previous turn. This is an exception to the rule that prevents a character from immediately retrying a failed Mental challenge. If you score an exceptional success against someone attempting to see through your Vanish from the Mind's Eye, that observer cannot contest any of your other uses of Vanish From the Mind's Eye, Mask of a Thousand Faces, Conceal, or Unseen Presence for the next hour. This prevents her from using normal means to retain sight of you, but does not prevent her from using Auspex (if she possesses that power) to foil your uses of Obfuscate.

When you use a standard action to activate Unseen Presence, Mask of a Thousand Faces, or Vanish from the Mind's Eye, you may choose to extend the effects of those powers to nearby allies. By using Cloak the Gathering, you may extend one of the above Obfuscate powers to a number of willing individuals equal to your number of dots in the Stealth skill, minimum one. Individuals feel a sudden, distinct chill when Obfuscate is used in an attempt to cloak them, but the targets have no mystical ability to know who is trying to use the power, nor to what extent. If any of your targets do not wish to be affected by Obfuscate, the power automatically fails to work on that individual. The power continues to work normally on other willing targets. If a character affected by your Obfuscate becomes unwilling at any point, the Obfuscate ends immediately for that individual. A character can always see through her own uses of Obfuscate, regardless of whom she is affecting. Further, other characters concealed by a single use of Cloak the Gathering can see each other normally. If one of your allies breaks her Obfuscate or moves more than 20 steps away from you, the power ceases to function for her but remains active for you and all other characters covered by this use of Cloak the Gathering. If you break the Obfuscate, however, your Cloak the Gathering ceases to function for all. When this power is used to augment Vanish from the Mind's Eye, you only need to test once per observer, as though you had simply vanished yourself. If you are successful, you Obfuscate the entire group. You can use Cloak the Gathering to extend more than one Obfuscate power, but you cannot extend the same power to more than one group at a time. For example, you might make five people invisible and make five people look like various circus performers, but you cannot use this power multiple times to make 10 or 15 people invisible. Cloak the Gathering can only be used on sentient creatures and confers no ability to conceal animals.

When you use Cloak the Gathering to hide another individual, the power lasts until dawn, regardless of how far away the target travels from your location. When you use Conceal to hide an object, you can hide anything smaller than a large car. Again, this invisibility persists until dawn, even if the object is not on your person. The invisibility granted by this power will still fail if your target takes an action that would ordinarily break Obfuscate.

When an event happens that would normally end your Unseen Presence, you can spend 3 Blood to activate Phantom Hunter. For the next three seconds, you can continue to take actions that would ordinarily break your Unseen Presence, without becoming visible. If you utilize Phantom Hunter during combat, the protection it grants continues only for the duration of one everyman round. For the remainder of that everyman round, you can attack, be attacked, speak out loud, and interact with your environment without becoming visible. However, if you are still interacting with your environment or with another character at the end of the everyman round, you then become visible. If you are no longer engaged in an action that would break your Unseen Presence at the end of the everyman round, your Unseen Presence remains active. Phantom Hunter can be activated at any time, even before your turn in the initiative order. For example, if you are struck before your initiative, you can activate Phantom Hunter at that moment. If you attack someone while you are under the effects of Phantom Hunter, the victim catches a brief glimpse of you during the attack and can retaliate on her next initiative. Other characters do not see you and cannot target you with an attack, unless they have the ability to pierce your Unseen Presence, such as by using Auspex or similar powers.

This power alters and confuses a victim's sense of direction, leaving her mind unable to perceive an exit or the path to her destination. Spend 1 point of Blood and a standard action to target a number of individuals up to your dots in the Stealth skill. If you succeed in an opposed challenge using the Obfuscate test pool, for the next 10 minutes you inflict your target with a mental haze that confounds her sense of direction. Should you expend a point of Willpower to retest any of these opposed challenges, you also gain that retest for the remainder of the opposed challenges without spending further Willpower. If you spend the Willpower to retest after some challenges have been resolved, you cannot go back to previous challenges you lost and apply that Willpower retest retroactively. Affected individuals become hopelessly lost and are unable to navigate out of the structure they are in or to navigate out of an outdoor area up to the size of 4 square blocks, and cannot find a specific location within their area such as an exit door, a side room, or where a specific vehicle is parked. No matter what efforts the affected target makes to change location, their mind creates obstacles that keep them trapped. Mental Maze prevents a target from declaring fair escape from a combat scenario while under the effects of this power. Once applied, the effect is continuous until the duration ends; the target cannot seek to escape through a clash of wills. If someone not affected by this power seeks to help someone that is affected, by guiding them out of the area or picking them up and carrying them, the duration of the power is halved allowing the affected target to leave the area after 5 minutes as opposed to 10 minutes as the affected character fights, argues, struggles, and resists the assistance, believing they are being led into danger. Contrived actions to reduce this time, such as victims allowing themselves to be willingly carried or staked, are not allowed.

Once purchased this power is always active. Your mind is a fortress hidden behind your Obfuscate. Any attempt to read your mind through Telepathy or other means automatically fails as they are unable to pinpoint your mind. In addition, you may alter your aura in any way you choose. For example, you can appear to be mortal, you can hide diablerie streaks, or you can appear to be another supernatural creature if you have the appropriate Lore specialization. To alter your aura, you must spend 1 point of Blood and a simple action. Once altered, your aura remains that way unless changed again. This power can be extended to other willing targets through Cloak the Gathering but its effects on others end when Cloak the Gathering ends. If others suspect deception in your aura, they may attempt to pierce Soul Mask using the powers of Auspex if they have at least one Auspex elder power. If they succeed, they may use their chosen power normally or receive the results for their power if they have already tested and won.

The penultimate power of Obfuscate, Create Name allows you to create a completely new persona. You must spend a total of 3 downtime actions in focused concentration to create an identity complete with a new face and body, speech pattern, aura, thought processes and supporting memories. Once created you gain a special 5 dot Alternate Identity Background. This power can be used to impersonate another individual; however, doing so requires you to spend 2 downtimes and for you to have familiarity with the individual you seek to impersonate. Once the downtime actions are spent, you gain a special 5 dot Alternate Identity Background as the individual you are impersonating. Finally, this power can be used on others if given enough time. You and your target must each spend 2 downtime actions as you systematically train your target to be their new identity. A user of Create Name can maintain a number of Alternate Identities up to their dots in Stealth. If you choose to deactivate the power, or if you are killed or placed in torpor, the effects of the power end and any Alternate Identities that you have created are lost. Creating an Alternate Identity in this way does not cost XP. An Alternate Identity created by this power behaves just like the background with the following exceptions: In order to pierce an Alternate Identity created by this power the Auspex user must possess an elder Auspex power; and any methods of investigation utilized to test an Alternate Identity created by this power do not work unless the user does so in conjunction with elder Auspex, as this power clouds the perceptions of the investigator. In all cases, should an Alternate Identity created by this power be compromised, it only reveals that the identity is false and not the character's true identity. If you die or choose to retract any granted identities, those Alternate Identities fade after 24 hours. The characters using those identities will intuitively know their identity is fading.

You have learned to shield your mind from hostile powers, wrapping your psyche in protective concealment. Provided you are conscious, this power is always active. Anyone who wishes to target you with a Mental or Social power must first defeat you in an additional opposed challenge using her Mental attribute + Willpower or Investigation skill versus your Mental attribute + Stealth skill. This does not apply to passive effects, such as Awe or Majesty. If the aggressor fails the challenge, for the next 10 minutes she may not attempt to target you with another Mental or Social power. Although you must have purchased the Obfuscate power Vanish from the Mind's Eye and other successive Obfuscate powers to be able to purchase the Luminary power Rampart of the Mind, your attacker does not need to possess the 5th dot of Auspex to attempt to attack you with a Mental or Social power, though they must still defeat you in the above opposed challenge. If you are targeted by a friendly power, such as Telepathy from an ally, you may choose to relent to that power without penalty even if you were not forewarned of the power's use.