Air Powers (FiD)
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Air is an elemental power that affects gasses, and to a limited extent vacuum.
Air powers deal with gases and atmospheric conditions such as wind, precipitation and cloud formations. It can be quite useful in that it can alter the battlefield itself, rather than the abilities of the combatants, evening the odds in an unfair fight by preventing the use or overwhelming odds or allowing escape from a hopeless battle. It is most practical when invoked over a small area, possibly dangerously powerful if used over wide areas.
Air attacks by buffeting and tossing opponents, which is powerful against fliers and good at distracting and delaying, but very poor at doing actual damage. Escalated air attacks can create a vacuum that does significant damage to creatures that breathe.
Air elementals appear as billowing cloud-creatures or as dust devils, transparent by nature. They are visible when they act but invisible while at rest. Creatures that manifest air are birds and winged and flying creatures of all kinds, including fantastic ones such as pegasi, winged horses.
Air Power Effects Table
Action | Basic No minimum 3 Stress |
Advanced Minimum 2 Dice 5 Stress |
Master Minimum 4 Dice 7 Stress |
Apex Minimum 6 Dice 13 Stress |
Attune | Perceive You can sense air creatures and active air powers. |
Dismiss You can force an air creature that is native to another plane of existence to return to that plane, or to end the operation of an air power ability. |
Summon You can call a creature of air from the aerial plane. This servant is generally unwilling. Summoning requires knowledge of the creature, which can be obtained through study. |
Gate You can create a portal that allows travel to and from the plane of air. |
Command | Communicate You can speak to air creatures, allowing you to use the command action on them. This does not give you the ability to understand them. |
Translate You and allies can speak to air creatures. |
Authority You can give commands to air creatures, as if you were their superior. Existing loyalties may cause conflicts. |
Enslave You can permanently bind air creatures to service. Unless affected by other power effects, they will stay in one location and act according to your instructions, like very loyal and literal-minded goons. |
Consort | Air Mask You can change your clothes and accessories by imbuing them with air and mist. This can mask your identity or create fabulous outfits. |
Shapechange You assume the form of an air creature. Add 1d to one action and subtract 1d from all actions covered by an attribute except if you just raised one of them. |
Transform You can shapechange a willing or helpless creatures into a form imbued by your power. This can be a curse, it can be broken but it is not easy. You can easily break the effect. |
Sky Hunt You can transform a large number of willing or non-sentient creatures into air creatures and give them a simple instruction, typically someone for them to hunt. |
Finesse | Ride If there is an air creature mount or air vehicle, you can ride it as if it was domesticated and you have the keys. |
Fine Control You can use air as a fine and potent close-range attack, similar in effect to a fine potent dueling sword or pistol, or you can give your friends the ride ability for the duration of a score. |
Manipulate You can do fine manipulation of air, creating tiny whirlwinds, clouds, and local over- and under-pressure that can push a button and move objects. |
Surge You create a storm of air blades, suppressing the effect of multiple opponents and acting as a fine potent weapon. |
Hunt | Cloud Chaser You can track a flier, even if the target does not leave any mundane trail or clues. |
Breeze Blast You can use air to attack, similar in effect to a fine and potent stun rifle. You can buff a ranged weapon to become fine and potent. |
Atmospheric Architect You can control the wind. You can cover a single room indoors or a city block outdoors. |
Air Assault You can use air to attack similar to a fine and potent grenade. This can harm many creatures in the same area, but there is a risk of collateral damage. |
Prowl | Shroud You can become invisible in air. This is similar to how air elementals work; you are transparent when passive, but cause wind and mist effect when you act. |
Flight You can fly. This is fast but clumsy, not really suited to cluttered environments. |
Air Circus You can bring allies along when you use Reconnaissance and Maneuver. |
Cloud Walk You and allies can fly very fast from one location to another in the same region. |
Skirmish | Air Skirmish You can use air as a close-range attack, similar in effect to a melee weapon or pistol. |
Potent Air Same as Air Skrimish, except the weapon is fine and potent. |
Whirlwind You can create distractions and obstructions that prevents the enemy from benefiting from numbers and otherwise works as a fine potent weapon. |
Gale Fury Your power strikes out in all directions, attacking all enemies in a wide area. |
Study | Analyze Air You can identify gasses and creatures of air and see the use of the abilities of the air power. |
Air Lore You know the powers and abilities of something you analyze. |
Air Echo You can read the past events of something you analyze. This includes past ownership, movement history, and significant events. |
Omniscient Air You research everything in a wide area. This is easy to do where you are, more difficult at range. You can then use hindsight on some of these targets. |
Survey | Detect Air You can sense air and air creatures at a distance and understand the general nature of that air; fresh, stale, toxic, vacuum. This works even when you can't see the target, but both range and information suffers. |
Eye of Air Choose an a volume of air that you have detected; you can perceive as if you were at that spot. You can perceive out of thin air, but doing so disturbs the air, creating small clouds or vortices. |
Aero Scout Choose a location or creature. You gain an Eye of Air at the nearest suitable space of air, which is usually right on top of the target. |
Omnipresent Air You perceive from all air at once over a wide area. This is harder if the air is closed of or must pass a narrow passage to give you access. |
Sway | Aero Ear You can understand air creatures even if normally couldn't. You can learn learn the objectives of air creatures. |
Aeromancy You and allies can communicate with air creatures. You can influence folk to be inspired and flexible, increasing the effect of suitable actions. |
Aerial Urge Post a suggestion in the mind of an air creature. This suggestion will be triggered under conditions you specify. Common suggestions are to steal something, attack someone, or ignore some event. This is a subtle power until triggered. |
Air Implantation You change the personality and motivations of air creatures. This power's effects are permanent but conspicuous. The target remember their past, but regard it as unimportant compared to their new motivations. |
Tinker | Bellows You can handle air and gases as bellows or a fan, air pump, or compressor. |
Fan You can shape sir, and it will retain their new shape for some time. You become capable of creating vacuums or stronger winds. |
Aeromorphosis You can create air out of nothing, or transform an object from or into air as long as you know the power required for the other form. You can separate air into its components and purify or pollute air. |
Skyshaper You can do create effects on a huge scale, affecting the weather or air of an entire region. |
Wreck | Gust Shove Air lacks precision in wrecking, but can jimmy even very large things, such as vehicles and small houses. Noisy. |
Air Smash Similar to Gust Shove but stronger. Works as a fine potent sledgehammer in combat. Noisy. |
Vanishing Gale Similar to Air Smash, but destroyed targets silently disappear or are reduced to a fine dust. |
Aero Annihilation Similar to Air Smash, but over a large area. This can level a city block, blow a spray of sand or water, raze a city wall, and similar massive destruction. |
Expanded Air Powers
Expanded descriptions of effects that differ significantly from Typical Powers.
Prowl
Prowling using air is quite powerful, because you can fly, and because hiding in air is very convenient.
Shroud: You can become invisible in air. This is similar to how air elementals work; you are transparent when passive, but cause wind and mist effect when you act.
This makes you invisible as long as you stay still, and you can hide out in the open at a distance, or in turbulent weather.
Flight: You can fly. This is fast but clumsy, not really suited to cluttered environments.
"This is fast but clumsy" means much easier to fly at speed than it is to hover. This makes flying easy when there is room, away from everything. Flying in built-up areas is harder, indoors both slow and dangerous.
Air Circus: You can bring allies along when you use Shroud and Flight. These allies still use their own Prowl action.
Now you and your allies can Prowl in places where your power is at home.
Cloud Walk: You and allies can fly very fast from one location to another in the same region.
Unlike most apex Prowl effects, Cloud Walk is not teleportation, instead it is fast flight. This has both advantages and disadvantages. It is slower, but you can adjust where you go once you come nearer to your destination.
Tinker
Manipulate, shape, and create air. Things made out of air don't last unless you force them to. Instead you do dynamic things, like create wind or smoke.
Bellows You can handle air and gases as bellows or a fan, air pump, or compressor.
This mainly substitutes for tools, up to a small workshop. The things you do only last as long as you keep maintaining them. The exception is that you can create or dissipate mist and smoke.
Fan: You can shape sir, and it will retain their new shape for some time. You become capable of creating vacuums or stronger winds.
This is where you can work with air and the effects last at least a little while. You can create wind, whirls, dust devils, and even complex air streams that follow paths you set up that could not occur naturally. This may allow you to set up traps or devices that would normally require extensive equipment.
The position depends on how quiet your workplace is and how much time you have to work with. The effect determines the effectiveness of your construction, but also how long it will last. Devices that are more powerful are harder to contain, and thus wont last as long. Most shaping will only be good for a single scene, but if your effect surpasses that required for the effect you want, you can stretch the effect until the end of the score.
Aeromorphosis: You can create air out of nothing, or transform an object from or into air as long as you know the power required for the other form. You can separate air into its components and purify or pollute air.
This is two distinct effects. The first allows you to create matter related to your power out of nothing. This is raw matter (or energy, depending on the power used) and needs to be shaped and refined to be of much use.
The second can only be used if you know multiple powers. You transmute material connected to one of your powers into material connected to another power. The result will maintain its form as if affected by the Shape ability. The advantage of this is that you can transform a complex object and it will retain its form and function as far as its new material allows. A door could be changed from wood to air, you then pass through and the door reverts to wood.
A mass of earth can be turned into air to create a pit, and then turn back to earth to trap those who fall into that pit.
Skyshaper: You can do create effects on a huge scale, affecting the air and weather of an entire region.
This is where you can affect the entire sky and really change the weather.
Wreck
Air wrecking differ from most other powers in that you don't destroy air so much as using air to wreck other things. Air can easily wreck large things that the air can push. Flipping a car over is easier than moving a single brick. Making a building fall over is easier than breaking a door open.
Stronger construction is harder to break. Limited effect can overturn wooden or tinny construction. Standard effect can affect more solid things, like timber, adobe, and precast concrete. Great effect can topple stone construction and unreinforced concrete, but against reinforced structures the effect is still not great.
Gust Shove: Air lacks precision in wrecking, but can jimmy even very large things, such as vehicles and small houses. Noisy.
This can do things up to the scale of flipping a car over or overturning a free-standing wall.
Air Smash: Similar to Gust Shove but stronger. Works as a fine potent sledgehammer in combat. Noisy.
You can hurl a car, flip a truck, and collapse a small house.
Vanishing Gale: Similar to smash, but destroyed targets silently disappear or are reduced to a fine dust.
The real difference here is that wrecking things is now silent when you have the right power. You also leave less traces, as what you wreck disappears. This can also be used to get rid of evidence, as long as that evidence matches your power.
Aero Annihilation: Similar to smash, but over a large area. This can level a city block, empty a canal system of water, raze a city wall, and similar massive destruction.
Rather straightforward, this just scales things up.