Resistant
(
)
Variable
You are naturally resistant (or even immune) to noxious items or substances that are not direct, physical attacks. This gives you a bonus on all HT rolls to resist incapacitation or injury from such things.
The bonus from Resistant applies to all rolls to resist noxious effects within a particular category – usually some combination of disease, poison, and environmental syndromes (altitude sickness, the bends, space sickness, etc.). It also applies to rolls to resist attacks that use these effects. This includes Afflictions with one of Blood Agent, Contact Agent, Follow-Up, or Respiratory Agent, and Innate Attacks that have such modifiers and inflict toxic or fatigue damage.
Resistant does not protect against effects that Damage Resistance or Protected Sense either stop or provide a HT bonus to resist. This includes Afflictions and Innate Attacks that do not have any of the modifiers given above.
The base cost for Resistant depends on the rarity of the effects it counteracts:
- Very Common: A broad category within the noxious items described above. Example: Metabolic Hazards (all threats that only affect the living, including all disease and poison, plus such syndromes as altitude sickness, bends, seasickness, and jet lag - but not Radiation). 30 points.
- Common: A group of related items encountered as often in nature as in an attack, or some other suitably broad subset of "Very Common." Example: Poison (all toxins, but not asphyxiants or corrosives) or Sickness (all diseases and environmental syndromes). 15 points.
- Occasional: A group of closely related items more often encountered in nature than as a deliberate attack, or a subset of a "Common" group. Examples: Disease (all bacteria, viruses, fungus infections, etc.) or Ingested Poison. 10 points.
- Rare: A specific item or environmental syndrome, or a subset of an "Occasional" group. Examples: Acceleration (blackouts due to extreme G-forces), Altitude Sickness, Bends (decompression sickness), Seasickness, or Space Sickness; Nanomachines. 5 points.
Multiply base cost to reflect your degree of resistance:
- You are totally immune to all noxious effects, and never have to make resistance rolls (write this as "Immunity" on your character sheet): ×1.
- You have +8 to all HT rolls to resist: ×1/2.
- You have +3 to all HT rolls to resist: ×1/3.
Drop all fractions from the final cost.
An ordinary human could believably have any level of resistance to a mundane "Rare" item, such as Seasickness. He might also have Resistant to Disease (+3) [3], Resistant to Disease (+8) [5], or Resistant to Poison (+3) [5]. Anything more would be superhuman. Golems, robots, undead, and other beings that are not truly “alive” must take Immunity to Metabolic Hazards [30]; this is already included in the Machine meta-trait. When in doubt, the GM's word is final.
Mental Resistance: It is possible to be Resistant to a purely mental threat. This works as described above, except that the bonus applies to resistance rolls against IQ and Will instead of HT. "Psionics" is an allowed category, and is considered Very Common.
Immunity to Disease
Resistant (Occasional), 10 points.
Immunity to Metabolic Hazards
This does not include radiation. While mechanics are not very susceptible, semiconductors and many materials are. Immunity (Radiation) costs 5 points; in Fallout world, radiation is an occasional hazard and it costs 10 points.
See Also
Martial Arts
Martial artists in cinematic games can be Resistant to Hypnotic Hands (p. 61), Invisibility Art (p. B202), Kiai (p. B203), Pressure Points (p. B215), or “Hand of Death” attacks (see Innate Attack, pp. 45-47). Neck-toughening exercises (an “iron neck”) allow Resistant to Neck Injury, which gives a bonus in Quick Contests to avoid injury from chokes (p. B370) and Neck Snap (p. B404). Arm exercises might give a similar bonus to resist injury from Arm Lock (p. B403) and Wrench Limb (p. B404). Individually, the above items are “Rare.” Resistant (+3) to any one of them costs 1 point and makes an excellent Style Perk.
The blanket category “Chi Abilities” is comparable in importance to “Psionics” and therefore “Very Common.” Anyone might enjoy Resistant to Chi Abilities (+3) [10]; this represents unusually strong chi. Individuals with Trained by a Master can go as high as Resistant to Chi Abilities (+8) [15]. Immunity to Chi Abilities [30] only suits unnatural beings. These traits protect against all noxious effects caused by cinematic skills or chi powers (see Chi Powers for Martial Artists, p. 46).
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