To make cinematic characters more interesting they can be given drawbacks. Drawbacks are physical or mental limitations that cause a character to behave in a certain way or limits her options during play. Legionnaires do not have drawbacks because they are removed during the Legionnaire Process.
Abnormal Metabolism
Characters with Abnormal Metabolism have an internal system that requires a character to eat unique and exotic foods in order to survive. These foods are usually very expensive and difficult to obtain. Very often, these foods are distasteful or even repulsive to other people. A char- acter with an abnormal metabolism will starve if they at- tempt to eat food available to the general public.
Accident Prone
Accident prone characters are very clumsy and absent minded so they have trouble handling things safely or do- ing anything without getting into trouble. These charac- ters receive a -3 dice pool modifier for any physical action they perform. These characters should be roleplayed as constantly causing trouble but who are always trying their best. These character’s mistakes should sometimes turn out for the best and resolve seemingly impossible prob- lems.
Acceleration Sensitivity
Characters with Acceleration Sensitivity are extremely sensitive to changes in the acceleration of their environ- ment. They become nauseated or even disoriented when they sense acceleration. A character becomes violently ill and can only perform actions as unskilled in a rapidly ac- celerating or decelerating vehicle.
Addiction
A character with Addiction is mentally and physically addicted to something and requires it to function normal- ly. An addicted character must have what he is addicted to everyday or he will suffer from severe withdrawal symp- toms. Some addictions include drugs, sex, gaming, pain, sadism, and excitement seeking.
Allergy
These characters have an allergic reaction to a specific substance that can lead to illness or death if they are ever exposed to the substance. The character will attempt to avoid that substance during the game at all costs.
Amnesia
A character with Amnesia cannot remember their past and must find out how and why they have lost their mem- ories.
Bad Luck
Characters with Bad Luck constantly fail at everything that they try and things always seem to go wrong for them. A character with Bad Luck receives an automatic failure for any odd die roll.
Bane
Characters with Bane cause everyone around them to have bad luck. They cause endless misery and disaster to anyone involved in their lives. Roll a Bane die at the beginning of each combat turn. Anyone in the same range band as this character automatically fails any die roll that is less than or equal to the Bane die rolled that turn. Char- acters with Bane are not directly affected by this disadvan- tage except for the fact that people hate and avoid them.
Blood Rage
A character with Blood Rage has constant feelings of hatred and anger, which prevents her from dealing with problems peacefully. Her arguments always end in vio- lence and bloodshed. These characters must take a chal- lenging Resolve test whenever they get angry or get into an argument. If they fail this test, they must physically attack the person that they are arguing with. They must keep fighting until they pass this Resolve test. The only other way to stop the character’s rampage is for her to pass an extreme Intelligence test. Both these tests can be taken each combat turn. These people are normally found in prisons and mandatory military service.
Brash
Brash characters have little or no self control. They must pass a hard Resolve test or they lose control and act without thinking. Their rash behavior gets them into a lot of trouble but their recklessness also opens up many opportunities not available to more careful and thoughtful people. Brash characters should be rewarded by having their reckless actions lead to surprising solutions to their problems.
Childish
These character are completely innocent and are easily influenced or tricked by other people. These people look at the world with rose colored glasses and assume that
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everyone is good like them. An opponent automatically passes all Presence based tests against these characters.
Chronic Pain
A character with Chronic Pain is in constant physical pain that is so extreme that he cannot function normally. These characters perform all actions as if they are two dif- ficulties harder and fire on targets as if they are two range bands further away. Modern drugs and therapies provide little or no relief for these characters.
Clumsy
Clumsy characters are very accident prone and absent minded so they have trouble handling things safely or do- ing anything without getting into trouble. Any die roll made by a clumsy character fails on a roll of 6 or less.
Combat Trauma
A character with Combat Trauma has been mentally damaged by a combat experience and now has trouble dealing with high stress situations. When under pressure, a character must pass a moderate Resolve test or he per- manently loses one point of Reality. Combat trauma can result in an inability to sleep properly, minor hallucina- tions, and severe panic attacks.
Compulsion
A compulsion is an uncontrollable urge that must be constantly performed by a character in order for her to be comfortable. Compulsions include compulsive lying, hoarding, repetitive behaviors, desire to be clean that can- not be satiated, fear of what the character has lost or for- gotten, and insatiable obsessions or desires.
Coward
Characters with Coward fear the consequences of their actions and are paralyzed by their fear of the unknown and any threat of physical injury. In combat, a character must pass a hard Resolve test or lose all her Actions that turn.
Dark Secret
These characters are haunted by reoccurring memories about a time of weakness or sin that now controls their lives. The dark secret can involve murder, betrayal, sur- render, a criminal act, or anything that could jeopardize her rank, social standing, or freedom. These characters constantly regret this act of weakness and they relive it in their minds everyday.
Delusional
Delusional characters have trouble interpreting the world around them and they cannot normally understand their situation or environment. This represents a character with a severe case of schizophrenia or dementia that can- not be cured with modern drugs or psychotherapy.
Dependent
Dependent represents a character with a bizarre or engi- neered dependence usually designed to control the charac- ter. A character’s body requires a constant supply of this chemical or drug in order to survive. Most engineered dependencies can never be reversed without completely reengineering the person’s metabolism and genome.
Doom
A character with Doom is always in the wrong place at the wrong time. Bad things always seem to happen to him and he is always surrounded by a constant sense of impending disaster. A character with Doom dies instantly if his Life is ever reduced by one third.
Eccentric
An eccentric character behaves in an unusual or erratic way that is very disturbing to other people. These char- acters see nothing wrong with the way that they live their lives so they have trouble integrating into normal society.
Extreme Metabolism
A character with high metabolism has a very inefficient or extremely active internal system, which requires the character to eat three or four times as much as a normal person. This may appear as overindulgence to other peo- ple but the character does not gain any extra weight from the immense amount of food that he eats. He will also experience constant feelings of hunger day and night.
Flashbacks
Flashbacks are reoccurring memories from an emotion- ally painful or traumatic experience, such as torture or watching a loved one die. Many combat veterans have terrible recurring images of war when they least expect them making it difficult for them to live a normal life and have lasting relationships. When a character has one of these flashbacks, he cannot perform any more actions dur- ing combat and his Defense drops to two. When these characters have these terrible flashbacks they will col- lapse or stare blankly off into the distance no matter what is going on around them.
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Frail
A frail character is physically weak and has little stami- na or resistance to disease. Frail characters receive double damage whenever a character’s body takes damage. Ex- treme age, illness, neural damage, and congenital diseases can cause frailness.
Glass Jaw
A character with a glass jaw is easy to knockout so he is rendered unconscious if his Stamina ever drops below three.
Grotesque
A grotesque character is physically repulsive, severely deformed, or has some strange physical abnormalities. This level of repulsiveness can actually repel other people giving her a -4 Presence dice pool modifier. The appear- ance of grotesque characters is so aberrant to other people that they have trouble fitting into their society.
Hollow
When a character is possessed by a demon or spirit, his personality and sense of humanity is destroyed. These characters seem to act and talk like machines because all sense of humanity in them has been destroyed and they act like a distortion of humanity. Hollow characters auto- matically fail all Presence based or related tests.
Honor
A character with Honor has a deeply held set of beliefs that allows him to perform actions without fear and with total concentration when he defends them. These char- acters will stop whatever they are doing to defend their beliefs.
Honest
A character with this flaw cannot lie without revealing the deception through her facial expression, tone of voice, and mannerisms. An opponent can detect when this char- acter is lying by passing an easy Perception test.
Impaired Vision
A character with Impaired Vision requires corrective glasses, lenses, or drugs in order to see properly. If the character does not have these corrective measures, he re- ceives a -3 dice pool modifier for all tests taken. These characters have unique optical abnormalities that prevent the use of standard corrective eye surgery.
Insane
Insane characters act in a completely random way and their memories of the past change almost everyday. They are extremely dangerous because they fear nothing and have no morals. Insane characters automatically pass all Resolve tests because they don’t care what happens to them anyway.
Mental Weakness
These characters have a very specific mental problem that can render them completely useless if they are ever confronted with their weakness. A character may crack and explode when anyone laughs at him so he blacks out and attacks the person. These characters might have a weakness to pain so a slap or slight cut can render them into a gibbering idiot. A common mental weakness is fainting at the sight of blood.
Motion Sickness
A character with Motion Sickness has a low tolerance to unnatural movements in her environment. These char- acters become extremely ill when they ride in a moving land, sea, or air vehicle so they perform all actions as un- skilled in a moving vehicle. Modern drugs can be used to help relieve this problem.
Pacifist
Characters with Pacifist have a mental block, which prevents them from performing any action that would cause harm to another person. If they injure someone, they cannot perform any more actions for the rest of that combat.
Phobia
A character with a phobia has an unnatural fear of some- thing or a specific situation. Some examples of phobias include the fear of snakes, heights, dead things, crowds, insects, space, blood, fire, technology, darkness, Gens, be- ing alone, open spaces, and enclosed spaces. A few indi- viduals have a general paranoia so they live in constant fear of other people and government conspiracies.
Social Conditioning
Social conditioning is an extremely invasive form of psychotherapy, which prevents a person from performing any action that is considered to be anti-social by the soci- ety that performed this form of mental rape on her. Social conditioning has a range of effects including the sensation of nausea caused by thinking bad thoughts to a total black-
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out when a character attempts to attack or injure some- one. Social conditioning can be removed but the process is usually very expensive and has been known to cause permanent brain damage.
Space Sickness
A character with Space Sickness is extremely sensitive to null gravity environments and becomes disoriented and physically ill when he is in low or zero gravity. A charac- ter with Space Sickness performs all actions as unskilled in a low or null grav environment.
Spineless
These characters are complete cowards that are afraid of everything and give into anyone that tells them what to do. Spineless characters automatically fail all Resolve tests.
Split Personality
Split personality represents an extremely rare and dis- turbing psychosis caused by extreme childhood abuse or physical brain damage. A character with Split Person- ality has two or more distinct and unique personalities that appear randomly and each completely dominates a person’s mind at different times. Each personality has its own goals, memories, and mannerisms. The actions performed by each personality are unknown to a person’s other personalities unless they are informed by an outside source. Many personalities have access to special skills and some personalities have different brain wave patterns and other physiological differences including metabolism, heart rate, body odor, blood pressure, and the sound of a character’s voice.
Sterile
A sterile character cannot produce offspring because he has a damaged or nonfunctional reproductive system. Sterility can cause long term mental stress and trauma for a character. Modern fertility techniques cannot help these characters conceive a child naturally but options like cloning and genetic modifications of donor gametes are available. A few scientists using advanced techniques can actually create designer gametes created from the DNA of a person’s other cells.
Stigma
Stigmas are traits or past actions that are known to the general public, which cause the character to be ostracized and persecuted by her society. Stigmas may include in-
famy or public disgrace caused by imprisonment, nega- tive media coverage, tragedy, imprisonment, dishonor, or indecent behavior. Stigmas may also include symbols such as tattoos or physical features that represent involve- ment in an organization or incident that might be currently shunned by her society. Stigmas include odd speech pat- terns and mannerisms or a strange physical appearance.
Ugly
An ugly character is physically unattractive or de- formed. This is a very subjective drawback because dif- ferent people, cultures, and races have different definitions of beauty and the fact that personality and a sense of hu- mor are as important as physical appearance to a person’s sense of attractiveness. A character with Ugly receives a -1 Presence dice pool modifier.
Vengeance
A character with Vengeance has some unpaid debt or incredible desire for revenge that eats away at her soul and completely controls her life. These characters can- not rest until their enemy has been punished or destroyed. They cannot sleep without waking up drenched in sweat after having a nightmare about their past. Even if this character gets revenge her life can never be the same and her feelings of emptiness will linger unless she comes to terms with her real problems. Everything this character does must be related to seeking revenge until the day she confronts and defeats her nemesis.
Wanted
A wanted character has a bounty on his head because of a real crime, a misunderstanding with a planetary gov- ernment or local crime boss, or antigovernment activities. These characters must always stay on the run because bounty hunters will always be after them to collect the large bounty on their head.
Xenophobe
A xenophobe is a person that irrationally fears and hates other species. Real xenophobia prevents a person from even looking at a member of an alien species without uncontrollable feelings of fear and hate. These characters will never do anything with another species and their ha- tred even drives them to violence against other sentients. It is believed that Imperial citizens are programmed as children to be xenophobes in every facet of Imperial soci- ety. This has prevented most Imperial citizens from ever leaving the artificial purity of Imperial space.