STRENGTH SKILLS
These skills use Strength as the action ability. Strength skills are related to physical might, stamina, hand-to-hand fighting, and resisting damage. If the hero has two suitable skills for the same action (such as Swords and Martial Arts Weapons), only one applies.
Axes: Battle axes, hatchets, and other chopping weapons. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating when striking with a battle axe, logging, or throwing a hatchet.
Boxing: The Sweet science. Boxing applies only if the hero uses his or her fists (gloved or bare) to attack. If you declare it, you can divide your hero’s total action score between two fist attacks, the second being a contingent attack.
Brawling: This skill lets the hero inflict bloody damage when using fists, claws, teeth, or any other natural attack. If your hero reduces a foe to 0 cards or 0 health this way, the foe goes comatose. These actions-bites, eye gouges, kidney punches, and so on-are generally frowned upon in hero circles.
Climbing: Scaling vertical surfaces. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating when resisting wind and acrophobia while scaling buildings, trees, cliffs, and other vertical challenges.
Clubs: Anything from a blackjack to a telephone pole, assuming the hero can lift it. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating when throwing the club or staff.
Garrotes: Strangling cords, piano wires, and even bare-handed choking. If the hero wounds the target, he or she may make a contingent action to begin strangulation. This is an average Strength action. If it succeeds and the target does not damage the hero, the hero inflicts 4 damage points on each exchange thereafter, assuming the strangulation continues. The stranglehold remains in effect until either the hero lets go or suffers damage from the target.
Hammers: Objects used for pounding things into other things. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating for throwing hammers, plus carpentry and other such actions.
Hyper-Breath: Blowing really hard to knock people over. This feat can be performed only by those with an 11+ Strength. Your hero must make an average Strength action, and those whom the hero succeeds against are knocked back and lose their action for the exchange.
Knives: Objects that are small, sharp and easily concealed, from daggers to hypodermics.
Martial Arts Weapons: A catchall for the shuriken, sai, nunchaku, and oriental swords and daggers, including the katana and wakizashi.
Natural Weapons: Claws, quills, horns, teeth, and the like.
Shields: Normally defensive, shields can also be thrown. A shield can either absorb its defense bonus in damage from one attack or to inflict its bonus in damage for one attack in a single exchange, but not both.
Sonic Slam: Smashing the ground or one’s fists together to produce a sound wave. This feat can be performed only by those with an 11+ Strength. Your hero must make an average Strength action, and those whom the hero succeeds against are disoriented, losing their action for the exchange.
Spears: Long, sharp, and painful pole weapons. Your hero can use this skill for throwing or stabbing with javelins, tent poles, and anything else shaft-like.
Swords: Any long-bladed weapon, from an epee to a scythe. If the hero chooses not to attack, he or she may parry with a sword, adding the sword’s damage bonus to Agility when dodging.
Whips: Anything that’s cracked to inflict damage on or entangle a target. This skill lets the hero snag an object that’s within firing distance on an average Strength (Agility) action. The
opponent can make an average Strength (Strength) action to break free on the next exchange.
Wrestling: The gentle art of holding on and never letting go. This skill can be used only if your hero is using bare hands. If the hero damages the target, he or she may make a contingent attempt to hold on. This is an average Strength (Strength) action (or the same action to avoid this if the wrestler is a character). If the hold succeeds, the same damage is dealt the next exchange, and can’t be dodged. The contingent hold action must succeed every exchange, or it is broken.
AGILITY SKILLS
These skills use Agility as the action ability. Agility skills are related to movement, speed, digital manipulation, throwing, firing and reflexes. If the hero has two suitable skills for the same action (such as Aerial Combat and Acrobatics), only one applies.
Acrobatics: Gymnastic movement, Your hero can tumble, swing from ropes, walk across thin beams, and leap through windows. The hero may reduce the difficulty rating when trying to lessen damage from falls and dodging attacks, if the hero has sufficient room to move acrobatically.
Aerial Combat: Fighting in the sky. Your hero may use Agility instead of Strength to attack while flying. The hero can use Agility instead of Intellect for declaration order during aerial combat.
Archery: Use of any sort of projectile weapon that fires arrows.
Artillery: The handling of really big guns, Artillerist tend to work in groups, but use the highest Agility of the team members to attempt the action.
Boating: Piloting any water bound vehicle, from a jet ski to an ocean liner. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating to avoid rapids, spot land, build rafts and other life -saving tasks while on water.
Boomerangs: Small objects which are thrown to inflict damage and then somehow return to the thrower’s hand. A hero with this skill can catch his or her boomerangs without fear of damage.
Construction: Building things. When trying to construct a familiar object, the hero may reduce the difficulty rating to avoid making mistakes.
Contingent Attack: Your hero can divide his or her Agility and pre-card play modifiers between two Agility-based attacks each exchange, making one of them contingent. Cards can be played to each attack.
Demolitions: Blowing things up with volatile explosives, generally smaller than a cruise missile.
Disguise: Making yourself look like someone or something else.
Driving: Piloting any land bound vehicle, from motorcycle to an eighteen-wheeler.
Equestrian: Riding horses and other four-legged beasts, with or without wings. Your hero can use his or her Agility to control the mount and perform tricks (see Animal Handling).
Escape Artistry: Getting out of dangerous places. Your hero can reduce the difficulty rating to squeeze through ultra-narrow corridors, squirm out of ropes, and undo handcuffs from behind.
Fast Exit: Your hero can attack physically and move to firing distance before any foe can complete an action that affects the hero. But make sure you’ve properly analyzed the situation,
because if even one of the opponents has an Intellect higher than your hero’s Agility, any of the opponents can redirect actions toward your hero, and he or she can’t dodge any of them.
Flinging: Throwing any easily hefted object (though “easily” varies from hero to hero). This skill can turn playing cards and feathers into lethal projectiles and is good for tossing grenades.
Gadgetry: Disassembling something mechanical in order to make something else. This skill reduces the difficulty of the creation of any item if a suitable item is available for dismantling.
Marksmanship: Modern personal firearms of all types - handguns, rifles, shotguns, submachine guns, including laser, stun and concussion varieties.
Martial Arts: Your hero may use Agility instead of Strength to attack. This changes the attacks trump suit to Agility as well. The hero also can reduce the difficulty rating to reduce damage from falling. If the hero doesn’t attack, he or she can reduce the difficulty rating to catch any thrown object that can be lifted by the hero, negating impact damage.
Piloting: Working knowledge of most 20th century aircraft. Even in a small spaceship, you hero has an intuitive understanding of which flashing light is the accelerator and which is the brake.
Repair: Repair and modifications of items, but not the building of new items.
Ricochet: The bouncing of a weapon off one target and into another. A hero using a ricochet can target two individuals with a single throw, halving the action score for each. The second target is hit as a contingent action. If the hero desires, he or she also may ricochet the weapon back into his or her hand. A second use of this skill is to launch a surprise attack by bouncing a weapon off something behind the target; this makes the attack contingent but reduces its difficulty. This skill can be used with some powers, such as Energy Blast and Web-Slinging.
Skating: Twirling and dashing with wheels or blades on or under your feet. This also covers the use of skateboards.
Skiing: Launching yourself down snowy mountains or across water at high speeds.
Sleight of Hand: Stage magic. Your hero can make small items appear and disappear by a combination of misdirection and swift, fluid gestures. The hero can also use this skill to pick someone’s pocket by making an average Agility (Intellect) action.
Slings: Anything spun to inflict damage, from a staff sling to a bull-roarer.
Surfing: Hanging ten. Generally, this is done on water, but you never know.
Thievery: Picking pockets, moving stealthily, and opening locks of all sorts. Your hero can also reduce the difficulty rating in securing locks and making locks and keys.