Status Effects
Every status effect currently defined in the system - what triggers it, what it does, and how it clears. This isn't necessarily a permanently closed list; more may be added as the rules keep developing.
From a roll
Off Balance
Trigger: rolling a catastrophic failure on any roll during combat.
Effect: everything you roll is at Disadvantage. It does not stack - you are Off Balance or you are not, however many catastrophic failures you roll in a round.
Clears: on its own at the end of your next turn, with no action or roll needed. A Fate Token spent to Shrug Off an Effect clears it immediately, though that never undoes the separate consequence the catastrophic failure caused. Never Off Balance rerolls the triggering failure itself: attack rolls at its first tier, every roll in combat at its second, every roll at its third.
Distracted
Trigger: losing a Health Level, or being the target of a Kotodama effect, while resolving a Slow Action Bracket action. A Gift, an environmental hazard, or GM fiat can also impose it directly, whether or not a Slow action is involved.
Effect: if the trigger happened during a Slow action, failing the roll downgrades that action to a Normal one, losing whatever its empowered action gave - the thing that made going Slow worth it. Outside a Slow action, failure instead imposes Disadvantage on whatever triggered it.
Clears: resolved immediately by the roll itself - success or failure, there's nothing lingering afterward. Concentration grants immunity to being Distracted, regardless of the source.
Surprised
Trigger: not noticing a threat before combat begins - typically because an opposing Stealth roll beat your Perception, or the GM judges the fiction calls for it.
Effect: Disadvantage on everything - attacks, and any other roll where being ready matters - for the rest of the round you're caught in.
Clears: automatically, once that round ends - no roll needed. Alertness grants immunity to being Surprised while conscious.
Staggered
Trigger: named by whatever causes it - a blow that lands wrong, a shock, a moment of not knowing which way is up.
Effect: your declared Action Bracket drops one step: Fast becomes Normal, Normal becomes Slow. Declared Slow, you still act, but lose whatever your empowered action would have given.
Clears: 1 Ki per step buys it straight back, the same spend that bumps a band up in the first place. Otherwise it clears at the end of your next turn. Staggered does not stack.
From a Vital at zero
Flustered
Trigger: your Poise reaching 0.
Effect: Disadvantage on all Social rolls, and on anything else where composure matters (GM's call), for the rest of the Scene.
Clears: lasts the rest of the Scene by default, but you can spend an action to roll Presence against a Difficulty and end it immediately on success. No Gift currently grants immunity to Flustered - intentional.
Humiliated
Trigger: your Poise dropping below 0.
Effect: you cannot take the lead, negotiate, or be trusted to speak for the group - socially deferring and complying rather than asserting yourself. Unlike Shattered, you still act fully on your own; this is social paralysis, not physical.
Clears: once Poise is restored to 0. While below 0, a rest or 1 Ki brings Poise back to 1 only, never to full.
Overwhelmed
Trigger: your Sanity reaching 0.
Effect: a temporary Mental scar effect - the GM picks it, or you agree it together - for as long as you stay Overwhelmed, plus Disadvantage on your rolls. You can still act on your own.
Clears: once you're removed from whatever caused it and get a chance to rest, or by spending 1 Ki - which brings Sanity back to 1.
Shattered
Trigger: your Sanity dropping below 0.
Effect: panicky, babbling, unable to act on your own - someone has to lead or drag you.
Clears: the same two ways as Overwhelmed - removal-plus-rest, or 1 Ki - but either one only restores Sanity to 1, not fully; normal recovery resumes from there. Dropping below 0 always leaves a Mental scar, however you recover - even with Ki - and it lasts until something heals it.
Unconscious, then Dying
Trigger: your Health Levels reaching 0, and then dropping below it.
Effect: at 0 you fall unconscious and cannot act. Below 0 you are Dying: still unconscious and out of the fight, but it doesn't get worse on its own - only more damage moves you toward death. The negative range mirrors the positive one, so a character with 7 Health Levels is dead at -7.
Clears: a Fate Token spent to Get Back Up puts you at 1 Health Level, conscious and acting, even while you're out cold. Stabilizing you - First Aid, a trauma kit, or a Gift that says so - brings you to 0: no longer Dying, still unconscious. Otherwise, below 0 a Short Rest recovers nothing and a Full Night's Rest buys back 1 Health Level, and only one, until you are back to 0. Going below 0 also leaves a Physical scar. Unstoppable lets a character stay conscious and act throughout instead of blacking out at 0.
From the world
Exhausted
Trigger: pushing a sustained physical exertion (forced marching, hard labor, running flat-out) past its free baseline duration, set by your Stamina. Each additional unit of time beyond that baseline requires a roll. Cold and heat impose levels too, on a timed exposure rate rather than a roll.
Effect: cumulative, stacking one level at a time on a failed check:
| Level | Effect |
|---|---|
| 1 | Disadvantage on Physical rolls |
| 2 | Disadvantage on all rolls |
| 3 | Movement Rate halved; no Fast actions |
| 4 | Every Ki spend costs +1 |
| 5 | Unconscious, until warmed, cooled, or rested |
Clears: a Short Rest drops one level; a Full Night's Rest clears it entirely - the same Short/Full split Health Level recovery uses. A level taken from an environment cannot be cleared while you are still in it: resting in the cold does not clear cold.
Blinded
Trigger: darkness you have no answer for, a flash, a faceful of something.
Effect: Disadvantage on anything that needs sight. You neither use nor suffer any effect that requires seeing or being seen - no eye contact, no reading the room, no Gift that depends on the target looking at you.
Clears: with whatever caused it. Heightened Senses can sidestep it entirely.
Deafened
Trigger: an explosion, a pressure wave, water, a Gift.
Effect: Disadvantage on anything that needs hearing. You neither use nor suffer any effect that has to be heard to work.
Clears: with whatever caused it. A Deafened character can still speak, so a Kotodama of their own is unaffected.
Grabbed
Trigger: being held - a hand, a jaw, a coil, a will.
Effect: your Movement Rate is 0, and you roll at Disadvantage on everything except escaping or attacking whatever holds you.
Clears: a contested roll against the grabber's Potence - or against its Hardness where the grip is a thing rather than a person, GM's call - or when the grabber lets go.
Prone
Trigger: knocked flat - a blow, a fall, or footing that gave out. Prone is always inflicted; going down on purpose is Belly Down.
Effect: you can't attack, every attack against you gains Advantage, and you can't Crawl.
Clears: one action spent recovering, which is a Fast character's entire turn.
Frightened
Trigger: something too much to face. Frightened always has a source, and the condition is of that source rather than of the world in general.
Effect: Disadvantage on rolls against the source, and you cannot willingly move closer to it. You can still fight it if it comes to you, still run, still act normally on everything else.
Clears: when the source can no longer be perceived, or at the end of the Scene, whichever comes first.
Envenomed
Trigger: venom, toxin, or a drug in the blood. Venomous creatures impose it on a successful hit, and each bestiary entry says so.
Effect: Disadvantage on Physical rolls. It does not clear on a rest - the body cannot sleep this one off.
Clears: once a day, starting the day after, roll Water + 8, and one success ends it. The roll is never at Disadvantage; a successful Medicine roll that day gives it Advantage, but Medicine never ends it on its own. Antitoxin always ends it. Ki cannot. A creature whose venom works differently says so in its own entry.
Bleeding
Trigger: named by whatever opened the wound.
Effect: 1 die against Soak at the end of each round, resolved per-die like any other attack, a connecting die costing a Health Level as usual.
Clears: a Normal action to stem it, spent by you or by somebody who reaches you, or any Gift that closes wounds. Being on fire is the same shape at 2 dice per round.