TK Wiki • Defenses

Each character has a set of five defensive attributes. These attributes are used to contribute to the difficulty value (DV) of actions that target or affect the character. As described in Checks, this means that the DV will be increased by the value of the defensive attribute.

Each character has a value for each of the five attributes; for player characters, the initial value is set during character creation, and can be upgraded via story points as the character progresses. For NPCs, the templates in the Bestiary provide initial values (with villains and their lieutenants likely to have slightly inflated values).

The five defensive attributes are:

Bravery - Used to resist fear-based effects; either effects that might cause fear damage, or effects that rely on the character being afraid to operate.
Spirit - Used to resist magical effects of all types, from those that do magic damage, to those that produce non-damage-based effects.
Clarity - Used to resist confusion-based effects; either effects that might cause confusion damage, or effects that rely on the character being confused to operate.
Fortitude - Used to resist physical trauma and other endurance-based effects, including most effects that apply physical and poison damages.
Reaction - Used to resist effects that can be avoided entirely with lightning fast reflexes or actions.

Beware of the difference between defenses and armors: defenses help increase the DV of actions, whereas armors reduce the amount of incoming damage (after an action has been successful, and is one that deals damage).

Defensive attributes may rarely be used as a surrogate for a skill when performing a check, as in the case of the bravery check that must be made by characters who are afraid (see Fear). In these cases, the value of the defensive attribute is counted as mastery, not as training (that is, add +1 to the roll for each value of the attribute; do not upgrade the dice).

Defenses can be upgraded at the following costs: