This martial arts set is strictly celestials and
Saints-only, and non Kyriotates/Shedim at that; a normal human being couldn't
hope to stand the strain that Sublimity would put on his system. Which is actually the whole point: the
discipline is designed to exploit the advantages a vessel has over a body, and
said exploitation can be severe. Once
an adept starts to fight using this style, his corporeal death is typically not
far behind.
This is the primary skill for Sublimity. A successful roll indicates that the user
has switched off both her ability to feel pain and the built in biological
regulators that prevent unconscious overstrain (this is much simpler to do with
a vessel than a corporeal body, obviously).
The adept may roll versus this skill after any successful Strength,
Agility or melee weapon attack; on a success, a bonus equaling (CD plus level
of Sublimity) is added to the first roll.
A successful roll will also make the adept immune to stunning for CD hours.
There are, however, two problems. First off, a successful use of this skill
does damage precisely equal to the bonus (an unsuccessful roll does 1 Body hit
damage). This may be healed normally,
but if the adept's running total of damage ever dips below the maximum Body
Hits of a vessel of lower level they permanently lose a level to their
vessel. For example: a character with
Strength 6, 3 Corporeal Forces and a vessel/3 has 36 Body Hits ([3 + 3] x 6). If use of Sublimity causes his Body Hits to
drop to 30 or below ([3 + 2] x 6), he will permanently lose a vessel
level. This damage cannot be
healed back; the adept is literally burning away his vessel to power his
attacks, and not even the Corporeal Song of Healing can reverse this
effect. The dropping of Body Hits to 0
or below will instantly kill the adept.
Second, this skill is in fact sufficiently unnatural that the
self-inflicted damage will register at the usual rate of one note of
Disturbance for every four hits of damage.
Generally speaking, most maneuvers in this art can
be adequately mapped by the above mechanics, but there is one particular move
that requires special attention: the Stop Thrust. On a successful Sublimity -4 roll the adept may choose to instead
take a bonus equal to (his total remaining Body Hits + total remaining Essence
+ CD) on one specific Strength, Agility or melee weapon attack roll. This will cause instant death, drain the
adept of Essence and quite possibly shatter whatever weapon might be being used
at the time (said weapon would take damage equal to the bonus, including - at
the GM's discretion - one that was normally deemed Unbreakable)... but that
might be worth it.
Generally speaking, Sublimity is a martial art favored by Malakim, Calabim and Habbalah: the first because they tend to go through a lot of vessels anyway, the second because this martial art can be impressively destructive and the third because, well, lacking pain feels deliciously blasphemous to a Punisher (it should be noted that any Divine Intervention rolled by a Habbalite attempting to use Sublimity would be a perfect time to impose Emptiness). Other celestials tend to find this particular martial art distressing, although some of the more militant Superiors can see its usefulness, and thus offer some training. It also tends to be sometimes studied by Saints, mostly as a last resort tactic.