Emerald Expansion 4 - Caltrops

Caltrops

Skill: Light Melee
Damage: None
Range: 15 feet

If you haven't read my spiel on Needles, please do so, as Storming Needles works with Caltrops. TL;DR these puppies do a lot more than "None" damage. Since you could just use Storming Needles to do damage with them, though, I thought I would focus on the differentiating point of caltrops: the penalties they inflict to movement distance and Speed (Initiative). I believe the entry specified initiative to encourage setting up caltrops beforehand as a preparatory measure, but as techniques provide in-the-moment combat actions I've elected to write techniques that broaden that to Speed in general.

I've chosen to present the techniques in level order rather than alphabetically so you get a sense for how skill with the weapon progresses. Without further ado:

Field of Caltrops

Discipline: Qinggong

Skill: Light Melee TN6

Type: Normal

Qi: 2

You spread caltrops out in a wide swatch across the battlefield.

Make a Light Melee roll against TN6. On a Success you spread caltrops wherever you describe within 20 feet per Rank of Waijia. Whenever someone moves in the affected area she must make an Athletics Roll against your roll for this technique or lose 10 feet of movement distance and 1d10 Speed until the caltrop is removed, which requires no roll but does take a full turn.

Cathartic: Cathartically anyone in the area makes an Athletics roll to avoid the movement and Speed penalties immediately (as well as additional ones later if they move).

Cruel Rat's Dance

Discipline: Dianxue

Skill: Light Melee against Parry

Type: Normal

Qi: 4

You throw caltrops into acupoints on your foe's calves so that she moves into her own peril.

Make a Light Melee roll against the Parry of one target up to 15 feet away. On a Success, she takes 6d10 damage and on her next turn she gains an additional Move action. This additional Move always confers her full movement distance (ignoring penalties such as those from caltrops), however if she takes it she must choose a path that brings her across your caltrops to trigger their Athletics check.

Cathartic: On a Cathartic use, when her turn begins, you roll 1d10 per Rank of Dianxue against her Resolve and if you succeed she must use the special Move action that turn.

Luck-Draining Spike

Discipline: Dianxue

Skill: Light Melee against Parry

Type: Normal

Qi: 5

You throw caltrops directly at your enemy's legs in a bid to get her to step on even more.

Make a Light Melee roll against the Parry of one target up to 15 feet away. On a Success, she takes 6d10 damage and the next time she makes an Athletics roll to avoid stepping on caltrops, she subtracts one from her final result.

Cathartic: On a Cathartic use if your victim is standing in a space with caltrops she must make an Athletics roll against those caltrops' TN. If she fails she picks up the leg you struck and puts it down on them, suffering their effects.

Foot-Taking Stance

Discipline: Dianxue

Skill: Light Melee TN6

Type: Stance

Qi: 6

When caltrops placed or thrown from this stance are stepped on, they inflict -20 feet of movement distance and -2d10 to Speed rolls instead of the normal amounts.

Cathartic: On a Cathartic use any person whose movement distance is reduced to 0 as a result of stepping on the caltrops takes the Broken Leg Flaw as he becomes unable to put any weight on his foot until it is healed.

Cascading Crash

Skill: Light Melee against Parry

Type: Normal

Qi: 7

Your caltrops stop even the speediest profound master in their tracks.

Make a Light Melee roll against the Parry of one target up to 15 feet away. On a Success you deal 6d10 Open damage plus 1 Extra Wound per 10 feet of base movement distance he possesses.