V20 Rules Reference
Vicissitude in V20
Vicissitude lets a Tzimisce spend blood points to rebuild face, flesh, and bone, including the Horrid Form war body.
Looking for flesh-shaping in 5th Edition? Read the V5 Disciplines guideThe short answer.
Vicissitude is the Tzimisce flesh Discipline in the V20 catalog. It spends blood points, not Hunger, to reshape face, flesh, bone, or the whole body, including the Horrid Form war body. Dots are bought in order from Malleable Visage through Blood Form. Generation caps the blood points you may spend on that work in one turn.
What Vicissitude can touch
The Discipline reshapes a body for the scene. It does not print new Attribute dots.
- Face and voice
- Malleable Visage rolls Intelligence plus Medicine. The catalog leaves the difficulty to the alteration, and blood is spent by the part you change.
- Flesh
- Fleshcraft rolls Dexterity plus Medicine. Finer work is harder. The Storyteller sets that difficulty.
- Bone
- Bonecraft rolls Strength plus Medicine. The catalog notes difficulty 7 when the sculpt is an attack, and other alterations stay with the Storyteller.
- The whole body
- Horrid Form, the war body some tables call Zulo, spends two blood points and has no roll. Blood Form has no roll and no fixed blood cost on its row.
Levels in order
Names and order follow the V20 catalog. Each line is the change, not a full system write-up.
| Level | Power | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Malleable Visage | Roll Intelligence plus Medicine, with the Storyteller setting difficulty by the alteration, and spend blood points for the part whose face, flesh, or voice you reshape. |
| 2 | Fleshcraft | Roll Dexterity plus Medicine, with the Storyteller setting difficulty by how precise the work is, to move flesh into a new feature or tool. |
| 3 | Bonecraft | Roll Strength plus Medicine, noted at difficulty 7 when the sculpt is an attack, to bend bone into structure or a weapon the Storyteller then harms with. |
| 4 | Horrid Form | Spend two blood points, with no catalog roll, to take the war body, and the Storyteller applies the monstrous shift rather than new Attribute dots. |
| 5 | Blood Form | With no catalog roll and no fixed blood cost on the row, become sentient blood that can seep through gaps while the Storyteller handles containment. |
Run it in this order.
- Declare the Vicissitude power and the body, or body part, it changes.
- Spend the blood points that power requires without exceeding the generation per-turn cap.
- The Storyteller sets the difficulty, because the engine catalogs these five powers and does not roll them automatically.
- Resolve the flesh, bone, or form at the table. The check does not rewrite Attributes or finish the surgery.
Fleshcraft is not a free second action
Shaping costs the action and, where the power asks, the blood. You do not declare Malleable Visage and Horrid Form as two unpaid extras in the same breath.
Generation caps the blood
Horrid Form's catalog cost is 2 blood points. Ninth generation may spend 2 per turn, so that form spends the entire allowance. Tenth generation and thinner may spend 1, which cannot pay Horrid Form in one turn.
The war form is not a new Attribute
Horrid Form and Bonecraft can make a body hit harder for as long as the Storyteller says the change lasts. They do not add permanent Strength, Dexterity, or Stamina dots when you step back out of the form.
Keep the blood on the sheet
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Common mistakes
- Rolling Hunger dice for a Vicissitude test on a V20 sheet. The cost is blood points.
- Spending Willpower after the dice are seen to cancel a botch. That spend is not a rewind, and it is never legal on a Willpower pool.
- Paying for Fleshcraft and Horrid Form in one turn after the generation cap is already spent.
- Writing Horrid Form down as permanent Strength, or treating Blood Form as a free blood-pool increase.
One spend at the table
The war form spends the whole turn's blood.
The courtyard
Radu Vasile, 9th-generation Tzimisce, declares Horrid Form.
He spends 2 blood points, the 9th-generation per-turn cap, from a pool whose maximum is 14. The catalog stores no roll. The Storyteller applies the war body, and a second power that also costs blood cannot be paid this turn.
What the V20 sheet tracks
The sheet stores a Vicissitude rating from 0 to 5 and the blood pool. It does not sculpt flesh or apply Horrid Form's bonuses.
- Tzimisce lists Vicissitude with Animalism and Auspex. The rating is one number.
- A check is allowed only when the stored rating is at least that power's level.
- None of the five powers is an automatic roll. Malleable Visage spends blood by the part changed, so the check will not invent that cost.
- Horrid Form's fixed cost of 2 blood points can be recorded on an adjudicated check. The Storyteller still applies the war body and Blood Form.
Frequently asked
Which clan has Vicissitude in this catalog?
- Tzimisce. The in-clan trio is Animalism, Auspex, and Vicissitude.
Is Horrid Form the same as Zulo?
- On this sheet the war form is Horrid Form, level 4. Zulo is a table nickname for that body, not a separate level.
Does Vicissitude raise Strength for good?
- No. Bone and the war form change the scene. They do not add a permanent Attribute dot.
Does Blood Form have a blood cost on the catalog row?
- No. The row has no roll and no fixed blood cost. The Storyteller handles the liquid body. Horrid Form, by contrast, costs 2 blood points.
Does the app perform the surgery?
- No. The sheet records the rating. Medicine pools can be rolled only as adjudicated checks, and the Storyteller decides what the flesh becomes.
Related rules
Keep the blood on the sheet
Want to run classic V20 without pausing the table for multi-step soak calculations and blood tracking? Test an interactive solo chronicle with Vampiro Life's V20 engine.