Custom Combination Discipline / Technique

Approved Feb 9, 2012:

Lucid Dreamers can exert incredible control over their own dreams, delving into their own subconscious, dredging up insights, and controlling their meditative states more effectively.  Similarly, those with knowledge of Telepathy can catch glimpses of others dreams and even interact with them in a limited fashion, so long as the telepath is actually awake.  Those who know Opening the Gates of Horn and Ivory, however, are able to do far more.

If the user is in close proximity to a sleeping target, either physically or on the Astral, they may initiate a Mental Challenge in order to merge a projection of themselves (and potentially, their own dreams) into the sleeper's dream state, effectively falling asleep themselves and creating a shared dream realm through which the sleeper and the user of this power can interact.  From this point until the target wakes, the user of Opening the Gates ofHorn and Ivory may perceive the target's dream and guide those dreams, including allowing the target to remember their dreams with perfect clarity upon waking.  Note that the cycles of dawn and dusk do not interrupt this power.

The real strength of this power is to allow for additional roleplay opportunities, to hold intimately private conversations, to perform psychological or psychic feats of various sorts, or to teach across great distances while sleeping.  The remaining paragraphs serve to offer guidance around those parameters, which are ideally worked out by the user and the target OOCly.

If the user of this power makes radical shifts in the target's dream state, the target may make a single Mental Challenge against the user to eject him from the dream, as his subconscious pushes against the foreign presence; if this Challenge is failed, however, the target's dreams are at the mercy of the user of this power; at a minimum, the target may be forced to suffer the effects of the Nightmares flaw.  If the target has the Lucid Dreaming ability, however, they may make such a Challenge whenever they become aware of the user or notice a significant shift in their dream state; if they succeed, they may force themselves awake, severing the connection.

Otherwise, this power may be used to probe for deep memories per the description of Telepathy.  The user is also considered to have the target's eye contact and attention for the purposes of Dominate, Presence, and Dementation, all of which can be used to effect drastic changes in the target's dreams (and, thus, the shared dream space).  The user is considered to be able to spend his own blood, as his consciousness is within his own form, sharing a dream space with the target.  This connection lasts as long as the target sleeps or the user wishes to maintain the connection, and, during the day, both user and target may elect to use their Lucid Dreaming scores in place of their Morality Traits for the purpose of determining trait caps.  The target may only relent to challenges if they implicitly trust the user of this power, are Blood Bound to the user, or possess the Lucid Dreaming ability.