/cofd/&/wodg/ Chronicles of Darkness and World of Darkness General

>>48901128
>can't even correctly copy-paste the last thread's OP
Step it up, fagness

>Demon
https://mega.nz/#F!3ElwBRpK!pC3J0VfZr2wnUSCuRcDj_w

>Mage 2e Errata
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxveHUKxwBU9UUZ4UjZJdEhIM2c/view?usp=sharing

>>48901128
All the time, my game is mini-splats so they're the best overall villain for us

>>48901128

If I ever played anything, my games woukd be drowning in Hunters. My 1960s Mage chronicle has the Keepers of the Source, the Merrick Institute, probably a canon-warping early Division Six, and maybe the Maiden's Blood Sisterhood.

>>48901128
They're gonna pop up. I'm running a Mage game and I'm definitely gonna drop some Hunters on them if they get too loud. Though, I can imagine in Boston there are probably some kicking about already.

Hunters go in every game.
They are the best antagonist, no matter the campaign.

I guess the exception is Demon. They only work in a certain kind of Demon game. Though even then a hunter cell investigating a PCs cover could be a greater threat than a whole gaggle of gay angels.

Is there any way except Time arcana to go around observing the past?

>>48901839
I wouldn't think that they would work as well in Changeling games. Then again, I could be wrong.

>>48901839

Even though they're kind of goofy, the Knights of Saint Adrian make for a fantastic antagonist group in Demon. Your ring is running around doing sneaky spy stuff and then a lunatic crashes a car into them, gets out, and roundhouse kicks them out of Cover. They're the antithesis of stealthy Demons and basically hit like an explosion out of nowhere.

Beyond that, you have Utopia Now competing for Infrastructure and trying to harvest their parts (I'm toying with the Machine sending an Angel disguised as a Chinese investor buying them out), you have paranoid Loyalists of Thule who remember what old Berlin was like and mistake you for Angels, you have Network Zero surveiling you and bringing your Cover under scrutiny, you have Habibti Ma trying to ruin your Tempter's delicate web of pacts, you have VALKYRIE and VASCU mistake you for a foreign spy/terror suspect...

Hunters are great for Demon, and can do a lot of damage even if they never actually shoot at you. Just being observed makes your life a living hell.

>>48901866

Guess you could use Mind to observe someone's memories or find the memories of a place in the Astral?

Observing the past is kind of Time's THING.

>>48901866

There's the Psychometry supernatural merit and I think at least one Contract has a similar effect. There's also an Embed somewhere that lets you rewind time by a scene.

>>48901935
I meant any way, other splat options are fine. Just don't have access to mages

I've drifted from WoD (or CoD or whatever they call it this week) because of the sheer quantity of pretentious, cliquey assholes I've met who play it.

Is there any way to address this? I have a hard time filtering them out. I don't get this problem with other RPG's.

>>48901888
I can't even remember the changeling focused hunter groups...

But I feel like they could cause typical trouble. Once they crack into the local area, taking out one changeling or finding a door into the hedge, it all goes downhill.

But changelings are good at scattering like roaches, and I feel like they would get back into hiding before long.

Good news is, hunters will alsontake care of some fetches and other problems for changelings. (Similar to how hunters may at times help woofs by killing pure')

>>48902009
Uh... What are some examples of the behavior you hate? Just to see how best to avoid those kind of people.

>>48902012
Of course, that deprives the Changelings of getting the bonus of killing their own fetch, at least in 1st ed cofd. I haven't played 2nd ed at all, did they keep that?

>>48902009
No, we're all shitcunts

Deal with it

>>48902012

The only Changeling organizations are fan-made, but some if them are great.

https://mrgone.rocksolidshells.com/pdf/HtV/DreamCatchers.pdf

>>48902031
Well, there are a lot of little things. Not all of them appear at once, but at least one of them does. I can list a few things I see a lot more of in WoD than other stuff.

Most male characters seem like they're intended to be some combination of Morpheus, Silent Bob, and Duke Nukem. Most female characters seem like they're intended to be some kind of SL+2 femme fatale, although the specifics vary. (Sometimes they're an evil manipulator bitch vampire -- sometimes they're a 2smart4u chess playing model, etc)

There's usually one player in every new group I start who makes a point to bring up how problematic everything is. There's typically another player who makes a point to argue with the first one, although sometimes I get one of these two but not their counterpart.

There's a lot more fucking going on within these games, but I've noticed that there's a toxicity to it. I've had a couple female players flirt with me while I'm ST but then treat me like trash when I'm not, so presumably they were trying to cozy up for XP.

There are people I've met playing this game who actually insist that they're vampires, and every time someone rolls up a Werewolf I seriously begin to wonder if they're a furry because I've met like three so far.

I can think of more, but a lot of the bad stereotypes about our type of gamer seem to come right to life with WoD/CoD

>>48902158

Play CofD instead of WoD.

>>48902211
I was playing CofD before they called it that and the exact problems emerged. In fact, I got into WoD when nWoD was already partly released!

>>48902237
I think you're lying because CofD is great and WoD is shit

>>48902158
Have you considered playing with friends.

>>48902267
You're retarded both games have good parts and bad part. They both attract the weirdest people.

>>48902158
You need to find people beforehand and learn about them before just getting into games. You'll meet a lot of creeps who play the game because it's weird.

>>48902267

No, that's just what happens when you let people play an Urban Fantasy game. It's like Murderhoboes in Fantasy or the guy who wants to be Han Solo in an SF game.

>>48902009

Only solution is to get people you were already friends with to play with you. If your friends are somehow already cliquey assholes, well.

>>48902323
Yeah that's probably true. Actually the best luck I've had IN GENERAL for RPG's, WoD/CofD included, is /tg/. I think something about the nature of 4chan requires you to get the fuck over yourself and have a sense of humor.

>>48902333
>>48902323
>WoD apologists

Not even once.

/v/ is the other way, you can talk about Bloodlines there.

>>48902158
I'm playing a tomboyish genki mage in my game. You just got unlucky with your players.

File: Bishoujo Senshi Yousei Kishi.pdf (1B, 486x500px)

1B, 486x500px

>>48902012
>I can't even remember the changeling focused hunter groups...
There are none. I made this, though.
I think a lot of the other fanmade Changeling focused Hunter groups also tend to not go after Changelings themselves as a rule of thumb. Then again, even in Mortal Remains they didn't usually have hooks for going after Changelings, aside from crazy ones that hurt mortals.

>>48902009
>>48902158
You know, I've honestly never had any of these problems.

>>48902717

I just wish the Lord Stewards were made canon.

>>48902717
>You know, I've honestly never had any of these problems.
That's because you're that guy.

>>48903165
I've done none of those things, you just don't like that I do things like make magical girl or catgirl homebrew, and update the BDSM wizards.

>>48902420

Every game had bad players. If playing certain games was a reliable detection system for being a bad player we would have dumped GenCon into the sea by now.

>>48902717

>insert obligatory joke about how you never actually play here

>>48903055

Don't think I've heard of those. What's their deal?

File: Society of Leopold.jpg (268KB, 1600x1131px) Image search: [Google]

268KB, 1600x1131px

>>48901128
>How often do hunters pop up in your game? (barring actual hunter games)

Well, when I'm the Storyteller (in our VtM 20th Anniversary games, which everyone in my group prefers over VtR) I change it up depending on what the players do.

I usually only run with "Hunters Hunted" types of hunters though, as opposed to the Imbued from HtR.

If a vampire drains a person and don't go to enough reasonable lengths to cover up the crime, or if they get caught on camera/film doing something overly supernatural, then hunters might start showing up. They might also randomly come across a single hunter (or just a pair of them) by chance.

If a larger group *does* arrive, they're usually only snooping around, chasing leads, in which case the group can just avoid 'em by not confronting said group, and simply staying hidden by covering their tracks.

Other times, they arrive in full force, like if the story is currently taking place in a Sabbat area where the local packs haven't been very sicrete...

NOBODY EXPECTS THE LEOPOLD INQUISITION!

>>48903331

Have you read Hunters Hunted II, by any chance? How is it?

>>48903301

Fan group, a British office that acts as supernatural diplomats and upholds old fae pacts to keep them from storming reality.

We really need more diplomat Hunters, and I'm a sucker for official agency types.

>>48903284
Some games definitely do have a sort of... "toxic playerbase", and certain games or types of games attract certain kinds of players. A lot of the OSR crowd, for instance, seems to hate on other games, and it seems to be the further back you go into D&D, the more likely people are to feel like it's the ONLY system. I'd say that WoD (both of them) can definitely attract a certain kind of player, but I don't think that it's as much as people would assume.
Contrasted with D&D, where I've literally never played a game where people weren't pirating 30 sourcebooks just to make one character from a non-standard race, and if you weren't doing the same you were looked down on.

>insert obligatory joke about how you never actually play here
True!
I have been in a game the last few weeks, but it's an OSR caveman game, not WoD.

File: TASTE THE FAITH, MOTHERFUCKER.jpg (181KB, 1281x965px) Image search: [Google]

181KB, 1281x965px

>>48903420
>Have you read Hunters Hunted II, by any chance? How is it?

I have, and it's pretty damn good, actually. One of the best V20 books in my opinion.

They go into quite a bit of detail on many various mortal groups of Hunters, including ones associated with major mortal religions.

Knights of St. George: Christianity (though it's become more inclusive in later years)
Akritai: Eastern Orthodox Church
Ikhwan al-Safa: Islam
The Judges: Judaism

There's also the U.S. Government, the Society of Leopold, the Arcanum, the Young Bloods (a gang of biker ghouls that figured out a way to keep themselves continually and safely fed with vamp blood without having to worry about the blood bond), major Criminal organisations (the Tong, the Mafia, the Russians, etc.) and more.

The Numina (psychic powers and hedge magic) are pretty balanced as well, with all of them feeling powerful in terms of mortals, but being weaker in nearly every aspect when compared to Vampiric Disciplines, especially in regards to the fact that they cost willpower to use and often have detrimental side effects or bigger requirements.

It also goes into detail on how the Hunters are coping in the new V20 timeline that moves away from the whole "GEHENNA HAPPENS IN 2004!"-crap, touching on stuff like the conflict in the Middle-East and whatnot.

The only thing that bothered me was the way the Numina are ordered; not every Numina is listed under the Numina section, and instead appear get listed under other sections of the book. Like, the "Alchemy" Numina is listed under the faction of the Arcanum, rather than with all the other Numina.

But that's a minor issue, and I highly recommend picking the book up if you got the inclination to play as (more or less) regular mortals against vastly overpowered foes.

>>48904260

Hunters Hunted 2 is probably the best V20 book.

>>48903464

Ooh, that's a good one. Is it on the OPP forums?

>>48904260

That's good to hear! I'll have to pick it up when my paycheck comes in.

>>48904332

https://mrgone.rocksolidshells.com/pdf/HtV/DreamCatchers.pdf

ded game, ded thread

>>48904891

What rises may fall. What has fallen may rise again.

>>48905051
Unless it's your ex girlfriend.

Got bored, made a cult for Mummies to run and mortals to join.

forum.theonyxpath.com/forum/main-category/main-forum/the-new-world-of-darkness/mummy-the-curse/954677-example-cult-joint-terrorism-task-force-42

>>48905718
Yeah... after that time you pushed her down the stairs, I doubt she'll ever rise again.

>>48902290
This

How do you make sure police don't get involved so new players don't rely on NPCs to get the dirty stuff done for them.

>>48906542

1) Self-incrimination. Make the strongest (or even only) evidence point right at the PCs.
2) He-said-she-said. A softer version of the above, have it be events that they couldn't really even report to the police; "ghosts possessed a man and made him kill someone else" is not a problem you can solve by bringing cops in.
3) Reprisal. The cops don't swoop in with AK-47s and grenades on first suspicion; even if it's something that you CAN report, the process is going to be slow enough that there's plenty of time for the bad guys to go to ground or just lash out against the PCs outright.
4) What cops? Set it in some shitty part of town or way out in the boonies where the cops don't even get out of bed unless at least 9 people have died.

Alright, so my regent just barely escaped death, but he's vulnerable. Should I diablerize him and skip town, or support his recovery for mad boons down the road?

>>48906542
>>48906755
Add to this, if the bad guys are organized enough, the cops have been bought out.

You think the local Prince or Alpha doesn't have a mole on the force that can make sure a call never reaches the right ears? Come on man, the world would fall apart if cops were constantly walking into fights with strix and junk.

>>48903276
>I've done none of those things, you just don't like that I do things like make magical girl or catgirl homebrew, and update the BDSM wizards.
People don't mind that you like those, it's that you blow off all criticism as trolls and haters and ignore the books and end up with unfinished products that don't fit into the game.

>>48906775

The latter. Social boons ultimately do more than raw Vampire power.

>>48906542
In addition to what other people have said, the inhabitants of the world of Chronicles of Darkness have been explicitly stated as not wanting to believe in the existence of spooky supernatural stuff. So they just repress their memories of it, or explain it away as something else.

Also most Supernatural organisations have some form of cover-up group whose entire job is sorting out the cockups of groups like PCs. They won't be too happy about it, and you can bring that in as a plot point later, but they're not going to abandon their job just because the PCs make it hard for them.

Also Supernaturals in the Police Force and so forth.

>>48906775
Did your character still not realize that vampire politics is just a game meant to entertain bored elders?

>>48907298
Good point. Fuck that guy, he's going in my vampire belly.

>>48906843
>ignore the books
You mean like that time I just had one of the writers point out that I know what I'm talking about? I don't ignore the books.

>>48906775
Regnant.

I feel like I'm missing it, but do they say how many skill dots to give a normal Pandoran in 2e?

I feel like it is just passed over in favor of saying what kind of skills not to give them. Which is fine.

What's a good Skill to use for a Rote that involves branding someone with a Rune to enchant them?

>>48909443
Craft or Expression?

>>48909443
Crafts,Expression,Larceny

>>48909443
Kind of depends on the enchantment, really, but
Occult if they have to be willing
Brawl if you have to hold them down when you brand them
Melee if the only requirement is that the brand makes skin contact for a moment.

Does your dedicated Magical Tool count as a normal Yantra as well? Does it count towards the limit on number of Yantras by Gnosis?

>>48909648
Yes and Yes.

>>48909648
The use of a dedicated Magical Tool is merely an enhanced version of the Magical Tool yantra, ditching 2 paradox dice. So yeah, I don't see why you'd think otherwise.

>>48909648
>>48909717
I wish Yantras were more interesting, and hope we see more in Signs of Sorcery. Everything is just bonus dice except for Dedicated Magical Tools giving -2 Paradox.

I want 9-again and 8-again and Rote and free Spell Factors. Instead of giving +1 or +2, Runes as a Yantra could have just made something's duration permanent so long as the rune is still there. There's so many things they could have done. I hope something similar to Rote Factors is in SoS. Use a Rote in a certain way that works with the "theme" and you get free Spell Factors.

>>48910444
You read the preview?

>>48910494
I saw that some of the metals seemed to give 9- and 8-again, but that's about all. What, did they have more Yantra stuff?

Or did you misunderstand me and think I meant I knew something other people didn't? Rote Factors were from Tome of Mysteries.

>>48910444
>Runes as a Yantra could have just made something's duration permanent so long as the rune is still ther
That would be beyond bullshit

Evil kung fu school as a Deceived cult; hot or not?

Is there any way to go back and observe the past?

No Mages available

>>48911191
Infrastructure designed to do that

>>48911191
Changelings could probably make a Contract for that.

>>48911292
Ooh, tell me more. There are Changelings in my gameworld.

>>48911288
Likewise. Haven't come across a Demon yet, but they haven't been ruled out

>>48911191

Like I said last thread, the Psychometry merit for mortals kinda does this, I think there's a Contract for it, and there's an Embed that lets you at least briefly rewind time. How far back are you trying to look?

>>48911356
>Like I said last thread,

Sorry, missed that completely. Yesterday was weird.

>Merit
Actually that's pretty sweet. Might ask or a 5 dot version that lets me just observe instead of asking questions.

>Contract
>Embed
Seriously interested in the Contract option. Will it be obvious how that would work from just reading that section?

>how far back
Any far back, specific issue right now is the 1740s, but prehistory isn't out of the question

>>48910987
Is this more mummy stuff?
Atamajakki, I think you have a problem.

>>48911315
>Ooh, tell me more. There are Changelings in my gameworld.
Changeling wants to learn the secrets of the past.
They make contact with the concept of Time through the Wyrd, and engage in some extended, and infuriatingly difficult quest to barter with it and craft a Contract permitting them to glimpse back through it.

Changelings can do almost anything by making contracts with the world. Of course, the process of making such a Contract is so bullshit difficult they only introduced it in 1e in the final "endgame" book, but it's still doable.
But once the Contract is made, it can be taught quite easily, to anyone who wants to learn.

Personally I've been thinking up powerful Changelings for a future game, and I'm currently brainstorming for one who's seeking to make a contract with the concept of Acceptance. Which would allow them to (through great effort), destroy Huntsmen, who are animated by a Gentry's loss. At the cost of taking upon themselves some of the Huntsman's anguish and pain of existence.

>>48911530
>You think
You should stop being polite.

>>48911530
>stop making new content for your content-starved favorite gameline

yeah nah

>>48911645
You just bet on the wrong horse. Mummy got introduced at the worst time, and will forever suffer for it.

>>48911651
Is Mummy nWoD's Wraith?

People keep mentioning one of the stories in the Beast anthology was good, something about a bunch of different creeps taking on a beast.

Which story was that?

>>48911651

Mummy will likely get a second edition confirmed next year, and with luck I'll write for it!

>>48911660

Wraith was my favorite WoD line alongside Demon. I'm cursed to forever be the gameline hipster.

>>48911662

Dave Brookshaw's story. The name of it eludes me, but it was really good; it has a Beast, a Mage, and a cat shifter from Changing Breeds.

>>48911820
That should be premeditation. Thanks.

If you were going to have a Mage be a Promethean's demiurge, which arcana would be their highest?

Show your work.

>>48911856
Prime

The meta-magic arcana, therefore most appropriate for woking with raw, sentient existence magic that is Pyros

>>48911856

Pandora's Book says a combination of Death, Forces, and Prime are needed to perceive Flux, but I think Prime makes little sense as its specifically the Arcana of Supernal things. I think you need a grasp of Death (for the not-quite-yet-a-soul that is Azoth) and Fate (for the weird Wyrd-like narrative structure of the Divine Fire), possibly with a dash of Mind as well.

Honestly, any Arcana could do it if you're Obsessed enough to get the attention of the Divine Fire.

>>48911938
>>48911867
I also feel like Prime is a little strange since it is meant to study a particular type of magic, supernal magic. While mages can study stuff and figure out wtf is going on, Prime shouldn't help too much more than any other relevant arcana.

Like Life! Which, while Prometheans aren't quite a full life, the Divine Fire and Azoth are all a supernatural force that is trying to create a natural life from death. Life has to have some input on it right?

Pyros creates souls and humanity

To build a soul from Supernal magic you need the five subtle arcana and some unknown catalyst out of the reach of non-archmasters

>>48911856
Doesn't matter. The Supernal cannot normally craft a soul, even an imperfect one. A five-fold Master of the Subtle Arcana cannot craft such a thing even in the face of Mage theory suggesting otherwise.

It is merely the domain of Death, in the Practice of Entities, a power sufficient to remake the nature of Vampirism, or the Bound, which can craft a Soul.
However even then, that can merely remake that which has been taken, granting a Soul to one who had at one point had one, restoring the Supernal order.
Taking such power that would otherwise be sufficient to rewrite the laws of the Underworld.

The power of Willworkers cannot create a new soul.

Let that remain the purview of Azoth and the Divine Fire.

I fucking hate mixing splat powers.

File: I Kill You Last.jpg (61KB, 500x742px) Image search: [Google]

61KB, 500x742px

>>48912236
>other splats can do a thing Mages can't
>other splats can do a thing achmasters can't

File: Matter 4.gif (590KB, 300x254px) Image search: [Google]

590KB, 300x254px

>>48912257
It's sad, but I genuinely can't tell if you're joking or not.

>>48912236
It isn't mixing splat powers.

The mage would be driven by the principle like any other demiurge, and it would be the principle that grants the divine fire and allows the act to happen.

The question is more, 'what type of mage would be most likely to use their magic to start the process'.

>>48910614

Signs has had an excerpt from chapter one (mage sight, from the supernal world chapter) and an excerpt from chapter three (perfected materials, from the crafting chapter) up.

According to the breakdown of the book on the blog, chaoter two is nothing but yantra stuff.

>>48912515
Sweet. Looking forward to that.

>>48901946
Geist Oracle, probably

>>48911191
If you wanna go back and observe and don't mind risking butterfly, Skafoi is your best bet.
If you want to observe past without even risking changing it, Apokalypsi got you cowered. Also if you mix in Metatropi you can can view past depicted as this awesome 3D hologram.

>>48912851
Eh. That blog post is already out. No need to look forward to it.

>>48913075
I have no idea what these terms mean. What splat/book?

>>48913084
>>48913084
Genius: The Transgression
Fansplat best suited if you want to deal with something vaguelly scientific (and/or really weird).
Butterfly is just me referring to butterfly effect.

I want to marry a cute Mekhet!

>>48913106
>Fansplat best suited if you want to deal with something vaguelly scientific (and/or really weird).

If only that were true, instead of it being shit and not even a bit scientific.

>>48913106
>something vaguelly scientific
Man that isn't even SLIGHTLY true.
In fact one of the main themes is that you're not engaging in science.
Your shit works not because you're following fundamental principles, but because you're sticking it together with psychic insanity-glue.
Genius is basically just playing Mages who make devices to perform their supernatural effects.

>>48913129
>>48913149
Pseudo-scientific or soft sci-fi is still vaguelly scientific.

>>48913356
It's not even that. A genius can pick up a club and spend Mania to increase his dice pool with it. He can use pop rocks, a glow stick, a turkey baster and half a bottle of cough syrup to make a virulent neurotoxin.

That's magic dressed up in science's clothing.

>>48913417
MacGyvering and Gadgeteer Geniuses are pretty standard these days.
Also those materials could be potentially toxic, and magic would be using them to create a love or mind control serum or something.

>>48913452
Which a genius could also do.

>>48913471
With those? Mind control/love potion is 3 dot Wonder, and requires 3 dots of resources. Sure they could pull some of the stuff out of dumpster but they at least need to make it sound plausable by mixing it some expensive alcohol, porfume, and some pheromones.

File: image.gif (65KB, 367x200px) Image search: [Google]

65KB, 367x200px

>Mage the Ascension is a guide to conjuring and familiar maintenance.

Changeling the Lost corebook's introduction to pledges mentions that there would be an example for official and concealed wording of pledges but I never found the examples?

>>48914409
>concealed wording of pledges
But the very nature of a pledge is that you can't bind people to something they haven't said. You can bind them when they're not serious, but they still have to say the words.

>>48906542
1. The Police are controlled by local supernatural leader like a Vampire Prince, so much so that you can't tell where the princes dick ends and their faces begin.
2. Police in CofD are like Police in Gotham City. They catch one sniff of the supernatural and decide to stand back, let you do your thing, and falsify a report later that makes them sound like someone who didn't sit there in the squad car trying to keep from pissing themselves and crying in fear by convincing their partner not to.
3. They police are horribly corrupt insert $5000 to make this all go away.

So what's the general goal of Mage? Getting rid of the Lie?

>>48914579
1) Be human with godlike powers.
2) Be king of whatever you behold.
3) Find exciting stuff that makes you grow as a Mage.
4) Try not to die as you come into conflict with whatever exciting stuff you find.
5) Try not to die as you come into conflict with another Mage trying to do 1-3

>>48914615
Those are hardly goals worth developing your character towards.

>>48914663
Oh. You meant specific goals? Sorry, I went with the general ones as you asked.

>>48914579
Ascension.
Shedding your mortal coil and ascending to the Supernal realms.

Or you know, the nigh impossible goals of defeating the Exarchs, purging the Abyss, and returning the world to the way it was in The Time Before.

>>48914702
>Ascension.
How is this achieved?

>returning the world to the way it was in The Time Before.
What about this?

>>48914801
>How is this achieved?
There's a 1e book all about this - Imperial Mysteries.

>What about this?
By doing those first two things, which aren't the sort of thing that should be spelled out in a core book, since they're PLOT.

Silver buckshot or silver slugs to dissuade Wolfs from eating faces?

>>48915193
Buckshot.
Also some silver that's actually visible, or they're having to take you on your word.

>If he has completed at least six Refinements, the character can choose in that moment whether to remember his journey, or forget it all. If he remembers, he can fully appreciate what he went through. He’s aware of the things in the night, though he may no longer notice them. Often, his memories spur him to do greater things, as he knows what he went through to become human. If he chooses to forget, he has the happiest ending of all — he remembers a normal life. His new life isn’t perfect, but whose is? He’s had fights with his parents, bad relationships, stress with his partner, maybe a divorce. This is what he remembers, and the universe creates just enough evidence to back it up.

>the universe creates just enough evidence to back it up

What does this mean? What if the Promethean was (like most Prometheans) a vagabond? What if he tries to contact these parents? Surely they just can't spring into existence? Or can the Principle do that?

>>48915410
It reorganises the world. Your asshole manager complains that you were late to you boring 50k/year job again, when the day before he'd neve heard of you and your role either didn't exist or belonged to someone else who retired yesterday (your existence shouldn't cost someone their job after all).

A widow who had adult children now has four, you're not in (m)any of the pictures, she knows you've always hated being photographed.

The woman who was single yesterday now has your number in her cell phone and memories of moving you into her house a year ago. Her son calls you by your name, and vows he'll never call you dad even after the vacation where you were kinda cool and bought him beer at the hotel bar.

Stuff like that, it's not likely to pop people into existence, but it'll nudge and shuffle things to fit you in.

>>48915257
That's where the Bowie knife comes in. Damn dirty injun Lupines got another thing comin', pardner

>>48915410
Never mind, I'm an idiot. The answer's literally in the next paragraph. Still, it's mighty good of the Divine Fire to instill the memory of someone who's never existed into a bunch of humans so that they think that the ex-Promethean was always their friend. I imagine it gets rid of the Anonymity merit, though (>and even a bank account).

>>48914801
>How is this achieved?

By becoming a Supernal Symbol. There are a bunch of ways, becoming one with the idea of your Legacy, becoming perfect Wisdom, be uplifted by an Exarch, perfecting your arcane knowledge as an Archmaster, and a bunch of unique works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iypUpv9xelg
This song is perfect for the Mourner group of Sin-Eaters

>>48915410
The Promethean adopts a cover just like a Demon does, except better.

So are Tremere a Vampire antagonist or a Mage antagonist or do the splats share them in CoD?

>>48916196
Mage antagonist, but a possible connection to Vampire.

>>48915193
I prefer crossbows because the bolts are easier to retrieve and reuse.

>>48915549

It certainly lends credibility to the "The Principle is a better/less bad God Machine" theory.

>>48916475
The fact that quashmalim are just super angels is also good proof.

The rules section for them is like 'don't bother giving them stats unless their mission is to fight and choose to lose, or win for effect.'

Like, they are literally god mode most of the time, and can reflexively go invincible.

>>48916196
In World of Darkness, the Tremere are a vampire clan who used to be mages, and have a few mage crossover elements.

In Chronicles of Darkness, the Tremere are a Mage Nameless Order who absorbed a vampire bloodline, and have a few vampire crossover elements.

They're a Mage antagonist in CoD

>>48917127
>other splats cannot have nice things
>everything you like belongs to Mages now

>>48916475
>>48916735
I like the idea that the God Machine was a corrupted part of the Principle that somehow ended up becoming larger than its precursor. The Principle is scrambling to somehow fix at least some of the cockups of the God Machine via the help of the quashmalim, but its power is dwarfed by the vast armory available to the God Machine. Makes me wonder, would Demons and quashmalim get along?

>>48917151

Eh. Requiem didn't want them. We're talking about design decisions made twelve years ago.

>>48917242
Hey Dave, I've read your post about the Arthurian legend being caused by mages and time travel shenanigans. Why do you have to shove mages into it? Can't it simply be a legend?

>>48917347
And now you're talking about design decisions made ten years ago, waaaaaaaaaaay before I ever got involved.

Besides, using Merlin as an iconic Mage is hardly unique to the CofD.

>>48917347
Just be happy that at least the King Arthur in CoD isn't a little girl.

>>48917347

Merlin and Morgan are right there, anon. Wizards did all of Arthurian Legend.

>>48917151
Just introduce the Tremere into Requiem, if you like. My preferred way of doing it is for them to be a Mekhet bloodline that swaps out Celerity for Dominate and Thaumaturgy.

>>48917623
complaining is easier.

>>48917347
Hey. Read the Elizabethan era in Dark Eras, and you'll notice it's also a Changeling one.

We seriously need a Changeling/Mage Arthurian era in Dark Eras 2.

>>48917623
I went with the idea of them being a secret cult instead, with the idea of gathering magical knowledge from everywhere, and using this to control everyone else.

>I like both WoD and CofD.

Am I a unique snowflake?

>>48917860
What did the Tremere do in WoD?
I mean, in Mage 1e they stole souls, they were liches.

>>48917904
Were one of the big Vampire clans.

They used to be mages, who stole Vampirism from one of the smaller Vampire clans, for immortality.
Their magic didn't work as vampires though, but they invented new, imba, blood magic.

>>48917900
No, just a liar

>>48917900

Lots of people like both. It's just that liking White Wolf stuff makes people really passionate about their preferred flavor of it.

>>48917211
>>48916475
>It certainly lends credibility to the "The Principle is a better/less bad God Machine" theory.
I like the theory that the Principle is making humanity better by having Prometheans undergo the Pilgrimage and become better humans.

>>48917900
Nah. Lots of people like both. Those people tend to get shouted down by the self-proclaimed superfans and people who are THEY CHANGED IT NOW IT SUCKS grognards.

As an example, when NWoD first came out? I had people who wouldn't even touch Requiem. Their reasoning? I was told by about 8 different people it's because they removed <X THING>.

I had 2 people who wouldn't play because there weren't Masquerade Malkavians, one person who wouldn't play because there weren't 2 'good/evil' sects, one person who wouldn't play because the Lasombra were gone, two that told me they wouldn't because Paths were gone (and these people were always bad for Path of Whatever I Was Going To Do Anyway) and one person who wouldn't play because 'combat was boring with just one roll'.

People bitch about things they like. And for a lot of people, these games DEFINED their lives.

>>48918208
Is the principle 100% the worst bit of Cofd cosmology?

Like, it has no 'home', its purpose is completely focused on like ~100 guys, the only impact it has on the world is creating terrifying monsters or tactical nukes to clean up the act of creating said monsters.

Why does the principle exist if it is barely going to do anything?

>>48918334
Because there's no unified fucking CofD cosmology. It doesn't NEED to do anything in the game lines it's not part of.

>>48918347
It barely does anything in the game line it IS part of.

The principle is the old White conservative of cosmology.

It goes out of its way to make sure you get born, even if that would be a terrible mistake for everyone involved. Then it doesn't do much for you except point in the right direction, expecting you to pull yourself up by your own stitched on bootstraps. But if you screw up, because it gave you barely ANY guidance on how to get it right, it will bring down the wrath of god.

And screw you if you don't do everything in your power to become the ideal that it defined for you.

>>48918389
Sounds like God to me

>>48918334
>hating on the only verifiable source of new souls

I'm a Mage so I can do everything the other splats do

>>48918593
I hope you're in the life Arcana, because you're going to need more bait.

>>48918334
What? The is a massive Quashmal in the Antarctic messing with a research station full of humans, and 2-for-the-price-of-1 Quashmalim dealing with monster infestations as sample examples.

>>48918656
I'm sorry you picked the wrong splat. Maybe next time?

>>48918389
Whaaat?

ANTAGONIST RATING CHART (official)

GOD TIER:
The Strix
Banishers

GOOD TIER:

Seers of the Throne
The Pure

MID TIER:
Belial's Brood
VII
Claimed

BUSH DID 9/11 LEGALIZE IT TIER:
Task Force Valkyrie


FUCK OFF WITH THIS TIER:
God Machine

>>48918732
Oh fuck off.
The (official) part just makes sure this is blatant trolling.

7/10, made me respond.

>>48918732
You forgot The Hosts.

>>48918774
But thats my official chart, and how I actually feel.

>>48918803
Right. Theyre Good tier.

>>48918834
Scelesti? Shuankhsen? Deceived?

...Heroes?

>>48918732
If Task Force: VALKYRIE gets to count as an antagonist, how about the Cheiron Group?

>>48917242

Dave, will we ever see a sequel or at least more stories with the characters from Premeditation in the Beast Anthology?

>>48918904
Medical companies cure diseases, how can they be bad anon?

>>48918919
Well, it's in their interest for there to BE diseases. This means the Medicine can't be too good. Just good enough.

>>48918898
>Selescti
>Shuankhsen
Mid

>Deceived
WHO CARES TIER

>Heroes
PROTAGONIST TIER

>>48918904
>Chieron Group
MID TIER

>>48918954
Very cynical attitude

>>48918919
Well, if you're playing a gang of supernaturals, they'll probably try to drag you to an underground lab, cut you open, and pilfer your innards. That's a pretty antagonistic situation to be in. And if you're a hunter, it's even worse: You may have to deal with corporate bureaucracy.

>>48918732
Pandorans?

>>48918732
Idigam? Bale Hounds? Les Mysteres? Keepers of the Source?

>>48918961
>Deceived in WHO CARES Tier

I'm mad

>>48918906

There's plenty of gamelines for Halcyon to be an insufferable asshole to.

>>48918732

Why Strix and Banishers in God Tier? May I see your rubric?

>>48919186

It feels so right that his real name is James. Of course it'd be James.

>>48918971
It's only theory of cynicism. Practice of cynicism is actually doing that thing.

>>48919186
>There's plenty of gamelines for Halcyon to be an insufferable asshole to.

Hal may be an insufferable asshole, but he is both very powerful and rarely wrong. Damn mages...

>>48919118
I love the ideas behind the Deceived but I've found their writeups to be endlessly frustrating. They were gleefully metaphorical ciphers that didn't reveal what the Deceived actually do. The short sample powers at the and of each writeup told me more on what to expect than almost two pages of previous text.

Was there something I missed?

>>48919320

That's kinda the whole tone of the line, really. Dig through the forums and you'll find me going "what the fuck did the Guilds actually do?" because the game as a whole is pretty opaque.

As a whole, the Lost Guild/Deceived were the artists and philosophers of Irem, and handled some of the Nameless Empire's most powerful magic. When the time came for the Rite of Return, the other five Guilds disrupted their part of the ritual and shattered the Shan'iatu of the Sixth Guild instead of taking them to rule Duat. These insane soul-shards melded with their servants and now wake them to feed them artifacts and enact vengeance on the loyal servants of the other Guilds; they also cultivate great works of art and eat powerful emotions.

The best part of the Deceived is that the mummies who comprise them may well have no stake in their great struggle, but are compelled to act it out by mad gods they share a mind with. If they can somehow sneak past their unholy masters and achieve Apotheosis, they become Fate's greatest servants.

>>48919320

Alternatively, do what I do and have The Dancer and The Keeper team up to create an evil kung fu school that teaches a debased form of Taoism that has its adherents utterly surrender their minds and selves to muscle memory and animal instinct.

>>48918334
"Very likely being the source of all souls" isn't exactly barely anything. Not that the Principle is benevolent or anything, either. It does what it does. It just happens to, mostly, seem to be on the side of humanity.

>>48918389
Not really. You're forgetting that Prometheans aren't "born" complete. They're half-finished. They need to go through the crucible of the Pilgrimage and face many Refinements before they're complete. And it seems to want them to become human. There's no "ideal that it defined for you", and being Centimanus isn't failing to work towards that ideal. It's denying that there's anything wrong with you and choosing to continue your half-finished existence.

>>48918732
>No Tremere
>God-Machine at the bottom
>VII and Belial's Brood on there at all
>No Huntsmen, Gentry, Alchemists, Heroes, Centimani, Pandorans, Bale Hounds, Idigam, Kerberoi, Spirits, Ghosts, Scelesti, Mummy things, etcetera.
>VALKYRIE is the only Hunter Org
>[Rival parties] isn't at God Tier.

>>48919076
>Keepers of the Source?
Hippie terrorist tier.

>>48919392
What?
Explain Mummy to me.

>>48919424
>being centimanus isn't failing to work towards that ideal
>literally cannot gain any ground toward that ideal while being centimanus

Uh...

>>48919408
I have to confess, I don't actually take part in games. I just enjoy reading the books. Having read multiple reviews and rants (mostly on other books) I'm gradually becoming more sensitive to flaws in writing. I hate when a book does itself disservice. More than that, this often results in fans of a game as intended clashing with detractors of a game as written. Even though cooler heads know how to behave in such a situation, everything becomes so ugly the writers have a good reason to stay away and not confront imperfections in their writing.

>>48919535
It's a vicious cycle, is what I'm saying.

>>48919473
The sum total of the Principle's plan for any Promethean is "become Human". There's no ideal human, just... Human.
Because Prometheans are not complete.
They have not finished.
They are dangerous, burning furnaces of Azoth that scorches and razes everything around them if left unchecked.
Being a Centimanus isn't simply squandering your potential, or some blue blood yuppy child giving away daddy's money to go be poor and fuck black guys and protest.
Being a Centimanus is about literally and metaphorically being a blazing fire of dangerous power that destroys the world around it and shrugging and saying "you know what this is fine".

Centimani aren't just failing to work towards some ideal of a paternal super being. They're literally failing to fix themselves. They're giving in to their broken nature and becoming monsters.

>>48919464
>Explain Mummy to me.
Do you recall how, time and time again, creepy cultist in spooky robes gather around an altar and resurrect their dread master to do his/her bidding? You're the thing they resurrect.

>>48918979
The worst part's those little clauses that let them keep you on retainer for up to 72 hours after your contractual obligations have been met.

For mysterious reasons they ALWAYS seem to result in some calamitous event that gets you killed to tie up loose ends and ensure you don't get paid.

>>48919464

The short version is that you play the immortal amnesiac demigod-slaves of a predynastic Egyptian empire lost to history, sporadically returned from death to serve your mortal Cult, find great magical Relics for your inhuman masters, and try to recover your lost identity.

It's a great game because it inverts a lot of traditional mechanics (you start play at the "I can destroy cities" level and then dwindle down) and provides an easy framework to do flashbacks pretty much anywhere in human history, plus it has a fantastic (though very, very dense) background mythology.

>>48919616
>>48919983
But can they beat Mages? I don't think so.

>>48920004
Of course not.

Mages = Gods

>>48920004
...actually...

So far I've enjoyed the out of World of Darkness cross-overs that gamelines and fansplats I read offered.
Changeling you can make any fairytale characters, myths, and fairy locations come to life with cruel twists. Vampires lets you play as anybody but a vampire! Princess let Storytellers and players craft these terrifying monsters and double identity superheroes. Genius let you basically built any character as if they appeared in Venture Bros.
Do other gamesplats offer same flexibility?

File: mummy op pls nerf.png (101KB, 558x538px)

101KB, 558x538px

>>48920004

Can mages do this?

>>48920050
>needing a physical body

Once again Purified win the WoD

>>48920030
>Vampire lets you play as anybody but a vampire!

I'm not sure I understand this, as nearly every single gameline has "think of any person possible and then turn them into a monster."

If customization is your thing, Demon has a fairly rigid background (you have to play a fallen Angel of the God-Machine) but you're free to build from there and have a ton of really fun fiddly pieces to choose from.

>>48920007

Rebuke the Vizer'll probably ruin their day, but I expect that to change come Dark Eras companion.

>>48920050
What is this, the Arisen way of saying "I don't want anything to do with you door-to-door salesmen, bugger off."?

>>48920103

It's the most powerful ability only available to the highest-ranking members of an antagonist faction, but it's still a fun power to show off.

Now, the Utterance that lets you rain meteors upon everyone in a one mile radius of you? That's in the corebook and relatively easy for anyone to get right out of character creation.

>>48920103
Mummy powers are always the definition of overkill.

>>48920198
>Now, the Charm that lets you rain meteors upon everyone in a one mile radius of you? That's in the corebook and relatively easy for anyone to get right out of character creation.

Exalted pls

>>48920093
The best way to make Demon characters is to start with their true form - because that normal WoD character you're making is literally a skinsuit.

It also has less of the "muh struggles" versus "becoming the beast" (no one likes beast) since you ARE the mechanical eldritch horror to begin with, and "human" is what you hide so Da Man doesn't find you.

It's rather fun to have everyone at the table judging or commenting on how "generic human" what you were doing could pass off as.

File: Relaxo.jpg (25KB, 544x416px)

25KB, 544x416px

So I got the 20th anniversary manual for Vampire: The Masquerade and I plan to be the story-teller for some of my friends. It's not my first time, although I far from being a World of Darkness veteran.

It's the first game for most of the players and they're all spaniards, mostly from Barcelona. So I plan to make their vampires to visit the city for some sessions, or maybe even set the whole story there.

I got two problems. The first is that I didn't find much information about Spain in World of Darkness. But I can deal with it. The second is that the few info I got from the White Wolf Wiki says that Spain is mostly a Sabatt ridden shithole. I've never played a Sabatt campaign and, to be honest, a Camarilla one is way better to introduce new players. Apparently Barcelona has both sects yet they happily coexist, how does that even work?

Any tips on how to plan this and/or how to get more info? Should I just scrap the few official lore and run a mainstream Camarilla game like it's the USA, but in Barcelona?

>>48920050
Well you could just use a "kill" spell...

>>48920209
You can't do it for long though.
Basically in like, what, the first hour? when you're summoned, you're at maximum power. Now is the moment where the cultists call down calamity or whatever.

Three months down the line you're down to like 3 dots of sekhem...

>>48920050
Easily

File: 23685795314566.jpg (43KB, 850x434px) Image search: [Google]

43KB, 850x434px

>Pick up Beast: The Primordial.
>Take a small flip through
> Neat beginning fiction
> Get to the "Myths and facts" bit.
>Not 100% sure what a Beast is meant to be, but damn if this doesn't look neat
>Come across a part that talks about "The Dark Mother"

>Put book down and walk away

>>48920246
>Any tips on how to plan this and/or how to get more info?

Here are some: sell or throw away (doesn't matter) that shit and buy VtR instead.

>>48920304
>that shit and buy VtR instead.

>shit

Fuck you, you melanin enriched minority

>>48920050
>You can't rebuild a body for at least a thousand years no matter what
Holy shit that's just excessive.

>>48919983
>plus it has a fantastic (though very, very dense) background mythology.
I meant explain that part.

>>48920238
>It also has less of the "muh struggles" versus "becoming the beast" (no one likes beast) since you ARE the mechanical eldritch horror to begin with, and "human" is what you hide so Da Man doesn't find you.
Iunno. Demon does have quite a bit of what you call "muh struggles". You're not just playing at being human, you've "defected to humanity", as the back of the book says. You want to find your Hell.

>>48920030
I'm not even sure what you said.

>>48920246
It's your World of Darkness, so honestly, just making your own version of Barcelona is probably best. You can fluff it as the Camarilla having recently seized the city, if you like.

>>48920301
Yes, yes, you're very brave.

>>48920372
Dat scary bitch throwin the horns was proper scary, bruh!

"Evil Female Goddesses/Progenitors" has been done to death in WW/Onyx Path, would you agree?

>>48920437
No, I like MILFs

I bet you're a DILF faggot

>>48920437

Yeah there's just way too many, like the Crone, and uh...

Uh...

Uhhhhhh...

>>48920466
>Lilith
>Weaver
>Gaia (ok, not evil but)

>>48920494
>>Lilith
I said the Crone. "Vampirebitch whot progenits vampires" is the sum total of both characters; they're the same.

>>Weaver
Literally the Weaver's whole point is that it ISN'T a progenitor (that's the Wyld) and isn't evil (none of the Triat are evil, just monomaniacal) you fucking beanbag.

>>Gaia (ok, not evil but)
Gaia barely exists even in the gameline she gets namedropped. "Gets mentioned once in oWerewolf's backstory and then never again anywhere else" isn't exactly an overwhelming amount.

>>48920494

Ennoia?

>>48920304
I don't feel attracted to VtR enough to learn the lore. Maybe I wouldn't bother to learn it for Masquerade either, who knows, but the case is that I already learned when I had more time and now it's handy if we feel like doing a vampire game.

>>48920346
That's what I was thinking. Maybe making camarilla Lasombras more common since the clan is supposed to be everywhere in Spain.

But I've also noticed that there's a lot of sabbat bloodlines are partially or mainly hispanic. In Barcelona if I want Setites, for example, it would make more sense to have a caribbean antitribu than a normal egyptian one. So maybe having a more light Sabbat or having traditionally sabbat clans and bloodlines under the Camarilla would be better.

I don't know if it makes sense at all, though.

>>48920338

The backstory is pretty crazy. Book of the Deceived covers most of it, but I'll try and summarize.

There was a lost empire in North Africa and the Near East well before the first Egyptian dynasty, centered on Irem of the Pillars (an actual mythical city). This Nameless Empire had a pharaoh, but was actually ruled by the Shan'iatu, shapeshifting alien necromancer-priests who instructed the people of Irem in servitude to the Nameless Gods and the 42 Judges.

Irem was notable for its great Guilds of artisans, who manipulated Sekhem (a weird energy that's kind of like the Lifestream mixed with the physical manifestation of Fate) into great magical Relics.The Shan'iatu led these Guilds personally and trained them in various arts. Eventually, the Shan;iatu came forth and performed a great sacrificial known as the Rite of Return that granted the men and women of the Guilds immortality, sent themselves into godhood in the underworld of Duat, and removed the Nameless Empire from time and space.

That's the basic gist of things. It gets more complex from there.

>>48920554
>Dark is the same as evil
Man, you're pissed

>>48920570
Nahhh, she's not...you know, 'up there'.

>>48920246
>>48920346
Came her to say this; Have the Cammies just recently oust their Sabbat rivals in Barcelona, and have the player characters either be quick wartime Embraces or boon Embraces for valuable services rendered by their sires in retaking the Domain.

Be sure to include at least one cute Assamite warrior girl who does odd jobs for important local notables and secretly lusts for the vitae of one of the player characters

>>48920591
>>Dark is the same as evil
>Man, you're pissed

Bruh. Look at what I am responding to.

>>48920437
>"Evil Female Goddesses/Progenitors" has been done to death in WW/Onyx Path, would you agree?
>Evil

>>48920437
>would you agree?
Not really. Plus, it's a concept that's rife for plundering. I'm pretty sure "paternal father figure God" has been done more often in WW/OPP.
The Principle, The God-machine, Father Wolf, then you've got "literally the source of all paternalistic religion" as an Exarch.

Nevermind that it's a game that runs on horror tropes and reinterpretations of classical myth and pop culture. How is a Dark Mother not fitting? Only some No Girls Allowed neckbeard would get so triggered by that. Especially when there's much better reasons to dislike Beast, like the lack of anything to do and the fact that it's boring as fuck.

>>48920554
>>48920494
The Weaver isn't even feminine.
>>48920570
Who?

>>48920579
>I don't feel attracted to VtR enough to learn the lore. Maybe I wouldn't bother to learn it for Masquerade either, who knows, but the case is that I already learned when I had more time and now it's handy if we feel like doing a vampire game.
The thing about VtR is that there isn't "lore". There's a setting and that's it and you do with the setting as you want. More or less what you're doing with VtM, but with better mechanics.

>>48920579
Camarilla Lasombras are not common because there are either hidding or dead

>>48920304
So what's the deal with VtR? How do I start out? What essential books would I need for my group to get things going? What kinds of blood magician vampires are there?

File: Lilith.jpg (248KB, 759x1053px) Image search: [Google]

248KB, 759x1053px

>>48920437
I want to impregnate Lilith and take responsibility for the apocalyptic child that results.

>>48920591
She has great tits though.

>>48920570
No joke, Earthshaker Ennoia was one of my favorite parts of the Gehenna sourcebook. That shit just sounded fun, imagining this big hungry ancient Sumerian lithomancer superwoman gobbling up cities to get at the tasty Methuselahs inside.

>>48920338
Hell is the old old old definition of it though: an eternity somewhere without god.

The defection is more "dude, I've seen some shit". Except for integrator agendas you MADE your decision. The internal "am I still people" crap so many others have doesn't apply to you.

That's not to say demons don't have worries, far from it, but the main "oh no I'm becoming a monster" morality tracks most of the others have are replaced by "am I wearing this human good" and your vices and virtues might be outright swapped.

>>48920644
I don't think The God-Machine is gendered as a dude, outside of the name we give it (and mind you, God is also the neutral term)

>>48920644
>The God-machine

I didn't think computers had genders.

>How is a Dark Mother not fitting?

never said it wasn't, but I remember that so many big bads in OWoD were kind of...you know, "evil mother"-ish, and it's just annoying. It almost makes me wonder if a lot of the people at White Wolf had mommy issues.

Like, sure, have a Dark Goddess, but when it's always a "Mother" it just gets stale.


I suppose, though, most ancient Goddesses usually had something to do with cranking out kids

>>48918732
>999999999999999. Heroes

>>48920714
God Machine is the father

Dark Mother is the mother

Principle is the androgynous babysitter

They share an apartment and are constantly outwitting their out-of-touch landlord Exarch

The sitcom writes itself

>>48920725
Eh
From what I've seen, they varied plenty.
Gods in general 'cranked out kids', it wasn't some mystical compulsion put on the goddesses (and sometimes male gods managed to do it all by themselves)

>>48920579
Put a sleepy Salubri Warrior Elder that's been torpid since the Middle Ages somewhere in the vicinity of Barcelona, and have it rise in the Modern Nights to shake things up a bit. Bonus points if the childe of his or her oldest friend is the Prince or an important Primogen.

>>48920660

Requiem is going to feel a little odd if you're coming to it from Masquerade; it's your same "vampires have always lived among us and play around in their little secret societies" setup, but there's no canon origin for them as a whole and there's not a ton of backstory to go with. The Clans are now broad archetypes of what a vampire can be, and as such there are only five of them; the role of specific lineages with their own histories is instead filled by Bloodlines, which there are many more of. Rather than a great war between two Sects, there are at least five Covenants, and while they don't exactly play nice with each other, they all exist in a rough detente and are capable of sharing a city.

It also enforces the personal horror bit more than Masquerade ever did, and generally has less elders running about.

>>48920782
First edition of Masquerade was strong on personal horror.

>>48920644
The Principle I'm pretty sure is an 'it'
The God Machine is very much an it.

>>48920644

But there's new clans, clans with the same name but probably different, new sects, probably new disciplines etc. Too much shit to bother with. I don't even dislike VtM mechanics, or care about mechanics that much to begin with.

>>48920650
I know, but in this hypothetical scenario that has the second biggest country in Spain controled by the Camarilla, the hidden ones could potentially seek refuge and even sire (if one of my players wants to be Lasombra) in Barcelona.

>>48920752
If the babysitter was THAT androgynous father wouldn't have gotten her pregnant.

Mommy drinks now.

>>48920782
>it's your same "vampires have always lived among us and play around in their little secret societies" setup
Cool

>, but there's no canon origin for them as a whole and there's not a ton of backstory to go with.
That's...not as big of a deal as it seems at first.

>The Clans are now broad archetypes of what a vampire can be, and as such there are only five of them; the role of specific lineages with their own histories is instead filled by Bloodlines, which there are many more of.
I like this

>Rather than a great war between two Sects, there are at least five Covenants, and while they don't exactly play nice with each other, they all exist in a rough detente and are capable of sharing a city.
This seems like it merits more explanation. What's the deal with the Covenants? Have there always been the same five?

>It also enforces the personal horror bit more than Masquerade ever did, and generally has less elders running about.
That's pretty cool.

>>48920660
Just buy Vampire: the Requiem Second Edition.
Each Covenant gets its own type of blood magic, though the main two are Catholic rites or bloody Pagan rituals.

>>48920709
Everyone made the decision to fall. It's always a conscious choice. And, yeah, they don't worry about becoming a monster, but they are worried about losing what they've worked for.

>>48920714
>>48920725
>>48920824
"God" may be a neutral term, and the God-Machine doesn't have a gender, but it's still taking the role of the paternalistic deity that Western culture associates with the term.
I mean, the whole point of it is that it's supposed to invoke the Judeo-Chrislamic God.
The Principle likewise is invoking that kind of God figure.

>>48920725
>when it's always a "Mother" it just gets stale.
It's almost as if the feminine was associated with the creation of life for some reason...

>>48920846
>>48920752
>>48920846
The Dark Mother and the God-Machine have nothing to do with each other. That's literally stated. "They are not kin".
Also, the father is Urfarah, since the Dark Mother is Luna

>>48920826
>But there's new clans, clans with the same name but probably different, new sects, probably new disciplines etc. Too much shit to bother with. I don't even dislike VtM mechanics, or care about mechanics that much to begin with.
That shit is barely any work at all. Also, I've found that bad mechanics can ruin a game even when people don't realize it.

>>48920816
That's because the first edition didn't make the shit like the Sabbat playable.

>>48920894
>Also, the father is Urfarah, since the Dark Mother is Luna

Hey

Fuck you

>>48920772
Considering I played a Salubri in an unrelated Dark Ages game, that could be pretty fun. He was a actually a healer but that's not important.

>>48920894
>Also, I've found that bad mechanics can ruin a game even when people don't realize it.

Probably, but never happened to me playing VtM.

>>48920894
>judeo-chrislamic
You can just say Abrahamic

Also I'm pretty sure the God-Machine is supposed to invoke whatever god is useful. Which would differ around the world and in different time periods.

>>48920911
I only said an old Warrior Elder because I'm envisioning this ancient dude or dudette being super miffed about the modern Salubri Antitribu going full-shithead with their new Sabbat pals.

Like if your Grand-dad was an ancient superpaladin who returned from beyond the grave to talk shit about your life choices.


But Healers are way cool too.

>>48920933
That's because you're playing VtM, where everything is shit so you don't mind/realize.

>>48920894
it's not paternalistic anything. it's a machine, it's mindset is cold and alien, and it doesn't even look down on people - it can't even see that far down conceptually.

also I think the babysitter thing went over your head. it was one of those things people call jokes.

>>48920944
Yeah, same god as the balmarians and muslims. Literally the same god: the rest is just how many prophets have we had and what the best way to oppress for a given climate is.


But I fully agree that bad mechanics can fuck everything up. When even the background fluff is fighting against mechanics every step of the way (like the usurpation being impossible), it kinda kicks suspension of disbelief in the fucking teeth.

>>48920886
>What's the deal with the Covenants? Have there always been the same five?
There are five main default Covenants:
>Heirarchy vampires that are basically the Camarilla and like rigid structure
>Firebrand vampires who are basically the Anarchs and want something approaching vampire egalitarianism
>Strict religious vampires who are kind of like the Sabbat and feel they were cursed by God for sin and must now Scared Straight mortals onto the path of the righteous
>Pagan vampires who worship a bloody Goddess figure and embrace their monstrosity (in a relatively positive way).
>Mad scientist vampires who want to become BETTER more fucked up and powerful vampires styled after Dracula

There are also a few antagonist Covenants:
>Literally just the Sabbat devil worshiper vampires
>Strange antagonistic hive minded vampires who have three contradictory truths presented in their supplement

But the thing is, each area tends to have different Covenants or even just different expressions of the main ones. Tokyo has three vampire organizations (and one Hunter one) that serve as half Megacorp half criminal syndicate. One 1e book presents a gang of Vampire bikers. There's a heretical cult that merges the pagan group and the Catholic group. Everything is just a suggestion for you to go off of, not something strict and "this is what the world is like", the way that Camarilla and Sabbat are global in Masquerade.

The pure = Nazis?

>>48920886
>What's the deal with the Covenants? Have there always been the same five?

Covenants are basically support groups and religious/political movements all in one; they're who you learn things from, and who you owe. The Invictus are going to feel a lot like the Camarilla, as a hierarchy of feudal lords who primarily fawn over wealth and political influence. The Carthian Movement are a lot like the Anarchs, a bunch of firebrands who want reform and equality; some of them even want to do away with the Masquerade. The Lancea Sanctum is a sort of debased Catholic church that believes vampires are cursed by God, but their divine task is to punish sinful mortals and make them fearful. The Circle of the Crone is a loose grouping of pagan cults who accept and revel in their own monstrosity. Rounding out the group are the Ordo Dracul, occult scientists who wish to improve upon and transcend the base vampiric state with strange experiments.

These five are the most common in the Western world by the modern day, but the oldest among them only dates back to the latest days of the Roman Republic; we know of several extinct covenants, and the non-Western world likely has its own.

>>48921051
Well, less killing the jews, more use the jews to further your aims, even if that means making breeding farms to get more of them that respect you above all others.

>>48920944
>>48920976
>>48921009
I mean that in our real world, the God-machine is meant to bring to mind the Old Testament God to we, the players.

>also I think the babysitter thing went over your head. it was one of those things people call jokes.
I know it's hard for you, but stop being incompetent.

>(like the usurpation being impossible),
What? What game are we talking about here?

>>48920953
Yeah that's what I was thinking, just making it a warrior. It wasn't a conventional healer so it would work without changing the character much.

Or maybe a healer would be even more butt devastated about the anti-tribu warriors.

>>48920588
At the risk of being reductive: The true lore of Mummy is like a Cosmic Layer Cake made of Pettiness and Failure.

>>48921030
>>48921058
Huh. That's pretty cool, I guess. So Requiem's just all about being flexible and modular and shit, right?

>>48920894
>It's almost as if the feminine was associated with the creation of life for some reason...


Hello Aspdel/Asdel/Aspel (however you spell it). I realized it was you due to snark.

Also
> Why no Dark Freyr? Dark Dick-guy who spooges evil critters? that would be the shit. Giant black dong.

>>48920756
>Eh

I've seen you around. "Eh" is your thing, innit?

>>48920725
I mentally substitute Dark Mother with Shub-Niggurath, but for now I have no idea where Beast is going.

>>48918732
>Strix in anything but FUCK OFF WITH THIS TIER

>>48921175
>Eh

*Shrugs*

I don't even know how much I've used it in these threads.

>>48921176
>I mentally substitute Dark Mother with Shub-Niggurath


That's cuz you know wut's gud.

>>48920752
Ammut stands outside the window, menacingly.

>>48921134

Exactly. Everyone is fucking over everyone else and then crying victim when it happens to them. It's a game about enslaving people to feel better about being a slave yourself, from the gods on down to the cultists.

>>48921154

Essentially. There's a lot less "and then Archbishop Examplename of the Sabbat did this thing to famed Brujah Anarch Huehueha in Portland in 1897" and more "here's a lot of vague, contradictory things you can use for inspiration."

The VtR 2e corebook is all you really need, but Danse Macabre goes absolutely crazy on the modular stuff (it might be my all-time favorite CofD book), Blood Sorcery expands on blood magic beyond what the Lancea and Circle already do, and then Requiem for Rome is an incredible historical setting. Dark Eras also has an Elizabethan setting that was pretty great, New Wave Requiem does a really fun 1980s America setting, and the Dark Eras Companion coming soon has a Black Death setting as well.

>>48921196
Well over 12. But that's just my count.

I will call you...Ehbro.
Yes. Ehbro.
Sounds exotic.
Much desert land
Great hotblood

>>48921154
>>48921205

I also forgot Ancient Mysteries, which is a collection of diverse historical settings and neat plot hooks, VII, which is a bunch of contradictory explanations for the setting's primary bogeyman, and Night Stalkers, a Hunter supplement about vampires and vampire hunters.

>>48921154
That's basically the mission statement. It gives many people choice paralysis, though.

>>48921205
>>48921238
>>48921293
Neat. So with some prep work, and judiciously making some good choices, you can build whatever chronicle you want, with nary a Sascha Vykos in sight?

Have they published anything with a Western slant for Requiem?

>>48921238
There are also the Clanbooks. They consist mostly of in-character writings and documents, but they nail the feel of the game.

>>48921362

Western as in cowboys and gunslingers? There;s a book called Shadows of Mexico that deals slightly with that, though it's mostly about modern Mexico proper and some Aztec stuff rather than the Wild West. Ancient Mysteries has a whole chapter on a Westward traveling party that has a few associated Bloodlines, though.

Nothing stopping you from having fun with just the corebook to make a deadeye gunsligner who uses Celerity to always shoot first and Auspex to never miss.

>>48921392

Mekhet clanbook is the only one I've read, but between the creepy fluff and the appendix on running a cult it's well worth the read.

>>48918732
I got a lot of (You)s with this for minimum effort. Left out enough to piss people off, no rationale whatsoever shown. Next time I promise I will do a more believable and in depth tier list, but I cant promise anyone will agree with it.

>>48921427
Cool. Yeah, I was thinking a Western game would be new for our group, so I may look into something like that. Only downside is low population kills the vampire society.

>>48921506

That could be an advantage for your chronicle; no elders to much things up, no power bases to upset save for the Natives, just your coterie and a handful of rivals following the blood out West and trying to ingrain yourself in the boom towns in the hopes that a city will grow up around you. You could have a lot of fun with a shorter chronicle set in the Old West, and then flash forward to century and a half or so to today and have the old player characters as the elders that predate the city and own all the mortals there.

While not CofD, there's a FATE game called Blood on the Trail you may want to look into, and then oWoD had Tales From The Trail: Mexico, which did some neat stuff you could use for inspiration.

Which is better mechanically: Werewolf the Forsaken 2e or Werewolf the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary?

>>48921506
Fresh Vampires can live off animal blood, so they're fine as long as they have large herds of cattle to attach to.
They can just about subsist in more bustling cities, by grazing on travellers.
In less populated towns they might have to trade anonymity for control and be an open secret among their Mortal herds.

>>48921051
The Ivory Claws are the only Pure Tribe that you can really draw Nazi parallels to.

>>48921588

I prefer Forsaken, but they're wildly different games.

>>48921629
I know they're wildly different in terms of lore, but if I run either I'd throw out all the lore and bring in my Original Canon Donut Steel anyway, so that I don't mind so much.

How do they different in terms of gameplay?

>>48921588
>oWoD
>better at anything

Better at being shit, definitely.

>>48920093
I think he meant 'anybody, but AS a vampire'.

>>48920301
Why? Primordial monster mothers are the bread and butter of mythology. Lilith, Echidna, Tiamat, Gaia...

>>48921646

Apocalypse: You're the chosen warriors of the planet fighting a doomed battle against the evils of corporate greed, pollution, and technology. Every session is a series of heavy metal album posters.

Forsaken: You're the heirs to a sacred duty of keeping the peace between the worlds of flesh and spirit, managing your gang-pack and protecting your territory.

Do you want apocalyptic hyperviolence or so you want a personal struggle?

>>48921698
Those were badass.

Beasts are pissy little bullies that can't take a bit of criticism though.

The great battle between Marduk and Tiamat they are not.

>>48921646
>How do they different in terms of gameplay?

oWerewolf dips way deeper into rage and magic as mechanical themes; werewolves can walk around in crinos (the warform) without any trouble, can shift into the umbra anywhere they can find a mirror, get 5 extra actions a round if they're angry enough, etc.

nWerewolf is a little more grounded in your pack as a vital support structure and the hunt as a mechanical thing; balancing your spiritual and flesh self is important to keep Harmony in check, and there's less "raw power" in each werewolf but they're exponentially more powerful the more of them are working together.

oWerewolves, mechanically, are self-destructing terrorists and expected to fight like it. nWerewolves, mechanically, are pack-hunters with lots of social expectation.

>>48921713
Conquering Heroes is right behind the corner. We'll see where they go with that.

>>48921583
>>48921612
Good points. I'll start researching.

>>48921713
And that has anything to do with that guy's 'oh, Dark Mother, welp this is dumb...' comment how?

>>48921706
What I'm planning is a campaign about the survivors of a pack that got wiped out, being on the run from the FBI after one of the younger packmates lost control and butchered a bunch of people in the middle of a college campus. Less a story of protecting the balance of nature or some upcoming apocalyptic battle, more a personal story of people who have lost everything trying to find a new home.

>>48921809

That's very much core to what Forsaken in.

>>48921175
>I realized it was you due to snark.
I wouldn't need to snark if you didn't say stupid things. Dark "Dick-guys who spooge evil critters" isn't really a thing with much historicity. Although the Nile is Ra's cum.

>>48921154
That's basically nWoD/CofD in a nutshell, yeah. It's got a setting, but it's more "stuff happened if you want it to have happened and exists if you want it to have existed". There's backstory and history to the factions (the Free Council was formed when a bunch of Seers asked some unaffiliated Mages if they wanted to make the Technocracy. The ensuing massacre war was known as "The Great Refusal") but nothing is global, nothing is unanimous. You won't have something like ALL Gangrel everywhere, even in remote parts of the world, agreeing to leave the Camarilla.

>>48921362
You could have Sascha Vykos. You could have no Sascha Vykos. You could have a city where everything looks like the corebook's default factions, or you could have a city ruled by a Nameless monster that lurks in the darkness and kills any vampires who join up in a group larger than four people, try to leave the city, or enter a certain part of the city. You could have a city where there are no Covenants and the Clans are ordered in rigid structure where clan determines your duty. You could have a city ruled by criminal zaibatsu instead of Covenants. You could have a city where one of the Covenants is secretly a heresy playing at being legitimate so that neighboring cities don't try to purge them. You could have a city where there's a group of not-quite-Kindred vampires that are so numerous for mysterious reasons that they're allowed to be part of the city's organizations.

Those last ones are all examples from the VtR 2e book, by the way.

>>48921392
>>48921445
Watch Gentleman Gamer's Guide to the Clans.

>>48921713
I wish people who complain about Beast would at least remotely attempt to discuss it in good faith instead of this weak ass bait.

>>48921713

Beasts are great antagonists for a Hunter, Mage, or Changeling game that deals a lot with the Astral. I'm just still trying to figure them out as protagonists.

>>48921792
>Lilith, Echidna, Tiamat, Gaia...

>>48921894
>Changelings in the Astral
Isn't the Skein explicitly unrelated to the Mage Astral?
Also, Protagonist Beasts requires the same kind of game type as Hunter. Or Mage, really, though with less incentive or interesting things to explore.

>>48920301
That was far from worst shit in that book.
On the one hand you are pussy that you couldn't handle even this weaksauce shit on the other hand you dodged the bullet of the really bad shit.

>>48920437
>>48920466
>>48920494
Luna is quite a bitch, too. Look how she screwed Pure.

Okay, thanks to Dave B, Changing Breeds is totally still canon.

What mechanical part of Changing breeds worked the least?
What fluff part of Changing Breeds worked the least?

>>48922218
>Luna is quite a bitch, too. Look how she screwed Pure.

Luna didnt do anything to the Pure, they rip the Auspices out all by themselves.

>>48922225

The Baal-Hadad are from another book, right?

>>48922307
War against the Pure?

I would pay good money to have geckopirateship never fucking post again

File: _89062758_89061500.jpg (43KB, 624x351px) Image search: [Google]

43KB, 624x351px

>>48922555

Okay, if Forsaken weren't doing border patrol all the time how wuicly would World of Darkness completely fall apart?
How much could this be scaled back to be less Masquerade ending without making border patrolling entirely irreleavant for Werewolves?
What other motives could be used to motivate Werewolves fight spirits other than "oath to the moon" and/or "you are good guys"?

>>48921854
>I wouldn't need to snark if you didn't say stupid things

How is asking for something outside of the "Dark Mother" archetype Goddess stupid?

>>48921854
>Although the Nile is Ra's cum.

I'm pretty sure it's Osiris. That or Ra put him in charge of it.

>>48922622
>Okay, if Forsaken weren't doing border patrol all the time how wuicly would World of Darkness completely fall apart?
>How much could this be scaled back to be less Masquerade ending without making border patrolling entirely irreleavant for Werewolves?
Probably not completely fall apart, since there are obviously parts of the world with no werewolf presence at all and they haven't descended into bedlam, but spirits would get more aggressive and more overt in influencing the material world to feast on its tasty essence.

It'd be less like a nature reserve, with some people watching out for it, and more like a hyper-aggressive "all natural" ecosystem, where everything's a predator except for humanity: the only thing keeping them in check in relation to us is OTHER predators that want to eat us.

>What other motives could be used to motivate Werewolves fight spirits other than "oath to the moon" and/or "you are good guys"?
The fact that spirits are mad useful allies. Hunting one to dominate it into working for you + favors from any spirits that appreciate you chaining their rival? Totally worth it.

>>48922218
>Luna is quite a bitch, too. Look how she screwed Pure.
Literally nothing?

>>48922225
The fluff problem with Changing Breeds is that it tried to be like Apocalypse. The mechanical problem with Changing Breeds is literally everything, because it was a 1e blue book.

>>48922555
Isn't she banned?

>>48922663
That's not what was asked, though. Someone said it was dumb that that trope kept showing up. I was pointing out that no fucking shit it keeps showing up for a reason.

>>48922622
They don't exactly do Border Patrol, and the Pure will outright fuck up the borders in their territory to try and recreate Pangaea. Werewolves don't hunt Spirits because of the Oath of the Moon or because they're good guys. They Hunt because Urum Da Takas. The Wolf Must Hunt. Period. Not spirits, anything.

>>48922805

People rarely get permabans on the OPP forums. For some reason, they don't use the term "probation".

File: 3523523521526.png (50KB, 186x152px) Image search: [Google]

50KB, 186x152px

>>48922805
>Someone said it was dumb that that trope kept showing up.

That wasn't said either. It was said that it was stale, and then admitted in the same post that yes, feminine is associated with cranking out kids.

It was literally lamenting that they don't seem to wish to break out of this cycle. Like, why not another type of goddess? There's historical/mythical precedent for that, why not use something like that?

>>48922868
Yeah, but she asked to be permabanned after bitching that Alchemists are the good guys and everyone should be Centimani or something.

>>48922965
>Like, why not another type of goddess? There's historical/mythical precedent for that, why not use something like that?
Because others exist in the WoD, but this specific one is not that. Besides, The Dark Mother, the Crone, etcetera are all referencing the same tradition of "Mother Of All Monsters" like Tiamat and Lilith and Ekidna. If you want other Goddesses, there's Isis, who created the first Nepri. There's also Inana, who's in both the Tammuz origin and the Daeva one. There are also Vampires who take after Kali and so on.

>>48923135

নতুন সূত্র

>>48922967

No one gets what they want in the Chronicles of Darkness.

On a Promethean front, Extempores are basically the catch-all "weird shit that don't fall under the other established Lineages" breed, right?

Well, with that in mind, how feasible from a crunch perspective and a lore perspective would be a Lineage inspired by Swamp-Thing & Man-Thing, which mostly occurs as a freak accident if a Tammuz tries its generative rite in a swamp or rainforest?

What a freak Lineage born when a Galateid unwittingly used a woman suffering vesperitillius (long story short; lycanthropy of the "I turn into a horny sexy wolf-man/woman with a tendency to eat my lovers" variety as an STD)?

Or a Lineage of "Moreaus", which are what you get when you either try and reshape an animal corpse into a humanoid shape before animating it or add animal parts to your Frankenstein?

>>48923531
Sorry, second line got screwed up: "What about a freak Lineage born when a Galateid unwittingly used a woman suffering vesperitillius (long story short; lycanthropy of the "I turn into a horny sexy wolf-man/woman with a tendency to eat my lovers" variety as an STD) for the generative rite?

>>48921748
Will this supplement actually Heroes a threat mechanically?

>>48922361
That would be the one, yes.

>>48923531
>>48923571
Extempore are less "alteration of an existing lineage" and more "weird expressions of the Divine Fire". A little boy's imaginary friend or a living sandstorm or someone created by a volcanic eruption, for instance. Or like Nana Natsu, a local culture's collective obsession with a vocaloid causing the Divine Fire to animate it.

>>48923947
>Or like Nana Natsu, a local culture's collective obsession with a vocaloid causing the Divine Fire to animate it.

Oh god, I loathe Hill's 2E Tokyo setting so fucking much.

>>48924022
It's honestly the fucking worst. The man apparently lives there but he can't get anything but surface level bullshit about the place. It was approaching Gypsy levels awful last time I read it.