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Robindaybird posted:While Jack's scheming and manipulative, Is this even proveable? Do people say this because he played a deadly prank on Lacroix or whoever was greedy enough to open the sarcophagus? The fact that the sarcophagus went on its Amazing Journey around LA really has nothing to do with Jack. He's just an anarchist.
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Mar 5, 2015 21:46
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MartianAgitator posted:Is this even proveable? Do people say this because he played a deadly prank on Lacroix or whoever was greedy enough to open the sarcophagus? The fact that the sarcophagus went on its Amazing Journey around LA really has nothing to do with Jack. He's just an anarchist. Jack knows Thaumaturgy. He's a scheming, manipulative bastard for sure.
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Mar 5, 2015 22:13
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TheMcD posted:Jack knows Thaumaturgy. He's a scheming, manipulative bastard for sure. Generally kindred that aren't don't last long.
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Mar 5, 2015 23:02
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  Alright, we're back, this time in wiiiiidescreen! Unbeknownst to me, the mod seems to have included some sort of widescreen patch, which ended up squishing the game. So now we're at maximum resolution shrunk down to the same height, but with more width, of course. Let's see how this turns out. Anyway, we have things to be doing, as this update will be going through most of the Santa Monica content in one fell swoop - the quests that don't have any really interesting or major changes, that is. To start off, we grab three blue blood bags, a normal watch, 100 bucks and some Desoxyn. Apparently, Desoxyn is some type of methamphetamine, particularly used against ADHD and obesity in extreme cases. Fuckin' A. The gently caress would that even do for a vampire? I'll have to use that at some point - so far, I've just been treating it like any other vendor trash.  Here's one of those simple, yet far-reaching changes - Blood Buff now raises stats by 3 instead of 2, making lock picking that much easier. After putting the 3 XP we got from the tutorial into Security, we can already open the doors in the apartment.  The room we'll later need to check out for the Southland Slasher/Muddy questline only has a fancy watch. The other one...     Note the more detailed blood textures. We find some interesting stuff here - some raw human flesh (which would be useful if we were playing Nagaraja or Tzimisce, but as is it's just something we can pawn off for a few bucks), 75 bucks, some morphine (which will immediately come in handy when we go to Mercurio's) and a new melee weapon, the "felling axe". I love the felling axe, simply because its name is infinitely more  than a boring fire axe. On the way out, I take the time to check some item descriptions. Judging by this, I guess it just restores some health?  No, I don't know why the Morphine bottle has a Research requirement. It just has, shut up and live with it. Also, I don't understand how exactly you can fail to read the big letters right there. Makes Victoria here look a little bit stupid. And yes, even though we don't know what Morphine is, we can still give it to Mercurio just fine. Internal consistency? What's that?     Here's some more descriptions. They strangely switch between little quips like in the original game and what could just as well have been copy-pasted off Wikipedia.  You know, we are a bit short on blood...  You're not exactly what I wanted, but choosers can eat beggars. And then I remembered that bums are literally worthless to Victoria, since the Giovanni flaw, which I must correct as not being "having to drain 50% of the victim's blood meter before seeing any benefit", but "having to drain for X seconds before seeing any benefit", means that it's impossible to get any blood from them. God drat. At least with Ventrue, you could take a chance if you were desperate, but with Giovanni, you're just straight up poo poo outta luck. Anyway, we step out and see Mercurio dragging himself into his apartment.  We then use Intimidate on this guy for some quick cash, then force him to give us his fancy watch... only we don't actually get it. Boo.  On our way to Mercurio, we see more of those new blood textures...  ...and I'm really not sure what I'm supposed to be seeing here. Did some of his internals spill out or something?  Nothing new with Mercurio, though we can save some time by giving him the Morphine right away. Next stop, the beach house.  Note the shoulder pads on this guy here - that's actually an item we can use after we pilfer it off his dead body. It's one of the "equipment" items that has a benefit and a drawback, meaning that whenever you need to remove the drawback, you need to drop the item, remember where you left it, do whatever you needed to do, then retrieve it again. poo poo sucks. This one in particular blows because it's a bonus to Bash and Lethal Soak (something we want in combat) and a malus to Appearance (something we don't want out of combat). Since combat and non-combat normally take turns fairly regularly in this game until the endgame, this leads to a whole bunch of dropping and picking-back-upping. Also, during this playthrough, I figured out a fourth solution to the Astrolite problem (gatz listed three in update 4 - 1) Killing everybody, 2) Sneaking, cutting the power, then stealing it, and 3) Talking). It's suboptimal, since it means you won't be getting the money, but it's very convenient. You know how it works? It's simple:   Just smash the window, grab the Astrolite, and loving leg it. Of course, since I want to give Mercurio his money back and get some goodies from inside the house, so...  Potence-fueled axe murder spree engaged! After clearing everything out, the goodies we grabbed are the shoulder pads, an assortment of melee weapons and the .38 pistol, some vendor trash, Mercurio's money and a book that raised Firearms, which is always welcome.  On the way back, I get the thinblood quest going, make a mental note to pick up some blood to sell to that gullible gently caress and grab the "holy stake".  Mercurio gets his money back, setting up a future business relationship that's going to be great, I'm sure of it. I however make a bit of a mistake by forgetting to ask him about what a ghoul is. This becomes relevant a bit later. We also get the tip about Trip selling weapons, so let's go check out what his inventory's like.  Note that extra security guard that's there for absolutely no reason. This mod seems to do a lot of that - just add more people to fill space. Not really complaining, it just seems weird.  Trip's arsenal is just as poo poo as it is in vanilla. The machete might be interesting, but we already have the axe and will have the katana by the end of the update, so it's kind of pointless. I mostly just drop off all the poo poo I'm not going to be using. One quick detour back home to pick up the werewolf blood quest and we're off to the hospital.  Bitch, move, I've got important vampire poo poo to be doing and can't deal with your "wait in line" crap right now.  "Stay with me, I can save you!" ...except we can't. Turns out that if you don't learn about ghouling in some way, either through Mercurio or Knox, you can't actually do anything and you have to wait until you learn about ghouling, and only then can you actually do it. It makes sense, but if you're just going through the game after already having gone through it, this could end up tripping you up and making you think your game was suddenly bugged. Guess that's something for the future then. Anyway, we go through the standard claptrap - blackmail the doctor, loot the place for some meds, drop down to the blood bank to pick up three packs to later sell, and then head up to grab the werewolf blood.  In doing so, this jackass gives me a hard time. I talk to him, dominate him to make him open the door to the controlled substances, he turns around, turns around again, tells me this area is off limits, I have to dominate him again to make him give me his keys, he then goes to open the door to the controlled substances...  ...and then I get tired of his poo poo and eat his face off.  For some reason, there is raw human flesh in the medical safe. I don't want to know.  Finally, we grab the werewolf blood, but we're not going to be turning it in, oh no... we have plans for that blood. Next stop, the diner, to pick up some extra cash and advance that que-  ...uh, what?  I... Don't ever speak to me again, do you understand... Go-o-od... And then he kicks the door and just leaves. Well, judging from a bit of looking around, it seems to be that this was supposed to be a reference to the Kurgan from Highlander. In fact, these dialogue lines seem to be directly ripped from the movie - I've never seen it and don't have any quick reference material to check this suspicion, but the audio for these lines sound like they were taken from a movie. This character has no other lines of dialogue and probably will never show up again. This is what we're working with, folks.  On my way to pick up the quest with Carson and Gimble, I notice this truck here. Was this always here? I can't remember a big tanker truck being here before.  Looks like Kilpatrick also stocked up on security. Man, looks like crime must be up. Anyway, we pick up the quest and move on, pick up the stuff from Rolf Toten's car, then make our way to the hospital again to free Lily.    The football pads make these scenes so much better, and the wide-eyed stare the Giovanni have going all the time is great as well. Nothing else really notable. Next stop, the Asylum. I waited to go there to make sure I had enough Seduction for the best path with the Jeanette/Therese situation. That, and I wanted to get the two blood dolls here, since it seems like a lack of blood is going to be a running theme here.  Jeanette's outfit seems to have changed a bit, but nothing really major, just some color changes as far as I can tell. And then we talk to...  ...to...  ...Christ, Knox, what happened to you? Man, you look like a right twat now. That look really doesn't suit you. Anyway, we pick up the Asian vampire quest, get Knox to tell us how ghouls work for later and make our way upstairs to trigger the Ocean Hotel quest...  ...after getting down on the dance floor, that is.  That, and talking to the bartender because I forgot about that. Looks like alcohol consumption is up too, judging by the second bartender - maybe a direct relation to crime being up?  Do mirrors actually work in this game? I've forgotten. And if they don't, how does the Lasombra flaw work? In fact, how does it work in general? What areas are there that have a lot of mirrors that you'd have to avoid? Are there any that are crucial to completing the game? Are there alternatives for those areas? Hm, I'll have to try and keep an eye out for that - never thought about it before now.  Anyway, the conversation with Therese goes off without a hitch and we go, grab the key to Foxy Boxes...  ...ghoul Heather on the way out and make our way to fight the Kuei-jin guy.  This fight is mostly unchanged, though his weapons have changed, which might explain why he kicked my rear end pretty hard despite having Defense 5.  This is just the replacement for the first submachinegun - seems better than the vanilla version from what I could tell, but ammo is scarce.  But here's the kicker - we don't get the weaker katana from this guy, we get the proper one, which gives our melee capabilities a pretty nice boost. Sure, our Melee skill still blows chunks, but that can be fixed fairly quickly.  Finally, we get our XP for the Lily quest and sell this guy some crap to make some dosh.  And here's a shot of our character sheet at the end of the update. I've been trying to do a bit of a balanced build in the beginning, and will specialize on combat and disciplines later on, but we'll see how that goes. Next time, we'll look at the quests that had some more substantial changes made to them and maybe get to Downtown, who knows?
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Mar 6, 2015 00:25
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I'm playing a Lasombra in the mod. I'm not entirely sure how the mirror thing works, as while I have some theories they could just as easily be changes to the game or gently caress-ups because of the mod. Spoilers, I guess, not sure if they are but welp. Certain locations just seem to cause Masquerade violations for me for whatever reason. Club Confession is one of them: if I literally do anything but rush inside to talk to Venus (or the Ghoul) such as feeding on the blood doll, wandering around, or attempting to dance I get a masquerade violation and usually get the cop and Venus permanently angry at me, which is understandably annoying. The Internet Cafe in Hollywood also seems like it was causing some problems for me, as if I walk by the bathroom door if it's open suddenly +MASQUERADE VIOLATION+ and a bunch of screaming humans. In addition, I am running into a *lot* of loving hunters on the streets despite having full masquerade. Not sure if they're actually hunters, but there are trenchcoat wearing guys who will decide to try and murder me in front of the cops if they notice me, and in Hollywood they've been upgraded to be practically paramilitary with assault weaponry. I've asked a few friends playing the mod and they say they haven't seen any of this, though they're playing Settites or other non-Lasombra. Also, it might just be me but if the game's running for a while with the mod on the game likes to have a freakout and replace random things in the environment (tables, computers, cars, couches, door knobs) with junk items. I've seen cars in Downtown replaced with paintings, the internet cafe has several doorknobs and computers replaced with pizza slices (which incidentally is not something you want to see on the mainline quest to find the video tape, because spoilers you can't use a pizza slice to check email), and the Downtown Haven get filled with more loving paintings.
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Mar 6, 2015 02:55
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Mountain Lightning posted:
Are you sure you're not actually a Malkavian antitribu instead of a Keeper?
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Mar 6, 2015 11:55
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Level 1: Eyes of the Serpent - Immobilize someone with your gaze. 
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Mar 6, 2015 12:05
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Mountain Lightning posted:Also, it might just be me but if the game's running for a while with the mod on the game likes to have a freakout and replace random things in the environment (tables, computers, cars, couches, door knobs) with junk items. I've seen cars in Downtown replaced with paintings, the internet cafe has several doorknobs and computers replaced with pizza slices (which incidentally is not something you want to see on the mainline quest to find the video tape, because spoilers you can't use a pizza slice to check email), and the Downtown Haven get filled with more loving paintings. Oh that's not the mod, that's just something the game does sometimes.
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Mar 6, 2015 14:21
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Zeniel posted:Level 1: Eyes of the Serpent - Immobilize someone with your gaze. I like that last resolution and size because it looks like it's from a 90's DOS game. Pope Guilty fucked around with this message at 14:29 on Mar 6, 2015 |
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Mar 6, 2015 14:27
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Pope Guilty posted:I like that last resolution and size because it looks like it's from a 90's DOS game. All that Lands of Lore I've been playing must be rubbing off on me.
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Mar 6, 2015 17:17
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Mountain Lightning posted:Masquerade violations As soon as you break the Masquerade, the mod will spawn hunters to come after you. They don't go away if you get a Masquerade redemption. The more you break it, the more hunters go after you. I'm not sure if getting redemptions resets this downward spiral. See how easy it is to get a violation, be forced into a criminal violation fighting hunters, get another Masquerade violation from fighting cops which spawns more hunters, etc. Gameplay.
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Mar 6, 2015 17:18
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The problem is that hunters were already spawned. I got my first masquerade violation in Club Confession from ?????, whereas I saw my first hunter shortly after leaving the haven, wandering the streets between the parking garage, diner, and Kilpatrick's bounty hunter office. At first I thought it was just a new model, but nope, he pulls a gun on me by the parking garage and attempts to dust me, and when I hit him back +CRIMINAL VIOLATION+ and I pulled every cop on me with that stunt. This of course quickly lead to final death. In my experience, the hunters generally respawn and occasionally switch locations after a map transition, and there's been one in Santa Monica, two or three in Downtown, and two on the streets/back alleys and two in the sewers of Hollywood (and those assholes are packing fully auto weapons that can and will dust your rear end). Honestly it's been making me want to turn on notarget when I'm on the streets moving around, because there's nothing worse than walking past an alleyway and suddenly taking a full-auto burst.
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Mar 6, 2015 21:09
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TheMcD posted:Yeah, the big problem with the theory I've got going is that it's born from the conclusion - "well, I think Grout is the 'friend', so obviously that has to mean he survived" - and built from there. That, and I don't want to believe that loving everything is traced back to Caine. That, and I really don't find him to be the type to be writing cryptic e-mails. Same with Jack - is he really the type to be busting out chess metaphors of all things? Strauss is viable, but seems fairly content just being the Tremere Primogen - you practically have to convince him to revolt against LaCroix, so he wouldn't be the one stringing you along since the beginning. Just finished reading through the thread and I have some thoughts on the Grout situation to share. (I do think Cain is clearly the best fit for the e-mails, though: Grout's mansion doesn't suggest he's embraced the advent of the computer, there's no indication that he's a chess player, and there's a clear progression toward "pawn with a choice to make" in Caine's dialogue that's also carried in the e-mail thread. Strauss is a reasonable alternative, though why then did he leave a paper note with a message instead of just e-mailing like everyone else does? Double-bluff? Gary makes an interesting possibility, too.) A handful of keys to Grout: his wife is ill; he is obsessed with her; he knows his days are numbered as the voices intrude upon his perceptions. It seems a reasonable assumption that LaCroix is the threat, as I think we can rule out Gary and Strauss and the other two primogen we see leaving the meeting with LaCroix play no further part in events. Grout is not in a position to escape town. Key, then are two statements in his journal: the Faustian bargain which the voices forced him to make, and his concern over his wife. What is the bargain, with whom? And how exactly does he believe he is protecting his wife? TheMcD posted:I am no longer safe - I know it! The voices have proven themselves authentic, and I have withdrawn from the vampire society entirely. My absence will no doubt draw attention, but I could no longer hold my fragile composure around the ravenous eyes of my vampire peers, especially not around him! The voices compelled me to make what I fear is a Faustian bargain. But I had to, for their demands are constant and merciless. I have secluded myself within the mansion. I know he will strike out at me. He will go to any length to achieve his ambitions, and he knows that I know! I have taken precautions to protect my beloved wife. A cure will have to wait until our immediate safety is guaranteed. The mansion was constructed with security in mind, but at that time I was not privy to the full range of vampire capabilities! The voices echo in the twisted corridors of my psyche, dark whisperings of a macabre and formless menace, the approach of which portends an end, an end to all of this! "A cure will have to wait until our immediate safety is guaranteed" seems an important sentence because of its implications. "Our immediate safety" means both Grout and his wife, suggesting that his plans don't involve his own death or his wife's loss, which would render both safety and cure impossible. But what are the precautions he took? Arming and releasing his inmates and otherwise securing the mansion in case of attack? If that's the case, he seems to recognize the inadequacies of his defenses and the voices seem to be telling him the end is near (for him, or Gehenna?), which would imply he ended up trapped and relying on defenses he suspected couldn't work. But the implication is clearly that "immediate safety" is NOT guaranteed, and it's unclear how sitting and waiting to be killed will correct that situation. Presumably, then, he expected his situation to change soon in a way which would guarantee both his own safety and that of his wife. Sending for a hunter makes no sense as his Faustian bargain, then, for such a person would surely kill him, securing only his wife's safety. A bargain with the voices themselves also does nothing to guarantee future safety. Let's assume he can only make a bargain with characters we meet in the game. With whom could he make a bargain which would guarantee his safety in time and which he would consider "Faustian?" Keep in mind that the other party presumably should at least intend to do something to help or else Grout's insight would make him suspicious; at the same time, he clearly has distaste for the other party. Assume he makes no deal with the woman who subsequently murders him (if that's what happened). His reasonable alternatives appear to be the Sabbat, the Anarchs, or some independent. The Tzimisce would have provided flesh-crafted security, so he's unlikely. Beckett doesn't get involved in politics. Nines would make an ironic person to deal with, but he seems not quite dark enough for a "Faustian bargain." Caine? Not impossible, but depressing. I'm hardly certain about this theory, but my money would be on Jack. Grout's personality definitely doesn't match Jack's and a deal with him could well be described as Faustian, especially if Grout has some sense of the shape of Jack's plot. Jack would truthfully be able to assure Grout that he's going to take care of LaCroix, which will secure Grout's "immediate" safety but not his long-term safety, whereas faking his death or fleeing town would provide safety past that horizon. All Grout has to do is wait a few days and LaCroix goes boom. LaCroix foils the plan with his unexpected alliance with the Kuel-Jin, and as Ming-Xiao could be described fairly as "a macabre and formless menace," the whisperings would have accurately warned Grout of his fate in a way which he took to mean the formless dread menacing the entire city, not the end to his mansion, his wife, and his plans to cure her. Jack's hardly likely to take a moment to mourn, especially as he fulfilled his end of the deal. So what did Grout provide Jack with in exchange? The sarcophagus and key are nicely positioned to tear the city apart, so what more does Jack need? My suspicion is that he's looking out for the PC, which would explain the convenient arrangement of recordings throughout the mansion (as TheMcD has noted, they paint a useful picture). The gains here are indirect and speak more to Caine's ends than to Jack's, though Jack does seem concerned with the PC's fate. Jack and Caine both want the sarcophagus to act as a test along with everything else, so they can't directly warn the PC not to open it, and Jack can't effectively warn the PC off LaCroix given his public association with the Anarchs. Grout's words might be more useful in that regard. Alternately, Grout invents one or more of those journal entries, replaces his wife with another woman and himself with a staked dupe and takes off. Ming-Xiao, when she talks to the PC later, never actually admits to killing Grout, but she does clearly indicate that LaCroix is the ambitious one Grout detected.
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Mar 11, 2015 04:34
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... Ming Xiao was the Faustian bargain. Grout finds out about LaCroix's dirty secret (that he's a diablerist and used that power as leverage for his Princedom) and realizes he can't go to any of the other Kindred with it, his paranoia had gone so deep, that he instead goes to the Kuei-Jin for protection. Ming Xiao, being a oval office, double-crosses Grout as a ploy to get in good with LaCroix and broker their "alliance" because she's a power player and had planned to set all the Kindred up to destroy each other from the inside so she could take over and clean up afterwards. LaCroix, being the pompous rear end that he is, hears about Grout's knowledge of his secret, thinks he'l be clever and use the Kuei-Jin to do his dirty work for him while also conveniently setting up Nines in the process, therefore setting up the board for LaCroix to instead wipe it clean... mainly because he's an rear end and totally underestimates the Kuei-Jin and thinks they can be controlled. It's only after the KJ reveal that they are master dickheads and have been playing him from the start (towards the end of the game, after you help him figure out that the Sabbat aren't the real threat that LaCroix needed to be worrying about this whole time when they try to steal the sarcophagus from the Giovanni) that LaCroix suddenly loses his poo poo and becomes frantic in his need to get his hands on the sarcophagus and open it up, so that he can eat whatever Methuseleh or Antedeluvian is in there and get the power he needs to take down the Kuei-Jin, who are now poised to overrun all of LA. This whole chain of events is laid out pretty clearly from the final run of conversations you have with LaCroix after the Giovanni mansion, Andrei at the end of the Hallowbrook, and Ming Xiao AFTER the Hallowbrook. If you do the Camarilla ending with Strauss and go talk to him pre-endgame, he also confirms most of this poo poo and argues it as his reasoning for just straight up taking LaCroix down in the name of the Camarilla, since diablerie and allying with the Kuei-Jin are basically pissing blood all over the Camarilla's tenets. You guys are terrible at unraveling video game plotlines. 
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Mar 11, 2015 05:12
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gently caress it, the Faustian bargain is OG, made with Mephistopheles (@TheRealMephistopheles), the cab driver is Cain from Kung Fu: The Legend Continues cause of course David Carradine is a vampire, and the emails are sent by vampire Deep Blue. mods knew
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Mar 11, 2015 06:35
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MartianAgitator posted:gently caress it, the Faustian bargain is OG, made with Mephistopheles (@TheRealMephistopheles), the cab driver is Cain from Kung Fu: The Legend Continues cause of course David Carradine is a vampire, and the emails are sent by vampire Deep Blue. To be fair, this is oWoD as gently caress. It has all the elements of a good oWoD conspiracy: Satan with a Twitter account, a real-life celebrity as a nigh-omnipotent vampire, and weird techno-fetishism disguised as some sort of magic. It... it all fits. 
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Mar 12, 2015 11:12
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JackNapier posted:Some of the model idea's seem to come from other games, the vampire who staked Victoria is very clearly Alex Mercer I can't think of a better reference to have for a Tzimisce.
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Mar 12, 2015 19:21
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BenRGamer posted:I can't think of a better reference to have for a Tzimisce. A very valid point, I don't think there is a better reference for what Tzimisce should aspire to be
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Mar 12, 2015 19:31
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 This update is brought to you by the fact that I keep forgetting that Sunkist actually has caffeine and choose to drink a fair amount of it when I really should be going to bed instead.  Alright, let's get to some of the stuff where things are actually noticeably different.  First stop, Carson's apartment. We pick up a bunch of junk and the key card for the tattoo parlor. I then proceed to head in the wrong direction and make a loop around the entire map before making it there. I've played through this game how many times now, and I still can't remember this poo poo.  On the way there, I talk to a prostitute to note that we can use Dominate to make her a follower. However, I don't like having followers with terminal  , so we pass her by. Also, I don't think this whole thing is all that well coded, and I don't want to invite bugs even more. Well, looks like the tattoo parlor didn't change much. Let's just move that box out of the way...  ...is that a loving skeleton?  OH GOD.  OH GOD AGAIN. And no, I don't know why this place is flooded with blood and has a dead prostitute in it. This might make sense later. Might. We pick up the call from Gimble and make an appointment. Time to head there!  On the way out, we find this note. I wonder what that statue might be...  Gimble is still Gimble.  However, he now has a computer here. I can't hack into it just yet, so getting into it will have to wait a bit.  Instead, we make our way down to rescue Carson. On the way there, we find this. No, I don't know why a dead alien is in the basement of Gimble's Prosthetics. It's there because why the gently caress not.  Furthermore, we find this baby. I said I was going to give credit where it's due, and this is one point where I have to say "good job". The shotguns. The shotguns in vanilla Bloodlines suck hard - they've got no power behind them, they're slow and awkward. In this mod, however, things are a bit different.  Now, time for a demonstration. We shall use this one Stanley Gimble as a test subject.  First, allow him to get close...  FIRE!  Just look at that distance! That's how a shotgun has to feel - like God slamming his car door. It still does poo poo for damage, really, but it doesn't matter because you can shoot fuckers across the room with it!  And then they try again...  ...and boom! While the combat is still fairly bad - given the turd that is vanilla Bloodlines combat, there's only so far you can polish it - it's much more intense thanks to increased damage and every weapon given more "punch". Some have been given a lot more "oomph" like the shotgun, others like the first peashooter have only some more damage, but it still goes fairly far. Of course, this might end up being a bit of an issue once we hit the endgame. The fact of the matter is that I really don't want to think about that right now. Let's just move on.  Turns out that Gimble was some sort of supernatural thing, because he loving EXPLODES after he gets killed. Probably shouldn't have gone in in melee, but oh well. Not like blood to heal with is in short supply.  We rescue Carson and find this thing in the other cell. No, I don't know what it is. No, I don't know why it's here. Please stop asking, or we'll be here all week.  Furthermore, we find some passwords on the wall. The more eagle-eyed amongst you might have noticed a small problem - there are three passwords, but only two submenus on the computer we found earlier. What is the third password for? I don't know. We might find out later, but I doubt it. I have the sneaking suspicion this asset was made before the computer was redesigned to only take two passwords instead of three. Anyway, off to the computer!  First of all, here's the emails. quote:<Subject> Stonehenge Hm, looks like there's more to this statue than meets the eye. Suffice it to say that Gimble isn't in a state to be doing any stopping any time soon, so we might have to intercept this ourselves. quote:<Subject> New blood This sounds like it's referring to the werewolf blood, which we currently have in our possession. We're holding on to that for sure. quote:<Subject> DANG! It's big you know!!!111 This a copy of the one we get in our haven or actually something semi-original? quote:<Subject> seeker I got really frightened for a second after reading that email. Like I was going to leave the menu and instantly be killed by something I didn't see. Thankfully, nothing of the sort happens and we check out the second part of the computer.  Hrm, so we're talking about a gargoyle here! That might be interesting to have... we do already have the potent blood, but we probably don't know a lot about gargoyles yet. Thankfully, we do know somebody that does...  Next, we drop by Carson's one more time to nab the stuff from his chest that we couldn't get to earlier thanks to a lack of Lockpicking. Stat-building books are always welcome.  Then, we continue the bounty hunter quest. Everything goes off without a hitch.  For some loving reason, the quest description for the gargoyle quest is written in first person, when all the other ones are written in second person. Why? I don't know. I just don't loving know. Next stop - the Ocean Hotel.  And here we are. The Ocean Hotel - widely considered to be one of the high points of the entire game, a master class in atmosphere. You know what this needs?  More combat. Specifically, we get to fight some Sabbat before we can get into the little shack that holds the key for the hotel. From what I played before starting this LP, this seems to be a running theme for this mod. For some reason, they decided to shove new combat encounters into many situations that don't need them at all. Thankfully, the Ocean Hotel proper has been spared this treatment.  We dispatch the enemies with relative ease and make our way into the hotel.  Inside the hotel, nothing much has changed. Good thing too, since it was pretty much perfect already. There were only three notable things. First, I managed to jump over the breaking steps and could have skipped an entire part of the hotel. However, I didn't, since there might have been new goodies down there. There weren't. Oh well.  Second, when the scene suddenly shifts to the hotel before the fire, the sunlight actually hurts you. How does that work? The sun isn't real. Is this some sort of reverse Deny thing where the imaginary sun hurts you because you believe it's real?  And third and most importantly, something has been changed in the room beyond this door - the one where the ceiling collapsed and you use the planks to jump up to the next floor. Are you ready for this? You aren't. No, seriously, you aren't ready. Get ready. Here we go.  DUNNNNN  DUNNNNN Yes, for absolutely no loving reason whatsoever, the mod adds a TV showing a three-to-four-frame GIF of Count Orlok from Nosferatu, the classic German silent film, just standing around. This was the point where I knew I was going to be in for some poo poo. Just look at this. It's so pointless that it almost becomes incredibly awesome. The only reason I can imagine the modders could have thought of for putting this here is to scare people. It certainly scared the poo poo out of me - just imagine, you're just playing through the Ocean Hotel for the fifteenth time, not expecting anything special, and suddenly you round the corner and are staring right into Count Orlok's face. Immediately, your mind is flooded with questions. "Why is this here?" "Wait, is something going to happen?" "Is a Nosferatu going to pop out of this TV and maul the poo poo out of me?" "Is the TV going to explode?" "WHY IS THIS HERE, MODDERS? WHAT IS YOUR PLAN?" And then it turns out it does absolutely nothing. loving genius. In fact, it's so genius that I doubt it was intentional - they just wanted to make another pop culture reference, didn't they? They didn't even consider how this could be perfect paranoia fuel. Oh well, even if the intention might not have been there, the effect is. Anyway, we grab the pendant and loving leg it.  Next stop, the Gallery Noir.  First off, you probably immediately noticed two things. One - this lighting is terrible. Apparently, I just missed the light switch. Whoops. Secondly - "Setites weakness"? What's that about?  Might it have something to do with these urns that are suddenly spread around the gallery?  Anyway, we slash the paintings in the correct order, the blood streams combine, and out pops...  ...a loving mummy. No, honestly, it's a mummy. I know you can't see it, just trust me on this one.  This mummy is a puzzle boss! Because what Bloodlines needed was puzzle bosses. Oh wait, no it loving didn't. Well, we still get them regardless, so let's deal with them. This one requires us to run around the gallery, dodging the mummy's blood-point-sucking spell, and shooting the urns until this sand stuff comes out of it.  When we get hit with the spell, it makes things even harder to see, which is just marvelous.  Once we destroy all three urns, the mummy becomes vulnerable. However, it's still invulnerable when it comes to ranged attacks, so we have to go in close.  Thankfully, it's slow and easily dealt with, though it does pack a fair punch. Also, for some reason, I couldn't steal the money. Was it because I didn't turn the lights on? Oh well, we're not really hurting for money.  Therese sends us to the diner, and we see these four savoury individuals hanging around.  I want to complain about this texturing, but I don't know where to start. Though the painted on suspenders might be a good place to do so. Also, I guess the heating in the diner isn't the best around.  Suffice it to say that their ambush attempt doesn't exactly go well, though they do inflict a fair amount of damage - that shotgun the fat dude has really smarts. When you get into a fight with multiple people with automatic weapons or shotguns, you better watch the gently caress out, because they'll tear you a new rear end in a top hat in no time.  We convince the sisters to get along for the XP boost, though I honestly considered killing off Therese to get the chance to bone Jeanette (after passing by the first chance to bone her, that is). I really wanted to see if the mod changed something in that scene. I'll probably check that out later at some point.  For now, we need to finish off our business in Santa Monica by blowing up the warehouse.  Then the game crashed. Fairly certain this is my first crash that wasn't brought by me mucking about with the console in ways I shouldn't have. Let's hope this isn't a recurring theme.  So then I have to go through the last few minutes of gameplay again because the autosave is a temperamental little minx that only works when it wants to.  This time, we make it to the warehouse without any major problems, though we're off to a great start when the pissing guy that was supposed to be an easy kill notices me. Next, we make our way to the empty room before the train yard.  Um, hello? I just said I wanted to go to the empty room before the train yard. Emphasis on empty.  This isn't going to end well, isn't it?  OH GOD HIT THE loving DECK. So yeah, surprise, this room suddenly holds six enemies that really don't like your face. I could have dominated the leader girl into falling over, which would have scared everybody else away, but this way I can get their stuff easier.  The prime strategy here is to just hide behind the open door and shoot the poo poo out of whomever walks out into your crosshairs.  And then, once you've taken a few out, you can just go out shooting. Still, if you take this too easy, you're going to get murdered hard - three enemies with guns is a big problem at this point.  Things occasionally go pear-shaped from here. More enemies + more damage = bad.  Thankfully, Necromancy comes to my rescue several times during this segment (though it doesn't stop me from occasionally getting a Final Death shoved up my rear end while I'm trying to summon zombies) - I've upgraded it to level 3, which means the zombies are now capable of moving (very, very slowly) and attacking.  They actually deal fairly massive damage, all things considered. These things are going to help a ton during bosses.  Of course, zombies don't help when you're met with five enemies with ranged weapons on a raised surface. The easiest solution here is to play chicken and pop up from behind a box, hoping you can get a pot shot off and quickly get back behind your box - this is harder than it seems, because the enemies seem to get a shot off pretty much instantly if you hit them and you're in their sights. Basically means you have to shoot them on the way down.  And then I open a door, get a Sabbat clawing at my face and a guy shooting me with an Uzi, run the gently caress away...  ...and get killed trying to summon zombies. Such is unlife.  The next attempt goes a lot smoother, thanks in part due to this Sabbat here triggering a trap I never knew existed. Moving the container...  ...slams it into these metal stand things, which launches one of them into the air...  ...and it lands on two guys, dealing massive damage and death. loving sweet.  Of course, that moment of things going really well has to be balanced out, so when I engage in melee combat with this guy...  OH GOD WATCH OUT WHERE YOU'RE SWINGING THA-  AND BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE! In a fit of incredible luck, the explosion leaves Victoria with a sliver of health. Thankfully, I've spotted something that might solve that problem...  ...hey there, how's it going? What are you doing in a dangerous place like this? All sorts of dangerous folks, gangsters, smugglers, maybe even vampires!  CHOMP.  Even though that solved our health problem temporarily, the game isn't shy about throwing us right back into the fire.  Shotgun + axe + Uzi = plenty of dead. Eventually, they get taken out with a Blood Buff + Potence combo attack.  We then find this artifact in one of the rooms nearby - a +1 to Manipulation but a -1 to Scholarship. In essence, this means a plus to Haggle but a minus to Persusasion, which is kind of suboptimal. I'll keep it around because  , but I don't really like this thing. Finally, we get to arm the bomb and loving leg it.  SUDDENLY, WOLF! This fucker can kick your rear end several ways from Sunday, so I'm very glad I have my three zombies around to tank hits and deal good damage while I mostly hang back and take pot shots. It goes down without much trouble.  SUDDENLY, SEMI-OBSCURE WOD REFERENCE! This seems to be a running theme throughout this entire mod - taking semi-obscure groups like the Pander and the Blood Brothers and working them into the game somehow, even if it doesn't make sense. Basically, the concept seems to be "We have this group within the Sabbat, what do we do with it?" "Just throw it in, like we really give a poo poo.".  The hell of it is that they seem to have gone to great lengths to make these characters, so I can only imagine they're going to be mercilessly reused throughout the entire game. Here we see one of the Blood Brothers using Octopod, an ability from their special discipline, Sanguinus, which allows you to send your limbs or organs to another Blood Brother in your Circle. We don't get to see a lot of their abilities, mostly because I hack them to bits before they can cause any real damage - and trust me, they're drat well capable of dealing serious damage.  The rest of the trip back goes without incident, which means we've just finished off Santa Monica in three updates. How fast things go once you don't have to write out dialogue any more, eh? Next time, we'll be checking out downtown, at which point I'll be starting to go through some things blind - I've seen some stuff, but not all of it. Fun will probably ensue. I hope. TheMcD fucked around with this message at 05:56 on Mar 22, 2015 |
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Mar 22, 2015 05:50
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 I uh, don't think that's a real phone number, Skype....
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Mar 22, 2015 09:40
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What a moron is that!
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Mar 22, 2015 20:57
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Combat doesn't actually give you experience, does it? So the mod just makes things more dangerous for no reward.
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Mar 23, 2015 14:28
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Glazius posted:Combat doesn't actually give you experience, does it? So the mod just makes things more dangerous for no reward. Yup! Mod of the Year.
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Mar 23, 2015 15:45
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 Y'know, I've been kind of annoyed today, and I don't really know why. Let's fix that. Let's get something to get annoyed at where I know exactly why I'm annoyed.  When last we left our intrepid heroine, she just got finished dealing with all the crap in Santa Monica and was getting ready to deal with the crap in downtown. To begin with, we drop off a lot of our crap at Trip's - including that stupid talisman thing, which got me a cool 106 bucks - and bought some ammo, which is much more useful.  We also drop by our haven to check if there's anything new. There is - for some loving reason, this cupboard (or is it the stove?) has the Inspection "there's something here" sparkle, but I can't actually find anything where we can interact. I have no idea what's going on here. Some might say that's not really a change from the general situation, and I wouldn't really have an answer to that.  Furthermore, we drop off most of our other junk in the fridge, since that seems as good a place as any.  Now, off to downtown we go!  Of course, being somebody new in downtown LA, we are still given the standard LA welcome of "bat with nails to the head".  In general, the new models at least give a decent variety, but I swear, I keep seeing loving Sabbat Jack #1 and Sabbat Jack #2 (Now With Hat) all over the place.  Anyway, Nines tells us his story, and we're off to down- wait, what's that to the right?  Surprise! Miniboss! Yes, for absolutely no loving reason, the guy Nines shot survived and now wants to kick our rear end! And Nines? He couldn't give less of a poo poo. He's more than happy to watch you get murdered by this guy.  Of course, you can always maneuver yourself in such a way that leads to the boss attacking Nines, after which he'll actually get off his rear end and do something. This isn't what people mean when they say "give the player options to resolve problems that don't revolve around fighting", by the way. This poo poo don't count.  Anyway, after Nines dispatches the Pander, we do get to go to downtown proper. I half expected I would have had to fight Sabbat Jack #1 and Sabbat Jack #2 too. I guess they're too busy murdering prostitutes or something.  Our first destination is LaCroix's place. Nothing much changed here. We get our quest to visit the Elizabeth Dane and leave.  Next, I wanted to head to Club Confession to do some stuff, and instead ran into Fat Larry over here. Why was he moved? I have no idea.  His selection blows, too. Since we've been dilligently collecting weapons from our many, many fallen foes, there's nothing new for us here bar the new armor set, which we obviously pick up ASAP.  Snazzy. Still not something that fits with the football pads, though.  Our next stop is the hospital - nothing changed here, at least not from what I could tell. Some item placements might be different, but nothing major. It's pretty handy when you can just go "yeah, this is all the same, moving on". So, moving on...  There's two feelings that constantly come up when playing this mod. Scratch that, there's three, first of which being "What were they loving smoking when they came up with this poo poo?", which comes up all the drat time. The other two are "Wait, this wasn't here before, was it?" - this comes up with things like the big tanker trucks, things that kind of fit in, but are really big and you can't really remember having seen them before - and "OK, this definitely wasn't here before" - this comes up with things like the TV in the Ocean Hotel and this new sports car that's just asking for somebody to vomit blood over. Or maybe that's just me still stuck in the Ventrue mindset.  Anyway, we drop into the Last Round to pick up a quest...  ...another quest...  ...and a dot in Brawl, then leave. Next stop, the Tremere chantry - we need to get some info on gargoyles, and I think I know where we can get a book on tha-  ...huh.  Son of a bitch, they actually locked it. I really hope I don't have to jump through a billion hoops or something to get that code.  We have a quick chat with Max to ensure we get our reward when we clear the plaguebearer quest. Now, to start searching for clues...  ...hm, what's this?  ...are you loving kidding me? This was when I knew I had to LP this thing. I thought I had reached peak stupid right here, but if I was going to be proven wrong, I was going to show it to everybody here, because if something that stupid comes along, it would be mindblowing. So, let's start off bitching about this. First, the easy target - internal consistency. When you have a keypad and want to give the player a hint on what it is, you should make sure it's a clue that would make sense. Either make it blatant because it's supposed to help somebody remember and if he were capable of figuring a complicated clue out he probably would have remembered the password itself (see also: the notes in the hospital), or make it cryptic because somebody laid it out for you to find and that somebody wants you to prove your worth by figuring out a complicated clue. Now, it seems to be true that somebody laid this out for us to find... it's just that it was the modders. Max has no reason to lay this out here, especially given how secretive the Tremere are - if he wants somebody to know the password, he'd tell them. Here's a better idea, free of charge: You see those PC models you've strewn about the areas? Use them! Make that male Tremere PC an interactible character that you can ask about the locked door, then have him give you a fetch quest or something, and in exchange he gives you the password! I guess that would require effort, though. Furthermore, this math puzzle is insane. Like, what the gently caress. I don't know how things are over in America or wherever the gently caress these modders are from, but over here in Germany, we barely did any matrix calculations all the way until university. Being a CompSci student, I had to deal with a lot of mathematics, and at that point we learned some things that I could have used to solve this. I suppose I would have tried a Gaussian elimination here, and if that didn't work, I'd have had to go back to the script for the lecture to find alternate methods. There's a thread about this puzzle at the forums for this mod, and somebody suggested using Cramer's Rule for this - something I've never even heard of, and I'm pretty sure I've heard more about mathematics than at least 80% of the population by virtue of being an university student in a relatively mathematics-heavy field - calculating determinants several times to find your solution. Thankfully, most of the people in the thread rightfully poo poo all over this puzzle, and then one of the developers came out with this gem. quote:the thing is that the Gargoyle is not supposed to be accessible by everyone. Its an easter egg that is to be rewarded to those that really want to get it. It was not really meant to be a side quest. The math was supposed to be that barrier. There are several things wrong with this. Number one - you marked it as a side quest in the quest log. If you really wanted it to be for only the dedicated, make it an unmarked quest. Number two - the gargoyle quest so far is the biggest change I've seen in this mod. Not a smart idea to hide what so far is one of the biggest changes as "a side quest for those that really want to get it". Finally, there is a locked statue in the main room that contains the things you would otherwise need to solve the math puzzle for, and it's only an 8 (minus 3 thanks to overpowered Blood Buff) in Lockpicking away! You are made of stupid! God drat, this annoys the everliving gently caress out of me. It's not just badly designed, it's badly designed on several levels! It's a loving master class!  Anyway, the solution is 1125. Thankfully, somebody posted that in the Games thread or I'd have gone insane. And what's our reward?  First of all, we get the book Thaumaturgical Creatures - the thing we find here in vanilla as well. However, we don't know that yet, as we need a Research of 7 to figure that out. Blah. And then we get to push a book in one of the shelves that acts as a switch. That unlocks the haven that normally only the Tremere get, and there we find the medallion that reduces damage from gargoyles, which is another thing we need. Of course, we could just get it from Max later when we tell him about the gargoyle Abrams wants us to deal with. I actually only noticed this later, though, so for now we're moving on to Club Confession.  ...there should be boxes here. Last time I played this, there were boxes here, I smashed them, and there was a hint regarding the gargoyle quest inside. Does that not appear if we've already found the book or something? What a strange concept. We also grab Venus's quest...  ...and deal with the Patty problem in a very nice way. Yeah, just head to the bottom of the abandoned hospital, he's totally there, no human-eating Nagaraja down there or anything at all! And now, off to deal with that debt problem.  Huh, what's going on here?   Stop! Stop, please! Keep quiet, bitch! Help! Help, anyone, please! Punch.   God, you run your mouth a lot. I got a way to keep her from talking... She can keep screaming, though... I like it when they scream. Nyeahaha... me too.  ...gently caress it, I'm not touching that. There are so many things I could be questioning right now, but I feel like when I ran into the bisexual skeleton S/M sex party in Unterwegs in Düsterburg - if I keep questioning this, I'm going to end up somewhere I'd much rather not be. Though one thing I will point out - these two are indeed vampires. Probably the exact same guys we ran into earlier. Their dicks don't work any more, and neither does their sex drive. I can only assume that they're just really, really into feeding or murder. But then again, if it were feeding, those last lines wouldn't make sense, since the victim is put into a trance-like state during the feeding... no, stop, I said I wasn't going to question this, just move on. Well, it's that, or the writers are imbeciles. I know which one my money is on. Reminder - these people are also working on what was Project Vaulderie and what is now an unnamed vampire game that just happens to take a bunch of cues from WoD.  Anyway, Sabbat Jack #1 and Sabbat Jack #2 get a healthy dose of Vitamin Shotgun and are swiftly dealt with.  Our reward is a free feeding session. loving whoopee.  I need to cheer myself up, let's tell some big Russian guy that the money is up his mother's rear end and get him really mad. That's always fun.  I'm starting to get the feeling that if this mod is just going to keep throwing me from combat to combat, I might as well oblige and start seeking it out. I've never really done a "gently caress you, fight me" playthrough where all problems are just solved by busting a cap in somebody's rear end before, so it's probably a welcome change. Plus, it gives me many opportunities to just hit things.  On the way back, we run into a gang shootout, which is always welcome, since it gives us some more ammo. That, and it's always a nice diversion to see something happening on the streets, given how many times we have to walk up and down on them. We get the second part of the quest, but before we go there...  ...we have some business to take care of in the Skyeline lofts.  Finding the dead Paul and getting the message from Hannah...  Finding the next part of the Southland Slasher questline...  Sending the film guy to his death...  And getting the clue about Jezebel Locke. Now that we've got two combat events lined up at the Empire hotel, let's head over there and deal with them.  Y'know, it'd be nice if this mod threw me a bone for once and made this fight not a pain in the rear end. It would be. Of course, this mod has no interest in being nice.  Things don't exactly go well. Her sword hurts like a motherfucker, and she has this strange attack that throws you away from her that she loves to keep using that's just a massive pain in the rear end. So you create some distance and she just takes pot shots at you and chipping your health away.  The solution, as it always seems to be for the Giovanni, is necromancy. You can't take hits for poo poo, but that doesn't matter if the enemy is attacking something else.  Eventually, and I do mean eventually, she goes down for the last time.  And she leaves about three times her body weight in blood and assorted guts on the wall. We grab the loot and get the gently caress out.  The same dance repeats itself with Boris. Summon zombies, give the guy something else to shoot at, then kill him yourself.  We pick up some cash, vendor trash and this nice gun, then leave.  On the way back, I check back in with the Tremere since I couldn't find anything at Club Confession even though I thought I should have, and find this book that doubles as a switch.   This opens up the Tremere haven, like I said, and that nets us some very nice loot.    And finally, we take care of some loose ends, where nothing notable happens. Then I ran out of hard drive space to record footage with, so I guess we'll end things here. This is what happens when most of the time is spent wandering around from place to place trying to figure these new quests out. Next time, we'll try to deal with Brother Kanker (which comes with its own share of bugs) and I officially start playing without knowing what lies ahead. Things could get very interesting from here. Or very boring. I'm torn on which to hope for, to be quite honest. See you then!
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Mar 29, 2015 02:17
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I googled the solution to that math puzzle. Found a neat little site that auto-solves simultaneous equations.
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Mar 29, 2015 02:55
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That thing took me all of a minute to put in matrix form and then rref. Anyone who tells you to apply the long form of Cramer's is a loving moron. Which I would expect out of the forums that produced this highly polished turd.
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Mar 29, 2015 04:35
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Cramer's rule seems a lot more compicated than how my Discrete Maths teacher explained it: Divide, multiply, add and subtract poo poo until each column only has one row with a non-zero value (i.e. 1). That method is what Gauss-Jordan elimination is - I just don't recall him calling it that. maswastaken fucked around with this message at 05:07 on Mar 29, 2015 |
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Mar 29, 2015 05:05
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There are MANY things wrong with that last show of content, but surprisingly enough, Fat Larry's placement ain't one of them. That was Fat Larry's original placement, WESP moved him closer to Confession.
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Mar 29, 2015 07:49
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TheMcD posted:Next, I wanted to head to Club Confession to do some stuff, and instead ran into Fat Larry over here. Why was he moved? I have no idea.  This is actually Fat Larry’s original, pre-:wesp: spot.
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Mar 29, 2015 08:09
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Are you math nerds talking about the method that goes "a = b+c so substitute a with b+c until you get one number for one of those variables", because that was not quite university but high school.
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Mar 29, 2015 09:13
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TheMcD posted:Well, it's that, or the writers are imbeciles. The example scene they chose was a Sabbat vampire spending blood points to rape a mortal before killing her while his pack watched in approval. So while the writers are imbeciles, maybe they're just following the canon WoD tradition of using lazy examples to illustrate the moral repugnancy of the antagonists... ...oh wait, the rulebook in question was Guide to the Sabbat. The one about *playable* Sabbat vampires. As bad as the mod is, WoD is worse.
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Mar 29, 2015 09:40
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I was going to say, it'd make sense for the Sabbat not because they have a drive but to torture folks or show the pack how tough they are, which is its own end for them.quote:Do mirrors actually work in this game? I've forgotten. And if they don't, how does the Lasombra flaw work? And I've forgotten, do most vamps in old world (or new world) have the mirror flaw? I thought the writers took a more "naturalistic" style with most clans, like the vampires in Underworld could be seen in mirrors but then again they were supposed to be purely a mutant strain and nothing supernatural. quote:Surprise! Miniboss! Yes, for absolutely no loving reason, the guy Nines shot survived and now wants to kick our rear end! And Nines? He couldn't give less of a poo poo. He's more than happy to watch you get murdered by this guy. That right there is probably the least OOC thing added in this mod so far. 
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Mar 29, 2015 19:54
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This poster loves police brutality, but only when its against minorities!
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I took one look at that math puzzle and my first thought was that if I was playing my only hope would be that someone had posted the solution.  Honestly I'm surprised you could find a solution on their forums, they seem kinda like the people who would throw a hissy fit about people not fully experiencing their wonderful content according to their designs.
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Mar 29, 2015 20:01
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DeusExMachinima posted:And I've forgotten, do most vamps in old world (or new world) have the mirror flaw? I thought the writers took a more "naturalistic" style with most clans, like the vampires in Underworld could be seen in mirrors but then again they were supposed to be purely a mutant strain and nothing supernatural. It was the specific Lasombra flaw. In terms of the basis for that, uh... Bram Stoker? oWoD took all the many different vampire mythologies of the old world and spun them off as different clans, so Nosferatu are the, not surprisingly, grotesque Nosferatu style guys. Tzimisce most closely resemble Dracula as portrayed in the original Bram Stoker, right down to needing to sleep in the dirt of their homeland and being able to transform themselves into grotesque abominations. There's also a lot of Bram Stoker in the Ravnos and Gangrel, which is why they share a similar geographic basis as the Tzimisce, to a degree, and those three clans have intertwined histories, moreso than some of the others. Toreador, Ventrue, Brujah, and Lasombra all heavily touch upon Anne Rice tropes, with being stronger, more resilient, able to twist people's minds, being ridiculously alluring and seductive and beutiful, etc. Malkavians tap into a combination of Rice and Stoker as well as the old Hammer films, with vampires being able to drive men to madness and cloud their perceptions to impersonate others. Tremere are a bit out of left field, but there's a lot of random lore and later works wherein Dracula took on more of a sorceror type of vibe, which is what spawned stuff like Castlevania, and again is why the Tremere backstory weaves into the Tzimisce. This is also how Cappadocians and Giovanni fit in, as Necromancy is essentially a form of sorcery. Followers of Set and Assamites are basically just really racist and stereotypical caricatures of middle eastern Vampire/Jinn mythology. Think that covers all the main clans. Then the Bloodline stuff was to fit every other possible demonic/monstrous trope into the existing Vampire framework, such that everything strange is basically a vampire. Except Werewolves. Except the Werewolves that are also Vampires (Gangrel). Basically White Wolf did a great job at ripping off everything and mixing it into a huge pot that somehow fit together reasonably well.
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Mar 30, 2015 05:29
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Kind of weird to go from simultaneous equations to gang rape, but there you go.
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Mar 31, 2015 07:40
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hahaha what why is there a matrix in the game loving modders I saw a lot of matrices but I took some computational physics courses and also an upper level proofs-based linear algebra course. proofs are more fun than calculations, computers can do calculations dammit 
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Mar 31, 2015 13:34
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The gun details on the stats screens - the one about the ammo and the M16 specifically - are "superficially almost right, but then you realize they're actually totally wrong" ... keeping in tune with the rest of this weird-rear end mod. They give you a Wikipedia stats dump on the 9mm cartridge, but you're buying specific 9mm rounds - so all of the value ranges are irrelevant. The vast majority of the synonyms/alternate models they name for the M16 are irrelevant because again, you're getting a specific rifle, and in this case most of those aren't even correct anyway - like, those aren't even right outside of this context. The 1911 image looks horizontally stretched out too, the proportions are all wrong. I don't even know anymore. I will give at least partial credit that in the inventory screenshot it looks to have the proper A1 handguards and has the old-school straight 20 round magazine, though if you think about it in context of 2004 vampire Los Angeles the 20 round mag is dumb too. I'm not even touching the idea that the Tremere leave math problems around for neonates to solve to get through doors. There's dumb poo poo, and then there's that. Psion fucked around with this message at 17:19 on Mar 31, 2015 |
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Mar 31, 2015 17:08
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mauman posted:There are MANY things wrong with that last show of content, but surprisingly enough, Fat Larry's placement ain't one of them. GrimRevenant posted:
Well, look who has egg on his face now. Seems like it shows that I've never actually played a vanilla game of Bloodlines. This is probably going to come up at some point later as well, but eh, gently caress it, not like that's really going to be the biggest problem. Not with things like "you can only actually kill this boss about 20% of the time, any other time and the fight glitches out and you can't progress" and "regular enemies that can easily kill you one-on-one with a lovely Tec-9" going about. I still contend that placement is dumb. If you've got a truck selling illegal goods, you're not going to put that right out in the street. LA is hosed up, but it's not THAT bad... I hope. Then again, it's Gehenna soon, so I guess nobody gives a poo poo, really. wiegieman posted:That thing took me all of a minute to put in matrix form and then rref. Anyone who tells you to apply the long form of Cramer's is a loving moron. Which I would expect out of the forums that produced this highly polished turd. maswastaken posted:Cramer's rule seems a lot more compicated than how my Discrete Maths teacher explained it: Divide, multiply, add and subtract poo poo until each column only has one row with a non-zero value (i.e. 1). It probably wouldn't have been that hard for me if I had actually tried it, but given that somebody already told me the solution beforehand and that I'm here to play a vampire, not do loving homework again (I thought I left that poo poo behind a few semesters ago, damnit), I really couldn't be arsed to do it and instead bitched about it. Even then, that's still asking a lot. Pretty sure that's around higher level secondary education level, if not tertiary, depending on the curriculum your particular nation has put together. That's still a really dumb thing to do, especially since it doesn't make a lick of sense in context. Anyway, I've got the next bit of footage recorded and will start working on the update - next up will be Brother Kanker and Bishop Vick. Nothing much else, actually - I spent a lot of time loving around with things and getting angry at the difficulty, and I presume I'll be doing the same in the update. Still, I think I'm starting to figure this mod out. Kind of. Maybe. Stay tuned.
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Apr 7, 2015 01:32
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Yesssss matrices! I miss those. They were fun to do.
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Apr 7, 2015 02:16
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Fat Larry is an interesting story. Originally he was in the alley that he's in in the Wesp patch, they even showed him there in several early gameplay vids. They moved him for usability because people were missing him entirely and that was the main store for a sizable chunk of the game, so they moved him. Wesp just moved him back.
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Apr 7, 2015 03:45
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