Kurieg posted:They're only in the kickstarter backer's copies for now. Also the Homecoming is now the Devouring, and it's where your character starts. There are two failure states where your beast soul fuses with you either in the primordial dream or the physical world and you become living uncontrolable hunger, but the Primordial Dream one is the only one that you can have accidentally happen to you(and you'd have to be very unlucky for that to happen). The physical world one is something you have to actively invoke. So, Beast is still the game about brand management where the bad things that happen are mostly along the lines of getting your mellow harshed?
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Feb 9, 2016 19:45
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I guess the lesson here is don't make a game based on Nightbreed.
MonsieurChoc fucked around with this message at 20:15 on Feb 9, 2016 |
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Feb 9, 2016 19:51
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Effectronica posted:So, Beast is still the game about brand management where the bad things that happen are mostly along the lines of getting your mellow harshed? I mean, mechanically the best thing you can possibly do is
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Feb 9, 2016 20:14
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I'm amazed that the Onyx Path is continuing with the plan to ask for money to provide a product about role-playing out the justifications and actions of child abusers.
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Feb 9, 2016 20:22
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Gerund posted:I'm amazed that the Onyx Path is continuing with the plan to ask for money to provide a product about role-playing out the justifications and actions of child abusers. They have the money from kickstarter, they're required to provide something. The hope is either that paradox requires further rewrites before final pressing. Them not actually allowing the public to purchase the book was a fevered dream.
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Feb 9, 2016 20:29
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Axelgear posted:There's definitely some interesting stuff in Beast, mechanically. The only problem is that anything worth saving could just be carved out and stuffed messily into Changeling 2e. The good parts would be a perfect fit for the new edition of Changeling: The Lost, and the bad parts would be a perfect fit for the new edition of Changeling: The Dreaming.
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Feb 9, 2016 20:48
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I hate to derail Beast Chat but I had a question: Currently I am working on a WoD D20 conversion for fun. Does something like this already exist?
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Feb 9, 2016 21:21
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Oh you poor soul. (here)
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Feb 9, 2016 21:26
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moths posted:Oh you poor soul.
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Feb 9, 2016 21:29
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Eh, I wasn't all that far in 
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Feb 9, 2016 21:30
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To my mind Beast is two different games with wildly divergent themes, to the point where I have to believe it's suffering from Exalted: The Infernals levels of multiple writers never speaking to each other during the development process. The only way to salvage the project would be to pick one of the two projects as the core and strip out the rest. If you go with Blackhat Matt's version, you'd get Axelgear and Tricky Dick Nixon's take; it's the route I'd have gone as well were I the lead dev just because it's easier. It would end up more of a Black Dog product than anything else Onyx Path has created, a game about struggling with sadistic desires to maim and humiliate 'lesser' humans; can you justify it by only hurting "bad" people, or finding constructive outlets like vandalizing buildings as part of political protests? Or you could go with the other writer's version and get a game about the Lady Gaga definition of 'monster', where it's about being born different than anyone else and building a family out of similar pariahs. Beasts would have to lose their privileges and power as supernatural royalty, but there'd still be room for some of the interesting interactions where Beasts see other supernaturals as fine-as-they-are without actively hanging out with the Gentry. I think this part makes substantially less than half the current material so it'd be a hell of a lot harder to rewrite around it, but it'd definitely make for a game I would be more interested in playing. MonsieurChoc posted:I guess the lesson here is don't make a game based on Nightbreed. Beast is what you get if the main character was the serial killer and the psychiatrist went mad after talking to him about all the murders.
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Feb 9, 2016 22:54
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To my understanding, Black Hatt Matt was arguing for the second interpretation more than the first, because as written all the 'bad guys' are the acceptable targets of people in power, frat boys, cops, popular girls, etc. It's your job to punish and/or kill them. Remember he started attacking people who saw heroes as sympathetic.
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Feb 9, 2016 23:09
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Personally I would have liked it to be a game about past gods and monsters forced into hiding by the reality consensus that they don't exist. Trying to build the belief in themselves through cults and manipulating urban legends until they can regain their former powers and status. But their own empowerment also affects their legendary enemies raising the risk that their death stories play out for real. I think that could have been quite fun, they could even pick giants and dragons and krackens and stuff as the races. But no, we got Tumbler: the Revengence
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Feb 9, 2016 23:20
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Arashiofordo3 posted:Personally I would have liked it to be a game about past gods and monsters forced into hiding by the reality consensus that they don't exist. Trying to build the belief in themselves through cults and manipulating urban legends until they can regain their former powers and status. But their own empowerment also affects their legendary enemies raising the risk that their death stories play out for real. I think that could have been quite fun, they could even pick giants and dragons and krackens and stuff as the races. But no, we got Tumbler: the Revengence Yes this. When info on Beast first started to trickle out, I was super pumped because this was similar to what I imagine. Welp!
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Feb 9, 2016 23:25
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That actually sounds like a really cool idea. Would make a neat spin off of Mage, maybe. Having to toe the line between "thing what goes bump in the night" and "thing what people call a priest/Hunter about" would be pretty interesting. gently caress, I might try to figure out how to hack that into an existing WoD system. Or even another system entirely.
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Feb 9, 2016 23:26
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In other news, Scion 2e is apparently trucking along through development. I wonder if it'll be bad like Scion 1e or if they learned!
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Feb 9, 2016 23:28
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Kurieg posted:To my understanding, Black Hatt Matt was arguing for the second interpretation more than the first, because as written all the 'bad guys' are the acceptable targets of people in power, frat boys, cops, popular girls, etc. It's your job to punish and/or kill them. Someone else wrote the Family chapter, Rose I believe going by memory? I'm unconvinced he understands the second interpretation whatsoever since he can only approach it through the lens of juvenile revenge fantasy; the key to the Family version of the game is that a Beast does not need to inflict pain to live. There are no bad guys that are acceptable targets for abuse, that's how serial abusers justify themselves after all.
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Feb 9, 2016 23:31
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I sure hope it's good, I loved the fluff for 1E but goddamn were the rules for that game a shambles (with the worst premade characters ever, yeah I'm looking at you, Eric "Put All Points In Strength, Fight With Gun" Donner).
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Feb 9, 2016 23:33
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I remember reading the beginning of Scion, getting super excited about the game, reaching the part about the gods and... stopping dead in my tracks. Half a paragraph per god? Really? This is supposed to be the supporting column of my whole character, and you give it half of a lovely, barely researched, oftentimes vaguely sexist paragraph?Kurieg posted:Remember he started attacking people who saw heroes as sympathetic. Attacking is perhaps a bit exaggerated. If I am not mistaken he just complained a lot and then told everyone to shut up and that THEY were the true """""heroes""""!!!!! This is more in line with a child's tantrum than an attack.
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Feb 9, 2016 23:55
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Mors Rattus posted:In other news, Scion 2e is apparently trucking along through development. I wonder if it'll be bad like Scion 1e or if they learned! The system preview stuff's at least been interesting and not "bad copy/paste of Exalted", so that's more promising from the start.
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Feb 9, 2016 23:58
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unseenlibrarian posted:The system preview stuff's at least been interesting and not "bad copy/paste of Exalted", so that's more promising from the start. Oh jeez, I intended to check those out but then forgot. I should remedy that.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:00
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Mors Rattus posted:In other news, Scion 2e is apparently trucking along through development. I wonder if it'll be bad like Scion 1e or if they learned! From talking to some of the people who who are working on it*, it sounds like they're very aware of the problems with Scion 1e. They also have several folks with relevant degrees working on it this time, so I'm reasonably enthusiastic about it. *Full disclosure, my better half works on it
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Feb 10, 2016 00:00
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LeSquide posted:From talking to some of the people who who are working on it*, it sounds like they're very aware of the problems with Scion 1e. They also have several folks with relevant degrees working on it this time, so I'm reasonably enthusiastic about it. Oh, that's cool! I'm glad about that. Maybe it'll be less insulting this time around, especially to the Norse. And the Aztecs. And voudoun. And...everyone but the Greeks, really. Also, hopefully it will address how the rest of the world actually reacts to the rise of larger-than-life heroes this time around, because there is no way to keep yourself secret in Scion, especially given, uh, Legend.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:02
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Wait, I was aware of the fact that they thoroughly messed up the Aztecs and vaguely that they stuck to surface stuff when it came to voudoun, but not about the rest. Would you mind illuminating me?
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Feb 10, 2016 00:12
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It's been brought up before, but the Norse pantheon power is to Norse religious belief as .having a section on the "Jewish' pantheon and giving everyone a Blood Libel based ability that causes them to grow horns and tails at higher level.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:16
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Also, Rose issued what was pretty much a formal apology for Scion 1E, so I think its safe to say they're actively working to avoid a repeat of last edition.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:18
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Luminous Obscurity posted:Also, Rose issued what was pretty much a formal apology for Scion 1E, so I think its safe to say they're actively working to avoid a repeat of last edition. Do you have a link to this somewhere? I'd be interested in reading it.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:19
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I don't think Matt saw either of the two "sides" of Beast as being the right one; I think he saw them as being the two poles of otherness the game was built on top of. You're the "beast" because you're a giant fuckoff monster with horns and teef wike dis, and the "beast" because you're the outcast that people other. The problem seems to have come in when most of the writers assumed that the second, sympathetic part of beasthood was assumed by the reader, or was going to be implicit somewhere else, and wrote most of the book about how wretchedly awful, sadistic, and narcissistic Beasts are, and completely miscalculated how the audience was going to receive this.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:25
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Soonmot posted:Yes this. When info on Beast first started to trickle out, I was super pumped because this was similar to what I imagine. Welp! Poison Mushroom posted:That actually sounds like a really cool idea. Would make a neat spin off of Mage, maybe. Having to toe the line between "thing what goes bump in the night" and "thing what people call a priest/Hunter about" would be pretty interesting. I'd try and make it myself. But I suck balls when it comes to making something as complicated and theme driven as a WoD splat. Though it would be especially fun to pare off against Mage. Because here's these wizard dudes who've got to keep their poo poo under wraps because humans don't believe in magic and things go wrong when they see it. Then along comes these god guys who not only CAN break through the reality consensus, they are trying to shred it for only themselves and no one else. With all the chaos, infighting, and tomfoolery that involves, while trying to keep it on the down low so that the ACTUAL Beowulf from the god things own legend doesn't show up to wreck its poo poo. It could be beautiful. God dammit I'm convincing myself to write a WoD! Look what you've done thread! Are you happy?! Huh?! 
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Feb 10, 2016 00:27
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My take on Beast was to borrow a little from Lovecraft and make them the former masters of the world, who got their butts handed to them by this upstart species called humanity. Now, they have to live and hide among humans, wrestle with the inhuman natures within them, and hopefully fight off the Heroes who would condemn them (possibly rightly) as monsters. All throughout this, there's the uneasy tension that what Beasts once were isn't all that great, and that Beasts and Heroes might work together to deal with the monstrous Oldest who haven't forgotten what they were. Then someone told me that Leviathan already exists and oh well.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:46
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Speaking of Mage, do we have any info for when the 2e is coming out for that? And when that neolithic mage thing is dropping? I wanna play some just-after-the-Fall wizards.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:50
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The Lord of Hats posted:Do you have a link to this somewhere? I'd be interested in reading it. Rose Bailey posted:So, here's something I think needs to be said, and it's not the easiest thing to say. Yawgmoth posted:Speaking of Mage, do we have any info for when the 2e is coming out for that? And when that neolithic mage thing is dropping? I wanna play some just-after-the-Fall wizards.
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Feb 10, 2016 00:59
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Rand Brittain posted:I don't think Matt saw either of the two "sides" of Beast as being the right one; I think he saw them as being the two poles of otherness the game was built on top of. You're the "beast" because you're a giant fuckoff monster with horns and teef wike dis, and the "beast" because you're the outcast that people other. They did try to make them sympathetic, but by only by inference. "You were picked on in high school", "You always knew you were different", "Your true soul" all of those are pretty evocative of Trans imagery and otherkin stuff. And then they made the heroes use a lot of PUA terminology and act like dudebro jocks. The problem is that they never act sympathetic, they never actually do anything that might evoke sympathy. So it comes off as cheap pathos of "These guys act like guys you like, so they're good. Those guys act like guys you hate, so they're bad" But the end result comes off more as "No the bad guys have a point." and the next logical inference is "Why is your trans metaphor torturing dudes to death to feed?" and it's a fairly obvious one.
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Feb 10, 2016 01:09
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Luminous Obscurity posted:Mage 2E should be coming out in the next couple weeks, they're wrapping up the layout now. Neolithic Mage is part of Dark Eras and is in the middle of layout, so it will probably be a little while longer. Fingers crossed, but I'd heard that wasn't the case. Dark Eras is in the layout queue ahead of Mage 2e; the latter won't be finished until the former is. RichT posted:Mirthful Mike was already laying out DE with holes for the art when we got the text back for M2, he is not going to drop work he is in the middle of to jump on Mage. Layout doesn’t work like that. That's from three weeks ago, now, so maybe that's changed, but...
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Feb 10, 2016 01:13
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Rand Brittain posted:I don't think Matt saw either of the two "sides" of Beast as being the right one; I think he saw them as being the two poles of otherness the game was built on top of. You're the "beast" because you're a giant fuckoff monster with horns and teef wike dis, and the "beast" because you're the outcast that people other. The problem is those two poles of otherness cannot coexist with each other without forming a bizarre message. The Beasts are rockstar princes/princesses of the supernatural world that everyone likes, without difficulty "passing" in the mortal world that Vampires or Werewolves or Prometheans have. They aren't discriminated against because of what they are but because of what they do: hurting people. And even then, it's only the odd "insane" MRA/fundamental Christian/frat boy/cheerleader who hates you, with the book's constant refrain that this means you can do even worse things to these Heroes because they deserve it. Beasts as "outcast" is incoherent with most of the text. Judging from Matt's posts I don't think he sees those poles as incompatible, you're right about that, I just don't think he's responsible for the parts where Beasts come off as genuinely sympathetic (the Family chapter) since they're so incongruous with the rest of the book.
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Feb 10, 2016 01:16
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I like the core idea of Astral/Primordial Dream things leaking into the real world, but I think their metaphor of subverting the ur-myth meranarrative blah blah blah would have been improved if it were more of an interdependent cycle, like sometimes Heroes came first and spawned Beasts. You've had this monstrous identity forced on you, what are you going to do about it? As written, the theme of "rewriting the story so the Beast wins this time" doesn't make sense if that's the plan all along and Heroes don't have any real power. Beasts win by making a barrel, turning people into fish to put in the barrel, then shooting the fish.
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Feb 10, 2016 01:22
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Kellsterik posted:I like the core idea of Astral/Primordial Dream things leaking into the real world, but I think their metaphor of subverting the ur-myth meranarrative blah blah blah would have been improved if it were more of an interdependent cycle, like sometimes Heroes came first and spawned Beasts. You've had this monstrous identity forced on you, what are you going to do about it? For the rewrite I was working on, my whole schtick there is that Beasts once ruled the world and humanity stole it from them... Or so they say. Problem is, the Beasts as they are now are at least a little bit human and few, if any, of them have memories of the World That Was, and those that do (the Oldest) are invariably horrible monsters that are as anathema to Beasts as they are humanity. Considerable effort is invested in keeping those jerks asleep. The Heroes, meanwhile, are humanity's (slightly overactive) immune system; they have set about cleansing reality of the taint of Beasts and subverting the relics left behind by their ancestors. They construct symbols that resonate with the human collective consciousness and give them tools to hunt the Beasts. Individual humans are, compared to a Beast, quite weak, but Heroes are a genuine friggin' menace and, if they incorporate enough symbols into a region, hunting Beasts becomes child's play. I never really got to finishing it because of how interminably difficult Hunger is to work into something not-horrible but, thanks to an idea from a friend, I might have it at last...
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Feb 10, 2016 02:01
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LeSquide posted:From talking to some of the people who who are working on it*, it sounds like they're very aware of the problems with Scion 1e. They also have several folks with relevant degrees working on it this time, so I'm reasonably enthusiastic about it.
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Feb 10, 2016 03:45
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Rand Brittain posted:I don't think Matt saw either of the two "sides" of Beast as being the right one; I think he saw them as being the two poles of otherness the game was built on top of. You're the "beast" because you're a giant fuckoff monster with horns and teef wike dis, and the "beast" because you're the outcast that people other. It doesn't seem, to me, that Beast has a good underlying idea that was just made to look bad by a few misjudgements on the writers' parts. Rather it seems that the fundamental concept of the game is facile and lame, and that the developer's defense of that concept online makes it clear that the problem isn't with the presentation.
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Feb 10, 2016 04:28
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Why would you make a game about being an otherized outcast where the expectation is that you'll be solitary and without a broader social context, and then explicitly associate the PCs with oppressed classes? It doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
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Feb 10, 2016 04:41
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