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Nomadic Scholar posted:I think I may start reading me some ars magica. Everything in this page about it sounds hilarious and amazing. It is amazing and I could talk about it and the weirdness within it forever. I will note, however, that at one point someone used Ars Magica books to prepare for a history exam. Successfully. They have since added a few disclaimers to some of the books asking you not to use them as textbooks for your medieval history class.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:28
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First off, that's really bizarre. Second, this just piques my interest even more because I love me some alt history.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:38
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Mors Rattus posted:It is amazing and I could talk about it and the weirdness within it forever. I will note, however, that at one point someone used Ars Magica books to prepare for a history exam. Successfully.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:40
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Mors' Fatal and Friends review of Ars Magica is also really good and comprehensive.
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Nov 17, 2016 21:56
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My favorite Ars Magica setting detail off the top of my head is one house literally has a Hubris trait and they are in-universe known to be even more prone than other wizards to becoming paranoid, obsessive, egotistical shotgun wizards, but they're allowed to stay around because they're really loving good at making magical items. It's treated like a known work hazard more than anything.
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Nov 17, 2016 22:38
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Not quite comprehensive any more, since a bunch of books have come out since I stopped, but...yeah. Yeah, I could talk about this forever.
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Nov 17, 2016 22:58
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Cabbit posted:Werewolves are idiot murder machines so this all seems consistent. Of course their laws are stupid and contradictory; they're morons. See, some of the best parts of the werewolf setting are when the writers consciously understood that the garou obsession with being murder machines had caused so many fuckups over the centuries that now they were essentially useless to actually meaningfully stop the wyrm. At best maybe the smarter ones might be able to pull out of the stupid long enough to salvage some small win or at least give the wyrm a bloody nose on the way down. I mean you get stuff like the impergium and the delirium, which the idiots in the nation are still going on about as being the good ol' days and this awesome power to make the pitiful humans fear them so they don't have to sneak around. And the smarter ones are like, great job dumbasses, now even if we could convince a sizeable enough part of the population about what was really going on and to help us fight, we couldn't actually team up with them because they'd run off screaming. This seems like the opposite of that. Its one of the guys who wants werewolf to be captain planet taking down the villains, and has made it so now there can be like tons of garou running around and you can team up with your vampire besties to curb stomp those meanie BSDs.
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Nov 17, 2016 23:43
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I'm surprised that the major part of the new Werewolf LARP system hasn't been brought up more: that the Fera (non-Garou shapeshifters) are fully integrated into werewolf society and are totally fine with being cat-eared bystanders while the rage machines plunge further into tragedy. This is largely because, before even the Vamp crossover, non-wolf animal crossover is huge and now a major part of the assumed setting because of that.
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Nov 18, 2016 00:11
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That at least makes sense as a design goal given that "none of the Fera really know each other that well and they all kind of hate each other, but they especially hate the Garou" isn't really how people want the game to be played. (So, it's kind of a pity that it's a critical part of the Garou's backstory that they murdered or drove off all their allies.)
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Nov 18, 2016 00:14
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Well considering that there are only 13 caerns left (And 13 tribes? Funny that) i imagine that the Fera now all have to play nice. Still doesn't make any goddamn sense. Rand Brittain posted:That at least makes sense as a design goal given that "none of the Fera really know each other that well and they all kind of hate each other, but they especially hate the Garou" isn't really how people want the game to be played. There's a built in solution to this in Werewolf's backstory. The War of Rage is entirely the Nagah's fault. If it gets out that they're responsible, and the Fera throw them under the bus, reconciliation could happen drat quick.
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Nov 18, 2016 00:14
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Kurieg posted:There's a built in solution to this in Werewolf's backstory. The War of Rage is entirely the Nagah's fault. If it gets out that they're responsible, and the Fera throw them under the bus, reconciliation could happen drat quick. I assume that the Ratkin are still "gently caress YOU" at least? Also why on earth are there only 13 caerns left has everyone just up and forgot the rite that's literally about making one?
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Nov 18, 2016 00:18
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Also, only 13 caerns? That's really odd for a book primarily written by people playing and running Werewolf in the MES.
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Nov 18, 2016 00:42
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Someone post more pics from the MES / By Night books
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Nov 18, 2016 00:47
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The only 13 caerns thing is because they now have 'seed caerns' where a pack or five goes out to found a brand spanking new spiritual locus to grow and defend, with no old history to it. This is because letting STs start fresh without having to explain five centuries of backstory is a good thing. Also most (Werewolf) LARPs fold in on themselves within a year so its easier to explain in a national game why, say, portland up and reappeared with an all new ground of players.
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Nov 18, 2016 02:14
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The reduction to 13 Caerns is, in-universe, because the apocalypse happened. All the other Caerns either died of plague or were destroyed by the Wyrm's marching army. For a reference of how devastating that actually is, not withstanding the spiritual apocalypse element I raised earlier, there's something like 400 seperate caerns and septs mentioned in my files. Over 95% of all Caerns are gone, and while many died peacefully, if even half of them lost their Garou in the fighting (and it's implied to be a higher death toll, leading to the quick adoption of The Bite even though it is the single worst thing you can do to boost the Garou population in the medium and long term (unless, that is, you only give The Bite to women past childbearing age and other Kinfolk who are for whatever reason unable to reproduce. That could actually be a fairly badass thing for the Get to adopt - 'You are old now, but your work is not yet done. We call on you for one final, heroic service to Gaia.' sorta deal)) that means the Garou have lost at least half their population, if not more. This is one of those areas I mentioned about the book being apocalyptic in its implications but not its execution. It treats it as if the Garou Nation is still a thing with a reasonable number of soldiers, rather than what it actually should be from the loss of 95% of its caerns - a total, shattered wreck. The only way that there could be more than a large handful of Garou left is if most of them fled from the fighting before their caerns fell (and the ones whose caerns fell peacefully would, logically, have joined the ones that still stood and were being attacked daily by the Wyrm's forces), which means that either a, there are only a few Garou left and every player pack is a not insignificant portion of the remaining Garou Nation's strength (which does actually fit with how the gameline has long presented Garou numbers), or b, the Garou Nation as it currently exists consists largely of Cowards Who Ran and people who were too badly injured to keep fighting (only they're meant to have been killed off, under the new litany. Which actually makes a terrifying amount of sense if most of the Nation is now cowards. Them adopting a hardline stance of 'kill the old cripples' to murder those who remind them, by simple fact of the arm that never grew back after a Nexus Crawler tore it off or the exposed bone left after a Tzimisce flayed their skull, that they are cowards who let their caerns fall rather than risk their own lives in the defence of Gaia.)
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Nov 18, 2016 04:55
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I think we can all agree that the 760 page Werewolf the Post Apocalypse larp book is poorly conceived and we're probably putting more thought into it than the creators did. I want to imagine they limited the caerns to limit the power creep that happens in larp but  .
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Nov 18, 2016 06:35
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It'd be more fun if all the Caerns were still there just Wyrm/Weaver tainted. Go fight a spider the size of a bungalow so you can spend the next decade dealing with urban zoning regulations.
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Nov 18, 2016 08:49
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Bone Gnawer in a t-shirt that reads "I fought off a Nexus Crawler and all I got was a caern full of used methpipes and hobo urine." Though that may not be that different to before it fell for some Gnawer caerns, actually.
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Nov 18, 2016 08:52
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The rite that makes trashcans dispense endless McDonald's and soda rules. Gnawers should use it as part of recruitment. "Look, you're going to be an enormous fuckoff Wolfperson with access to infinite food." Get rid of the Delirium right quick, especially because WoD-folk are so much likelier to be starving/homeless/generally wretched.
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Nov 18, 2016 09:36
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Werewolf: the Post Apocalypse: in which a Black Fury Historian gets basically every detail wrong. In the history chapter, we have some big shifts and some minor ones. It’s presented as an in-universe work, but I’m going to treat it as intended to be loosely accurate both in and out of universe, especially as it’s one of the few parts most players are likely to read. First, and right off the bat: Gaia created the Triat. Humans are bad, because they used tools and the weaver liked it. These aren’t quite changes, but they’re very big oversimplifications and it annoys me to see the book double down on the annoying idea that humanity is essentially evil because we do things like form patterns, cultivate plants, and learn how to use tools. The most interesting take on mankind in the Werewolf cosmology is the one where we were born originally to manifest all three elements of the Triat in proper balance, and the Garou – because they are biased towards the Wyld – hosed it all up when they freaked the hell out over us. A great example of why ‘that drat weaver!’ isn’t so bad is here in my own country, where the pre-contact indigenous peoples turned almost the entire country into a farm so lush that it supported far greater biodiversity and animal populations than it would otherwise, without causing pollution, soil erosion or degradation, or mass extinctions. For Werewolf, this would be the ideal state of the human being: A farmer who lives in connection with the world around him, letting things grow mostly wild but with a plan behind them, applying destruction only where needed to ensure that growth is not harmed or inhibited, and who moves regularly so as to avoid overstressing any region. But instead, METW20 is doubling down on ‘Wild good, tools bad’. The natural state of the world is apparently Wyld, with ‘little of the Weaver or the Wyrm corrupting it’ – so we double down there too on the idea that the influence of either of those, even pre-struggle, is Wrong for the planet. Also not new, but an affirmation of the older, shallower view. We also have a date now for when the Wyrm fell, which is new to my recollection. It’s not exact, but by inference from the passage ‘As the Triat warred against itself, the shockwave of their struggle echoed throughout the cosmos. The Material Realm shattered into the continents...’ we can place the latest possible date for the fall at around 175 MYA, because we know from Shattered Dreams that circa 250MYA the Wyrm had not yet fallen, and thus only Pangaea fits the supercontinent bill. This is silly, though, as there were continents before Pangaea, and it in fact joined out of continents. But hey, I guess the Black Fury Historian didn’t pay attention in Earth Science class and/or knows secret truths. Because there was no cooperation between BNS and OPP, we get our first big inconsistency. Echoing earlier editions, the Gauntlet arises as a result of the Impergium. But we know from Shattered Dreams that it actually arose between 200MYA and 65MYA, and solidified 72KYA – well before the Impergium began by any possible dating of it. Apparently the Sept of the Crescent Moon is now the first Caern ever. It’s not. It’s the first Garou caern, but the Gurahl had them long before. The Three Brothers left for North America post-Impergium now. Also inconsistent with the rest of the setting, which has them leave for North America pre-Impergium, c. 30,000BC (or c. 27,000BC, or in one bad case, c. 10,000BC. The most recent reading is for before 27,000BC). This is also pre-War of Rage, which is already no longer accurate, as strong aspects of the War of Rage had already kicked off. Shattered Dreams rather nicely turned the War of Rage into a series of retaliatory brushfire wars and open fighting that culminated in the most brutal fighting taking the name proper, but which arose as a result of that earlier strife. The treatment of the War of Rage is pretty standard. It repeats a lot of the nonsense – e.g. there was no War of Rage in the Americas, etc. As an in-universe document, our Black Fury Historian is actually really bad at her job and a strictly orthodox historian, even if what the Garou actually need is a revisionist willing to kick the asses of anyone who challenges her. King Arthur is now explicitly a real figure – and a Gurahl. Before, this had a single mention and was ambiguous as to whether or not he outright ruled or was merely the inspiration. Now it is quite explicit. The peace between the Fenrir, Fianna and Silver Fangs in England is now a pan-European peace, and happens 16 years early. And come the return of the Ratkin in 1345, they release the Black Death. However, the Ratkin were already back by then for centuries, the Black Death can be traced earlier along the Silk Road, and we have sources that say the Ratkin were already cultivating and unleashing it in the 1100s. So, we have a bad retcon here. We get a slight revision to the Prophecy of the Phoenix to more accurately reflect climate change vs global warming. Back on the retcon/inconsistency/bad history front, the Shadow Lords now arrive in North America in 1521. This is inaccurate – since at least 2001, the story has had them arrive well before then. It is now their genocide of the Camazotz that summons forth the Storm Eater, and it is because of the Storm Eater that the Eater-of-Souls wakes and the Croatan have to sacrifice themselves. This is more significant a retcon when we remember two things. First, the Apocalypse-that-Wasn’t was down to the Storm Eater, and second, the Storm Eater is nothing more than a massive bane-weaverspirit, and the Eater-of-Souls is one of the Triatic Heads of the Wyrm. So we have the implication that the Wyrm is not as great a threat as the Storm-Eater is now. The Central Park Caern is declared to be the first Urban caern ever. This is inaccurate. The Central Park Caern is preceded by a number of medieval caerns in urban environments, and is actually less urban than many of them by virtue of being in a very large park. The old version of the Bunyip war is reiterated, with there being basically zero responsibility for the Garou Nation and it all being the BSDs fault – which was, a, never the case, and b, completely retconned in Shattered Dreams. So again, a case of no real communication between BNS and OPP out of universe, and a revisionist historian who wants to whitewash the Garou in-universe. “The Great Depression struck down much of the hope and optimism triggered by the Industrial Revolution. For a time, it seemed that humanity might turn back towards the Wyld and embrace Gaia.” And remember – the Wyrm and the Weaver have no place on Earth according to this telling, so it turns out hope and optimism are bad because they keep humans from Gaia. It’s funny, but I seem to recall suffering and hopelessness being the leading cause of bane birth. Also, the movements at the time that were looking to ‘turn back’ on the industrial revolution were either naturists, who didn’t eschew the modern age so much as go ‘hey, let’s not go crazy’ or, well, fascists. So y’know. Not a great time to be celebrating mankind’s sensible decisions. Apparently the Metamorphic Plague made lots of Black Furies give birth to sons, which seems to imply they would usually birth mostly girls. This is not the case – BF offspring have the same ratio as any other offspring, it’s just they ship their boys off to other tribes. The newly invigorated Council of Tribes is apparently High King Albrecht’s work, which does make a degree of sense. At the same time, it departs from what he actually did in the timeframe they refer to so it’s a retconned innovation – and its form (as a defacto government) doesn’t seem like something he’d have adopted. I already did their apocalypse, but here’s another bit that stands out. Of the Breeds likely to come fight by the Garou’s side, the Gurahl rank fairly high. But here, only three come: The Bastet, the Corax, and for some reason, the ratkin – who don’t immediately start bombing humans in the fighting as well. The most likely breed to help is nowhere to be seen, and instead a Gangrel named after them saves the day. The Mokole, the Nuwisha, and the Nagah make no appearance in the final fighting. After the Apocalypse, with Gaia either dead or torpid, the Garou splinter into two camps. One wants a total return to the old traditions, which is a terrible idea in many ways, but Garou are idiots so that’s fine. The other main one wants to work with the Weaver – who remember is, at this point, strangling the world to death with an increased gauntlet – to protect the material world. Oh, and at some point the Margrave Yuri Konietzko died, and his son is the new margrave because I guess everything has to be hereditary. At this point, relations are improving with fera, which is actually a nice change, but it isn’t because the Garou have been contrite or apologetic so much as not being raging assholes for a change. The new caerns attract rips in the umbra and wyrm hellholes. So now, not only is most of Gaia’s gnosis network gone, but any attempt to rebuild it also heightens the strength of the Wyrm on earth. So everyone is pretty much hosed. I wonder if the part where shard caerns require human sacrifice to build has anything to do with it? That’s the history chapter, and enough effortpostin’ for now.
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Nov 18, 2016 12:43
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:I think we can all agree that the 760 page Werewolf the Post Apocalypse larp book is poorly conceived and we're probably putting more thought into it than the creators did. The MES Addendum (basically the full set of house rules, adjustments, and so on that governs the MES chronicle for a given game) for old MET Werewolf is 144 printed pages, if that tells you anything.
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Nov 18, 2016 13:01
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Their VtM timeline is alright, at least. I mean I haven't looked in detail but it has enough proper citations to make it useful to me even if I disagree with things like when the Bronze Age started (it's not 4KYA, it's actually around 5.3KYA.) or the dates of the First and Second City. Towards the end it starts to really invoke stuff from LARP scenes, though. https://games.mindseyesociety.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2015/12/CamAnarchTimeline.pdf
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Nov 18, 2016 13:43
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Pope Guilty posted:The MES Addendum (basically the full set of house rules, adjustments, and so on that governs the MES chronicle for a given game) for old MET Werewolf is 144 printed pages, if that tells you anything. Why did they change the name of the Glasswalkers? From what it says in the addendum they're the same as far as stats go.
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Nov 18, 2016 15:21
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The answer is almost always 'a really stupid plot.'
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Nov 18, 2016 15:22
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"Silicon Sentinels" Are you loving kidding me?
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Nov 18, 2016 15:31
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According to this there are still regular old glass walkers who don't acknowledge the name change but they don't get access to the swanky new gift lists. This is stupid. In the MET-verse did Genereader just start changing everything to gently caress with people the minute she got into power?
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Nov 18, 2016 15:43
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They are, at least, still known as Glass Walkers in the rulebook. EDIT: Let's play... GAROU OR NOSFERATU? 
Loomer fucked around with this message at 16:55 on Nov 18, 2016 |
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Nov 18, 2016 15:44
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Loomer posted:They are, at least, still known as Glass Walkers in the rulebook. My guess is Garou. Did I win?
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Nov 18, 2016 17:19
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Yeah. I'd have guessed Nosferatu from gun and non-bleeding wound, but then I noticed the elf ears. Werewolves are a type of elf.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:27
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Kurieg posted:According to this there are still regular old glass walkers who don't acknowledge the name change but they don't get access to the swanky new gift lists. I remember there was a big plot in the Camarilla back before the end of OWoD where a faction of Glasswalkers, not the Cyber Dogs or whatever, were passing out free cybernetic brain implants. The tribe changed in the aftermath of that, I forget the name change, but it was dumb and super obvious as a gently caress you plot line. EDIT: Loomer posted:They are, at least, still known as Glass Walkers in the rulebook. Possibly both, it's an abomination.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:41
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drat, picked out the trick quick.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:45
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Mors Rattus posted:Werewolves are a type of elf. Their hobbies (in oWoD) were worshiping nature, condescending to people, and making terrible decisions that get everyone killed. It checks out.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:50
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Loomer posted:drat, picked out the trick quick. I saw it posted on the Facebook page.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:54
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On the one hand, I don't mind the idea that the Glass Walkers might change their name, since that's like a thing they've done in the past. It fits their whole "fluid adaptation to changes with humanity" thing. On the other hand, "Silicon Sentinels" sounds loving stupid, and will end up looking as painfully dated as the Virtual Adepts and the Digital Web in a few years. Pick something a little more general.
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Nov 18, 2016 17:55
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The Silicon Sentinels sound like a really goofy 90s superteam. Sort of like the American supers version of Corrector Yui.
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Nov 18, 2016 18:05
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I imagine they're all about gentrification and wistfully dreaming of a technocratic, despotic government like Peter Thiel to match with Paradox's take on the WoD.
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Nov 18, 2016 18:26
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:I remember there was a big plot in the Camarilla back before the end of OWoD where a faction of Glasswalkers, not the Cyber Dogs or whatever, were passing out free cybernetic brain implants. The tribe changed in the aftermath of that, I forget the name change, but it was dumb and super obvious as a gently caress you plot line. Seriously what the gently caress? I'm assuming one of the Lead STs just really really wanted all the Glass Walkers to go full cyberpunk and turned it into a org wide storyline, loving over everyone who didn't?
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Nov 18, 2016 18:43
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Kurieg posted:Seriously what the gently caress? I'm assuming one of the Lead STs just really really wanted all the Glass Walkers to go full cyberpunk and turned it into a org wide storyline, loving over everyone who didn't? It was the opposite. If you took the implant, which gave you a tribe wide version of pack speech and some other perks, you were on the path to being calcified by the Weaver. After it was done and the Weaver tainted people were dealt with, the tribe renamed itself because Cockroach had fallen and I think Clashing Boom Boom became the tribal totem.
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Nov 18, 2016 19:30
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:I think Clashing Boom Boom became the tribal totem.
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Nov 18, 2016 19:32
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Bone Gnawer pack totems include All Mighty Dolla and the General Lee.
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Nov 18, 2016 19:35
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