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Memory serves that they give him great respect but, refreshingly, don't say he was outright one of them. A kinfolk, I think, may be the extent they claimed him in 1E.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:05
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They specifically say that Jesus was Gaian. But they do that in the same book where they explicitly claim every other important peace maker as kin or Garou. They also hold themselves responsible for Jesus's death but I can't remember why off the top of my head at seven am.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:07
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There's a non-zero chance my eyes glazed over in their tribebook. I'll revisit it. EDIT: Rechecking, they take the blame for bringing Pontius Pilate into power. This is why I didn't record Yeshua as a Child of Gaia: "He was a Gaian - not literally, in all likelihood, but part of our spirit whether he knew it or not." When I have wiggle room to not count things like 'jesus was a Children of Gaia Metis Philodox', I leap at it. Loomer fucked around with this message at 15:16 on Nov 30, 2016 |
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Nov 30, 2016 15:10
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...so, was Jesus actually documented in oWoD as a Sorcerer and then a Lasombra?
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Nov 30, 2016 15:17
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He crops up as a sorcerer in the 1997 Order of Hermes book, though that has an unreliable narrator issue. He appears as the protagonist in a short story in Dark Destinies 2, which I had been inclined to dismiss as non-canonical but may not have that luxury once it gets a kindle reissue like DD1 did. In that, he's embraced, has no shadow, chats with Paul and is rather perplexed at this new religion in his name because he was a good Jewish Rabbi, and then fucks off to torpor.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:23
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...that seems extremely unlikely, given Jesus' actual attempts to present himself as God's son and his active rejection of standard Jewish practice in favor of active recruitment of Gentiles. Not that I expect much better from Dark Destinies.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:27
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Mors Rattus posted:...that seems extremely unlikely, given Jesus' actual attempts to present himself as God's son and his active rejection of standard Jewish practice in favor of active recruitment of Gentiles. Well, it kind of works with Reza Aslan's Zealot, but even in that book Jesus is a reformer of the jewish faith.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:40
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Yeah, there's no way to view it as 'Jesus was just, like, a Jewish guy'. He was - even if you're an adherent to the school of thought that emphasizes the early Jewish Christianity over Pauline Christianity (I am myself) - a Rabbi with a lot to criticize about the systems that had evolved, points of doctrine, and concepts of theology, to the point where at best he'd be forming a major branch of the religion rather than a wholly new one.
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Nov 30, 2016 15:46
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Alright I looked it up, a lot of Gaian Kinfolk were killed in King Herod's purge so they did what they could to get someone more even handed put in charge of Judea, that person was Pontious Pilate.quote:What was that about?" Hack asked.  Yes that is Rage-In-The-Streets, famous lupus drug pusher, saying that the Homid shape feels good like it's the first time he's done it before. Of course that brings to mind the idea of a wolf peddling smack like the Fox from Persona 4. "ALL YO AUDs, YIP YIP YAP!"
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Nov 30, 2016 16:03
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Loomer posted:Yeah, there's no way to view it as 'Jesus was just, like, a Jewish guy'. He was - even if you're an adherent to the school of thought that emphasizes the early Jewish Christianity over Pauline Christianity (I am myself) - a Rabbi with a lot to criticize about the systems that had evolved, points of doctrine, and concepts of theology, to the point where at best he'd be forming a major branch of the religion rather than a wholly new one. There's a reason it's often called The Jesus Movement when scholars want to distinguish between eventual Pauline Christianity and the early version that was more of a major reform/new branch in a Jewish context. Jesus' followers clearly saw him as a major reformer and critic. Of course, they also had to explain why such a man had been executed as an enemy of the state and so they wrote Pontious Pilate, a guy who was kicked out of being governor of the region because he was too kill-happy, as being deeply conflicted about ordering Jesus' execution.
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Nov 30, 2016 16:21
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Mulva posted:You can try to post-modernize that bitch all you want, but it really doesn't loving matter: The monster dies in the end. I haven't read Beast yet, but doesn't this line of thinking effectively invalidate one of the main thematic premises of the World of Darkness's various splats as a whole, i.e. you're an inhuman creature, but you're also still a person with your own wants, hopes and dreams, and part of the drama is trying to reconcile being a monster with being a person? This is basically saying "All vampires deserve to be staked and left for the sun, all werewolves deserve a silver bullet to the skull, etc." and that just seems like a strange approach to take for a system that's traditionally been all about humanizing what has traditionally been the "other side" by putting the players in the monsters' shoes.
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Nov 30, 2016 17:51
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I suppose this depends on how we're using the word 'monster' and whether we're defining it as 'creepy thing that goes bump in the night' or 'serial killer.'
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Nov 30, 2016 17:53
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W.T. Fits posted:This is basically saying "All vampires deserve to be staked and left for the sun, all werewolves deserve a silver bullet to the skull, etc." and that just seems like a strange approach to take for a system that's traditionally been all about humanizing what has traditionally been the "other side" by putting the players in the monsters' shoes. One of the problems with Beast is that they drop this in favor of "you're a monster who subsists on abuse, but it's okay because you can justify that abuse!" with a heaping shovel of "...and anyone who claims otherwise also deserves your specific brand of abuse." There's nothing to reconcile and no balance to be struck; you're just That Guy and everyone should love you for who you are, even through what you are is wholly reprehensible.
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Nov 30, 2016 18:28
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Thematically the Beast-as-Monster treads on the same ground as Vampire. The world would definitely be a better place were Vampires not around, but a "moral" Vampire can feed while leaving their victims feeling weakened, but pleased with the memory of the experience. They might get addicted to it, and there's definitely rape undertones, but Vampire never tries to make excuses for what it is. Even the Lancea Sanctum basically go "We are beasts of god but we are still damned and deserve to die". If a vampire fucks up and forgets to feed they fall into Torpor, that's not even getting into the fact that they burn up in sunlight and are inherently monstrous. But Beasts don't feed on physical health, they feed on psychological health, they break down what makes a person a person. At their best a Beast feeds on petty slights and technicalities that they can force their horror to stomach as 'feeding'. But if they gently caress up, if they have a bad string of luck, then their horror is going to go out and force the issue. If they somehow manage to get down to ravenous then it doesn't matter, the only way they're coming back from that is by either fundamentally ruining someone's life or just killing them. At the same time Beasts are fundamentally human, short of supernatural intervention nothing can 'out' them as nothing but what they are. A Beast at Satiety 10 is human. And for as much as Beasts moralize that they're serving a purpose, the game admits that most of the lessons Beast teaches are now handled by parents and school. The game never posits what a world without Beasts would look like because a World Without Beasts would look very much like the Chronicles of Darkness looked like prior to Beast's existence. That is to say exactly the same just with less serial killers in it.
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Nov 30, 2016 18:34
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Yawgmoth posted:Well that's the main source of pathos and inner conflict. All vampires do deserve a stake in the chest and an extended sunbathing session. By their very existence they inflict harm and cause suffering. But these things don't change that they still retain some fragment of their lost humanity, and can (if they choose) minimize that harm and work to make improvements to other aspects of life. There's a choice of how much of a monster to be, but "not a monster" isn't on the scale. While it's more often about the journey than the actual realization, Golconda is very much the search for the 'Not a Monster' end state. Rare for a player to go after it, and I've never seen anyone get further along than a few steps - but it's still on the scale.
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Nov 30, 2016 19:46
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Vampire is a game about people who are (if they are trying to be decent) constantly trapped in bargaining. "If I fight enough evil, if I never kill anyone, if I give enough to charity, if I live well enough, I can make up for the fact that my continued existence is a statement that I value my existence over the people it inevitably harms by definition." is a very human reaction to their status.
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Nov 30, 2016 19:55
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Barbed Tongues posted:While it's more often about the journey than the actual realization, Golconda is very much the search for the 'Not a Monster' end state. Rare for a player to go after it, and I've never seen anyone get further along than a few steps - but it's still on the scale.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:19
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I don't actually remember if the word 'Golconda' shows up in nVampire 2e. I know 1e just kind of left the idea behind around halfway through its run, having mentioned it only a bare handful of times before that.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:23
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It's like a Wisdom Ascension in Mage: dumb bullshit that completely betrays the premise of the splat it's from.  
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Nov 30, 2016 20:27
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Golconda usually only comes up in the same breath as the Salubri, the special snowflake clan that are too good for this sinful earth.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:29
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Golconda would be fine if it was just the discovery that the only way you get it is to go sunbathing. The realization that there is, in fact, a state where a vampire will never hurt anyone again: Ashes.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:34
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Kurieg posted:Golconda usually only comes up in the same breath as the Salubri, the special snowflake clan that are too good for this sinful earth. There aren't any Salubri in nVampire.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:43
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Redemption and permanently becoming not-a-monster seems to me a pretty common vampiric theme, well within the wheelhouse and given a lot of word count. It does look like they dropped Golconda from 2E, though, via a quick word search - so fair enough for a 2E-only scale I suppose. Special snowflakes are annoying no matter what they latch onto, even stuff I usually like or find clever personally.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:48
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Mors Rattus posted:I don't actually remember if the word 'Golconda' shows up in nVampire 2e. In the Carthian book, the concept of a "Bodhisattcracy" is discussed, that is rule by those who have achieved Golconda, among the various forms of vampiric government they experiment with.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:50
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Night10194 posted:Golconda would be fine if it was just the discovery that the only way you get it is to go sunbathing.
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Nov 30, 2016 20:50
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I'm picturing a riff on the ending of Pippin, where a vampire learns that the climactic end to their quest is to set themself on fire while their allies and rivals encourage and cheer them on.
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Nov 30, 2016 21:19
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At most Golconda should be a way to reverse the vampiric curse and go back to being an ordinary mortal again. Becoming a parasitic monster isn't the path the enlightenment, even if at the same time "the only possible redemption for someone like you is suicide" is kind of a lovely theme.
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Nov 30, 2016 21:23
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Kellsterik posted:I'm picturing a riff on the ending of Pippin, where a vampire learns that the climactic end to their quest is to set themself on fire while their allies and rivals encourage and cheer them on. "Congratulations Shinji" "Congratulations Shinji" "Congratulations Shinji" *horrified gurgling screams and the pop of boiling fat* Kurieg fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Nov 30, 2016 |
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Nov 30, 2016 21:32
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I think that the idea behind Golconda is that it is possible to transmute the curse of vampirism into a blessing. By being a immortal with a bunch of powers, the good you can do/level of enlightenment you could achieve would be exponentially greater than most mortals would ever be capable of.
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Nov 30, 2016 21:36
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Says the Ordo Dracul, shortly before doing donuts on the lawn of God.
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Nov 30, 2016 21:37
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I mean, in both versions of Vampire, vampirism is a poorly understood 'curse' with lots of obvious benefits. From a eye-in-the-sky, outsider perspective, yeah, vampirism should always be a devil's bargain. In universe, though, it sort of makes sense that people want to find a way out and it's obvious why there are so many different interpretations of how that looks. In fact I would say the interpretation of Golconda is akin to a vampire's view on their own condition to begin with. If you hate being a vampire than being mortal again would be fine. If you love being a vampire but hate hurting people being some kind of vampire buddah makes a lot of sense, and so on. "I don't understand how this works but there must be some way to eliminate the bad parts" makes perfect sense.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:16
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Conversely, the three end-state goals of Beast all involve you leaving your humanity behind to become a better monster.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:24
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Kurieg posted:Conversely, the three end-state goals of Beast all involve you leaving your humanity behind to become a better monster. God, you could make such a good splat if you leaned into this premise instead of half-assing it.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:24
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I'm really bummed about how Beast turned out. There's some good ideas and cool concepts there, marred by a ham-fisted, insensitive, and tone-deaf presentation.  e: I hope Deviant is good, it sounds cool
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Nov 30, 2016 23:25
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Scion released a preview of the Teotl of the Mexihcah. That'd be the Aztecs.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:31
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'Lair of the Hidden' from V:tM has group of old-rear end Inconnu all trying to achieve Golconda and a lot of discussion on the nature of it, I'm too busy right now to sum it up but the jist came down to a vision quest (the suspire) where you try to come to terms with just being a Vampire and if you fail you end up an instant-Wight
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Nov 30, 2016 23:35
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:God, you could make such a good splat if you leaned into this premise instead of half-assing it. But then they couldn't be everyone's best friends because no one wants to buddy up with the dude who's explicitly trying to eat your dreams and the stated goal of Beast was to be the crossover splat. Like even as it stands the end-goals are antithetical to group play, since the first two make you an NPC and the last one has an implicit QUIEN ES MAS MACHO component attached to it which means only one member of the group can actually get that far and you might as well be an NPC.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:38
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Kurieg posted:But then they couldn't be everyone's best friends because no one wants to buddy up with the dude who's explicitly trying to eat your dreams and the stated goal of Beast was to be the crossover splat. If I were designing a game based on Beast I'd get the players really involved in the process of creating their opposing Hero, either with the Hero inevitably destroying them in mind or some kind of deal where they play the Hero in interludes leading up to a final confrontation where they have the option of picking either to play and the GM takes over the other, and either one can triumph. Sort of like an inverted Ars Magica, if you like.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:45
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The Teotl, on my first read, appear to be heavier on the hedonist/sexual side of things, but I don't really mind - they're very passionate gods, tied deeply to blood and life and the land. The signature power of the Teotl is Nextlahualli - the power to tap into the ritual debt of sacrifice for power. The example powers listed let you heal yourself when you gain Legend from a major sacrifice, or sense sacrifices made to you or the Teotl near you and use one of your powers to grant the request of the mortal doing the sacrifice, even if they'd be out of range of your power. Plus, they have Itzpapalotl, the Obsidian Butterfly, who is metal as gently caress.
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Nov 30, 2016 23:57
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Mendrian posted:I mean, in both versions of Vampire, vampirism is a poorly understood 'curse' with lots of obvious benefits. I mean in universe you could just be an alchemist or something and become immortal and also be able to eat chocolate on a beach somewhere, really no upside to being a vampire. Pretty much *all* other forms of immortality are superior, except maybe Bane Mummies. Which I'd find it amusing to see Vampire address. Then again I hate the semi-connected-but-not-really-but-they-are nature of the oWoD games. It means you never bring up the others until they are a plot point, and then you never bring up that plot point until you have to. It's why I find it funny the new v20 Black Hand book has a totally legitimate way for a Vampires to use True Magick that doesn't step on anyone's toes and offers benefits to both sides of the equation and isn't overpowered. You have the Tremere giving up everything for a lesser deal, and then being total assholes to everyone afterwards, and completely turning inwards and blocking out all attempts to really bond with another group, and all it does is push them increasingly closer to the edge of oblivion. And then you have the Tal'Maha'Ra of all people managing to put aside the around nine million forms of insanity that make up their membership and vaguely trying to form something like a working force for social good [You know, according to the picture of "Good" that you get from such a wildly disparate group of total extremists], and in the process discovering all sorts of things like Dark Thaumaturgy that doesn't drive people instantly insane and evil, or soul bonds that let a vampire soak up Paradox for a Mage while having access to their Spheres [Or Pillars, in this case]. The messed up space cadets actually do manage to work together and learn something from all their different positions, and they manage it while being mostly civil and understanding of their differences. And then some of them probably go out and brutally torture and murder an entire town to keep a demon from outside reality asleep, but again. Relative to their beliefs, actually managing to do good. The funny and sad part is imaging if everyone else was as tolerant and open minded as the True Black Hand.
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Dec 1, 2016 00:15
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