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Libertad! posted:Y'all are probably gonna give me the stink eye for this, but I'm in the process of writing a fan crossover supplement between Werewolf the Forsaken and Princess the Hopeful titled By the Power of the Moon! I'm curious about what subject manner and topics I should cover for this. I already have some general ideas, such as Princess/Uratha interactions, new Gifts/powers/etc interfacing with each other's respective enemy factions (Magical Girls fighting spirits, werewolves performing the Sacred Hunt against creatures of Darkness, etc), a mini-bestiary, and possibly a Unified Cosmology tying together concepts from the two sourcebooks into a more put-together whole. I can't speak for past versions of it, but the current version of Princess is actually really good and reads like a clever deconstruction on not just the grim darkness of the setting but also what'd happen when you had some genuinely heroic people with high tier superpowers show up and try to set things right. Pick up the Vigil expansion if you can find the full version of it for It also serves as a pretty good parody of Exalted if you hate it or don't mind the line gently satirizing the core Exalted types. Contrary to their name, Princess's are more like discount Solar Exalt's all heavily specced into virtues like compassion or conviction after being run through a modern anime blender. And it absolutely confuses the gently caress out of pretty much everyone else in the setting since it's clear they're way out of place in the era they show up in. It probably helps that there's an entire community of table top gamers working together on the project to make sure everything is properly is proof read properly and engages with the rest of the setting in an interesting way. Maybe check out the discord for the fan splat? Asking about what they're looking into doing with the game line might give you an idea of what you should focus on writing. Archonex fucked around with this message at 15:53 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 15:39
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As someone who actually likes magical girl anime: Princess is loving awful and has no understanding of any magical girl show except, possibly, Madoka. Sorry.
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Sep 7, 2019 16:57
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Libertad! posted:Y'all are probably gonna give me the stink eye for this, but I'm in the process of writing a fan crossover supplement between Werewolf the Forsaken and Princess the Hopeful titled By the Power of the Moon! I'm curious about what subject manner and topics I should cover for this. I already have some general ideas, such as Princess/Uratha interactions, new Gifts/powers/etc interfacing with each other's respective enemy factions (Magical Girls fighting spirits, werewolves performing the Sacred Hunt against creatures of Darkness, etc), a mini-bestiary, and possibly a Unified Cosmology tying together concepts from the two sourcebooks into a more put-together whole.  Wait no.
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Sep 7, 2019 16:58
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Mors Rattus posted:As someone who actually likes magical girl anime: Princess is loving awful and has no understanding of any magical girl show except, possibly, Madoka. I agree with you, but that's pretty much the point. Madoka was the first (really) 'dark genre' magical girl anime, and it was pretty much the sole inspiration for Princess.
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Sep 7, 2019 17:22
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MoonKnight posted:I agree with you, but that's pretty much the point. Madoka was the first (really) 'dark genre' magical girl anime, and it was pretty much the sole inspiration for Princess. Also, the original Madoka series was all about how much it sucked that the world was dark like that and how important it was to reestablish the original genre/escape samsara by the intervention of Mahayana Buddha. I can imagine a Chronicles game with Madoka inspiration (my Mage game had a Free Council Obrimos who specifically used Madoka as a yantra for 'the world sucks, and we deserve better than this') -- but the useful thematic opening would be a yearning for a brighter order that doesn't exist, which... Princess doesn't seem to do at all? Although, on the same general topic, a friend got me to watch Princess Tutu with her and it's been a lot of fun, and also seems like it ought to be compatible with Changeling: The Lost? I'm just not sure how to do that.
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Sep 7, 2019 17:29
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MoonKnight posted:I agree with you, but that's pretty much the point. Madoka was the first (really) 'dark genre' magical girl anime, and it was pretty much the sole inspiration for Princess. ahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahaha you summer child you know literally nothing Lemme talk some time about Nurse Angel Ririka, Princess Tutu, Utena, Kaitou Jeanne...honestly, though, even stuff like Cardcaptor Sakura got loving dark in places (hey did you know the fail state of Sakura's mission is the world goes on, but, explicitly, is altered so that no one truly loves you and you know this), to say nothing of Sailor Moon's AND THEN EVERYONE loving DIED moments. Madoka is nowhere even near the first, it just got really big and was written by a misogynist. e: and spawned legions of lovely imitations, of course Mors Rattus fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 17:31
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I really feel like that's unfair to Madoka as a show; the really uninteresting takes on it and the bad fandom are pretty prominent, but the work itself is pretty great. (It's also just really pretty, I don't think that can be understated in terms of why it got so big; that and lovely male fans feeling like they're allowed to watch it because it's a 'deconstruction' or something, when the actual thrust of the story is 'Cardcaptor Sakura is good, actually, and it's good that you can feel secure that Sakura will win in the end.') e: I should specify, I got into Madoka via getting it as a recommendation from a friend who also deeply loves CCS, Princess Tutu, and Utena (and probably others, those are just the ones we've watched some or all of together) and it was the first magical girl genre show I watched. I haven't had any interest in 'dark' magical girl shows, since that really wasn't what was interesting in Madoka. So I don't think the show is inherently just, well, Princess: The Hopeful. Oh also Flip Flappers is good, idk how it fits into the genre but I really enjoyed that for a more recent example. Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 17:48 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 17:39
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Kurieg posted:
Kurieg, you remain my one of my favorite people in this thread.
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Sep 7, 2019 17:45
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Mors Rattus posted:ahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahaha you summer child you know literally nothing Let's not forget how many times Pretty Cure, current standard bearer for unironic, non-deconstructive Magical Girl anime has had late season sequences of "And then the world loving ended and everyone was catapulted into miserable darkness where positive emotions can no longer exist". The fact there's a happy ending doesn't mean the series won't do some serious poo poo. Madoka was not the first magical girl anime to do dark poo poo by a hundred country miles. If you ask me its stranglehold on the Zeitgeist came because of the Zeitgeist. Madoka exploded by being good in the right ways at the right place at the right time with the right buzz and the right creator to spawn a legion of imitators. If Madoka hadn't happened there's a decent chance everyone ever would be talking about Yuki Yunna is a Hero or (ugh, gag me) Day Break Illusion. If you want a game for playing Madoka then go ahead, Magical Burst is right there, but if you want a broader Magical Girl game it needs to do way more than just Madoka to really get good at doing its genre.
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Sep 7, 2019 17:48
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Joe Slowboat posted:I really feel like that's unfair to Madoka as a show; the really uninteresting takes on it and the bad fandom are pretty prominent, but the work itself is pretty great. (It's also just really pretty, I don't think that can be understated in terms of why it got so big; that and lovely male fans feeling like they're allowed to watch it because it's a 'deconstruction' or something, when the actual thrust of the story is 'Cardcaptor Sakura is good, actually, and it's good that you can feel secure that Sakura will win in the end.') I actually do think that Madoka as an original show is decently done, even though I don't like it. But it's real hard to ignore that Gen Urobochi has a long history of punishing women in his works for having desires or wants, to a notably greater degree than men so that it can't just be written off as 'well he's a Buddhist and thinks all desires are bad.'
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Sep 7, 2019 17:51
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Mors Rattus posted:I actually do think that Madoka as an original show is decently done, even though I don't like it. That's fair, and unpleasant. ...I didn't really see it in Verdant Planet Gargantia, the only other show of his I've seen, but then that was a really light-hearted show at the core. I totally believe he has that pattern, and that sucks. I do think Madoka is specifically a Buddhist parable, but I can see why in that context the misery the show involves can go beyond the pale, and I certainly wouldn't argue anyone has to like it - I just think the imitators and the terrible fans are a distinct thing from the show as a text. Also specifically I get really annoyed at how all the 'Magical Girl RPGs inspired by Madoka' focus on the misery and hopelessness and so on, rather than the themes I actually think are key to the piece (hope being actually able to transform the setting, the religious parable, the actual triumph of innocence at the end of the show). Also fans keep thinking it's Faust rather than Buddhist, but also not knowing that Faust goes to heaven in the end of many versions. That just drives me up the wall.
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Sep 7, 2019 17:59
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I’m just going to leave this here: Senshi: The Merchandising
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Sep 7, 2019 18:00
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Joe Slowboat posted:Also, the original Madoka series was all about how much it sucked that the world was dark like that and how important it was to reestablish the original genre/escape samsara by the intervention of Mahayana Buddha. As of the GMC/2.0 update the theme of the game is literally "You all come from a time and place that was better than all of this grimdark wankery. Get to work in fixing everything up and keeping your dip poo poo co-workers from cocking things up even worse." with a side order of Princesses possibly having come about as a manifestation of humanity hoping for a better future via some supernal fuckery that's too long to bother getting into here. Also, the game literally rips elements of the plot of older magical girl shows like Sailor Moon and Pre-Cure wholesale while contrasting it with the grimmer/down to earth nature of the CofD/NWoD. So yeah, the idea that it doesn't have anything to do with older tv shows like that guy up above said is pretty ridiculous. I could flip the PDF file open real quick and explain it more if someone's interested. But at the end of the day it's basically a parody fan game in the vein of Senshi: The Merchandising so i'm really not going to bother unless anyone's interested in knowing the deep lore about what happens when a bunch of animes decide to unload on a bunch of grimdark assholes with cute, insanely destructive, and weebish magic. Archonex fucked around with this message at 18:11 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 18:01
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One of my werewolves is literally trying to become a magical enbie, so lay that weeb magic on me so I have something to give them.
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Sep 7, 2019 18:14
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Soonmot posted:One of my werewolves is literally trying to become a magical enbie, so lay that weeb magic on me so I have something to give them. Unless you're using Enbie in a different context than I'm aware of... there's a Father Wolf gift in the 2nd ed core that lets you switch biological sexes at will with an essence.
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Sep 7, 2019 18:29
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Yeah, one of my trans players has it. I'm using enbie for non-binary. Neither they not their character identify as male/female.
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Sep 7, 2019 18:55
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Soonmot posted:One of my werewolves is literally trying to become a magical enbie, so lay that weeb magic on me so I have something to give them. Kurieg posted:Unless you're using Enbie in a different context than I'm aware of... there's a Father Wolf gift in the 2nd ed core that lets you switch biological sexes at will with an essence. Yeah, there's definitely a gift for that. But since you asked for it it's time for a  nerdy lore and mechanics dump:So first and foremost one of the things that Princesses have going for them is their ability to transform. Rather than being a transformation like werewolves where they turn into furry murder machines this is more like the traditional magical girl or even superhero costume switches. Keep in mind that the term Princess is a bit misleading in this regard since either gender can be a Princess. The requisites of becoming one are to A: Have an insane amount of hope and/or compassion for other beings. B: Have been one in a past life. If you're seeing some shades of Exalt there in the second thing then you're right on the money. I'd get into that but it's own thing that's fairly huge so i'll only bother by request. This is, barring me missing something, implied to completely change the appearance of a person. Sometimes it's something more armored --- like a guy or gal turning into the Green Knight of Justice or whatever the gently caress. Other times the appearance is physical in the sense of the flesh. It's not impossible for someone to switch genders if that's related to them in some way. Some quotes for posterity: quote:One aspect of the Hopeful’s transformation is subtle but amazingly convenient: the mundane and transformed Paging through the book real quick also revealed this ability that Princesses can use. It may be of use to you in your game if you want to house rule something similar in for Werewolves. If you want I can PM you the full text for all this stuff. This is mostly for preview purposes since I don't want to clutter up the thread too badly. quote:Twenty Faces (Appear •) Archonex fucked around with this message at 19:01 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 18:57
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MoonKnight posted:I agree with you, but that's pretty much the point. Madoka was the first (really) 'dark genre' magical girl anime, and it was pretty much the sole inspiration for Princess. Open development of Princess: the Hopeful began on March 23, 2009 on RPG.net, and when the first episode of Puella Magi Madoka Magica aired on January 7, 2011 there were over 300 pages of discussion and development, people were talking about compiling the work into a usable game, and according to a friend who worked on in that period all the central ideals had been settled on already.
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Sep 7, 2019 19:23
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There’s simply no possible way that Princess is any good, and anyway we already have a game about using your unlocked magical powers to rescue humanity from its dreary and miserable existence.
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Sep 7, 2019 19:42
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Ferrinus posted:There’s simply no possible way that Princess is any good, and anyway we already have a game about using your unlocked magical powers to rescue humanity from its dreary and miserable existence. Yeah but people want a game that's actually good at dealing with that theme. e: Fundamentally your skill set is too high and your opposition actually doesn't care about literally every bad thing out, so you eventually have to deal with the question of "Why are there still Vampires in a world where Mages exist?", and replace Vampires with literally anything the Exarchs aren't personally invested in perpetuating. And the only reasonable answer is they don't give a poo poo about dealing with those things. Maybe some particular Mage does, but then that's not a widespread push to rescue humanity. Which of course is not what Mage society is about, and it never has been. Which is why it's not the greatest game to do Hunter or Princess or any other "You are stuck in in the CoD with everything else: Now deal with it" centered game. Mulva fucked around with this message at 20:08 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 20:04
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Mulva posted:Yeah but people want a game that's actually good at dealing with that theme. No, people want, themselves, to be good at dealing with that theme, but unfortunately there is no royal road to science.
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Sep 7, 2019 20:07
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Soonmot posted:Yeah, one of my trans players has it. I'm using enbie for non-binary. Neither they not their character identify as male/female. There are rules for becoming a Rebis in Magnum Opus for Promethean the Created, which is not really the same thing but is interesting anyway. IIRC, it's caused by Qashmallim.
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Sep 7, 2019 20:24
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Quick question because I'm drawing a blank, does Vigil require the blue book to run or does it have everything you need as is?
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Sep 7, 2019 20:31
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joylessdivision posted:Quick question because I'm drawing a blank, does Vigil require the blue book to run or does it have everything you need as is? 2e Hunter isn't out yet so you'd need the first edition core. Mortal Remains is a sort of 2e-ish conversion but I don't think it's complete enough to be satisfactory for a whole game. From what I recall from recent MMs though, 2e Hunter is in drafts, so I'd expect a Kickstarter preview manuscript within a year.
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Sep 7, 2019 20:41
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Mulva posted:e: Fundamentally your skill set is too high and your opposition actually doesn't care about literally every bad thing out, so you eventually have to deal with the question of "Why are there still Vampires in a world where Mages exist?", and replace Vampires with literally anything the Exarchs aren't personally invested in perpetuating. And the only reasonable answer is they don't give a poo poo about dealing with those things. Maybe some particular Mage does, but then that's not a widespread push to rescue humanity. Which of course is not what Mage society is about, and it never has been. Which is why it's not the greatest game to do Hunter or Princess or any other "You are stuck in in the CoD with everything else: Now deal with it" centered game. First, this is wrong because mages aren't actually meant to be overwhelmingly stronger than vampires or chthonians or whatever. The scattershot and by now largely nonexistent balance of the various lines means that some of them are in a random and haphazard way, but it's not actually a setting truth that all mages could neatly eliminate all vampires if someone who somehow had the authority to do so decreed a global war tomorrow. Second, this is wrong because the existence of vampires specifically and misery and darkness generally actually does perfectly comport with the agenda of the exarchs, and so a dyed-in-the-wool pentacle campaign (especially with sufficiently high scope or story stakes) is exactly a push to rescue humanity.
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Sep 7, 2019 20:42
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how much trouble could a wizard get in for deliberately inventing a new kind of vampire and accidentally having it escape into the wild
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Sep 7, 2019 20:52
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ogresque posted:how much trouble could a wizard get in for deliberately inventing a new kind of vampire and accidentally having it escape into the wild They would get their own sub-template and chapter of a game supplement as did the Tremere.
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Sep 7, 2019 20:53
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ogresque posted:how much trouble could a wizard get in for deliberately inventing a new kind of vampire and accidentally having it escape into the wild Like literally none outside of the storyteller invoking karmic consequences on the player or group in question. At worst the vampire might get pissed off at it's existence and eat you. At best you'd maybe get a really stern talking too by the slightly more responsible wizards among the Consilium before they go back to whatever project they're busy with/trying to achieve ultimate knowledge through ascension/plotting to murder their rivals. And obviously if it's a Seer doing it their colleagues are just going to give you a rousing round of applause for making the world a shittier place. I guess depending on the success of the vampire brood in question you might get a promotion? Which doesn't really sound that bad on the face of it unless it's the Seinfeldian "Do more work, get the same pay." type I guess. Also, the NWoD version of Tremere exist because a mage did literally exactly that and everyone that knows of them just straddles the line between "Eh, not my problem." to "Oh gently caress they're literally soul eating monsters. Guess I should keep my head down and wait for someone else to deal with this.". The whole wizards are assholes meme is very much in effect for Mage. Archonex fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 21:19
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are the tremere vampires in the nonmetaphorical sense? i meant dead human that maintains existence using the blood or other handy metaphor for vitality of the living a new breed of convergent vampire, to see if you could
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Sep 7, 2019 22:05
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LatwPIAT posted:Open development of Princess: the Hopeful began on March 23, 2009 on RPG.net, and when the first episode of Puella Magi Madoka Magica aired on January 7, 2011 there were over 300 pages of discussion and development, people were talking about compiling the work into a usable game, and according to a friend who worked on in that period all the central ideals had been settled on already. So you get discrepancies sometimes because the original material is widely available and can often be seen in context now, so you get some of the jokes and interpret the overall mood in something nearer to what it was probably commenting on (other nerd poo poo of the period). This leads to a different interpretation, then you get dissonance like this.
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Sep 7, 2019 22:07
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ogresque posted:are the tremere vampires in the nonmetaphorical sense? i meant dead human that maintains existence using the blood or other handy metaphor for vitality of the living They pretty much are vampires, yeah. Especially when you factor in all the different types of vampires from Wicked Dead that feed on alternative sources like time, fear, memories, excess body fat, etc, etc. That book points out that the term vampire is as much about blood as it is other things that people need to live or function as sane individuals. Only the Tremere in the NWoD literally diablerize souls to continue to exist and are categorized as a mage legacy because presumably it's a reference to their origins in Ars Magicka. Unsurprisingly, the reaction most vampires have to hearing of them is to poo poo their pants in terror and run the other way because what the gently caress you literally eat souls to prolong the horrible existence that is your life. Even most vampires know that that's a bad thing to do. Outside of their magey origins you could just have a bloodline of vampires with special disciplines that need to diablerize when feeding and you'd have the same effect. Hell, that's literally how vampires actually see them in most of the fiction. To most vampires that have a bit of knowledge about the Tremere they're not "rear end in a top hat mages that gobble souls to sustain their lives". They're "Those creepy vampires that rear end in a top hat mages made that literally feed on souls oh god what the gently caress did you morons do now?". They're also heavily implied to be linked to the necrophiliac Sangiovanni vampire bloodline of necromancers in one 1e book. So there's that too. Archonex fucked around with this message at 23:17 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 22:19
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does that imply the tremere can/will access the other trappings of vampirehood in time (USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS POST)
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Sep 7, 2019 22:36
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A while ago I wrote a custom vampire-inspired legacy for one of my Mage players. I'm pretty proud of it, though I'm not sure to what extent it's compatible with 2E rules: THE LEECH “Look, it’s – I don’t have time to explain. Just give me your hand.” Having clawed its way up a ladder of stolen lifeblood, the soul of a Leech refuses to allow its body to die, holding the Pattern of the mage that hosts it in a state of full, vital animation. It’s a precarious existence, though, one which can only be sustained through predation. The first Leech was an accident. Elias Drescher, a Mystagogue who had let slip more than a few secrets that he shouldn’t have, feared that the Guardians of the Veil might strike at him at any moment. He draped himself in protective spells, using the Death and Life Arcana to suppress his biological functions entirely and animate his body with magic alone. Safeguarded against blood loss or poison and free of the need to breathe or rest, Elias Drescher imagined himself safe against a hypothetical assassination attempt, but only grew more unhinged as his days of sleepless undeath wore on. He obsessively recast and reinforced the spells that held his body in suspended animation, turning the evocation of a complex Imago into a repeating nervous tic. Things came to a head when, while negotiating for asylum with the vampires to whom he’d first furnished occult secrets, Drescher unthinkingly refreshed his animating magic and triggered a catastrophic paradox in the process. The spells he’d been relying on twisted out of his control, releasing their hold on his body and reaching hungrily outwards. The vampires in attendance were unaffected, but had no intention of sitting back and watching while the mage’s mistake blighted their lair and enervated their servants. When killing Drescher didn’t work, they tried turning him. Buffered with stolen life force of a much more refined sort, Drescher’s body and soul stabilized enough to allow the paradox anchored in them to dissipate. When Elias Drescher next awoke, he was to all appearances alive and healthy, but both he and his saviors could feel the change that had taken place. Unfortunately for Drescher, the city’s vampires weren’t interested in competition. The transformed Drescher had little luck reintegrating into Awakened society. Rather than relinquish his collected relics and submit to analysis, he fled the Mysterium. Friends, cabal mates, and rebels against the established order sought the necromancer out beyond city reaches, looking to lend support or simply learn precisely what had happened. It wasn’t long before the assembled mages determined what was going on, or before some of those present decided that Drescher’s affliction had its benefits. The Leech condition has proven to spread as a Legacy does. More a deformity of the soul than a refinement, it can take root in any mage exposed to the Legacy’s powers, though it can’t seem to overwrite an actual Legacy and it rarely manifests without deliberate cultivation. The condition is a liability to many mages, but to others it offers plentiful Mana, robust health, and, most importantly, a stab at immortality. Parent Path: None – any mage without a Legacy can become a Leech. Moros and Thyrsus, however, are most likely to be able to take advantage of the Legacy’s powers. Nickname: The Legacy is young enough that “Leeches” is both its formal and informal name, although some have bandied about “Ghouls” and “Vampires” as alternative, if potentially confusing, nicknames. Appearance: Leeches normally avoid announcing their condition and so do their best to look like normal mages, whatever that may mean. Paleness and emaciation are common features of Leeches that fail to see to their appetites, and increasingly powerful Leeches become increasingly corpselike. Background: Most first- and second-generation Leeches were drawn from the fringes of Awakened society, but variety in the Legacy’s membership has increased with time. Any mage fed upon by a Leech can contract the condition, and so a member of the Legacy might hail from any walk of life. Organization: Leeches are a recent occurrence and as yet are very rare; most are only two or three “generations” from the Legacy’s founder, and a good fraction of those were infected by accident rather than inducted by choice. Many are drifters and apostates who hide their condition by avoiding contact with other mages. Such Leeches have no real support networks beyond their kin, and often find themselves competing for prey not only with each other but with vampires and other supernatural predators. Other Leeches have carved out niches for themselves within Awakened society, usually thanks to supportive cabals and trusting superiors. Powerful and established mages are usually too canny to allow the onset of the Legacy to catch them by surprise, but might embrace it by choice. Such Leeches usually go to great lengths to hide their condition and work to drive away other members of the Legacy in order to avoid both suspicion and possible competition. Leeches aren’t generally known to exist by either the Pentacle or the Ministries, but concerned cabal mates or prying superiors can’t be kept guessing forever. Leeches are members of a left-handed Legacy by most lights, but theirs is a gradual, piecemeal evil in comparison to dramatic crimes like soul theft or abyssal summoning. Though Leeches engender distrust and disgust by default, it can be argued that the feeding methods the Leech legacy provides are in fact a benign and sustainable alternative to the blood sacrifice all mages have the capacity to practice. Some Consilia might therefore allow Leeches to operate in the open without formal censure—especially if respected and influential decision makers turn out themselves to be Leeches. Overall, members of the Legacy prefer to keep their true nature hidden. It’s good practice not to give others cause to wonder whether one should be allowed to live. Oblations: This Legacy wounds the soul, rendering Oblations of any kind impossible. Concepts: cannibal in denial, luminary with a dark secret, kindred rights advocate, optimistic transhumanist, patient zero, self-serving vampire hunter, wandering penitent, would-be curse breaker Joining: All it takes to become a Leech is to be fed on by another Leech. The Willpower expenditures involved in joining the Legacy might represent a deliberate gift, an accidental infection, or an unwanted imposition. Whether a mage character actually becomes a Leech is, nevertheless, always the decision of that character’s player. New Trait: Vitae A Leech gains no Mana from Oblations. However, any point of Mana a Leech gains by inflicting harm on a living person (such as by performing a sacrifice or casting “Devouring the Slain”) becomes a point of Vitae. A Leech can also obtain Vitae from vampires, but suffers the same consequences that another vampire would. Leeches store Vitae in their Mana pools, and can hold maximum Vitae up to the sum of their ratings in the Death and Life arcana. Acquired Vitae over this maximum becomes normal Mana. Leeches can spend Vitae place of Mana or metabolize it directly. Each turn, a Leech can metabolize one point of Vitae per Attainment possessed. One point of metabolized Vitae heals two bashing wounds or one lethal wound. Once every day, a Leech can metabolize five total Vitae to heal an aggravated wound. Metabolized Vitae counts against the Gnosis-based limit of points of Mana spent per turn. Each sunset, a Leech loses a point of Vitae. If they have no Vitae to lose, they instead age an extra day and suffer a Resistant lethal wound. Only one such wound can be downgraded or healed for every two days that pass, whether by natural or supernatural means. Attainments 1st: ABSORPTION Prerequisites: Death ••, Life •• Once per turn, through skin-to-skin contact with a living person, the Leech can reflexively inflict a lethal wound and gain a point of Vitae. This causes no pain or visible damage, just creeping exhaustion. Supernatural victims can detect the enervation with a Wits + Gnosis roll. Absorption can be activated as part of an appropriate combat action; the drain replaces the first two points of damage the Leech would have caused. Wounds this power causes each take two days to heal naturally, regardless of normal healing times. Supernatural healing is effective, but always costs a minimum of one Mana or equivalent resource per wound. Leeches and vampires take no damage from Absorption, but lose a point of Vitae and notice immediately. Such creatures can instinctively recognize a mage with this Attainment as a competing predator. Drawback: Whenever a Leech with two Vitae or fewer touches potential prey, roll the Leech’s Resolve + Composure minus the Leech’s own Gnosis. This roll takes a –2 penalty if the Leech has no Vitae at all, and a cumulative –2 penalty if the Leech has any Resistant wounds. On a failure, the Leech involuntarily uses Absorption on whoever triggered the roll. 2nd: FIXATION Prerequisites: Death •••, Life ••• No longer is precious life force frittered away on the myriad processes required to keep a human body functioning. This Attainment permanently transforms the Leech into an undead creature. The undead Leech no longer needs to eat, breathe, or sleep, and cannot be sickened, fatigued, or poisoned. Conventional weapons inflict bashing rather than lethal damage and extremes of temperature or pressure barely register. A wounded Leech feels pain, but can’t be knocked unconscious by bashing damage or caused to bleed to death by lethal damage. Only deterioration from hunger causes the Leech to age. When the Leech metabolizes Vitae to heal, it can cure even Resistant wounds. The Leech can see to its needs even when insensate. For each full day of unconsciousness, it can metabolize one point of Vitae and can also activate Absorption once. Drawback: The Leech no longer heals naturally. Close examination identifies the Leech as dead unless some disguise, magical or otherwise, is in place. Absorption’s drawback now triggers when the Leech has four points of Vitae or fewer. 3rd: DISCARNATION Prerequisites: Death ••••, Life •••• The Leech’s soul escapes into the world, leaving a desiccated corpse behind. A diffuse mass of stolen breath, the creature exists naturally in Twilight but manifests in the physical world as a cold fog. To those who can scrutinize souls, it’s a roiling mass of bizarre feeding appendages that stretch hungrily towards life and warmth. The Leech can hear normally and see through total darkness, but lacks other human senses. It is tangible to vampires and other Leeches and can be burned by fire, but is otherwise incorporeal. It can drift at its Speed in any direction and flow past any Twilight obstacle that isn’t airtight. It can no longer meaningfully age. Magic becomes the Leech’s primary means of predation. Whenever its spells or spell-driven minions wound suitable prey, the Leech can replace the first point of damage dealt with the effects of Absorption, potentially draining multiple victims simultaneously. Drawback: Still undead, the Leech retains Fixation’s drawbacks. In its natural state, it can’t exert physical force or even speak, whether in Twilight or the physical world. If it obtains a body, such as by casting spells to animate and possess a corpse, it can use its Physical Attributes normally. A bodiless Leech needs an hour of contact to use Absorption directly rather than through a damaging spell. When the Leech has four Vitae or fewer, Absorption’s drawback triggers the first time in any scene that the Leech perceives potential prey. Upon succumbing, the Leech loses control of its own magic, using its Instant Action each round to lash out at prey with hostile spells. This frenzy continues until the Leech has obtained as much Vitae as it can hold.
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Sep 7, 2019 22:43
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Sep 7, 2019 22:44
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Nessus posted:I think the broader issue is more the way in which the English-speaking fandom has absorbed the ideas that were present in these shows, which prominently include Sailor Moon (which as Mors said had a lot of similar beats), and reinterpreted them in a way which is pretty divergent from the broad meta-narrative arcs of the original context. There is, I think, a similar phenomenon with giant robot shows, centering around Evangelion. I'm reminded now of Serial Experiment Lain, where there are apparently production interviews from the creators who say they deliberately wanted to create a show that would be interpreted differently between East and West. Interestingly they failed, my understanding is that discussion of the show as a whole seems to go along similar lines no matter where you are, but that also might be because most of the show's context is within itself. Madoka existed in a continuum with a lot of other shows in the same genre, but because it was the first time viewing of the genre for a whole lot of Western fans they mistook it for something truly new in the Magical Girl genre (it wasn't) or something truly revolutionary that would elevate this genre (a genre whose heights they weren't familiar with) to what it "should be" (it didn't, wasn't trying to, and it honestly probably couldn't have judging by the awful post-Madoka detritus, looking at you Magical Girl Raising Project). Evangelion is a good point of comparison because when it was first getting its hooks in western fans it was something they'd never seen before, and that novelty may well have warped discussion of it. Nowadays you'll find a lot more people who understand what Eva is built off of, the context surrounding it when it came out, what became of it, and what its legacy was and wasn't simply by distance of years and greater availability of Evangelion's own influencers. Eva fandom isn't nearly as nutbar as it used to be, but there's still a spark around Eva stuff that hints at the sophomoric buzz surrounding it back when it was on top of the world. If you don't believe me then consider how big it was when Netflix announced they were going to air some weird old mecha anime from 1995. I think that should be all the to spewed from me about anime in the WoD/CoD chat. I think you could parley discussion of assumption/reality/interpretation dissonance into talking about oWoD and what it actually was and how people played at it being, but I know very little about oWoD really being that my introduction to White Wolf stuff was Mage the Awakening, so on that note pray continue discussion on why Banishers do nothing wrong.
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Sep 7, 2019 22:52
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Oberst posted:Have you considered not being so sexy? I cannot handle this right now. Just ugh. So what if she's sexy? That's none of your business. She is still a human being even if she has big bouncy tits or a tight pussy. Her tuesday tabletop roleplaying party and game master should be mature enough to respect that. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Sep 7, 2019 23:03
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ogresque posted:does that imply the tremere can/will access the other trappings of vampirehood in time Nah. I mean, it's theoretically possible they could bring their special brand of what the gently caress and terror to the vampire community. But in reality they're more focused on literally trying to either topple or devour the Supernal watchtowers and ziggurats of the main mage groups. If one of them did do something like that they'd presumably be a smaller group or a one-off sort of deal since the Tremere in the NWoD are depicted as being literally so incredibly power hungry and evil that aspiring to become a full fledged vampire would probably be an improvement in morality over their current aspirations. NWoD Tremere kind of put the OWoD Tremere to shame when it comes to being villainous assholes. Archonex fucked around with this message at 23:27 on Sep 7, 2019 |
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Sep 7, 2019 23:20
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Tremere are mages who are soul vampires. They have access to Supernal Magic and start off as mages, who then get infected/converted. So Tremere are mages who got vampire'd, basically. And also worship a terrifying soul-devouring god who eats their soul when they get converted. They're the primary antagonists of my current Mage game. Also, Ferrinus is right that a huge part of the appeal of Mage is playing esoteric terrorists using their glorious revelations to power their fight to free humanity. There's a lot of hubris there - but also a lot of hope and idealism. They're fighting a system of the world entire, but Mages are still the ones who want to revolutionize the world, crack the world's shell, etc etc. (Which is, in Utena, a reference to Hesse's Abraxas, which is a gnostic deity.)
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Sep 8, 2019 00:54
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A Major Fucker posted:I cannot handle this right now. Just ugh. So what if she's sexy? That's none of your business. She is still a human being even if she has big bouncy tits or a tight pussy. Her tuesday tabletop roleplaying party and game master should be mature enough to respect that. 
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Sep 8, 2019 01:37
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Mors Rattus posted:ahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahaha you summer child you know literally nothing Well, when I say 'dark' I mean dark in the way Madoka went. I wouldn't consider Princess Tutu or Jeanne to have quite went there in the same way, same with Sailormoon's 'and everyone died' wasn't quite the same. Utena's about the only one that's really close, and Princess just 'reads' like someone who modeled Madoka and hadn't really seen much others. Madoka just seems to have been that 'catalyst' for a lot of people on the 'dark' scale (or maybe 'edgy' scale). I didn't realize Princess was being written prior to Madoka airing though (I could've sworn Madoka aired first, but I'll totes admit to being wrong). MoonKnight fucked around with this message at 05:16 on Sep 8, 2019 |
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Sep 8, 2019 05:13
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