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Dawgstar
Jul 15, 2017

Nehru the Damaja posted:

The bane also dovetails with the clan compulsion, which is basically "when you do something I disagree with, I get to drink some of your blood as a punishment."

So now your bestial failure turns you into a D&D Paladin who might drain someone dry.

Yeah, I'm a fan of the Banu Haqim getting out from under the 'we are all Islamic assassins' and part of them joining the Camarilla and everything but I'd really want to make sure a BH PC explicitly consider worthy of judging for letting them go into the wilds.

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StratGoatCom
Aug 6, 2019

Our security is guaranteed by being able to melt the eyeballs of any other forum's denizens at 15 minutes notice


Nehru the Damaja posted:

The bane also dovetails with the clan compulsion, which is basically "when you do something I disagree with, I get to drink some of your blood as a punishment."

So now your bestial failure turns you into a D&D Paladin who might drain someone dry.

Blood fueled avenging paladin does sound vaguely cool.

Kurieg
Jul 19, 2012

RIP Lutri: 5/19/20-4/2/20
:blizz::gamefreak:
Pity the half-vamps from Heroes of Shadow didn't make the jump to 5e.

Dawgstar
Jul 15, 2017

To give credit where it is due, I like that the guiding factor of character creation in 5E is the players all pick the same generation and it can't go higher than 10th.

Pope Guilty
Nov 6, 2006

The human animal is a beautiful and terrible creature, capable of limitless compassion and unfathomable cruelty.
Is that Gesar Khan who the leader of the Night Watch is supposed to be in those novels?

Mors Rattus
Oct 25, 2007

FATAL & Friends
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#1 Builder
2014-2018

Pope Guilty posted:

Is that Gesar Khan who the leader of the Night Watch is supposed to be in those novels?

Apparently.

also what the hell, why is the answer to that on stack exchange

Pope Guilty
Nov 6, 2006

The human animal is a beautiful and terrible creature, capable of limitless compassion and unfathomable cruelty.
Wow, that's a hell of answer. And I suppose when you learn that his real name is Gesar, if you're from a place where he's well-known, that's probably a pretty cool moment.

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!
So I've got a game I'm trying to get going and I'd like some input. System is nominally W20 but I'm incorporating elements from most of the 20th anniversary stuff. One of my PCs wanted to be a vampire so I let him be a 7th gen Nosferatu so he'd be in the same league as all my changing breeds folks. (Explaining it in lore got a little fucky but I think we made it work) It's going to be a hell of a lot of fun-- all my players are really creative people, and we've got a really diverse group.

I'm looking for ideas for a dungeon crawl through a small but very secretive Pentex outpost-- something appropriate for players that haven't earned any XP yet but not a total cakewalk either. At the very end will be a high-security lab with a bunch of failed experiments in it. The last room will have one of the Samsa in it-- he'll be filthy and terrified, cowering in absolute terror of those the spirits have told him are pure and righteous. He'll show up to all senses as the Wyrm-tainted hacked-together abomination he is, but I'm going to write him sympathetic. At the risk of diving into edgelord territory, torture is all he knows so torture is all he expects. The party gets to decide what to do with him: if they overcome their revulsion to the gross cockroach abomination man (rolling to do so, natch), he becomes a useful ally so long as they keep it secret from any other 'real' shapeshifters. If not, he becomes the dungeon final boss in his gross bug-man form.

What I'm looking for are creative enemy sets/ set pieces leading up to the final room. I don't want it to just be endless waves of Dudes With Guns-- not only is that boring, it kills the whole vibe of a research outpost relying more on secrecy than firepower. I'm planning to have some BSDs for them to stealth around guarding the entrance. I'm less familiar with Werewolf than I am with Vampire. What are some very Pentex-ey hazards they could face that'd be challenging but not overwhelming to relatively new players? We've got some bruisers, a face, and I think a hacker in the group (if she'll get her character sheet in) so I'll be tweaking stuff so that everyone gets a chance to shine.

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



You got anything hosed up in the Umbra?

Possible ideas: Some kind of Bane in the electronics to make the hacker person sweat and encourage crossover beyond "I hacked the files, I got the data."

Something that can be overcome fairly easily if the team remembers that they can change shape in more ways than "become Crinos, kick rear end."

A 55 gallon drum of Gooshy Gooze imported as "holiday party novelty supplies."

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

Axqu posted:

So I've got a game I'm trying to get going and I'd like some input. System is nominally W20 but I'm incorporating elements from most of the 20th anniversary stuff. One of my PCs wanted to be a vampire so I let him be a 7th gen Nosferatu so he'd be in the same league as all my changing breeds folks. (Explaining it in lore got a little fucky but I think we made it work) It's going to be a hell of a lot of fun-- all my players are really creative people, and we've got a really diverse group.

I'm looking for ideas for a dungeon crawl through a small but very secretive Pentex outpost-- something appropriate for players that haven't earned any XP yet but not a total cakewalk either. At the very end will be a high-security lab with a bunch of failed experiments in it. The last room will have one of the Samsa in it-- he'll be filthy and terrified, cowering in absolute terror of those the spirits have told him are pure and righteous. He'll show up to all senses as the Wyrm-tainted hacked-together abomination he is, but I'm going to write him sympathetic. At the risk of diving into edgelord territory, torture is all he knows so torture is all he expects. The party gets to decide what to do with him: if they overcome their revulsion to the gross cockroach abomination man (rolling to do so, natch), he becomes a useful ally so long as they keep it secret from any other 'real' shapeshifters. If not, he becomes the dungeon final boss in his gross bug-man form.

What I'm looking for are creative enemy sets/ set pieces leading up to the final room. I don't want it to just be endless waves of Dudes With Guns-- not only is that boring, it kills the whole vibe of a research outpost relying more on secrecy than firepower. I'm planning to have some BSDs for them to stealth around guarding the entrance. I'm less familiar with Werewolf than I am with Vampire. What are some very Pentex-ey hazards they could face that'd be challenging but not overwhelming to relatively new players? We've got some bruisers, a face, and I think a hacker in the group (if she'll get her character sheet in) so I'll be tweaking stuff so that everyone gets a chance to shine.

Pentex is basically the Umbrella Corporation from Resident Evil, except, somehow, even more evil. Bane-possessed "zombies." Those weird demon-dog things. Also, just rooms with Nazi-style experimentation in them to demonstrate just how hosed up Pentex is with a strong vibe of "That dude on the table missing all his skin begging you to kill him to stop the pain, that guy could be you if you gently caress up in here."

Zereth
Jul 9, 2003



Everyone posted:

Pentex is basically the Umbrella Corporation from Resident Evil, except, somehow, even more evil. Bane-possessed "zombies." Those weird demon-dog things. Also, just rooms with Nazi-style experimentation in them to demonstrate just how hosed up Pentex is with a strong vibe of "That dude on the table missing all his skin begging you to kill him to stop the pain, that guy could be you if you gently caress up in here."
Umbrella is, at its core, still trying to make money. In profoundly unethical and/or stupid and self-destructive ways*, but they're trying to make things they can sell for money. Individual members of it might have other motivations, but they're usually just trying to gain personal power or something.

Pentex's goals are specifically to make life worse for everything they touch.



*By the time Resident Evil 4 rolls around, Umbrella has folded offscreen because their stock price cratered after all their zombie disasters and they just kinda went bankrupt, hilariously.

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



A snake fomor made out of seven additional snakes sewn together and grotesquely increased in size.

joylessdivision
Jun 15, 2013



Zereth posted:

Umbrella is, at its core, still trying to make money. In profoundly unethical and/or stupid and self-destructive ways*, but they're trying to make things they can sell for money. Individual members of it might have other motivations, but they're usually just trying to gain personal power or something.

Pentex's goals are specifically to make life worse for everything they touch.



*By the time Resident Evil 4 rolls around, Umbrella has folded offscreen because their stock price cratered after all their zombie disasters and they just kinda went bankrupt, hilariously.

True, but I was also going to suggest just snagging up some weird monster poo poo from an RE game. If you're doing a secret Pentex lab, go nuts with it.

Who says Pentex hasn't made a quiet move towards biological weapons that are deeply wrym tainted nightmare creatures? It fits the "Pentex: gently caress You!" ethos.

1994 Toyota Celica
Sep 11, 2008

by Nyc_Tattoo
You could make the head of research at the facility is a BSD theurge or awakened Nephandus, or even a Tzimisce, blending conventional Pentex wyrm-tech with more occult, esoteric approaches to the same ends. Intersperse the glossy high-tech operating theaters and server racks with rooms that've been stripped to the bare concrete and daubed all over with horrible runes in grisly fluids, or carpeted in broken bone and pulsating flesh.

Dienes
Nov 4, 2009

dee
doot doot dee
doot doot doot
doot doot dee
dee doot doot
doot doot dee
dee doot doot


College Slice
If you don't want run-of-the-mill humans, Pentex does have at least one project recruiting psychics.

Vampires are another option - Tzimisce or Ventrue. Maybe a Gargoyle that's been captured and turned into a guard dog of sorts, much like how the Tremere use them.

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!
You guys rule. I'll stick something bastardly in the Umbra, and the non-crinos-shapeshifting puzzle idea is genius. Banes are good; RE is great inspiration. Frankenstein monstrosities are also good, although I want to stay away from fleshcrafted things because that's for a different plot mission. (Sabbat Bishop who would rather fleshcraft itself a longer arm than walk across a room to flip a switch; it uses vicissitude as often as most people use their eyes)

Probably gonna gloss over the Mengele-style experimentation stuff, even though it's in the setting. It reminds me unpleasantly of being an edgy teen and writing every organ hitting the floor IC for "realism." Also, importantly, at least 2 of my players are around 15-16 so I'm not gonna go too hard on the violence. This mostly means no sexual violence of any kind, and the horrific torture is implied but not described in detail. Wicked instruments stained red, a dark red smear on the floor, distant screams of people who know they're doomed and begging for death, already-dead bodies of people who "have obviously been under the implements of someone with a horrible and creative mind," the way cockroach-man is going to cower and flinch from even the slightest touch... you get the idea.

It serves to let their imagination help do some of the heavy lifting, but also I don't want to go 100% hardcore edgelord and freak out a parent to the point of them banning WoD stuff from the house, yknow? Resident Evil is good for inspiration, but I need to keep it on the tasteful side at least a little. Kiddos are siblings of friends, too, so like... they can handle a lot, buuuuut I want to err slightly on the side of caution. There's a pretty huge middle ground between Goosebumps and Ichi the Killer (JP version with subtitles, naturally) and I think implied extreme violence/torture without spelling it out does a good job of both being horror and not being Too Much.

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!
Also, I LOVE the blending of shiny sterile server rooms with the more traditional scrawling on the walls in gore. Having a Gargoyle be a thing also ties in well with the rest of the plot-- the main quest giver has a gargoyle retainer that he and his husband rescued from the Tremere because she was trying to escape. Maybe she gives them the sidequest in the first place. "I have a brother who got out but there have been terrible rumors; if my new master allows it, perhaps you could check on him for me?"

Another option is Malkavian wih a perfectionist streak. Or, hell, that Malkavian could've studied vicissitude under the Bishop, which leads the party to investigate the Bishop's compound next.

moths
Aug 25, 2004

I would also still appreciate some danger.



Pentex is a fun big tent company that covers all sorts of mad science, but don't forget that it's primarily a company.

This facility will probably have some innocuous name like New Way Research and be indistinguishable from anything you might find in an industrial park from the outside.

BSD are Wyrm but they're not thematically Pentex, and wouldn't be around as security. Check out Pentex First Teams instead.

The surface floor would probably be incredibly mundane. Records, offices, rooms for focus groups, meeting rooms, an auditorium, warehousing, etc.

Start getting into the weird on other levels. The room where they trap banes to infuse into prototypes, the morgue, the real records archives, test creature holding cells, etc. Look into Dulce Base if you haven't already. It's a "real" conspiracy theory about an alien R&D station on Earth, and the material there wouldn't be hard to reskin and dovetails perfectly with what you're working on.

Axqu posted:

if they overcome their revulsion to the gross cockroach abomination man (rolling to do so, natch)

"Roll the dice to see if I'm allowed to play my character" is never the right move. Just let the players make up their minds here.

1994 Toyota Celica
Sep 11, 2008

by Nyc_Tattoo

moths posted:

BSD are Wyrm but they're not thematically Pentex, and wouldn't be around as security. Check out Pentex First Teams instead.

I'm not so sure about this, there's long history of BSDs both collaborating with and actually taking positions in PENTEX, as high up as C-suite executives. The BSDs are among the main interfaces between more mundane Pentex elements and the Wyrm's banes.

e: unless things have changed quite considerably with W20, at any rate.

joylessdivision
Jun 15, 2013



moths posted:

"Roll the dice to see if I'm allowed to play my character" is never the right move. Just let the players make up their minds here.

Yeah don't make them roll to decide if they want to kill it or not. Let them decided that themselves. You can make them roll something to make them not freak out or something, but the actual "Do we kill it or not" should be up to the players choice.

Old Boot
May 9, 2012



Buglord

joylessdivision posted:

Yeah don't make them roll to decide if they want to kill it or not. Let them decided that themselves. You can make them roll something to make them not freak out or something, but the actual "Do we kill it or not" should be up to the players choice.

Yeah, the only time I've enforced this in games or scenes I've STed, it's usually because a character has some kind of flaw or trait that demands it, and even then, it's usually something that's meant to be outside of their immediate control (Hatred, et al). Even then, they're welcome to burn a WP if they don't want to make a roll, it just means less WP to burn in the actual fight/scene.

The characters are going to have a natural revulsion of Wyrm Things, but rolling to make the decision stifles an interesting character moment that could be rewarded with additional XP for good roleplaying, re: how aggressively do they argue with one another over whether or not to let the guy live? He's inherently a Wyrm Thing, and has done terrible poo poo. It should be a contentious moment, if it happens at all.

EDIT: Chances are, the guy's going to be deep sixed no matter what. Collaborating with the enemy is a Big loving Deal, and painting a target on their backs by allying with an abomination of that caliber is a huge campaign-changing decision that could, and SHOULD follow them everywhere.

Old Boot fucked around with this message at 18:28 on Jan 5, 2020

joylessdivision
Jun 15, 2013



Old Boot posted:

Yeah, the only time I've enforced this in games or scenes I've STed, it's usually because a character has some kind of flaw or trait that demands it, and even then, it's usually something that's meant to be outside of their immediate control (Hatred, et al). Even then, they're welcome to burn a WP if they don't want to make a roll, it just means less WP to burn in the actual fight/scene.

The characters are going to have a natural revulsion of Wyrm Things, but rolling to make the decision stifles an interesting character moment that could be rewarded with additional XP for good roleplaying, re: how aggressively do they argue with one another over whether or not to let the guy live? He's inherently a Wyrm Thing, and has done terrible poo poo. It should be a contentious moment, if it happens at all.

EDIT: Chances are, the guy's going to be deep sixed no matter what. Collaborating with the enemy is a Big loving Deal, and painting a target on their backs by allying with an abomination of that caliber is a huge campaign-changing decision that could, and SHOULD follow them everywhere.

Give your players the rope and they'll hang themselves basically.

Metapod
Mar 18, 2012
Being a blood leech and desperately chasing a vampire lover is very good character arc

moths
Aug 25, 2004

I would also still appreciate some danger.



1994 Toyota Celica posted:

I'm not so sure about this, there's long history of BSDs both collaborating with and actually taking positions in PENTEX, as high up as C-suite executives. The BSDs are among the main interfaces between more mundane Pentex elements and the Wyrm's banes.

e: unless things have changed quite considerably with W20, at any rate.

BSD definitely have a space within Pentex, but not as night watchmen, especially at a facility where nothing is expected to happen.

Pentex would cynically employ human guards to watch the place, with a first team on ice below deck just in case. They could even be (unknowingly) armed with silver alloyed ammo. It wouldn't be useful after the Delirium takes hold, but they're not meant to wipe the party.

It still makes sense to have one or two BSD on staff, but walking the perimeter is very much below their pay grade. Maybe as a chief of security, or head bane binder.

Dawgstar
Jul 15, 2017

Fun fact re: Pentex and BSDs - Pentex have a Dancer on the board, named Francesco. He's even a lupus. Lots of Dancers find themselves on First Teams because they can both do the Wyrm's work AND get a nice 401k.

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!
Good stuff. Y'all have given me a lot to think about.

WRT the "roll to spare the abomination" I was thinking much more 'roll to not freak out at the sheer horror of what was done in the event they can sense the sheer magnitude of the abomination against all that is good,' and not literally roll to make the decision. I worded that extremely poorly; my apologies. It's a lot less interesting if I don't let them decide; the decision is the entire point of this leg of the campaign, and it wouldn't have occurred to me to not let my players decide. Again, poor wording on my part. Sorry.

I like the slow creep into horror thing going on and making it mundane on the surface. That makes a lot of sense. I think I'll make a couple of BSDs into bane-wranglers and set it in an otherwise boring office park. That makes a lot more thematic sense than what I was planning to do. Plainclothes security guards on the ground floor, probably some sort of spiritual dampening something so they can conceal their wyrm taint, and poo poo only starts to get fucky like 2-3 floors down behind some hidden security stuff.

Agreed that if they decide to save the cockroach man it'll paint a giant target on their backs. They're already under suspicion for working with at least 2 vampires.

Apologies if I'm clumsy here; I'm still pretty new to the changing breeds stuff and am bound to screw up a few things. :( y'all have been very helpful.

moths
Aug 25, 2004

I would also still appreciate some danger.



Something else that's thematically interesting about using regular humans as low-level Pentex employees is that most of them aren't evil, they're just there for a paycheck and clueless about what's really going on.

It's an opportunity to have a better "contractors on the death star" moment - minus the easy out of villains knowing they're working on a gigantic WMD. Is it ok to tear a guy in half for (as far as he knows) only manufacturing boner pills and shampoo? What about his boss? Or her boss? Where is that line?

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

Old Boot posted:

Yeah, the only time I've enforced this in games or scenes I've STed, it's usually because a character has some kind of flaw or trait that demands it, and even then, it's usually something that's meant to be outside of their immediate control (Hatred, et al). Even then, they're welcome to burn a WP if they don't want to make a roll, it just means less WP to burn in the actual fight/scene.

The characters are going to have a natural revulsion of Wyrm Things, but rolling to make the decision stifles an interesting character moment that could be rewarded with additional XP for good roleplaying, re: how aggressively do they argue with one another over whether or not to let the guy live? He's inherently a Wyrm Thing, and has done terrible poo poo. It should be a contentious moment, if it happens at all.

EDIT: Chances are, the guy's going to be deep sixed no matter what. Collaborating with the enemy is a Big loving Deal, and painting a target on their backs by allying with an abomination of that caliber is a huge campaign-changing decision that could, and SHOULD follow them everywhere.

See, right now I see very little reason to let the guy live. He's a Wyrm thing. He's done terrible things in the service of Pentex. He could be "useful" but he'll paint a big target on the party's back. So why are they considering letting him live?

What if they know him? What if this cockroach mutant is someone they know. And like. Or love? What if he's somebody's boyfriend? Or brother? Or husband? Or father?

This only works if this is someone who has been in the campaign that they've actual met in roleplay. The whole "Oh, it's my bestest friend in the whole wide world that I've never so much as mentioned even once" bit that pops up in stupid TV shows should be left in the stupid TV shows.

ulmont
Sep 15, 2010

IF I EVER MISS VOTING IN AN ELECTION (EVEN AMERICAN IDOL) ,OR HAVE UNPAID PARKING TICKETS, PLEASE TAKE AWAY MY FRANCHISE

Dawgstar posted:

Fun fact re: Pentex and BSDs - Pentex have a Dancer on the board, named Francesco. He's even a lupus. Lots of Dancers find themselves on First Teams because they can both do the Wyrm's work AND get a nice 401k.

Also, Pentex has a whole crew of bane-infested-humans that can be the next line beteween humans and BSDs...

Dienes
Nov 4, 2009

dee
doot doot dee
doot doot doot
doot doot dee
dee doot doot
doot doot dee
dee doot doot


College Slice

Everyone posted:

See, right now I see very little reason to let the guy live. He's a Wyrm thing. He's done terrible things in the service of Pentex. He could be "useful" but he'll paint a big target on the party's back. So why are they considering letting him live?

What if they know him? What if this cockroach mutant is someone they know. And like. Or love? What if he's somebody's boyfriend? Or brother? Or husband? Or father?

This only works if this is someone who has been in the campaign that they've actual met in roleplay. The whole "Oh, it's my bestest friend in the whole wide world that I've never so much as mentioned even once" bit that pops up in stupid TV shows should be left in the stupid TV shows.

When wereroaches die, they basically spend a willpower point to self-resurrect with most of their memories (except the hour or two before their death) after like a month. Regardless of which way the party goes, he could be a recurring character. Maybe they kill him only to stumble upon a wereroach trying to sabotage the company later, who feels like the party is oddly familiar but can't seem to place them.

"My name is Connor. I'm the Samsa sent by Pentex."

I Am Just a Box
Jul 20, 2011
I belong here. I contain only inanimate objects. Nothing is amiss.

Everyone posted:

See, right now I see very little reason to let the guy live. He's a Wyrm thing. He's done terrible things in the service of Pentex. He could be "useful" but he'll paint a big target on the party's back. So why are they considering letting him live?

I mean, because he either got kidnapped or signed up for medical experimentation he was presumably thoroughly lied to about, was tortured, broken down both physically and psychologically, and then kept as a slave only because euthanizing him is difficult and his captors can unbox him in order to disrupt the enemy because he panics at the drop of a hat?

He's a moral dilemma. He is hideous, maladjusted, mistrusted, spiritually malformed, potentially dangerous to be around – and an innocent victim of circumstance living in constant fear. The right and sympathetic thing to do is already to rescue him without having to bend the story around landing a previous ally in a Pentex prison. You don't take the moral measure of a person by asking what they'd do for a friend. You do it by asking what they'd do for a stranger.

And if the players are playing fanatics of Gaia who smite anything that registers on Smell Wyrm or violent killers unwilling to take the risk of deescalating a situation? Let them. Let them kill the innocent victim and don't even rub it in or dwell on it. They will be who they are, and acting like that will have consequences sooner or later, and consequences are interesting. (Though the difficulty of permanently killing a Samsa is definitely a kind of consequence on its own.)

Dawgstar
Jul 15, 2017

ulmont posted:

Also, Pentex has a whole crew of bane-infested-humans that can be the next line beteween humans and BSDs...

There's a couple of fun flavors of that sort of thing.

Project Illiad is the essential fomori monster factory, making them on purpose (although they will recruit if they find them outside). Lots of them make it into First Teams.
Project Odyssey is Pentex recruiting psychics by any means necessary
Project Aeneid is Pentex then shoving Mind Feeder Banes into some of the psychics to jack up said powers.

(Useless Woof Knowledge: The psychic fomori were held under sway by the Malkavian antitribu Harold Zettler who sits on the Board. When the Board was... uh... 'let go' during the End Times they all went off the leash. That was fun.)

Dawgstar fucked around with this message at 02:12 on Jan 6, 2020

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



Can't you get Cockroach on the horn to handle this poo poo? Or is he gonna be pissed off about it instead? I'm not familiar with these Samsa things but that is where I (Ray Smuckles, Child of Gaia Theurge) would think to check first.

Zereth
Jul 9, 2003



I Am Just a Box posted:

I mean, because he either got kidnapped or signed up for medical experimentation he was presumably thoroughly lied to about, was tortured, broken down both physically and psychologically, and then kept as a slave only because euthanizing him is difficult and his captors can unbox him in order to disrupt the enemy because he panics at the drop of a hat?

He's a moral dilemma. He is hideous, maladjusted, mistrusted, spiritually malformed, potentially dangerous to be around – and an innocent victim of circumstance living in constant fear. The right and sympathetic thing to do is already to rescue him without having to bend the story around landing a previous ally in a Pentex prison. You don't take the moral measure of a person by asking what they'd do for a friend. You do it by asking what they'd do for a stranger.
I mean, if you can't cure him it seems like the right thing to do is euthanize him as painlessly as possible?

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!

I Am Just a Box posted:

I mean, because he either got kidnapped or signed up for medical experimentation he was presumably thoroughly lied to about, was tortured, broken down both physically and psychologically, and then kept as a slave only because euthanizing him is difficult and his captors can unbox him in order to disrupt the enemy because he panics at the drop of a hat?

He's a moral dilemma. He is hideous, maladjusted, mistrusted, spiritually malformed, potentially dangerous to be around – and an innocent victim of circumstance living in constant fear. The right and sympathetic thing to do is already to rescue him without having to bend the story around landing a previous ally in a Pentex prison. You don't take the moral measure of a person by asking what they'd do for a friend. You do it by asking what they'd do for a stranger.

And if the players are playing fanatics of Gaia who smite anything that registers on Smell Wyrm or violent killers unwilling to take the risk of deescalating a situation? Let them. Let them kill the innocent victim and don't even rub it in or dwell on it. They will be who they are, and acting like that will have consequences sooner or later, and consequences are interesting. (Though the difficulty of permanently killing a Samsa is definitely a kind of consequence on its own.)

Yes. This, this exactly. He's a broken, tortured, tragic, very human figure. He only lashes out to defend himself; he's not inherently evil in temperament. He's a test to see how the party handles the most broken and wretched who are broken and wretched through no fault of their own. You captured PERFECTLY what I wanted to do with Samsa man. He hasn't "done horrible things in the service of Pentex," he's been forced to do horrible things to avoid torture, dismemberment, and death. He's been pushed and tormented to the point his psyche and soul shattered, and then pushed even further than that. The poor bastard just wants to be somewhere where people aren't threatening to torture or vivisect him right that very second.

My understanding of Cockroach's opinion on the Samsa is that IIRC he pities them but thinks they can be brought around to being his if cared for. Cockroach doesn't want them hurt or killed. This could be an awesome redemption angle. Get Samsa guy in touch with Cockroach and see if he can start piecing himself back together with help from a patron that isn't evil and doesn't immediately hate him

ETA: The euthanasia angle is a valid one!! That's exactly what I want my party to think about!!

Axqu fucked around with this message at 02:43 on Jan 6, 2020

Dienes
Nov 4, 2009

dee
doot doot dee
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College Slice

Zereth posted:

I mean, if you can't cure him it seems like the right thing to do is euthanize him as painlessly as possible?

What do you do if someone is begging to be euthanized but can't die? What if the attempt at euthanasia leaves him alive but even worse off?

Just how much will the party know about the mockery breeds going into Pentex?

Axqu
Nov 28, 2016

I'm a hot bitch angel named Panty. And no matter what anyone says,
I DO WHAT I FUCKING WANT!

Dienes posted:

What do you do if someone is begging to be euthanized but can't die? What if the attempt at euthanasia leaves him alive but even worse off?

Just how much will the party know about the mockery breeds going into Pentex?

Very little if at all. All the party members are going to be relative outsiders, cut off from their clans or packs through lore. I've got a weretiger whose bloodline was cut off from the greater tribe for a great betrayal, a wereraven whose family was allied with the aforementioned tigers, a kitsune whose parents fled with them to the US following being blamed for a disaster in their homeland, a werecrocodile whose mom and stepdad were killed for producing Innocents (and their own standing tainted thereby), and a Nosferatu autarkis elder who mostly knows about Kindred things and isn't pleased to be called in to babysit. None of them have any way to know anything about the Mockery Breeds, since they're all fairly well cut off. The group is outsiders everywhere.

Badactura
Feb 14, 2019

My wish lives in the future.
I just got a copy of Orpheus, because it has been the most interesting WoD game I never played before, and I am excited to run a campaign soon! But I have some questions for people who might have played or ran it before:

I am planning on running without the metaplot stuff from later books because I don't really like it. Is that reasonable or do you think players would get bored of too much 'GHOST SPIES' without anything else after a while?

As an addition to that, any ideas for what is going on with ghosts behind the scenes? I want to keep the whole 'ghosts don't seem to exist past X years ago' premise but without the 'its because all the ghosts for real died right before then' reveal.

Finally, are there any other lower powered supernaturals that might be good antagonists for the aforementioned ghost spies?

Everyone
Sep 6, 2019

by sebmojo

Badactura posted:

I just got a copy of Orpheus, because it has been the most interesting WoD game I never played before, and I am excited to run a campaign soon! But I have some questions for people who might have played or ran it before:

A) I am planning on running without the metaplot stuff from later books because I don't really like it. Is that reasonable or do you think players would get bored of too much 'GHOST SPIES' without anything else after a while?

B) As an addition to that, any ideas for what is going on with ghosts behind the scenes? I want to keep the whole 'ghosts don't seem to exist past X years ago' premise but without the 'its because all the ghosts for real died right before then' reveal.

C) Finally, are there any other lower powered supernaturals that might be good antagonists for the aforementioned ghost spies?

I don't really know anything about Orpheus, but off my head's top:

A) Presumably they all had some kind of "unfinished business" or they wouldn't be ghosts. Cue adventures off their goals/anchors as characters. If one of them had a kid, put the kid in danger. If one of them was murdered, let their be an extensive conspiracy around the murder. Like that.

B) Nuclear testing/some big-rear end spirit monster did it. The latter brings in the campaign goal of stopping the monster from doing it again to your PCs. Or ghosts that fail to finish their business fade away. Those that do reincarnate.

I remember planning to run a Promethean campaign like that. The players begin as Prometheans, do a campaign, become humans-with-a-little-extra and then become another type of Supernatural. Run your ghosts, let them do/complete their business, go "into the light" and then they come back as humans with vague memories of and links to each other as different supernatural beings.

C) Other ghosts with conflicting anchors/agends (One ghost is guarding the guy who murdered one of your PC ghosts. Giovanni vampires. Mages. Spirits, including Banes from Werewolf. Just basic mortals unknowingly destroying one or more Anchors for your PCs. Anyone part of or interfering with your ghosts' unfinished business.

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Badactura
Feb 14, 2019

My wish lives in the future.

Everyone posted:

I don't really know anything about Orpheus, but off my head's top:

A) Presumably they all had some kind of "unfinished business" or they wouldn't be ghosts. Cue adventures off their goals/anchors as characters. If one of them had a kid, put the kid in danger. If one of them was murdered, let their be an extensive conspiracy around the murder. Like that.

B) Nuclear testing/some big-rear end spirit monster did it. The latter brings in the campaign goal of stopping the monster from doing it again to your PCs. Or ghosts that fail to finish their business fade away. Those that do reincarnate.

I remember planning to run a Promethean campaign like that. The players begin as Prometheans, do a campaign, become humans-with-a-little-extra and then become another type of Supernatural. Run your ghosts, let them do/complete their business, go "into the light" and then they come back as humans with vague memories of and links to each other as different supernatural beings.

C) Other ghosts with conflicting anchors/agends (One ghost is guarding the guy who murdered one of your PC ghosts. Giovanni vampires. Mages. Spirits, including Banes from Werewolf. Just basic mortals unknowingly destroying one or more Anchors for your PCs. Anyone part of or interfering with your ghosts' unfinished business.

Thanks! The Orpheus rules are a little different, so the PCs don't have Anchors (I think? Still reading the core book), and some of them are actually mortals who astrally project themselves as ghosts. I do like the concept of having each PC have some unfinished business or personal agendas at play, it's always fun in spy movies when stuff 'gets personal.'

I will read about the Giovanni and Banes, I was thinking of using Pentex as a rival/villainous organization to the Orpheus Group.

I also like the reincarnation idea, although I don't know if the game will switch to a different supernatural type or anything. I really really like the concept of supernatural espionage ever since I read those terrible Necroscope books.

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