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Mors Rattus posted:Well, oMage's, anyway. M20 actually came out before Awakening 2e, so, not strictly true. Admittedly Awakening didn't need nearly as much rehabilitation.
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Mar 18, 2020 21:25
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Five Eyes posted:M20 is absolutely total garbage but even then I'd be hard-pressed to rank it among Brucato's top 5 offenses. Yeah that was me, and I had just about managed to put that out of my mind. Welp now I'm thinking about Deerhoof Antlerman's gigantic package again, thanks for that.
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Mar 18, 2020 22:58
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Yeah, Awakening 2e fluffwise is more about a refocusing of the themes and an integration of some supplements (like the Order books). The 2e magic rules are the bigger positive changes.
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Mar 18, 2020 23:00
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Slimnoid posted:Remind me again what Phil did? I know he's kind of uh, "special" when it comes to writing. Brucato in general is just a super gross individual. His dumb little music-based RPG had a F & Friends going but the writer dropped it when it was clear too much of Phil gonna Phil was bleeding through and it became less about mocking Brucato for thinking a lot of very super mainstream bands were bleeding edge and just went straight up skeeve.
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Mar 18, 2020 23:32
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Five Eyes posted:M20 is absolutely total garbage but even then I'd be hard-pressed to rank it among Brucato's top 5 offenses. Does he have an entire litany that's legitimately terrible and not just predictably bad with his usual quirks? Changing Breeds and Powerchords, yeah, and odds are there's at least one oWoD tribebook or something he helped ruin, but that'd make three or so. Does his spectacularly bad lineup hit five?
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Mar 19, 2020 00:08
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My immediate gut-feeling list has Bastet and 1e Black Furies on it, and that's four before touching anything from Ascension. Hell, it's like four in the category of "weird sex notions" before we reach the rich veins of "also kind of lovely about christianity" and "miscellaneous political opinions." Changing Breeds has the distinction(?) of possibly being the worst book in the nWoD. M20 is "merely" the worst anniversary edition. Five Eyes fucked around with this message at 02:32 on Mar 19, 2020 |
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Mar 19, 2020 02:08
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Worst books in the nWod: 1) Beast: the Primordial 2) Changing Breeds 3) Mummy: the Curse (1e) 4) Book of the Deceived 5) ???? But really, 3 and 4 aren't nearly as bad as 1 and 2, and it's hard to think of a 5 that's not significantly less bad than 4.
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Mar 19, 2020 03:40
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So for my Deviant + Mortals game, I decided to make Mortals also have 10 dots to use at character creation and then also have Professional Training 3 to reflect some special training in given areas to help them keep pace with the Deviants. (they cannot raise it any further) Thoughts? I mean, they'll be highly skilled and rolling more dice for mundane tasks than Deviants will, but they also, you know, can't melt into pools of meat and slide under doors, or stab people in the neck with razor hands, or generate multiple tangible copies of themself and punch people int eh face in a flash mob... seems fair.
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Mar 19, 2020 03:55
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That's a good idea, XP to spend on non-supernatural merits is good too, but I like your approach.
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Mar 19, 2020 04:08
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Rand Brittain posted:Worst books in the nWod: What did you hate so much about Book of the Deceived? I felt it was Sheppard at the top of his game.
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Mar 19, 2020 04:09
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dingo with a joint posted:What did you hate so much about Book of the Deceived? I felt it was Sheppard at the top of his game. It had some interesting stuff, and I usually like Sheppard's work, but so much of it was word salad. quote:"The great philosopher lord of the Shan’iatu is perhaps the most desperate and confusing of the shattered masters. Offended by the mystical, religious, and the vague, the Thousand Eyes in One seeks the raw meaning of all realities and does so with the intent of individuating the soul to the point where it becomes that very meaning. In this, he fails to see the mark of his own hand and calls Truth what are actually the trapped shards of the void that he has suffocated with definition, matrices of logic, and metaphysical exposition. He is ruthless with method, as all things divided can be further divided; an infinite regress which lays the blueprint for the deepest and most vicious of inner and outer insurrections. It is not enough that the Deceived who share his spirit go mad from unending deconstruction, but that they perpetuate his method and teachings, infecting all thought with his compulsions so that obedience to the mandates of others become unutterable offenses against the highest self." It also really bugs me because: 1) The introduction goes on at length about how super loving dark and edgy the book is going to be (the book is not that dark). 2) Basically every detail about the Deceived is about 10% away from how it works from the Arisen, and it's all fiddly enough to make it hard to remember but doesn't really add much. 3) The answer to "how have the Deceived stayed hidden for thousands of years" turns out to be "they all get a power that makes them completely impossible to find, ever." 4) The book goes on at ridiculous, endless length about the various temakh's personalities and their agendas and so forth but they can't talk. Their relationship with the maddened slave they're permanently attached to is supposed to be this huge deal but they can't talk. I couldn't escape the feeling that they were desperately creating new Secret Lore for the setting because everybody figured out the Big Twist (the Judges are the Shan'iatu in funny hats) five minutes into the corebook.
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Mar 19, 2020 04:29
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So we've hashed out which nMage orders are Actually Correct and which oMage factions are Actually Correct Depending On Which Book You're Currently Reading, but have we had lovely mage-politics chat for the archmage ententes? Let's poo poo this thread up! Alienated - licking ancient, eldritch boots doesn't make you less of a bootlicker Aswadim - I actually gently caress with the Aswadim, they're not so bad. Want the right sort of thing - power to the people - it's just their version of power is power over form and logic and meaning. Still, their hearts are in the right place. Might come a time where it's our Ascension or theirs but until then I say we let the black and red alliance stand. Bodhisattvas - Their heart's in the right place but they're like people manning soup kitchens instead of demanding political action to end poverty. Plus some of them think a Seer awakening is a victory? Kinda the left-liberals of the setting. Exemplars - Kinda depends on the order. Guardians and Mystagogue can gently caress right off. More Arrows are probably itching for a fight than fighting for a good cause. Libertines are probably good folks. Silver Ladders are vanguardists and could be extremely useful, but should also be monitored at all times for reactionary tendencies. Siddhas - Kinda the libertarian "gently caress you, got mine" scum of the archmages. Sure there could be say, a Death Siddha who dedicates their Ascension to fixing the underworld but I feel like most would rather puzzle out pointless secrets and ascribe their names on the Arcana themselves than actually do anything to make the world a better place. Tetrarchs - though the power of gnosis both boot and bootlicker! come at me with your Objectivly Incorrect Takes Digital Osmosis fucked around with this message at 04:33 on Mar 19, 2020 |
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Mar 19, 2020 04:31
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The boddhisatvas are basically the Awakening incarnation of the people in Ascension who said fighting the Technocracy was meaningless and you should work on global Ascension instead.
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Mar 19, 2020 04:32
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Digital Osmosis posted:Aswadim - I actually gently caress with the Aswadim, they're not so bad. Want the right sort of thing - power to the people - it's just their version of power is power over form and logic and meaning. Still, their hearts are in the right place. Might come a time where it's our Ascension or theirs but until then I say we let the black and red alliance stand. Definitionally, when you gently caress with the Aswadim, your takes are Objectively Incorrect. They embrace Objectively Incorrect, they become it, and frankly, they should be shunted into it so they don't bring the rest of us down with them. Just because they don't like meeting agendas doesn't make them your friends. Libertines are the anarchists and the Diamond are the reds; Aswadim are academics who get super into horrible ideologies after they get tenure, and we can't get rid of them because Tenure, so we have to play nice. The example Aswadim who wants to replace the entire Shadow with a horrifying parasiteverse, and also replace all nature to make that possible, is on the near end of acceptable Aswadim-ness. And he still wants to hijack literally the entire ecosystem and spiritual reality despite what anybody else says in order to get rid of Spirits. Anyone who goes 'oh all the torture poo poo that the Scelesti do, that's just because they're the crude version of my sophisticated ideology' is not just telling on themselves, they're waving a great big flag about why they're about as politically acceptable as Steve Bannon's "I'm a Leninist, but for nation instead of class." Just Say No! To The Void Of Unreason. E: Nick Land is the closest IRL analogue of an Aswadim. Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 06:21 on Mar 19, 2020 |
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Mar 19, 2020 04:46
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Cult of Ecstasy is the best cult
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Mar 19, 2020 05:07
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Joe Slowboat posted:E: Nick Land is the closest IRL analogue of an Aswadim. Mage is the Nick Land game.
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Mar 19, 2020 14:10
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who's the Frantz Fanon of Mage
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Mar 19, 2020 14:34
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Five Eyes posted:My immediate gut-feeling list has Bastet and 1e Black Furies on it, and that's four before touching anything from Ascension. Hell, it's like four in the category of "weird sex notions" before we reach the rich veins of "also kind of lovely about christianity" and "miscellaneous political opinions." I think that Brucato either A) Had a very profoundly strict Christian upbringing, so he never really learned anything about sex or "Devil Music" as a result, thus when he became an adult he immersed himself in them without actually being taught boundaries. or B) Had the exact opposite of that, was exposed to sex at a very young age by free love parents and thus never actually learned boundaries. Changing Breeds has a lot of really really really weird bestiality/incest/prima nocte poo poo in it, and also a long detailed paragraph about "Things conservative parents do to beat the Powerchords talks about really mundane bands as if they were literally frontmanned by god himself with the Metatron doing vocals. And has that one sexualized barefoot teenager who's super in tune with the secret music of reality that's shown up elsewhere in his work.
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Mar 19, 2020 14:57
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Even his character creation example in M20 is about a teenager who was kicked out of her house for having a threesome and finding it awesome to live on the streets.
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Mar 19, 2020 15:12
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Dawgstar posted:Even his character creation example in M20 is about a teenager who was kicked out of her house for having a threesome and finding it awesome to live on the streets. Is her name Meghan?
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Mar 19, 2020 15:19
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Tulip posted:Mage is the Nick Land game. Nick Land is in the general genre of Awakening’s influences, but I contend that his amphetamine-driven philosophy and his turn to elaborately articulated weird fascism are a cromulent framework for thinking about what a successful Scelestus might look like in terms of ideology and trajectory. The Abyss is very bad actually.
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Mar 19, 2020 15:31
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:who's the Frantz Fanon of Mage Werewolf. Joe Slowboat posted:Nick Land is in the general genre of Awakening’s influences, but I contend that his amphetamine-driven philosophy and his turn to elaborately articulated weird fascism are a cromulent framework for thinking about what a successful Scelestus might look like in terms of ideology and trajectory. Yeah gently caress Land. Though having mages who write like his pre-fash stuff would be funny. How could you not want to kill someone who writes “A zIIgōthIc-==X=cōDA==-(CōōkIng-lōbsteRs-wIth-jAke-AnD-DInōs)”
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Mar 19, 2020 15:40
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He really missed his calling writing Zodiac killer letters to a cabal of sorcerers chasing him down while he tries to summon an Annunaki.
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Mar 19, 2020 15:46
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Kurieg posted:Is her name Meghan? No, it's Jinx. Here's her description: quote:A tough-eyed mix of German and Choctaw heritage, Jinx is 16 years old with rough-chopped chin-length hair dyed (badly) in blue and purple streaks. Smeary dark mascara and an array of fierce facial piercings accentuate her face. Overlarge ragged death-metal T-shirts conceal her solid athletic build. A former gymnast, Jinx keeps in shape with rigorous exercise, skateboarding, and an especially risky form of parkour. Hoodies, torn leggings, and a beat-up Utilikilt compliment her battered Doc Martins and a thrift-shop biker jacket decorated with whatever Jinx can stab through or draw on its shell. Lean and pixie-grinned, she’s about 5’ 7” but comes across as shorter than she really is. Fingerless gloves cover her punch-roughened knuckles. Jinx looks like trouble, smells like a street-kid, and manages to make that all look good. Surprised she wears shoes. Also Utilikilt.
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Mar 19, 2020 15:50
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My brain refuses to square the circle of 'tiny teenager with a lovely dye job, bad makeup, tons of spiky piercings, a ratty t-shirt, a moldy leather jacket and weeks of not bathing is curiously attractive and looks good, says Brucato.'
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Mar 19, 2020 16:07
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Mors Rattus posted:My brain refuses to square the circle of 'tiny teenager with a lovely dye job, bad makeup, tons of spiky piercings, a ratty t-shirt, a moldy leather jacket and weeks of not bathing is curiously attractive and looks good, says Brucato.' Also is super fit because of urban homeless Crossfit and parkour.
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Mar 19, 2020 16:08
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Dawgstar posted:No, it's Jinx. Here's her description. I'm trying to scream but no sound is coming out.
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Mar 19, 2020 16:11
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Rand Brittain posted:Well, there's a number of answers to that question, but from my perspective the #1 thing Mage Twentieth Anniversary needed was to rehabilitate the Traditions, who are already so unpopular that lots of people would rather pretend the fascists are the good guys than accept them as protagonists. This isn't solely on Brucato, though. The first edition always presented the Traditions as the good guys and the Technocracy as 1984 cosplayers. This brought some problems – the image of heroic faith healers, crackpots and magicians opposing evil scientists who created a shadow world government didn't age well for obvious reasons. Revised tried to change this by making the Traditions murkier, splitting Technocracy into the soulless Control and actually well-meaning field agents and deciding that the Ascension War was a mistake that only strengthened the Nephandi – but this didn't really change anything, because the main problem with M:tAs is that all the factions are nineties as gently caress. What Brucato actually did in M:tAs20 was deciding that the Ascension War was NOT a mistake, but the real heroes are neither the Traditions, nor the Technocracy, but a newly created faction that's pretty much "the Traditions, but more noble".
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Mar 19, 2020 16:40
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Mors Rattus posted:My brain refuses to square the circle of 'tiny teenager with a lovely dye job, bad makeup, tons of spiky piercings, a ratty t-shirt, a moldy leather jacket and weeks of not bathing is curiously attractive and looks good, says Brucato.'
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Mar 19, 2020 16:45
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Mors Rattus posted:My brain refuses to square the circle of 'tiny teenager with a lovely dye job, bad makeup, tons of spiky piercings, a ratty t-shirt, a moldy leather jacket and weeks of not bathing is curiously attractive and looks good, says Brucato.' I imagine Brucato as a 40 or 50 something guy who still thinks wearing his 90s Rage Against the Machine shirt is going to suddenly spark the revolution of the proletariat. And still lurks around college coffee shops creeping on the punkier looking ladies. Why yes, there are people from my college days who remind me uncomfortably of Brucato.
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Mar 19, 2020 16:56
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Tulip posted:Werewolf. You know, that raises an interesting question. Given Werewolves' origins, they should theoretically be capable of Supernal magic, if not necessarily through the same channels as a human being.
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Mar 19, 2020 17:08
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Thanks for the M20 link guys! Time to check out this weird heh i already won via majicks, foolish ST game everyone is always writing insane screeds about
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Mar 19, 2020 17:26
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:You know, that raises an interesting question. Given Werewolves' origins, they should theoretically be capable of Supernal magic, if not necessarily through the same channels as a human being. This is a long step towards "everyone should just be using Supernal magic because everything comes from the Supernal."
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Mar 19, 2020 17:29
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Fanon's applicability to Mage is kind of weird but extremely broad if you look at it the right way. Is the entire Fallen World effectively a settler colony? It's not like the Exarchs themselves are here, but then the queen of England didn't personally winter in Algeria either. And it's certainly true that there's a necessity for massive and violent insurrection, that "native intellectuals" (fallen world mages) must needs go on personal journeys in which they dig deep into the mythic past but ultimately learn that the collective narrative they need is one forged through common struggle, etc.
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Mar 19, 2020 17:33
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Desiden posted:I imagine Brucato as a 40 or 50 something guy who still thinks wearing his 90s Rage Against the Machine shirt is going to suddenly spark the revolution of the proletariat. And still lurks around college coffee shops creeping on the punkier looking ladies. Admin edit: don't post people's personal info, dipshit (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Mar 19, 2020 17:39
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Ferrinus posted:Fanon's applicability to Mage is kind of weird but extremely broad if you look at it the right way. Is the entire Fallen World effectively a settler colony? It's not like the Exarchs themselves are here, but then the queen of England didn't personally winter in Algeria either. And it's certainly true that there's a necessity for massive and violent insurrection, that "native intellectuals" (fallen world mages) must needs go on personal journeys in which they dig deep into the mythic past but ultimately learn that the collective narrative they need is one forged through common struggle, etc. "The ruling species is first and foremost the outsiders from elsewhere, different from the indigenous populations, 'the others.'" You're probably already familiar with the etymological origins of "Exarch."  Bonus: "In scaring me, the atmosphere of myths and magic operates like an undeniable reality. In terrifying me, it incorporates me into the traditions and history of my land and ethnic group, but at the same time I am reassured and granted a civil status, an identification. The secret sphere in underdeveloped countries is a collective sphere that falls exclusively within the realm of magic. By entangling me in this inextricable web where gestures are repeated with a secular limpidity, my very own world, our very own world, thus perpetuates itself. Zombies, believe me, are more terrifying than colonists."
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Mar 19, 2020 17:52
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That Old Tree posted:This is a long step towards "everyone should just be using Supernal magic because everything comes from the Supernal." Not... exactly? "Should" is doing a lot of work here; the fact that they can't, combined with what we know about the origins of Werewolves, suggests something about how the Fallen World incorporates things from the Supernal. Or put another way, Werewolves are like an alchemical by-product of how the Lie degrades Pangaeans.
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Mar 19, 2020 17:58
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Not... exactly? "Should" is doing a lot of work here; the fact that they can't, combined with what we know about the origins of Werewolves, suggests something about how the Fallen World incorporates things from the Supernal. Sorry I thought you meant it the other way.
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Mar 19, 2020 18:31
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Desiden posted:I imagine Brucato as a 40 or 50 something guy who still thinks wearing his 90s Rage Against the Machine shirt is going to suddenly spark the revolution of the proletariat. And still lurks around college coffee shops creeping on the punkier looking ladies. When Powerchords was funny and not terrible, it talked about the deep reverence Brucato had for radio stations that dared to play stuff like Bruce Springsteen or Prince in the 70s and 80s. Can you imagine! The aborted F&F on said book speculates that Brucato mostly uses neo-paganism to be horny on main 24/7. It featured the vaguely unsettling dedication to "my Beloved Feral Sweeteheart; her husband; their son; and all their Beloved Trybe." Imagine wanting Brucato around your kid.
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Mar 19, 2020 20:47
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Changing Breeds is also horny on main throughout most of the book, when it isn't demanding that you strip naked and poo poo in the corner and/or smacking you with a harmony sin for stripping naked and making GBS threads in the corner.
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Mar 19, 2020 21:27
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