World of Darkness Megathread: Curse of the Were-Poster

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Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Speaking of Beasts, we just got a Changeling 2.0 preview.

Welp.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 11:29

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# ¿ May 21, 2024 05:38

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Edit: ^^^ Yeah, like that seems a bit much.

Gerund posted:

Seemings are altered so that now your decision to leave arcadia is locked into your Wyrd profile, rather than being a moment of humanity.

A seeming perk of being able to, once per story, gain a point of clarity. Meaning that Clarity is just another powerstat of fae design rather than a difficult piece of humanity countered by fae madness.

lol nope sorry 2E, I'm sure y'all tried really hard.

From what Hill has been saying, Clarity is going to be a bit more fluid to fit better with the sanity/madness theme that it had. So that might wind up working out alright. He mentioned doing a post on it at some point, so we'll see then I guess.

As far as Lost's Beasts go, I'm down with them being defined by Id/instinct, but I feel like the focus on breaking taboos is a bit... OWOD-ish. IDK, maybe I just have PTSD from Changing Breeds.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 12:21

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

I think the big shake-up with Changeling Beasts is coming from the redefinition of Seemings as an expression of agency. So where before the Beast Seeming was just a collection of animal related kiths with no real overarching theme binding it (even Elementals had detachment and alienation), now they have to give it some sort of unifying idea. Like I said, I think Id/instinct works pretty well for that, but I do feel that the write-up could be smoothed out a bit.

Soonmot posted:

Ferrinus, I'm generally curious. Is there anything you actually like in nWoD?

They have a vague sort of respect for Mage.

Luminous Obscurity fucked around with this message at 19:41 on Apr 23, 2015

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 19:37

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Ferrinus posted:

The overarching theme of Beasts was a particular sort of dehumanization, same with all the other Seemings. The big difference here is that each Seeming is going to be a survival strategy you adopted rather than a scar the Durance inflicted on you.

"Humanity has failed her, failed her when she was the most in need, and so she rejected it" is a weird sentence to see in Changeling.

Its definitely weird, but I think it could potentially work. One of the things mentioned is that they seem to be shifting to survival metaphor rather than solely an abuse metaphor. People generally do pretty shocking (and many times, out of character) things to stay alive. So if your Seeming is treated almost like another scar or piece of your trauma that you have to come to terms with, it could be pretty cool. Like while Ms. Beast Changeling understands and values her humanity now, at her lowest point she felt betrayed/abandoned/whatever and cast it aside and thats like an entire aspect of her durance that she still has to deal with. I'm not sure if I'm explaining it well, but I could see it tying into a PTSD/survival metaphor pretty cleanly.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 19:51

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Ferrinus posted:

So your "Seeming" describes your innermost nature and the source of your willpower rather than how you seem.

I mean, that's not really fair of me. I suppose that in terms of external, available-to-everybody visuals you get a mix of both, so if as my Durance I was just one of the menhirs marking the borders of my Keeper's dominion, and then I became a Beast and escaped, I'd look like a big ox or tiger or whatever that's been carved roughly out of stone, or at least a golem suffused with unnerving vitality and that's got a wild look in its eyes. This feels a bit like Court territory, though... I'd expect that the thing currently called your "Seeming" is what should be determining your mantle and maybe your favored means of reaping glamour more so than your appearance.

I think Courts are probably still going to be coping mechanisms of some kind. They're still your support groups or YMCA self-defense classes or w/e. I feel like your Seeming is something that is always going to be behind you, but you'll never really be "free" from it. Because Arcadia is Arcadia so that trauma is literally manifested. So like say I'm a hammer for the New Old Yankee Workshop Fae and I survive by doing some awful stuff I'm probably not proud of and the nature of whatever it was I did makes me an Ogre and now I'm back in society trying to deal with all that, so I join Court X because I feel like drinking away my pain or w/e.

Luminous Obscurity fucked around with this message at 20:31 on Apr 23, 2015

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 20:28

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Geist 2E needs to up the importance of The Bargain. As it is, its more like The Gift. Yeah you have the option to turn it down, but why would you? Geists are like mildly annoying at the most and in return you get all these cool powers. If you give people reason to turn down The Bargain, it will automatically make the PCs existence more meaningful simply because now it means that there was something they cared about enough that they were willing to fuse a superghost to their soul for it. Also play up the fact that barring some Hunters (and Demons, arguably), Sin-Eaters are the only ones who choose to become supernaturals. Everyone else is a victim of circumstance. Sin-Eaters actually get a say in the matter. That should mean something more than "Okay now you're a Sin-Eater here's your powers."

# ¿ Apr 24, 2015 10:36

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

New Geist Threshold: The Spent

# ¿ Apr 24, 2015 12:24

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Holy moly those first draft power levels :stare:

# ¿ Apr 29, 2015 04:25

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

So going over this in the light of day, probably the only Kith Blessing I'm really not comfortable with is Razorhands being able to start throwing around Agg straight out of the gate. Especially with the 2E focus on making Agg sources really hard to come by.

The fluff bits are kind of bland, which isn't too damning. Fluff pieces generally run a pretty wide gamut. If it were the main fiction bits I'd be concerned, but these are like 1-2 sentance(s) apiece. That said there are still a few that I'd like to see reworked because a couple of them are pretty cringeworthy.

Overall this update didn't really feel too world-shattering. I think the only thing I wasn't expecting, apart from just how strong some of those Kith Blessings are, is just how much of an impact Seemings have on your appearance. I was expecting it to be a bit more subtle. I suppose it makes sense though, if you tone them down too much they'd basically just become a second Mantle.

Free Cog posted:

The bizarre fluff pieces do show off one of the challenges of having Kith take the spotlight. My problem is less that they're goofy and more that none of them make me really want to read more about the Kiths on their own. If there's going to be 100 or so of these in the final book, the flavor text needs to be more than just either doing mundane things with a "twist" or vaguely sinister threats. I can only hope that they pull it off in the final draft.

Do we know if Kith/Seeming is the new X/Y splat for 2e, or is it Kith/Court? I'm still not sure and I've read the outline a few times.

X is more like Kith + Seeming. Y is still Courts. There's not going to be default Courts this time, though. The chapter about regions is going to cover multiple potential structures (including 1E's Seasonal setup).

# ¿ Apr 29, 2015 12:34

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

I asked in the comments, but just so everyone here is fully aware.

Using Forces to Shield someone from gravity means just that.

You can turn off gravity at two dots. :getin:

# ¿ Apr 29, 2015 21:06

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:

Behold my terrible power, mortals. The ability to exert my will against the Fallen World, inflicting devastation on my foes limited only by ST fiat

Welcome to Mage. :getin:

# ¿ Apr 30, 2015 13:20

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Kavak posted:

Who would a mage fight naked except a werewolf?

A Thrysus, clearly.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2015 19:20

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Darklings are up.

# ¿ May 1, 2015 10:26

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

From what the Kith section has been saying, I think Wizened are going to be people who used their faestuff/magic/skills to give themselves the power to escape or do whatever. Sort of like fairy transhumanists.

Something that's really impressed me so far though, is how they've been presenting Seemings overall. I was honestly expecting them to be much more of a mark of defiance or pride and while they can become a badge of honor, like many scars, they are still scars first and foremost. So now we have a system where Kiths are the scars of things that were done to you and Seemings are the scars of the things you did. It winds up supporting the shift in metaphors really well, and I'm honestly pretty optimistic about some of the other stuff now. Some of the flufftext is a little goofy but honestly that's pretty minor, all things considered. What matters to me is it looks like they're going to be able to pull off the change in metaphor without losing the tone of the game.

Doesn't mean they can't botch it, but so far things are looking surprisingly good imo.

# ¿ May 1, 2015 16:30

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Fairest are up.

# ¿ May 3, 2015 02:25

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

To answer your other question, the WoD 2E Core is still in dev. It's currently slated for release sometime this Summer.

# ¿ May 16, 2015 08:41

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Meanwhile oChangelings were listening to ICP's "Miracles" on repeat because learning things just kills the magic. From what I've been told, at least. C20's gonna be interesting.

# ¿ May 20, 2015 22:21

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

The Dark Era, To the Strongest, just got an update about it's 10k word expansion. Includes otherworlds and Egyptian cults. :hellyeah:

# ¿ May 21, 2015 20:54

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Changeling 2E just updated with information on the new demisplat, The Fae-Touched.

# ¿ May 26, 2015 20:36

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

In other news, Beast: The Primordial's Kickstarter should be going up at the end of the week. So we should have a look at the final text of it soon enough.

Androc posted:

I'm definitely liking it so far, Fae-touched can be used as a very obvious way to expand on any given character's connection to the mortal world.

Though, it seems a bit odd that they just tack on "oh, by the way, you're gonna die a few decades sooner" in the disadvantages section with no mention anywhere else.

Yeah, David Hill mentioned in the OP thread that the shorter lifespan bit is probably going to be put on the chopping block.

# ¿ May 27, 2015 17:46

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

I've been pleasantly surprised with Lost 2E. I'm really into the way Seemings now map to responses to trauma. I'm not entirely sure if it was intentional or just a happy accident (like the courts in 1E mapping to the stages of grief), but drat if it hasn't won me over.

They can still fumble Huntsmen and the Others, but so far I'm pretty optimistic.

# ¿ May 28, 2015 20:48

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Beast's Kickstarter missed it's window and will now be going up this Tuesday at 12pm EST. They've posted an update on crossovers in the meantime.

Mage 2E also just got an update about non-Legacy Attainments (stuff like Mage Armor, Counterspell and Imbuing).

# ¿ May 29, 2015 22:46

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Beast: The Primordial Kickstarter is live :siren:

# ¿ Jun 2, 2015 19:14

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Yeah, that's pretty much how I feel, too. There's a recurring sense of innocence in the way Beasts are handled that reminds me of Promethean. Except it makes sense with Prometheans. With Beasts it just feels weird.

# ¿ Jun 2, 2015 21:47

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

I think I just landed on what's really bugging me about the whole thing. I'm picking up on two dominant tones in how Beasts are described: one of innocence and one that's very unapologetic. This would be fine except Beasts are predators by nature. An innocent, unapologetic predator is going to start feeling really dissonant really quick if you aren't careful, and I feel like that's what's happening here.

# ¿ Jun 2, 2015 22:18

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Kurieg posted:

Make it so that the beast soul is the bit that doesn't want *you*.

That's cool...

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 02:11

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

CommissarMega posted:

So... I'm guessing that Demon (which as far as I know, was written by Onyx Path) is a crapfest then? Because everything I'm hearing about Beast is that it's rubbish.

What? Where are you getting this? Demon owns.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 11:53

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Exactly. Until this, OP has been pretty good about everything (on the WOD side, at least) and the most of the issues people have had were relatively minor nitpicks with certain rules or bits of fluff. Beast is just a massive brick wall that sprung up seemingly out of nowhere.

Even though Matt McFarland was the dev on Promethean 1E, I'm still kind of worried about 2E now that we've got a complete view of Beast.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 12:35

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Like people have said earlier, the worst thing is that the core concept is pretty cool. Like I really dig the idea of Heroes as these terrifying forces of will and pride who hear everyone saying "Someone kill Smaug" and go "I'll kill Smaug." That baseline idea of the only person willing to challenge Smaug being a delusional egomaniac is cool. There's a story in that. Same with the idea of someone being a horrible monster by nature and coming to terms with that and their role in the ecosystem of the world. Even the question of "Does someone who's joy comes from the suffering of others deserve a chance at happiness?" can make for some good pathos.

Free Cog posted:

I guess some folks must like it, though, cause it's been funded with an extra thousand as of right now.

I feel like the people who are turned off by it are offset by people who've just found a NWOD book they like.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 13:03

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Crion posted:

This is the bargain Beast is counting on you to make in order not to write it off.

I'm kind of glad this book is as irredeemable as it is, because instead of trying to salvage any of it my table can just ignore it and its fluff completely. Beasts are such boutique dev-insert characters, as a splat, that you lose literally not a single bit of texture from the nWoD by just pretending this book never happened. That's a success, right? I mean it's a huge, massive failure. But it's also a success.

In its defense, it's given me some cool ideas for what a cooler version of Beast would be.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 17:17

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Crion posted:

First, that's not really a defense.

Second, I've yet to see any "cooler version of Beast" that didn't creep further thematically into another nWoD line's already established niche. Most of the New Versions of the game presented here involve colonizing Changeling or Wraith's game-space.

Tezzor posted:

Aside from some minority of vampires, what player splat in the WoD asked to be what they are

Only Sin-Eaters. Which I hope is something we see Geist 2E delve into.

Edit: You could argue Demons, too.

Luminous Obscurity fucked around with this message at 18:05 on Jun 3, 2015

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 17:55

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

I mentioned it earlier, but the big problem with Beast is a conflict of tones. They're predators who are treated as both innocent and unapologetic. That's really the heart of nearly all the issues here. The material tries to treat them as all three at once and it just sort of collapses on itself.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 18:44

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

They might not always draw blood, but they're still victimizing and tormenting people.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 18:55

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

You know how cats bring home dead mice?

# ¿ Jun 3, 2015 21:35

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Kellsterik posted:

Who was responsible for the original supplements?

McFarland. He can make good stuff, I just hope whatever happened with Beast doesn't leak over into PtC 2.

# ¿ Jun 4, 2015 02:57

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Holy crap I think Beast just clicked for me. Beasts aren't being mapped to "The Other." Think about it. They're predatory, have incredible power that is inherited from ancient times, have connections to nearly every group of shadowy monsters in the WOD, and their actions generate monsters personified by the worst of humanity.

They're the 1%. The deck is stacked in their favor from the start and they still don't feel like its enough. Any actions against them are treated as irrational and villainous no matter how justified they may be.

Heroes aren't meant to be seen as oppressors, they're the products of a corrupt system. They're the PIC/Tea Party/etc. While they have the power to harm Beasts, they're largely too unstable and disorganized to do so. Meanwhile the masses are either blind to the true nature of their predators or too scared/overwhelmed to make any serious moves against them.

I mean I still don't really want to play them because that's super depressing, but they make way more sense when you view them through that lens. Mage just lost its title as "The Wire" of the World of Darkness.

Luminous Obscurity fucked around with this message at 23:23 on Jun 4, 2015

# ¿ Jun 4, 2015 23:14

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Gilok posted:

Please post this somewhere Matt McFarland will see it.

I put it on the OP forums.

Edit: Holy poo poo no wonder Beasts and Demons don't like each other! Demons are revolutionaries! :aaaaa:

# ¿ Jun 4, 2015 23:35

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Gerund posted:

But I concede that the 1% reading did try to flog that tired touchstone The Wire and as such should be avoided for the near future.

Fair enough. :shobon:

# ¿ Jun 5, 2015 01:50

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Night10194 posted:

Considering Scion 1e, I don't think this is going to happen, sadly. I agree that El-Shaddai/YHVH/El could be a really cool twist for the crazy godchild setting and I can see a ton of ways to do it, but they couldn't be bothered to do very much research as it was.

A while back Rose actually put up an apology on behalf of WW/OP for how poorly researched (and racist) Scion 1E was, so there is hope.

Dammit Who? posted:

What response is there, other than to ignore what the game is telling you or to decline to play it?

This is a good interpretation, considering Beast also prefer Gentry over Lost, tying into some of the ways orgs like the HRC sweep abuse in queer relationships under the rug. I have to wonder how Prometheans factor in, though. They're probably the most othered line, mapping fairly easily to things like homelessness and gender dysphoria, but Beasts would prefer they stay homeless/transitioning/whatever rather than become "palatable."

Regardless, I think its interesting that the only line that Beasts expressly dislike is the one where you play faceless revolutionaries fighting the ultimate authority, who Beasts view as newcomers who have no place in their world.

Luminous Obscurity fucked around with this message at 17:27 on Jun 5, 2015

# ¿ Jun 5, 2015 17:23

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# ¿ May 21, 2024 05:38

Luminous Obscurity: Jan 10, 2007; "The instrument you know as a piano was once called a pianoforte, because it can play both loud and quiet notes."

Kurieg posted:

Do you have a link to this?

The OP site is blocked at my work so I can't get the direct link, but someone posted the full quote in the last megathread.

Rose Bailey posted:

So, here's something I think needs to be said, and it's not the easiest thing to say.

With regards to cultural respect, we have done wrong. There are things in Scion itself that are pretty bad. The treatment of Mesoamerican pantheons is a good example. That's something we can only really fix with a new edition. Cultural respect in the pantheon descriptions is a big deal to us. It comes up literally every time I have lunch with one of the main writers. (I mean literally literally.)

We've also allowed some stuff on the forums -- including recently -- that we shouldn't have. In reviewing the last few weeks of threads, I've seen stuff that we should have taken action on, specifically because of racism. We're not here to set out a policy against trying to improve Scion's cultural respect. Quite the opposite.

Where politics and equality intersect Scion -- and those are some big intersections -- they're legitimate topics for discussion, and I don't plan to have the moderators crack down on anything related to that that doesn't violate current forum rules. I do, however, intend to make sure that the rules get enforced for Scion as much as they do for, say, cWoD.

# ¿ Jun 5, 2015 19:19

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > World of Darkness Megathread: Curse of the Were-Poster

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