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E totally wrong thread
moths fucked around with this message at 16:11 on May 1, 2024 |
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May 1, 2024 16:00
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| # ? May 22, 2024 11:37 |
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I'm a hardcore fan of CoD2E just because I love proggy psychedelic / gnostic horror and the God Machine was more or less perfect for that imo. As "shared universes" go you can't beat it. That said, HtV 1E is also where Horror Recognition Guide came from, and so it is objectively the best line. Anyhow, speaking of great weird horror scenarios, Werewolf: Book of Hungry Names is the hairy Hellboy / Alpha Protocol spiritual sequel you didn't know you needed. It's incredible. Go buy it and play it.
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May 1, 2024 17:50
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So with Werewolf 5E does the game really scold you for trying to manage your Rage? That seems a little original Aberrant of it.
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May 2, 2024 00:05
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Not normally, not in BoHN. Some of the tribal bans will dock you renown (or whatever 5E calls it) for actions that affect Rage. Eg the Black Fury patron spirit will dock you Glory points if your Black Fury shows mercy to a guilty party -- showing mercy just happens to be one way to cool off your Rage. You're more likely to get in trouble for ignoring it entirely.
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May 2, 2024 00:23
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In general the theme with NWoD2e seems to be just fixing what wasn't broken, and losing a lot of the nuance in the progress. Especially a pity given as much as the system's usually a mess mechanically there did seem to be a lot of fun tie-ins across games. I like how Inferno has Changelings uniquely get the lowest chance of losing Clarity from making deals with devils- after all, it's not far off from what they already have to do.
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May 2, 2024 03:08
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Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, and Geist were all improvements, I feel. Changeling and Promethean were a lateral move with some stuff improving and some stuff getting worse.Dawgstar posted:So with Werewolf 5E does the game really scold you for trying to manage your Rage? That seems a little original Aberrant of it. it's been decades since i played 1e aberrant, but are you referring to taint? I don't recall that being a resource you could spend, like rage, but again, it's been forever. Soonmot fucked around with this message at 03:21 on May 2, 2024 |
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May 2, 2024 03:19
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The thing that people noticed is that you can spend rage to heal but only in combat, once you're out of combat you are no longer allowed to spend down rage, the spirits object.
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May 2, 2024 03:54
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What really annoyed me about CtL 2E was how goddamn flowery the prose was for the powers' description, to the point where it obfuscated what they actually did.
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May 2, 2024 04:12
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Kurieg posted:The thing that people noticed is that you can spend rage to heal but only in combat, once you're out of combat you are no longer allowed to spend down rage, the spirits object. I think you can always spend rage to heal in W5, but you only get rage from taking damage out of combat, which I have noted before is an incredibly awful exception to make. You're gonna break the logic of the game's resource system but against the players' favor and in a way that makes combat less fun???
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May 2, 2024 05:26
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Kurieg posted:The thing that people noticed is that you can spend rage to heal but only in combat, once you're out of combat you are no longer allowed to spend down rage, the spirits object. Yes, I encountered this sidebar: Woof 5E posted:Both the Storyteller and the player are responsible for Rage gains. A player is encouraged to suggest a gain whenever they feel it’s appropriate, just as the Storyteller shouldn’t be afraid to apply it liberally and thematically. The rate at which characters gain Rage is also a powerful Storyteller tool. Stories in which Rage is always available tend toward the more action-oriented and violent, whereas a lower rate of Rage gain is better for evoking a sense of desperation, where any exercise of Rage jeopardizes the Wolf within. Likewise, a Storyteller should be mindful of players attempting to game the system by using Gifts or other abilities for the sake of dumping Rage. Spirits tend to frown on such abuse, and recklessly calling upon them to A game where you can both wag your tail and your finger.
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May 2, 2024 12:50
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Ferrinus posted:I think you can always spend rage to heal in W5, but you only get rage from taking damage out of combat, which I have noted before is an incredibly awful exception to make. You're gonna break the logic of the game's resource system but against the players' favor and in a way that makes combat less fun??? I need to do another reread of the book and eventually run the game to put the system through its places (so huge grain of salt here), but if I had to take a guess as to why, it's like that because between a margin-only based damage system, and the low dice pools of most actions a starting character can do unless they chose the specialization spread, starting characters would probably get overloaded with Rage even assuming they're only playing the recommended "three combat rounds and then move on" framework. Early game combat could potentially lead to one or more characters risking going into Frenzy once per combat. Why this couldn't be accounted for with a Frenzy that assumes you'll see it once per session, a "one Rage increase per combat" rule, or fun yet terrifying ways to dump Rage in battle besides gifts (what if you could spend Rage points up to a Difficulty to just kill someone in the worst, most blatant, messiest way possible or something?) are questions I couldn't make a guess at though. But again, I'd need to reread and actually run the game to be sure on any of this. My initial impressions are that they weren't really sure how to approach Rage as a Hunger reskin and tried to find a decent middle ground.
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May 2, 2024 16:38
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For basically the reasons you list in the middle third of your post, I don't really buy it. But I'd go farther: the math in these games is basically never calibrated as finely as they pretend it is, and I don't think a single thing would break even if you allowed rage gains from combat damage without any other changes. After all, the sidebar Dawgstar quotes above says pretty explicitly that the actual rate of rage gain is going to vary from group to group per the players' (I include the ST as a player here) tastes, so even if it starts to feel like combat is generating too much you can just ease off the pedal in other areas of the game. And that's the least elegant option - you could also just make the general roll be that suffering damage only generates range 1/scene, or if the damage rises over a certain threshold, or both, or any number of other rules that doesn't require you to make the shittiest and most disappointing exception you possibly could. All that said, the "spirits are sure to frown on such abuse" is absolutely damning, just a complete gently caress-you from the game developer in response to the expectation that they do any work or even spend a few minutes thinking things through. Give this one a wiiiide berth. It's a shame, too, because a pool of rising and falling dice suits rage wayyyy better than it suits blood. Hunger dice break in half one of the cardinal themes of Vampire and do so while being maximally annoying and disruptive to boot, while at least the basic function of rage dice (making you more likely to fail attempts at subtlety or finesse, but increasing your crit range on anything violent or scary) is clean and quick to resolve while also being narratively appropriate. But then they just throw up their hands and shrug at you instead of making the economy work.
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May 2, 2024 17:46
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Free Cog posted:Early game combat could potentially lead to one or more characters risking going into Frenzy once per combat. I want to note that, in W5 Rage does not have any direct bearing on when to test for Garou frenzies. Frenzy is given a loosely defined set of triggers and then resisted with Willpower. Rage only contributes in that if you would gain Rage above 5, you take Willpower damage, thus reducing your dice pool to resist. Ferrinus posted:All that said, the "spirits are sure to frown on such abuse" is absolutely damning, just a complete gently caress-you from the game developer in response to the expectation that they do any work or even spend a few minutes thinking things through. Give this one a wiiiide berth. I agree this game was very lazily designed. I wonder how much their thinking was handcuffed by feeling the need to include the “Rage Check”. They made the decision to separate themselves from V5 by making Rage into a resource to be spent, but then ported over the Hunger check concept that gives a chance that your magic doin’ is free, and thus, reduces the need for more sources of gain.
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May 2, 2024 19:02
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Ferrinus posted:For basically the reasons you list in the middle third of your post, I don't really buy it. But I'd go farther: the math in these games is basically never calibrated as finely as they pretend it is, and I don't think a single thing would break even if you allowed rage gains from combat damage without any other changes. Yeah, I think you're right on this. I know I mentioned combat being pretty margin-dependent and margins can get swingy, but as someone running a game of about mid-game/light end-game V5 (at least by my estimate), margins usually don't get so big that someone's going to jump to Rage 5 immediately if you were taking increases through margins one-to-one. Also now that I have the corebook in front of me again, I got some stuff pretty wrong in my last post so I'm gonna correct myself on the actual Rage and Frenzy mechanics as written :
That still doesn't make the ending of the Rage Economy sidebar any better, however. "Oh, the spirits look down on that" kind of makes sense considering that W5 mentions in passing that Gifts are calling upon the spirit you made a pact with who makes the power actually happen, but that's only mentioned in a few lines (at least that's what I believe you're supposed to take from those lines), and there's no real example of what a spirit would do if they felt like you were calling upon them to use a Gift to ease up Rage too much, how they would even know that was happening, or why they would care in the first place. Sure, spirits and the Umbra are unfriendlier to Garou in this version of the setting, but a pact's already been made! What's that supposed to look like in the fiction and why is this vague borderline story hook patching in a concern the book brought up in the first place?! So yeah, some of the things I mentioned actually are in the Rage mechanics, and I should remember to always double and triple check these books before writing about the rules, but that still doesn't mean the game doesn't handwave away something that really should have a little more mechanical structure. Free Gratis posted:I want to note that, in W5 Rage does not have any direct bearing on when to test for Garou frenzies. Frenzy is given a loosely defined set of triggers and then resisted with Willpower. I'm glad I previewed my post before posting because the possibility of a post like this is exactly why I went to double check right after my first post, since I was posting off the cuff as opposed to with the book with me. Thank you! Free Cog fucked around with this message at 19:18 on May 2, 2024 |
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May 2, 2024 19:15
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Free Gratis posted:I want to note that, in W5 Rage does not have any direct bearing on when to test for Garou frenzies. Frenzy is given a loosely defined set of triggers and then resisted with Willpower. This is the other thing I remember striking me as precisely backwards from what it should be when I read the rules; surely going into a Rage deficit should sap your very will to go on, while suffering Rage overflow should flip you into berserk mode or put notches on you "turn into a draugr" meter or whatever negative Rage currently does. Free Cog posted:Also now that I have the corebook in front of me again, I got some stuff pretty wrong in my last post so I'm gonna correct myself on the actual Rage and Frenzy mechanics as written : The more I think about it, the more I feel that your Rage rating should be a slowly-changing trait like Limit in Exalted, and you should have a pool of Essence points that you actually spend to burst heal or use powers. Your Rage rating can still replace regular dice with angry dice as-written, and maybe it's treated as several points higher depending on what form you're in (maybe in the war form every die is a rage die!) but if we want it to believably and seriously scale with story events we shouldn't separately be gamifying it as a mana pool such that it your ST is honor-bound to weigh your heart against a feather every time you spend it to use a power.
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May 2, 2024 19:23
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Ferrinus posted:The more I think about it, the more I feel that your Rage rating should be a slowly-changing trait like Limit in Exalted, and you should have a pool of Essence points that you actually spend to burst heal or use powers. Your Rage rating can still replace regular dice with angry dice as-written, and maybe it's treated as several points higher depending on what form you're in (maybe in the war form every die is a rage die!) but if we want it to believably and seriously scale with story events we shouldn't separately be gamifying it as a mana pool such that it your ST is honor-bound to weigh your heart against a feather every time you spend it to use a power. No one will agree that the classic editions were pinnacle of game design, and its Rage rules in particular needed refinement, but there were a few aspects that were actually quite elegant. You had Permanent Rage and Temporary Rage, which is similar to the Exalted-like set up you pitched, with Temp Rage being your fuel for powers, while Permanent determines your cap and also your Frenzy Dice pool. The various Auspices all had variable Permanent Rage values at character gen. The Ahroun/Full Moon had the most, with 5, and then the Ragabash/New Moon had the least with 1. In addition to Rage being fuel for Gifts and Extra Actions, there was also “The Curse”, which gave Garou a predatory aura that scared animals and humans if the Garou had high Rage values. This system helped reinforce the Ahrouns as the big badass warriors, because they had the most mojo to spend on Extra Actions, were the most prone to frenzy, and suffered the curse the most. “Don’t poke the Ahroun” was a thing. Conversely, the lowly Ragabash was the least combat ready, but also suffered the Curse the least, which promoted their sneaky Face archetype. W5 got rid of all this nuance, and now, only the gift lists distinguish the auspices from eachother. To make it worse, each auspice only has a single gift that is unique to them, all the rest are shared among the various tribes. Free Gratis fucked around with this message at 19:57 on May 2, 2024 |
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May 2, 2024 19:48
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So has anyone try and swarp the terms in book of Hungry Names with the forsaken equivalent? I sware if it wasn't for the fact that Wt:F is inactive then this games would have been based around Wt:F rather than W5... Ghost Armor 1337 fucked around with this message at 20:24 on May 2, 2024 |
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May 2, 2024 20:16
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Seems like Onyx Path is gonna launch a Final Fantasy inspired game. https://www.backerkit.com/call_to_action/4bee2599-c6a8-4b43-957f-556265b83e37/landing
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May 2, 2024 20:34
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Ghost Armor 1337 posted:So has anyone try and swarp the terms in book of Hungry Names with the forsaken equivalent? While there's no denying W5 took some pages from Forsaken like how every WoD5 game sometimes feel like CofD 1e games from another dimension, and the game's author is absolutely familiar with CofD games (this is the guy that wrote Genius: The Transgression if I'm not mistaken!) it doesn't feel like a Forsaken game reskinned so far. For lack of a better term, the vibes of it are different from most of the stories you'd get out of the box with either edition of Forsaken. You could probably do some kind of term swap, but I don't think they'd be 1 to 1 relabels. Also concerning the temp/permanent split for Rage, it would be super easy to put that into W5 proper, come to think of it. Rage being a tracker like Health and Willpower would have gone a long way, and would have fit better than two additional separate trackers to count down how long until your character is unplayable.
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May 2, 2024 20:46
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Free Cog posted:(this is the guy that wrote Genius: The Transgression if I'm not mistaken!) this is an extremely damning track record
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May 2, 2024 20:49
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Having played Forsaken, I don’t see the comparison. You’re fighting the Wyrm and there’s never any kind of thematic or spiritual conflict between your human and wolf halves. There is a lot of focus on the titular Apocalypse. I totally understand how you could boot up a Werewolf game and say “something’s not right here” when it turns out the thing fuckin rips, though. Were it that Wolfmother, or whatever that third person brawler’s name was, had sold.
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May 2, 2024 22:15
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The third person brawler just wasn't that good though, is most of the problem. There were all sorts of really weird parts that just took you out of the game, which probably could be attributed to it's aging engine, but the graphics looked terrible even taking that into account.
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May 2, 2024 22:32
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Kurieg posted:The third person brawler just wasn't that good though, is most of the problem. There were all sorts of really weird parts that just took you out of the game, which probably could be attributed to it's aging engine, but the graphics looked terrible even taking that into account. Earthblood seemed like it was going to be janky, but fun. It was janky, and also not fun. I have no idea how they made killing dudes in Crinos with metal on the soundtrack suck, but they did. Just walking around the maps felt bad, and the stealth was half baked and infuriating. And I say that after slogging til near the end of the story before finally giving up on a boss fight because of the aforementioned lovely Crinos combat sucking even worse when turned against another Crinos Garou.
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May 2, 2024 22:48
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The greatest sin of the stealth was not having any stealth takedowns as a wolf.
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May 2, 2024 23:14
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I've mentioned this before, but it's really funny that Earthblood gave you modal "biped crinos" and "quadruped crinos" battle stances as well as a time-limited super rage mode of some kind, where a Forsaken game could naturally let you shift between Dalu and Urshul for steady, sustainable combat but pop Gauru when the going gets tough.
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May 2, 2024 23:30
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Oh yes them making thrall of the wyrm into spartan rage made me laugh, a lot.
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May 2, 2024 23:37
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John Dracula, your rage meter is full. Hold L3 + R3 to unleash a devastating Bat Blast.
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May 2, 2024 23:48
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Ghost Armor 1337 posted:So has anyone try and swarp the terms in book of Hungry Names with the forsaken equivalent? So you've been playing the game?
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May 3, 2024 00:31
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MonsieurChoc posted:Seems like Onyx Path is gonna launch a Final Fantasy inspired game. It's gonna have to be really good to compete with Fabula Ultima in that space
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May 3, 2024 00:37
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I'm just glad Melissa Uran is doing some art for it.
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May 3, 2024 00:53
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So this is the numbers filed off Exalted to go with their upcoming WoD with the numbers filed off?
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May 3, 2024 01:49
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dingo with a joint posted:So this is the numbers filed off Exalted to go with their upcoming WoD with the numbers filed off? No, they still have Exalted. And what upcoming WoD?
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May 3, 2024 02:25
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Dawgstar posted:No, they still have Exalted. And what upcoming WoD? Curseborn, or whatever it's called. OPP wanting to develop WoD-y things without having to ask Paradox' permission and give them a cut. I figure this is the same situation but for Exalted-y stuff. They may still be working on Exalted books, but they still have to run everything past Paradox and then give them a cut.
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May 3, 2024 02:33
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Ferrinus posted:First you'd have to decide what fidelity to either setting you want, like if you're just dropping some PM conventions into the standard WoD or trying to replicate the entire City setting with d10 pools or whatever. To the extent that you shade towards the latter, you'd probably want fairly detailed rules for cybernetic augmentation, high-tech equipment, etc. Well I'm basically trying to fuse Project Moon shared universe with WOD so I would go with the latter. Though if I want to make this thing more than some scarps of head canon I sporadically post on the web then I would focused on the Associations since there's plenty of material about them from Library of Rania and Limbus company to make a playable splat. Like I can imagine Shi PC being focused on moving fast, striking first and stealthily approaching they targets in a environment that more amenable to the tactic than the Library, while a Liu PC by contrast would be focused on open combat, retaining sanity during stressful situation (thanks to the moon stone) and fire, lots and lots of fire , Zewi is focused on physical protection, Seven for detective work, ect, ect. Of course not all of the associations would be suited for player characters since I see Associations like Tries and Öufi I can see as quest givers but maybe not viable player characters with out some work on the ST's part due to how they seem on more niche subjects (Workshop lichening and contract enforcement respectively) thus limiting the stores they can be in, while Hana seems to be a bit too high level for a starting character, though they could work as "prestige class" for high level PCs since as Olivier has shown Hana is known to recruit high level fixers. Hell the associations even got they equivalent of the Sabbat, in the form of the Five Fingers (who ironically instead of detaching themselves all human concepts (family, politeness, faith, art ) like the sabbat, they take them to violent illogical extreme) Meanwhile independent offices should have a robust office creation rules since there's a wide variety of offices beyond the Associations , from four misfits slumming in a small shack in the backstreets to a large nest born that outsources it's jobs to lower rank Fixers like a Uber for hitman. If a job is available in the city, there's a office for that job. Also I think the fixer would be a crossover friendly splat since at the end of the the splat is just a mundane Job (as much as the term "mundane" means in the City at least...) So there's nothing preventing other splats from taking a fixer job as cover... Also with all the talk about EarthBlood inspired me to write a short expert form my head world... Cahal: What in Gaia name? Roland: heh didn't you're mother told you not you're god's name in vain? Cahal: Th-this much must be some kind of trick Weaver-spawn, how could you- Roland: How could a Monkey like me use the crinos from?, Heh well dear guest let's just say the Library provides...(Though the process really stings. Angela you should really warn me next time.) Cahal: To think you weaver spawn could pervert Gaia's gift like this... This place will burn. Roland: I though a honorable warrior like you would be more excited to face something you're own size...*sigh* Well, time to finish this reception... Ghost Armor 1337 fucked around with this message at 13:05 on May 3, 2024 |
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May 3, 2024 12:44
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Book of Hungry Names might have my favorite depiction of a wolf-born thus far. (Which is, now that I think about it, a way it is really not palette swapped Forsaken because those don't exist there.) Nin just comes off as wired differently in a way that makes it clear she's not human. She also gets some of the best lines, like: "Cop bars are bad news. Cops don't know Irish punk bands hate them and cops get mad when you point it out."
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May 3, 2024 12:51
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Blockhouse posted:It's gonna have to be really good to compete with Fabula Ultima in that space Also ICON. Looking at OPP output in the last few years and honestly yeah They could potentially leverage Storypath into a game that's different enough in that space, so there's that.
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May 3, 2024 16:58
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Dawgstar posted:Book of Hungry Names might have my favorite depiction of a wolf-born thus far. (Which is, now that I think about it, a way it is really not palette swapped Forsaken because those don't exist there.) Nin just comes off as wired differently in a way that makes it clear she's not human. She also gets some of the best lines, like: "Cop bars are bad news. Cops don't know Irish punk bands hate them and cops get mad when you point it out." quote:BridesheadReloaded ok first did everyone read the news links I sent?
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May 3, 2024 17:26
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AWAB15 
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May 3, 2024 17:29
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Had my first Frenzy in my second run of Book of Hungry Names, against my landlord. Game 10/10, no notes.
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May 3, 2024 17:41
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| # ? May 22, 2024 11:37 |
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Kurieg posted:AWAB15 wolf-born 🤝 vampire
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May 3, 2024 19:51
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