History TabletopGame / WitchCraft

** For all their power and malevolence, demons are unable to harm humans directly. But they can [[TheCorruptor encourage humans to give in to all our worst impulses]] - and they can sell us all the drugs, weapons, and slaves we'll willing to buy to make it even worse. Oh, and if a pack of Gifted avengers draws first blood on the ''demon'', then all bets are off!

** The Skysha introduced in Armageddon. Creatures of neither Taint or Essence, unless they are inhabiting a human host, no one can even properly see them. When asked about them even the Angels refuse to give a straight answer, only saying they come from "Eslewhere".

* TokenEvilTeammate: The Legion of Hell as a whole is this for the forces resisting the Church of Revelations. The Heavenly Host (and for that matter everyone else) would prefer to see the demons wiped from existence, but Leviathan is an even worse threat, and right now the resistance needs all the help they can get.

* IncorruptiblePurePureness: Oddly enough, the Rosicrucians are the one Covenant that is ''not'' corrupt. They're not necessarily good guys, but their Inquisition ''works''. Hell and the Mad Gods have no power over any major groups in them, and very few members at any level have sold their souls.

** The Dark Covenants as a whole are this to the regular Covenants, being Gifted who abuse their powers. Indeed, most (though not all) of the Dark Covenants have their origin as [[RenegadeSplinterFaction Renegade Splinter Factions]] of an existing Covenant, using the same kind of Gifted powers as their heroic peers but having selfish or psychopathic goals.

** Angels in this setting may be prone to GoodIsNotNice or even LightIsNotGood, but demons are still absolutely the more evil of the two sides.

* HarmonyVsDiscipline: The conflict between Wicce and Rosicrucian in a nutshell. The Wicce strive to live in harmony with nature and maintain her balance, while the Rosicrucians believe that nature and the world should be shaped by the will of humans. While the core is written from a largely pro-Wicce viewpoint, the Rosicrucians aren't seen as bad; like the Wicce, they understand that actions have consequences, and they believe that WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility.

* {{Precursors}}: Atlantis and the other True Immortal kingdoms are technically this, being great civilizations who wielded technologies unimaginable to the Mundane world today, yet mysteriously vanished before recorded history. The trope is ultimately inverted, though - while stereotypical precursors are extinct but leave behind artifacts of their dead uber-civilization, the only remaining artifacts of the True Immortal civilizations are the True Immortals themselves!

** While lacking any form of supernatural traits, Mundane players get so many points for other stats that they can start with excellent attributes and near-superhuman levels in combat (or any other) skills. A sidebar in the main rulebook also warns that the Gifted have their limits, using the example that a trained gunman can fire several shots before most wizards can finish a sentence (let alone a powerful invocation).

* NoCampaignForTheWicked: There are no rules for playing Combine-affiliated [=PCs=] or members of Dark Covenants.

** Divinely Inspired healing has no such drawback, but like all Inspired powers, the Touch of Healing can never be used frivolously or selfishly. Depending on the Chronicler's point of view, even using it to heal a ''non-lethal'' wound may smack too much of hubris to pass muster.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Demons are thoroughly evil, but they want nothing to do with the Mad Gods, even as a tool to hurt humanity.

* BlackMagic:
** The Sadicas Invocations practiced by the Cult of Pain, the Nahualli, and possibly other evil magicians. The Essence used to power them can only be recharged by torturing innocents.
** In general, Black Magic is magic that doesn't require care and consideration when used. It can freely be used for evil without rebounding on the caster, but someone will always suffer when it's used - and if it's used selflessly, the caster's the one who'll be stuck with the bill.

* OurWerebeastsAreDifferent: Werewolves are the most common type of Ferals (at least in the western world), but every mammalian predator has a Feral equivalent. Ferals can either be born that way, or acquire the Feral curse by [[ViralTransformation being sufficiently injured by a Feral or even killing a Feral]].

** Under Rosicrucian law, this is a defense. If you commit an atrocity under the orders of a higher Rosicrucian, the one who gave the order gets the heat for it, not you. As for why a "good" faction would have this as a law, and just how much "heat" is involved for someone who abuses it, two case examples are given of senior Rosicrucians ordering their subordinates to commit massacres. In one instance, no one was punished because the victims were a cult who were allowing the viral EldritchAbomination they worshiped to inhabit their bodies, and the only way to banish it was to [[IDidWhatIHadToDo kill them all]]. In the other instance, there was no such reason. The subordinates were not punished, but the senior Rosicrucian was not only executed but [[DeaderThanDead had his soul "unraveled"]].

The players take the part of the Gifted, humans who secretly wield the power of magic, psychic abilities, divine miracles, or other supernatural talents. Set against the Gifted are a wide array of [[MonsterOfTheWeek inhuman threats]], [[EvilCounterPart Dark Covenants]] (Gifted who abuse their powers), the [[TheIlluminati shadowy Combine]] (an ancient conspiracy that manipulates world events to oppress humanity), and the [[ApocalypseCult cults of the Mad Gods]] (who seek nothing less than the dissolution of Reality itself). For all of recorded history, the Gifted have kept their existence hidden, but now an approaching [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Reckoning]] threatens the world, and new Gifted are being born in record numbers. The time for hiding in the shadows is coming to an end.

While similar in many ways to the ''TabletopGame/WorldOfDarkness'' games, ''Witchcraft'' differs in having [[LighterAndSofter less emphasis on personal horror]], a [[MonsterMash more integrated setting between the various supernatural factions]], more of a [[CosmicHorrorStory Lovecraftian flavor]] (albeit with [[LovecraftLite heroes who can often fight back]] against the sanity-blasting horrors), and more focus on [[HumansAreSpecial human protagonists rather than monstrous ones]].

A SpinOff, ''Armageddon'', takes place in 2017, where the Reckoning is in full swing, and the [[ReligionOfEvil Church of Revelations]] is spearheading the takeover of the Earth on behalf of a near-omnipotent [[EldritchAbomination Mad God]]: Leviathan.

* AndIMustScream: True Immortals have no fear of being destroyed by any force the Mundane world can bring against them... but that doesn't mean Mundanes can't get rid of them. There is one example of a True Immortal who got on the wrong side of TheMafia, and the gangsters ended up burying the immortal in the concrete foundation of a new building, where he will never again move, never be found, and never die.

** The Mad Gods aren't so discriminating. They'll grant power to any human who is twisted and wretched enough to reach out to them -- and accept [[TheCorruption their soul-eating corruption]].

* MuggleWithADegreeInMagic: {{Exploited|Trope}} and {{Downplayed|Trope}} by the Wicce, who train their [=unGifted=] members in RitualMagic so that they can fill in when their coven needs a little more Essence, or when they need to cast a spell with a certain number of people.

** In the earlier ''Witchcraft'' sourcebooks, most Covenants focused primarily on one Gifted art, with other arts being a small minority (if tolerated at all). Later sourcebooks switched this up, with new Covenants whose rank-and-file members typically wield ''two'' different Gifted arts. Examples include the Covenant of Legban (Invocations/Necromancy), the Ghost Dancers (Invocations/Second Sight), and the Society of Assassins (Invocations/Tao-Chi). The Wicce are another exception, as they have members who use Necromacy or Second Sight, but also teach them a couple of Invocations and the skills for RitualMagic.

** This trope is more overt than it is in ''Witchcraft''. As individually feeble as humans may be compared to Celestials or the Old Gods, it's acknowledged that collectively, humanity will be the deciding factor in the war -- and Leviathan knows it.

* ImplacableMan: None of the Celestial or Primal character types are easy to kill, but the Nephilim -- with their sheer toughness and general immunity to supernatural powers -- really take the cake.

** In the earlier ''Witchcraft'' sourcebooks, most Covenants focused primarily on one Gifted art, with other arts being a small minority (if tolerated at all). Later sourcebooks switched this up, with new Covenants whose rank-and-file members typically wield ''two'' different Gifted arts. Examples include the Covenant of Legban (Invocations/Necromancy), the Ghost Dancers (Invocations/Second Sight), the Society of Assassins (Invocations/Tao-Chi), and the Order of Shambala (Tao-Chi/Second Sight).

* MurderInc: The Society of Assassins are the Covenant for this trope. Every single rank-and-file member of the Society is either an Assassin, someone who infiltrates target groups to set up hits for the Assassins, or both. And yes, you ''can'' hire the Assassins to do some dirty work of your own (although the "good" sect - the Raya'ha - will only accept hits that are in accordance with their One True Imam's Will).

* RitualMagic: The slow, tedious way of using magic. If you don't have Essence Channeling (a category which includes all True Immortals), it's also the ''only'' way.

** Usually, the Divinely Inspired and magicians don't get along. Not only are the powers incompatible (no character can have both), but most monotheistic religions that believe in magic take a dim view of it, to the point that the Sentinels (the main Covenant for the Inspired) are almost an AntimagicalFaction.
** The Knights Templar are an exception to the above, as they are one of the few organizations where magicians and the Divinely Inspired work side-by-side.