Emotion Eater / Tabletop Games

• Old World of Darkness
  • In Wraith: The Oblivion, all wraiths have a number of ruling "Passions" that define their drives in life and in death. They can draw "Pathos" (the game's unit of Mana) from humans who are exhibiting the emotional state that underlies said Passion; the stronger the Passion, the more energy they can potentially draw.
  • Changeling: The Dreaming: Although dreams, art, and inspiration are favored means of getting Glamour, changelings can also reap by instilling strong emotions. Through the path of Reverie, favored by the Seelie Court, this may involve instilling hope; for the path of Ravaging, favored by the Unseelie Court, this may involve instilling fear or anger.
  • Similarly, in Demon: The Fallen, demons gain their power through human faith. They most often gain capital-F Faith by revealing their true forms to humans, either benevolently or... otherwise.
• New World of Darkness:
  • Spirits in the setting can be animal, machine, idea or emotion. These last two feed on the emotions of humans, and work to instill them. However, even a Love spirit is unable to understand the emotion it feeds on: all it knows is it likes it and will go to manipulative extremes to get a favorite mortal to feel as much of that emotion as possible before burning them out.
  • Changeling: The Lost: Emotion is a strong source of Glamour. A changeling who's a member of one of the Great Courts even gets bonus Glamour if he attempts to harvest the Court's ruling emotion — desire for Spring, anger for Summer, fear for Autumn, and sorrow for Winter. Unusual in that they don't actually remove the emotion from the person they're feeding on, although there are rumours about awful things happening to mortals who are regularly targeted.
    • 2E also includes the ability to "reap" emotions much more directly, forcibly ripping them out of a person with much more severe effects. It's both easier and provides a greater yield than simply harvesting ambient emotion, but it's also a guaranteed hit to your Sanity Meter and might get the attention of wary Hunters or hostile Fae.
  • In Vampire: The Requiem, the Formosae are vampiric beings that feed on a person's self-loathing and body issues. By absorbing such things, they're able to make others more beautiful... at the cost of some of their life. Ironically, the energy accumulates on the Formosae in the form of fatty deposits, which means they need to maintain their own pyramid schemes to appear thin.
  • In Beast: The Primordial Beasts, embodiments of humanity's worst nightmares, feed on fear. Different beasts do tend to feed on different types of fear, especially if they've been eating well and are mostly sated, but terrifying the hell out of people in general will do in a pinch.
• Exalted: The Fair Folk feed off of human emotions and dreams. Said emotions don't grow back, eventually leaving any long-term victim a mindless husk. Consequently, everyone who doesn't adore the Fair Folk tends to be utterly terrified of them. Which is fine with them, as either way, they find it delicious. They can have ways of feeding that don't do permanent harm, or any at all^note Like capturing the excess emotion on a big event. Party, funereal etc., the thing is those aren't as effective and they mostly just don't care.
• Warhammer 40,000
  • Daemons may be born from emotions, but they don't take them away from the source. Daemons actually feed on souls, but not the emotions directly (although a soul is required to have emotions).
  • Dark Eldar can feed on the pain and suffering of other sentient beings. This serves many purposes in their civilisation, but most importantly, it reinvigorates them and prevents their souls from being drained by Slaanesh. Also, they can apparently feed on the emotional energies of battles to become more powerful. This effectively makes them Space Vampires.
• In the Deadlands setting, all of the supernatural weirdness is ultimately caused by a quartet of malevolent entities called the Reckoners, whose power is derived from negative emotions, especially fear. The Reckoners' goal is to cause enough fear on a global scale to give them the power to manifest physically on Earth, and in doing so, kick-start the apocalypse.
• Shadowrun
  • The game (along with Earthdawn) has the Horrors, creatures from the Astral Plane who live on the negative emotions of others. The Horrors can only eat negative emotions caused by their own actions.
  • In addition, certain spirits, like the Yama Kings of Kowloon Walled City, feed on the negative emotional energies of places full of despair and horror.
  • HMHVV-type I sufferers drain Essence through strong emotions, usually leaving the victim emotionally drained in the process. While the emotion itself isn't what they feed on, it's the vehicle by which Essence is drained so the effect is indistinguishable from the trope.
  • Ka•Ge magazine Volume 1 Issue 9 short story "Wonderland". The evil monster threatening the protagonists feeds on the emotion of fear in its victims.
  • Supplement Howling Shadows
    • Nocnitsa are spirits that feed off of the fear they cause in young children. They cause the children to have nightmares while sleeping. When the children wake up, the nocnitsa show them their worm-eaten, rotten faces to scare them into losing consciousness.
    • Stabbers are spirits that feed on the emotional energy from pain. They inflict pain on their victims by stabbing them with their barbed tentacles.
• Dying Earth RPG supplement Scaum Valley Gazetteer. The Gleft are spirit creatures who gain nourishment from confusion and distress. They cause these emotions by inserting a ghostly finger inside the victim's brain and stirring it around.
• Dungeons & Dragons
  • Mayfair Games' Role Aids supplement Dark Folk. The troll deity Lirabyth draws energy from the fear of victims sacrificed to her.
  • In the Mystara (Known World) setting, the Darkhood (a spectral undead monster) lived off the fear it caused in living creatures.
  • Ravenloft setting
    • In the Nightmare Lands, the Nightmare Court traps dreamers in nightmares and lives off the negative emotions the dreamers feel: Ghost Dancer (guilt and shame), Hypnos (inadequacy, frustration and humiliation), Morpheus (misery), Mullongan (fear), Nightmare Man (any), and Rainbow Serpent (insecurity, mistrust, suspicion). Dream spawn (nightmare monsters): Ennui (fear), shadow morph (fear and horror)
    • 2nd Edition boxed set, Realm of Terror booklet. Odems are incorporeal entities that can possess living humanoid creatures and force them to cause mayhem and destruction. The odem feeds on the fear, anger and hatred in other people caused by their actions.
    • The 2E Ravenloft Monstrous Compendium III had four variant forms of the Will O'Wisp that drained emotions. The Will O'Dawn feeds on excitement and happiness, the Will O'Deep hungers for fear and desperation, the Will O'Mist consumes the emotions of people crossing the Mists of Ravenloft, and the Will O'Sea lives on panic, particularly that of drowning victims.
  • Dark Sun Monstrous Compendium Appendix 1 Terrors of the Desert. Zhackal packs feast upon the emotions of those about to die.
  • 2nd Edition Planescape setting boxed set, Monstrous Supplement booklet. The Spirits of the Air feed on the happiness of other creatures.
  • 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual. The skriaxit is a living sandstorm that delights in destruction and feeds on the terror of its victims.
  • 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendium Annual 1. The Al-Jahar (AKA Dazzle) feeds off of strong emotions like anger, fear and lust. It tries to cause people to feel these emotions by pushing them to fight each other and enticing them with its beautiful (illusionary) appearance.
  • 3rd Edition supplement Relics & Rituals. The Chaotic Evil magic sword Bloodlust feeds off the fear of its victims.
  • Forgotten Realms supplement Elminster's Ecologies, booklet "The Settled Lands". Lichlings are small cockroach-like creatures spawned from the brain cells of demiliches. They consume the fear experienced by their victims.
  • Spelljammer Monstrous Compendium Appendix II. The Allura are reptile-like monsters that take over the crews of spelljamming ships and put them in dangerous situations so they can harvest the crews' emotions.
  • Dragon magazine
    • Annual #2 (1997) article "Villains of Gothic Earth". The odem Praskovia Voronov possesses victims in order to feed on the emotion of hot anger. She needs it because her unlife status is sustained by her own frustration and anger.
    • Issue #271 article "Bazaar of the Bizarre". Soul masks are parasites that eat emotional energy to survive. They use their powers to cause their victims to feel a particular emotion which they then feed upon.
  • Dungeon magazine
    • Issue #54 adventure "Eyes of the Iceborn". An evil creature known as a fogwarden lives in fogbanks and feeds on the fear of those lost in the fog.
    • Issue #64 adventure "Last Dance". If Madame Tuvache dies, she will become a Greater Animator monster that feeds on the terror and fear of anyone she traps inside her house.
    • Issue #67 adventure "Eye of the Storm". Thunder Children terrorize people with their storm-based powers so they can feed on their victims' fear.
  • White Dwarf magazine
    • Issue #19 article "The Fiend Factory". The empipath is a monster that magnifies the emotions that other creatures are feeling. It then feeds off of the enhanced emotions it creates. The stronger the emotions the targets are feeling, the more likely they are to succumb to the empipath's emotion amplification.
    • Issue #47 article "The Fiend Factory". The trist feeds on hate and uses its powers of Charm Person to cause people to take actions that cause hatred in others. The krowk is a crow-like demon found in Hell and the Abyss that feeds on the pain and torment of lost souls.
  • Imagine magazine #16 article "Goroghwen". The goroghwen is a monster that uses its power of illusion make its victims feel intense fear, which it then feeds on.
  • Polyhedron magazine #73, Monstrous Manual entry for Tiamat, the Chromatic Dragon. Tiamat feeds on the terror of helpless victims before eating them.
• GURPS Supers supplements
  • Wild Cards. Both Senator Hartman (AKA Puppet Man) and The Gatekeeper (owner of the Joker's Wild cabaret) feed off emotions.
  • Mixed Doubles. The super villain Orgy can control other people's emotions. He must be exposed to strong emotions at least once per week or suffer damage.
• Hot Chicks RPG. Demons feed off negative human emotions such as terror and suffering.
• Mayfair Games' Chill supplement Veil of Flesh. The creatures known as Ganabes absorb the psychic energy given off from the terror and agony of their victims as they beat them to death.
• Lejendary Adventures. The Moriant inflicts a slow and painful death on its victim so it can feed on the victim's terror.
• Champions
  • Supplement Teen Champions. The villainess Jeepers Creepers causes other people to feel intense fear. When she does so she gains nourishment from the fear.
  • Supplement Champions Universe (2002). The supervillain Samhain feeds off the fear and terror in the minds of human beings. Its superpowers include the ability to induce such fear using mind control.
• Eureka: 501 Adventure Plots to Inspire Game Masters adventure "Weapons Grade". A spirit of vengeance amplifies feelings of anger and aggression in people so it can feed on those emotions.
• White Wolf magazine #44 article "Gargoyles by Night...Life", which introduces the new Gargoyle race for the NightLife game. Gargoyles can feed by draining the fear of other creatures. They cause other creatures to feel fear by either using their Fear Projection power of using their scary appearance to frighten them.
• Chaosium's supplement All the Worlds' Monsters Volume III. The Demon of Love and Madness feeds on the emotion of love. Anyone meeting the demon's gaze may permanently lose the ability to feel love.
• Pathfinder: Will-o'-wisps feed on the fear and pain of dying creatures. They claim that different types of fear have different flavors — the growing dread as one begins to realize that he's hopelessly lost "tastes" differently from the terror some feels when she stumbles across a hungry beast, for instance — so they try to vary what sort of danger they lure people into to spice up their diets.
• Game Designers Workshop's Dark Conspiracy supplement Dark Races Volume I Compendium
  • The Boogey Man is a monster which consumes the emotions of its victims, particularly fear. It is evil, has red Glowing Eyes and takes 1d6 points of burn damage per phase it spends in sunlight.
  • The dread sidhe feed on the energy of negative human emotions such as anger and despair. They receive more pleasure from doing so if they are the targets of the emotions.
  • The dreamweaver monster causes sleeping people to suffer nightmares and feeds on the victim's confusion, fear and misery. It also feeds on the anxiety the victim's friends feel.
  • The wendigo torments and terrorizes its human prey in order to absorb the emotions of fear and terror it needs to survive.
• The Unofficial Hollow Knight RPG: Spirits that feed on emotion naturally accumulate in the Bayou for reasons unclear, and are divided into the So'Raseo, Dream spirits that eat positive emotions, and the En'Raseo, Nightmare spirits that eat negative emotions. The former are considered malignant entities often blamed for woes such as a sudden loss of passion in a relationship or lack of motivation, while the latter are summoned by Witch Doctors to help relieve their patients of things like resentment, anxiety, and depression.

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