Reviews TabletopGame / The World Of Darkness

I'm pretty sure Exalted doesn't have to do with the World of Darkness, so I don't know why you decided to include mention of MoEP: Lunars in here.

They're made by the same company, and they share vast similarities in theme, rules, quality of the editing, not to mention the whole WMG about "Exalted is the World of Darkness' past!", turned out not to be true, but eh. They're similar enough and the Ur Example of the shitty editing that's become wod's Signature Style.

I am growing increasingly doubtful that you just have a problem with the World of Darkness.

Seriously, this is starting to look increasingly like a hate-on for White Wolf as a whole.

You know that the flaws that you picked are clearly subjective, right? Seriously? The d10 system is boring? Using vague sentences does not help this review in the slightest either; your flaws are really just you nitpicking and screaming how this whole line sucks because it wasn't made the way you wanted it to be.

This should've been stuck into the Just Bugs Me section.

Dude, if I put this in the Just Bugs Me section you would complain that it wasn't relevant, I'm putting this in a review, because this is my opinion on Wo D, I think it's a crappy overrated system that people think is really deep and dark because you get to play as a fucking vampire. This is my opinion, these are my personal feelings about the matter, I'm sorry if I violated your sacred cow, get over it, World of Darkness and White Wolf are not perfect, and if you really think otherwise, there isn't much I can really do about it, but it's nice to have a dissenting opinion every once in a while.

And, and if this system is so great, then how come every single game follows the exact same formula?

No one says it's perfect, but your review frankly isn't good as it is mere nitpicking that tries to sound legitimate through vague words. It doesn't bother me that you dislike The World Of Darkness, it bugs me that you try to pass off a badly written rant as a legitimate review and freaks out when someone calls you out on it.

Dude, no one thinks it's deep because "fucking vampires." It's narrative-oriented, which tends to attract people who like a little more story to their RPG than "demons over there, kill their asses." Where the hell have you been looking?

You are confusing systemic compatibility with interchangeability. This is kind of like bitching about DnD's character classes because all of them use levels or because wizards and clerics both cast spells.

For the record, the things you mentioned as universal are pretty much anything but. The only game in which having a Hunter Of His Own Kind is undeniably the case is Mage (Banishers), with "maybe" cases arising in Geist (Sacrosanct), Changeling (Privateers), and Werewolf (The Pure). Vampire and Promethean are a bit short on Eldritch Abominations, malevolent or otherwise. "Humans who want to kill you", meanwhile, is only really covered extensively in Promethean. And seriously? Having backgrounds is samey now?

You say narrative orientated, I say needlessly pretentious. And the major new gimmick that really got White Wolf a lot of fame was this; You're a monster. Still a very human monster, but that concept was very new at the time.

Oh, and the games are so original? All of the supernatural creatures are obsessed with holding onto their humanity while fighting versions of themselves that don't have the same inhibitions: Belial's Brood, Bale Hounds, Seers of the Throne, Privateers, Centimani. And hunters of the their own kind who are obsessed to an insane degree with hunting down and murdering all of the "good" monsters, we have: VII, The Pure, Banishers, Bridge Burners. While fighting virtual gods, Exarchs, (The space spirits from werewolf), True Fae, Qashmillum. There's such a thing as compatibility and there's such a thing as reusing your own ideas over and over with some cosmetic differences.

This isn't nitpicking, this is pointing out pretty major laziness by the staff of white wolf. The games are oh so very similar, and I expect more from them.

The gimmick was new twelve years ago. nWoD started six years ago. I trust I don't need to draw you a map illustrating how "game targeted at goths in the late nineties" does not scan to "broader-targeted game from the mid-noughties is just as pretentious."

This is taking such a broad view that it's not even funny. Belial's Brood is no more or less a threat than any of the covenants, the Bale Hounds are way off on the fringe, the Seers of the Throne have no humanity concerns what with being mages, Privateers aren't any more or less human than other changelings (pretty much everyone's insane and embracing the change to the degree of "no more humanity" is usually framed in terms of becoming a babbling maniac or one of the Others yourself), and Centimani, in addition to not actually having humanity to retain, are no more or less evil than the other Refinements. VII barely gets any mention outside their own splatbook and Banishers likewise, The Pure aren't Hunters Of Their Own Kind so much as they are the other side in a war that might not even come into the PCs territory, Bridge Burners are focused on a completely different thing than hunting down changelings (their goal is destroying entrances to the Hedge - you're thinking of Privateers, who happen to be in the employ of the True Fae and therefore capture). The Exarchs are virtual non-entities, the idigam exist mostly as boogeymen, the True Fae and Abyssal entities are the closest an Eldritch Abomination comes to center stage, and the qashmallim are comparatively benign and compared almost directly to old-school angels.

Given that the games are built as toolboxes and a lot of things happen to fit fairly well in multiple games, similar items are going to appear. Hence why "pick and choose" is practically the unofficial motto of the nWoD.

Trying to hold onto your humanity includes holding onto the perceptions and morality of your humanity, in all of the books outside of werewolf, higher morality means more sanity, and a closer connection to humankind. Those that chose to forsake this traditional morality, and thus connection to humanity, gain advantages from this, Belial's Brood have their Satan magic, Privateers get special Tokens and Pledges as a reward, Centimani loose humanity in exchange for some pretty bitching Body Horror powers and the Seers have weird Exarch artifacts. And just because they aren't actually present doesn't mean that the Exarchs aren't a significant symbol, Mages are fighting God The Demiurge, just like each Changeling has a Physical God after them, Werewolf's fight close to gods and Qashmillum aren't always so benevolent, they're very similar in terms of enemies. VII have a substantial fandom and quite a bit of nods in other books. The Pure are obsessed to a Foe Yay level with gaining revenge on the Forsaken, instead of actually, doing what werewolf's are supposed to do. And Bridge Burners aren't the right term, but there are Changelings who want to destroy everything glamour related and kill all changelings.

So what? They can still make the games a little more original.

Points well made. However, saying that all of these things are direct equivalents is, as I'm trying to point out, vastly oversimplifying. They are not interchangeable. Stick a privateer in a WtF game and the outcome will look very different from if you stuck one of the Pure in a CtL game. Ditto Belial's Brood and the Centimani being swapped around. (Funnily enough, one of the benefits of that Refinement is that they don't risk their Humanity from taking Pandoran Transmutations - presumably they still suffer the extra dice on the Azoth roll for Disquiet, but they don't risk losing Humanity.) Changeling frailties are different in their incurrence than werewolf bans. Mages don't possess natural bulletproofing like vampires do. Promethean resurrection and Sin-Eater resurrection work in completely different ways. And, as always, there's thematics.

How?

They're different, but it's mostly cosmetic, vampires could be mistaken for werewolfs and changelings, even prometheans, mages can copy any power and do it better, changelings are creatures of story, so they could be vamps, shapechangers, golems or wizards, and prometheans limitations are so undefined that they could do any of the physical spells, especially with the Refinements of Flux. If you don't know a supernatural creature is that supernatural creature out of game, then you really can't tell what it is. The monsters are very similar, with a couple cosmetic differences and fluff.

And how would I make it different? First, eliminate all world order and society, you're monsters, there could be small groups of monsters that group together, but the courts, lodges, orders, (whatever vamp groups are called), and refinements should be mystical and philosophical groups, not political. Creatures of the night should be rare and monstrous, and capable of living their entire existences without ever seeing any other magical group. When magic becomes as common as it is, (and it is pretty common in wod, not as bad as oWoD, but still pretty bad) it stops being magic, it changes and loses the panache it used to have. Second, make your abilities and appearance unique, you are not part of a stable bloodline, you are a monster, an abomination that does not belong in a world of rationality and reason. You are not a member of a species, you are a freak, a beast that is completely alone in the world, you don't have family, you don't have peers that you don't make yourself. Third, make the struggle against your monstrous side much more apparent, you're trying to remain human with every day and every hour, you can't wander amongst the streets without magic or disguises. That's how I would change World of Darkness.

I do not think you know what "cosmetic" means. Werewolves don't usually get incinerated by the sun. Mages don't have to drink blood to live. Vampires don't get healed by electricity. Prometheans aren't bulletproof. Changelings don't have ghost-sight as a universal ability. Sin-Eaters can't cut deals with each other for fate-given benefits. And so what if there's overlap? There was overlap in the myths that inspired the groups in the first place.

The Refinements are mystical/philosophical groups, as are Archetypes, most Legacies, most Lodges, many bloodlines... Several of the Y-splats are as much philosophical and mystical as they are political. Going their entire life without ever seeing another supernatural group is entirely possible — again, toolbox — on account of mutual secrecy and variable rarity. Removing supernatural society utterly destroys the way Vampire and Changeling (and possibly Werewolf) work, since politics and in-group/out-group concerns are very much a part of their sources. Magic remains magic even if it's commonplace — it's just not as wondrous anymore because you take it for granted, which is kind of a part of that whole "distanced from humanity" thing. Turning everything into a unique one-of-a-kind special snowflake — cosmetically, even — is completely unnecessary and in several cases makes no sense, as does the whole "alone in the world" thing — Prometheans are just about the only supernatural group for which that makes sense, and it makes absolutely no sense for vampires — who exist in a one to fifty-thousand ratio with humans and make other vampires — to be "alone in the world" in a literal sense.

All of these are valid changes for a variant WoD game. None of them, however, fit in any way with what we actually know about the setting. How do these actually help make the game more original in any beneficial way?

But they're just weaknesses, maybe this a problem with the source material, but they're all very similar, Vamps, Werewolf's, Mages, Changelings and I think Prometheans too can all, or have to, feast upon humans to gain energy, they all (sans Prometheans) have a Kryptonite Factor, they all struggle to remain sane, they all have these enemies that are thematically similar, they have all these similarities with a slight cosmetic and rules related difference, i.e. silver as opposed to cold iron.

Promethean is the sort of game I'd like to go for, lonely, empty, feared or hated by those who know your true nature and ignored by those that don't. I want a game where you are a monster not a man with powers. Mage works in groups because you are still human, but I think Unknown Armies did the "Men with superpowers wouldn't make them better men" thing much, much better. I want a game were you live in a World of Darkness and I think Wo D could do it better. And having one to fifty-thousand ratio thing is, IMAO, a mistake, first of all by giving concrete data, second of all, one hundred and forty thousand vamps? Seriously, that's a fucking lot.

Okay, how about giving each game a very distinctive feel and theme that works well with the system? Or making a vamp power that prometheans can't do? Or creating a game were there aren't horrors from beyond reality that have an unhealthy interest it you?

Again, I feel that's taking a bit too broad a view of the matter. Having weaknesses is kind of a necessity to keep the hidden-world setting from imploding. (Prometheans have one, too - this is a group that includes mummies and Frankenstein's monster, remember.) The ability to draw power from humans (even Prometheans can do this - they can get a point of Pyros per day by spending an hour in the presence of humans) exists for various reasons - vampires have it built into their definition, werewolves have it as a tempting option for staving off Essence bleed at higher levels, mages have it as part of that whole "power corrupts" angle and to explain why anyone would risk the whole shebang that comes with attempting human sacrifice in a modern setting, Prometheans have it to make living in society and risking Disquiet more worthwhile, changelings have it to facilitate their magic and increasingly alien worldviews (harnessing the joyful Glamour that comes from the laughter of children to use a Contract sans-catch in the case of the former and doing something precisely to provoke a reaction and soak up the ambiance in the latter), and Sin-Eaters have it to encourage either taking up the job of sin-eating or living your new life regardless of consequences (things like high-stakes gambling or pulling a Typhoid Mary can be done for Threshold Resonance). They're carrots and sticks, mostly, and in fact a lot of them exist to make monstrous and/or destructive behavior actually tempting.

(Promethean doesn't have you ignored by the people who don't know what you are. Quite the opposite, in fact.) The powers are largely a consolation to the fact that you aren't precisely human anymore. Unknown Armies magic works in a very different way from Awakened magic. The vampire statistic is more a rough estimate than concrete data, and considering that vampires are the most common supernatural group overall, I'd say less than a fifth of a million worldwide (and remember that most cities only have a population of a few hundred thousand at most) is a reasonable amount.

Each game has those. There's a section in every corebook and everything. Vampires have the best non-Mage mind-control powers in the setting. (They also get the best "spend fuelstat to boost ____" rate in spite of their slow progression in that department - you start out with a boost rate that other supernaturals have to get to Supernatural Tolerance 2 to get. The rate is equivalent or worse as you get higher up, but once you've hit elder status at Blood Potency 7+ you can pretty much OHKO a goodly chunk of the populace.) The only horrors from beyond reality with an unhealthy interest in you in particular are the True Fae - the things in the Abyss just kind of generally hate reality, the qashmallim just do the job they're there for, and spirits are spirits and largely concerned with feeding their purviews and, to a lesser degree, internal politics.

Thank you for making my point, but I guess it goes down to preference, you see it as a good rules balance, I see it as unoriginal.

I'm talking thematically, they both have Comes Great Responsibility as a major part of the series, humans gain magical powers and do jack shit with them, it is my personal opinion that Unknown Armies does it way better.

Alright, then what is the theme of each game? Kay, so what if they have the second best, Prometheans can still Mind Rape you, you could make a Promethean with every single Vampire ability. Demons of the Abyss want to consume the souls of mages, Qashmillum are very interested in Prometheans, and a lot of spirits hate werewolves.

The point I'm trying to make is that this particular complaint rings distinctly of not liking the fact that they have some very very vaguely similar ideas somewhere in them.

I have yet to see any indication that Mage is that sort of game. A significant part of Mage revolves around searching for knowledge and finding things out - spirit bans, ancient rotes, and so on.

...There's a section in each and every fatsplat, (it's the bit titled "Theme and Mood") but I'll humor you.
Vampire: "A Beast I am lest a Beast I become," morality.
Werewolf: "Hunt or be hunted."
Mage: "Power corrupts."
Promethean: Alienation.
Changeling: The quest to find one's way home, deception.
Hunter: "Light in shadows," simultaneous power and fragility of humankind.
Geist: Death, transition, "What would you do with a second chance at life?"

Being a vampire generally sucks less than being a Promethean and no, not really. Demonstrate and I might believe it, but otherwise, no, you can't replicate every Vampire power with Promethean, and not just because of bloodline bloat.

Abyssal demons can also consume regular souls. That Awakened souls are extra-tasty kind of removes "unhealthy interest" from the equation on account of this being the equivalent of going for the delicious-and-nutritious superfood rather than the colorless gruel of questionable edibility and origin.

Qashmallim are interested in very little except their mission; without the Drain Pyros Numen, they have maybe two weeks to get their job done if it doesn't call for Pyros expenditure to do. That Prometheans sometimes receive more direct meddling via the Principle is to be expected on account of mutual association with Pyros and the magnitude of their undertaking - most of the other groups aren't doing something as monumental as trying to turn themselves from monsters to ideal humans.

Spirits hate werewolves because their great-to-the-nth-power-granddaddy regularly cockblocked the entire species, and then his kids — their great-to-the-(n-1)th-power-granddaddies — decided to murder him. Father Wolf was a powerful spirit. You don't generally fuck with powerful spirits — racial memory means everybody knows when you do. Most spirits would be perfectly happy if they never saw a werewolf — they're immune to possession and they have a nasty habit of messing with your nice Essence-buffet, which means only the particularly clever or stupid spirits even try to work with them outside the pack-totems and the ones in the territory who've reached an understanding.

Vaguely similar ideas fly better when it isn't the same series. Imagine if a book had this journey, A to B to C, then another book by the same author in the same world had the exact same journey, A to B to C. That's lazy.

Mage is very much about the flaws of mankind and the problems of humanity, since, you're a human.

I'd say they suck around the same level, whenever vamps feed there's the chance that they'll kill, they can't travel and are stuck in an archaic and backwards society that you can't remove yourself from. Prometheans have to travel have no major weaknesses and in fact is the most hopeful game wod had ever made. And about power similarities, vamps can shapeshift, so can Prometheans, vamps can gain super-strength, speed and endurance, so can Prometheans, vamps have mind control, so do Prometheans, vamps have super senses, so do Prometheans, need I continue?

Many demons want to use Mages to create portals into the fallen world so they can fuck shit up. And wanting to eat their soul cause it's like chocolate isn't an unhealthy interest?

Qashmillum have something planned for Prometheans, and since they're made of the the stuff Prometheans use for their magic (Just like big nasty spirits are made of essence and demons are made of anti-mana).

And many spirits despise Werewolves, all the Sun spirits do, and the Big Nasty Lovecraftian horrors do, and so do the Rat dudes and Spider chicks (Forgot their names). A lot of spirits have beef with Werewolves. Yep, I'm calling it, White Wolf is unoriginal.

That's formula. You're free to dislike it. Claiming any use of formula is automatically "sucky," "lazy," or "unoriginal," however, is not an objective statement. Kindly deal with it and stop bitching.

Except that every WoD game is about that to some degree - Changeling provides a nice commentary on abuse, Vampire covers addicts and rapists, Werewolf does a pretty decent job looking at religious zealotry, Promethean examines ingroup/outgroup dynamics and mob psychology, Geist looks at folks who had near-death experiences, and so on and so on.

(Prometheans have a major weakness in common with vamps.) Again I point out that you're zooming out too far. Everyone can shapeshift. Everyone can tweak people's minds. Everyone has sensory powers. The fact that vampires are the best at fucking up your mental shit before mages happens to be one of their strong points.

You're really going to have to define "unhealthy interest" now, since it seems we're speaking past each other on this particular topic.

If you would kindly realize it and stop bitching.

Mage is about the failure of the powerful, mages are given a great gift, to reshape reality, and what do they chose to do with it? Gain more power, get money, get wimmmin, get revenge, get political clout. Mages are the pinnacle of mankind's potential and power and they chose to do what a man would do, and act how a man would act, since they're still men, men with the bodies and powers of a god.

Yes, and it bothers me that all their powers are the same, each supernatural creature should be unique! Individual and separate from the others.

Um, an unhealthy interest, stalking to a Foe Yay level, wanting to capture you and do unpleasant things (Possession, soul eating, body eating, brain washing etc.), that is an unhealthy obsession.

Realize what? That they're formulaic? Again, it doesn't bother me. If it bothered me to the same degree as it seems to bother you I'd hate all fiction everywhere forever for using the same basic plot structures that have been seen a thousand times before. That is how over-the-top you are coming across as.

If you mean "have I realized that your opinions are not objective," meanwhile, yes, I'm well aware of that. However, when you post something that's barely a review I have the right to complain about it, just like you have the right to complain about my complaining about it and so on and so on into some kind of bizarre fractal pattern of internet argumentation. However, from what I've seen in this discussion, your reasons for disliking it aren't even related to the actual game — as dragonfire5000 pointed out, a not-insignificant portion of your complaints boil down to the game's take on the supernatural not matching up with your own. You're framing your complaints in the vaguest of vague terms (saying, for example, that every supernatural should be totally unique, an argument which is so easy to reduce to absurdity that I'm not sure where to begin) and your arguments are predicated upon inaccurate assumptions (that everything in the books is absolutely going to happen to every character, for example, or that having legitimate reasons for going after something renders it an "unhealthy interest.").

The power is explicitly fucked up by mortal witnesses. What could they do on any kind of large scale? (And no, "bodies of gods" is not part of the standard deal - you have to finagle that with the powers and those explicitly can't be made permanent on a living thing like yourself.)

This would require limiting everyone to having mutually-exclusive powers that cover none of the same ground. And in a world with mages that can do anything, that means either nerfing a supernatural type whose hat is being able to do anything given enough preparation and arcane knowledge or making it so that nobody else can do anything. Even removing mages from the equation, this means no shapeshifting vampires or changelings or Prometheans or Sin-Eaters since werewolves get all the shapeshifting, no mind-control powers for anyone except the vampires, no supernaturally-enforced deals since that's as close to a hat as changelings have, no physical-boost powers for anyone but the Prometheans, no death-oriented powers for non-Bound, and so on. And if you happen to be running a game where one or more of the above doesn't exist and you need a missing group's specialty, you're fucked. The lines are meant to cover some fairly broad territory and are supposed to be (and are) able to be used independently of each other. Covering similar ground helps this.

Spirits do none of these things to werewolves on a regular basis. Qashmallim do none of them to Prometheans on a regular basis. Abyssal demons are depraved and alien things that could theoretically do any of these things to anyone. The True Fae can have this attitude to earthly things as a whole, not just changelings, and plenty of them don't even bother with recovering their errant victims. These either aren't unhealthy interests by your own definition or aren't interested specifically in the PCs, which just leaves them as unhealthy. How is this proof?

I'm not hating the formulaic nature of fiction, I'm hating the formulaic nature of White Wolf. As I said, it'd be like an author writing the exact same book and just changing the names, authors are supposed to grow and develop.

Alrighty, and yet again, your point is? My arguments aren't objective, I've never said they're objective, these are my personal problems with the system. And I desire having unique supernatural creatures because this is a game, and if somebody's going to sell the exact same game five different times that bothers me. And about me assuming everything in the book is going to happen to you...first let me know where I actually said that, and then I can answer you.

Come on! It's so easy to get around that, legacies are paradox free, the Mind Arcanum is almost completely free of vulgarity, demenses aren't difficult to make, use your head!

No, I want each supernatural creature to have something that marks them as distinct and is completely theirs, something that when you see it, you can say, that's a Vampire who did that! That's what I want.

Um, The Rat Dudes and Spider People will fuck with Werewolves if they have a chance. Yet again, Qashmallim are made of the stuff that powers Prometheans, and their missions often involve them. Demons can be accidentally summoned by Mages so no, they can't go after everybody as easily as mages. True Fae desire Changelings especially since they're already acclimated to Arcadia. Those are all unhealthy interests.

Except that isn't what's happening. Sheer weight of splatbooks is going to result in similar things appearing in the different gamelines over time. This does not make the games more than remotely identical.

You didn't say it, but it's kind of implied when you keep going on about how everyone has a different flavor of eldritch thing after them and that the Hosts are going to be after every werewolf and so on. Also you keep going on about how the games are all the same with minimal evidence to back you up apart from "there is overlap and I don't like overlap."

Legacies also give you a maximum of three (possibly four if the rumors are true) Attainments that do specific things and are locked to specific levels of Gnosis. The Mind Arcanum can cause some problems of its own - it's not Wise to forcibly bind someone to a task (e.g. mind-controlling someone into doing something) and mind-controlling humans takes four dots in the Arcanum, which is just a step below full mastery and not something every mage is going to have. Demesnes take soul stones to make — the creation of which is as unWise as impassioned serious crimes like manslaughter — and require mastery of an Arcanum, in addition to doing nothing to assuage Sleeper backlash and only providing their benefit to spells targeted within the Demesne itself. None of this stuff is easy to get to.

That would be stuff like blood sorcery, Garou form, pledges, talecrafting, keeping on going through the loss of limbs, and so on down the line. They have these things. It is suspected you are ignoring them.

You've yet to actually properly explain, if there are benefits to pursuing a given course of action and minimal risks (as is implied by the Things From Beyond The Veil Of Time dealie) and an opportunity arises, and you take that chance, how exactly this is an unhealthy pursuit when that sounds like the exact opposite.

...then quit making as many useless books? That seems pretty simple.

It's not overlap, it's the exact same character archetype for each of their villains. I've outlined them pretty clearly!

Mind boost yourself and become the most amazingly awesome speaker ever. That's...mind three? Which you can start with. And I never said it would be easy.

Garou form is claws, anger and size, um, animalism and vampire rage. Pledges, fate. Going without limbs? Life or mind. Yeah, there magic isn't very original. And suspected by who?

Unhealthy for the stalked party PC.

To what end? Some people want voodoo vampires. Some people would like to be able to play as a modern mummy without having to houserule vampire into oblivion or a werewolf without having the thematic constraints of having been off with the fairies. Further, White Wolf is a business. If there are enough people who will buy a given book, they will make it. (I have yet to discover a book that was "useless.")

See previous sentiment regarding such subtle differences as "non-interchangeability."

Augment The Mind only applies to one Mental or Social Attribute at a time at Mind 3, the boost is limited by the lower of your successes and your Mind dots, as a spell cast on a living target it can't be made indefinite, and unless you've somehow secured the guarantee of a scene longer than one hour you can't practically use an extended roll to boost your odds of success. Using the Creative Thaumaturgy rules to tweak the instant-action version to last for a useful length of time (let's say twelve hours) inflicts a pretty hefty penalty on the roll… unless you have Mind 4, which you can't get at character generation, and even then doing so expands the spell factors outside the bounds of the rote form, which mean you get to roll Gnosis+Mind instead of Resolve+Academics+Mind, which is almost definitely going to give you just one or two bonus dots at best. And then there's the matter of actually knowing shit about speechifying, which involves Skill dots that aren't boosted by Augment The Mind.

Your exact words were, "Come on! It's so easy to get around that," and "demenses aren't difficult to make," which are somewhat at odds with your claim that you never said these things.

Animalism doesn't let you turn into a nine-foot-tall manwolf and frenzy doesn't give quite the same effects as Death Rage (nor does riding the wave work the same as Gauru form). Pledges can manage their panoply of carrots and sticks without having an entire bushel of conditional geases and curses and blessings weighing on your simultaneous spell count. Likewise for aping Superlative Endurance - that's essentially a combined Life+Mind spell to mix Sleep of the Just, Body Control, and some other spells that don't have rotes in the corebook, which calls for at least Life 3, Mind 4 and Gnosis 6; you'll be rolling the lowest of the associated Gnosis+Arcana pools at at least a -4 penalty to try and get the same number of successes as you'd need casting them all separately (which would weigh on your simultaneous spell limit); and as with Augment The Mind, you can't even make it permanent. (Suspected by me. I had figured that was obvious what with me apparently being the only one still talking with you about this.)

Which is a completely different meaning than is usually implied when saying that an interest is "unhealthy." This would be like saying an indestructible mugger has an unhealthy interest in people's money.

White Wolf being a business doesn't excuse writing superfluous and stupid books, there is such a thing as "artistic integrity".

What subtle differences?

Get it as a rote and cast it every scene, and boosting your Presence by two can turn a guy of above average likability into the most charismatic man on earth, combined with some clever use of spirits and you can be quite persuasive.

Yeah, those are some really easy things to do, it requires some work, but it doesn't require a whole lot in brains, demenses and legacies aren't hidden knowledge to most mages.

COSMETIC DIFFERENCES!!! What is the legend of a werewolf? A flesh eating beast that turns into a wolf, what do vampires do? Eat flesh and can turn into wolves. Mages can shoot fire, changelings can shoot fire, Prometheans can shoot fire. And no, nobody gives a shit about this conversation. You can play a vampire, changeling or mage with lycanthropic abilities, a mage, changeling or werewolf could be mistaken for a vampire, quite easily, none of these supernatural creatures are that distinctive.

Wow, I'm glad you're out arguing that other guy with those invisible posts, a guy who takes peoples "money" (Replace with whatever), grinds it up and snorts it has an unhealthy interest in "money". Demons hunt down mages, stalk them and seek to devour their souls have a mage soul fetish.

Define "stupid," "superfluous," and "artistic integrity."

I believe I just mentioned one of them — non-interchangeability — but there's also the matters of thematics, mechanics, motivations, and so on.

Let's hear some details on this "clever use of spirits."

"Some work" here being "compromising your moral/psychological integrity, finding the right teacher and/or getting higher Gnosis, which takes a lot of experience to raise."

Again, your failure to appreciate such subtle differences as "vampires cannot, as a matter of course, turn into a wolf-man" and "Prometheans cannot shoot or even touch fire" shows a very poor grasp of the meaning of "cosmetic." (If nobody gives a shit about this conversation, why are we still having it?) Aping other supernaturals is not the simplest thing to do. Vampires don't need to breathe, for instance, and mages aren't flammable by default.

(If we could keep away from meta-argument that would be great.) I have yet to find any proof that demons do these things for trivial reasons - Abyssal entities get Essence and/or Willpower from doing so. Spirits likewise get Essence from eating people's souls and easier access to Essence and ways to carry out plans from possessing people. The qashmallim just do what they're sent to do.

Okay...White Wolf creates books that aren't needed and add nothing to the world just for the purpose of having more books to sell.

Motivations? What is the motivation of the Qashmillim, True Fae, Nahsdkl;fjk (Space Spirits) or Demons? Thematics? True Fae, Demons and Naklsjd;fkl can look like anything, and Qashmillim are so mysterious they could look like anything too. Mechanics? They're badass and don't really have a limit on their powers, you could justify them doing anything.

Spirits don't provoke paradox.

Yeah, but anyone with enough time and or effort can accomplish those things.

They are cosmetically the same, vampires don't turn into the exact same wolfman as Werewolves, but they can still turn into a wolf. Prometheans don't shoot the exact same fire as changelings, but they can still shoot fire. And I have no idea why we're having this conversation.

I never said they're trivial! I said unhealthy, Qashimillim, Demons, True Fae, Naskljd;fj, they all want to do things to Prometheans, Mages, Changeling and Werewolves that are not healthy for the Prometheans, Mages, Changelings and Werewolves.

Unprovable statement. That they sell things does not meant they make them for the sake of having more to sell.

"Motivations" was not solely in regard to the assorted eldritch things and in fact was more related to the less alien antagonists that you were claiming were all the same, like the Pure, privateers, et cetera, but even then a given horror's pursuits can be tied down to a generally simple goal or facet of their being. (The word you're looking for is idigam. We have an article on the game they're in and the name is mentioned in it under the Eldritch Abomination example.) Likewise for mechanics - a member of VII does not look like a Seer of the Throne in any of its incarnations.

And…? At two dots (which is all you'll be able to manage at chargen with Mind 3 already) all you can manage is seeing them, calling them, and talking to them. (I can see where this is going, but bear in mind that individual spirits are rather limited in what they can do. This is a rather particular build that only two of the five Paths can actually do this at character generation, as well. Characters who have it, let alone use it for world-improving purposes, are going to be less than common.)

The same can be said for reaching Blood Potency 10 without using experience points or diablerie. And just like that example, it takes a lot of time. (Not quite on the order of 450 years, but still a long time regardless. To use narrative terminology, the chronicle would probably span the length of a goodly-sized series of novels to amass that much experience - going from Arcanum 3 to 5 alone takes at least fifty-four experience points, and unlike with Gnosis, you can't spend Arcane Experience raising Arcana.)

The parts of the books covering creating new Disciplines and Contracts make note of thematic concerns for vampiric and fae powers - changelings don't generally shoot fire so much as call on their deal with Fire with respect to a given flame (and so need an existing flame for most of the abilities that involve fire); vampire powers are generally more creepy - a vampire-wolf is going to be the creepy quiet stalking predator that seems kind of off, whereas a werewolf-wolf is going to generally pass more easily for a regular wolf. (Prometheans don't shoot fire. That would defeat the whole purpose of them taking aggravated damage from it.) These aren't just cosmetic concerns; they limit what can and can't be done with a given supernatural's abilities - chances are good that werewolves aren't going to be shooting laser beams out of their eyes, a vampire isn't going to have a great deal of direct-attack powers, and changeling Contracts in general tend to be lower-strength than other supernatural abilities of a similar level.

And then you proceeded to respond to my analogy in a way that suggested the actors were unhealthy for their actions rather than that the actions were unhealthy for the victims. I realize my inexcusable failure to comprehend is frustrating, but I'm honestly confused as to what your point is with regard to this particular topic.

Seriously? You think that White Wolf doesn't stretch out it's material with filler to sell more books? I admire your optimism.

Alright, but their motivations seem to be revenge for VII, (some) Banishers and the Pure. Seers, Balehounds, Privateers and Belial's Brood are just power hungry and not very moral, and cosmetics, bleh, they fit the exact same role in the story. Shadow Archetypes with the backing of gods or Eldritch Abominations that have your powers and some hidden tricks.

Eh, with some super persuasive abilities and the ability to talk to spirits, you should be good.

Yeah, but every other supernatural creature can achieve Power Stat Ten without half a millennium under your belt, no it's not easy, but it's possible, and you can steadily increase it without breaking your soul into little piece or doing that crazy shit. Hell, you get Gnosis ten without casting a single spell.

K, Changelings can still manipulate fire into shooting at you, and Prometheans can't shoot fire, but with Vulcanus they can cover their hand with it. And it doesn't say anywhere in vampire that the animal you transform into is creepy, it's a wolf, and prometheans can do the same thing. Werewolve's can't shoot lasers out of their eyes, but can any supernatural creature? And they can shoot BFBL (Big Fucking Bolts of Lightning). And Vampires have Nightmare which does direct damage. Changeling contracts are weaker? They have an excellent heal, and one of the most awesome level five anythings, Elements, and Hearth is the most versatile power ever.

What is the point of your question in the first place? My point was this, all those beasties that are after the PCs? What they want to do to the PCs is not good for the PCs, and by human morals, makes the beasties pretty fucked up.

(Again I would like to point out that mechanics are not cosmetics.) VII is generally more mysterious to the average vampire than Banishers to the average mage or the Pure to the average werewolf, and Belial's Brood and the Bale Hounds are more akin to the Scelesti or the odd changeling cult that worships the True Fae than the privateers or the Seers. (A big thing in the nWoD seems to be that there's a lot of cults, for various reasons.)

True. Again, though, not necessarily going to be put to world-fixing use, if demographics are any indicator.

At least three-hundred and ninety-two experience points without shortcuts like diablerie or esoteric cost-breaks. Assuming an average of three experience points per chapter, that's about a hundred and thirty chapters, not counting story-end experience, just for getting from Supernatural Tolerance 3 to 10. We're talking a looong time.

Changelings can manipulate fire into helping them by, say, coming when it's called or going where it's told at a rate that kind of fails to fit into the description of "shooting." Fire Grasp is fairly different from fire-shooting and so can be safely termed "not the same thing." It doesn't say it, but considering you're a bat or a wolf with the mind of an inhuman vampiric predator, as opposed to a wolf with the mind of a wolf-man, it's not a terribly inexcusable conclusion to draw. Eye-lasers could ostensibly be pulled off by Mages with improvised Forces magic. I had said "not a great deal," not "none" — see VtR Core page 261: "Very few Disciplines directly cause damage to an opponent." With regard to relative supernatural power strengths… Equinox Road, page 32: "However, it's worth noting that changeling Contracts tend to be a bit less powerful when compared to Disciplines, Gifts, Arcana or the like."

(Which question? I've asked a lot of them.) From a human perspective, yes. From the perspective of said beasties, though, they're just after a really good meal or other appropriate immensely-desirable-thing.

I'm talking story wise, they fit the same role.

Eh, it's a lot of experience, but it's perfectly doable, let's see, six points a chapter, one chapter a week, one and a quarter years, yeah, it'd take a long, long time, but it's possible.

Minor differences, shooting, or throwing, or grabbing, they all can hurt someone with fire. And vamps are more unnatural than an inhuman lycanthropic predator? It doesn't say that vamps aren't natural creatures, there are theories, but nothing is substantiated. And eye beams are just...unpractical, it's much easier to electrocute someone with a wall socket. Also, do any of these power limitations make any sense? Why can't vamps have direct attacks? Why are contracts weaker? Why, why, why! There is nothing intrinsic to any of these creatures that make having or not having these powers make any sense? Why can vampires turn into mist? Cause Dracula could, right? Well, when did Dracula get super claws? Or astral projection? Or plague control? Or fucking necromancy? When did werewolves call down tsunamis and summon a pack of spirit wolves? White Wolf can justify giving any power to any creature because everything is so ill-defined, it Prometheans could teleport, could you really say, "That doesn't make any sense!" since they can also mind control people and animate machinery.

I don't think True Fae, Idigam, Qashmillim, or Abyssal Creatures think the same way you or I do about morality and right or wrong, and since I can't judge their behavior or their moral standpoint (Because A, I don't know it, and B, they're fictional fucking creatures!), I'll judge them on a human one.

…In the vaguest possible sense, which I keep trying to point out really isn't that "identical."

I have no idea where you got six points per chapter from, given that five points per chapter without a Flaw is kind of a lucky break to begin with. And again, this is for Supernatural Tolerance alone. This assumes you don't spend experience points on anything else whatsoever.

Which is a very very vague and broad way of looking at it — that's like saying modern weapons are passé because they can all hurt people with metal. Vamps are undead. It is difficult to get much closer to a global definition of "unnatural" than undead. (Further, check the second paragraph under Animalism - page 115 of Core: "Most Kindred are repellent to animals. Lesser creatures grow agitated in the presence of the undead and normally flee the scene (or, in some cases, attack the vampire in question).")

Sometimes wall sockets are in short supply. Sometimes you're up against a Promethean. Sometimes you need your hands free. And so on.

Assuming that Dracula is the sole source of vampiric myth-legend-and-folklore is kind of missing a huge point, i.e. there are a lot of vampire stories. Besides which, haven't you spent roughly half this conversation complaining about lack of originality?

Werewolf Gifts almost categorically involve trucking with spirits, which have those things as their purviews and such, and since dealing with spirits is part of the model White Wolf has for Werewolf, this scans reasonably.

If you can figure out a way to sensibly tie teleportation to being a transhuman reanimated corpse powered by the Divine Fire (and figure out where in the existing power trees that fits or make a new Transmutation class), then more power to you. Ditto if you manage to figure out a way to make a Discipline that involves the power of the sun.

So… because you can't judge them you're going to judge them. That… doesn't make sense. Because you know they don't think like humans, you're going to say that they're sick bastards as if that actually had meaning in this context. This is kind of like saying that sharks are abhorrent because they don't breathe air.

If by vaguest possible sense, you mean, the exact same archetype that has the exact same role in the story then yes, you're correct.

I have no idea either, it was an Ass Pull.

And most guns are pretty similar, I don't consider the Russian army that different from the American one, they both rely on hand held phallic devices that rapidly propel pieces of metal to kill people. Is their a mechanical penalty to vampires for using Animal Ken?

In cities? Electricity is almost always around us. And improvising a spell to shoot eye beams is vulgar as fuck and probably wouldn't be very efficient, most of the direct attack spells aren't.

Yeah, and Dracula is the trope codifier, still the only aura reading vampires I can think of are in Black Blood Brothers, there a lot of vampiric abilities that aren't really traditional vampiric abilities. And I want originality, not ridiculous as fuck powers.

And since there are spirits for everything couldn't you justify making a gift for everything?

Um, can you tie turning into a big fucking dog to being a transhuman reanimated corpse powered by the Divine Fire then please do so. And a Discipline that involves the power of the sun? Um, Dangerous Forbidden Technique using sun worshiping vampires? I'd have to spend some working on balance, but I could make a blood line around that, yeah.

I can't judge them on their morality, so I'm going to judge them on my morality, cause that's all I can do. No, it'd be like saying sharks are evil because they eat humans, and yes, by human morality, sharks are evil for eating humans. And these monsters are way less understandable then sharks, sharks are living breathing creatures, I'm not sure that Demons are alive in a traditional sense. And sharks don't breathe air because they can't, does the abyss need mage souls to survive? I don't know.

Considering that archetypes are rather broad to begin with...

So, to continue this metaphor, what should the distinction be rather than Russian-versus-American? (Penalties are presumably left up to the Storyteller, but when you have such straightforward guidelines as "animals freak out and either attack or run away" I think we can safely term that quasi-mechanical.)

And on the highway or in the woods? Not so much. (There's no such thing as "vulgar as fuck." If a spell is vulgar, it's vulgar. If it's not, it's not. If Sleepers see it, the Paradox is a little stronger. None of this prevents eyebeams and efficiency was never part of the question.)

Dracula is not, however, the final word on vampires, or else we wouldn't have that whole "sunlight" thing to worry about. How many vampires do you know of who can tell when someone's lying? That is also part of that particular power. (Okay, now I'm going to ask you to define — and I mean really define, not snap, "Not what nWoD is doing!" — what you mean by "originality.")

Ostensibly, yes. The characters would still have to hunt down the spirit that could teach it, though.

The Divine Fire is transformative. (To narrow the goalposts/clarify: a Discipline that involves the power of the sun with the vampire as the source.)

What I'm getting at is that trying to apply human moral standards to something that's non-/super-/sub-sapient is really fucking silly.

Um, I do not mean to get in the middle of your argument, but I have a comment. Phrederic, one of the reasons that the characters have so many similar abilities is because in the original myths they are based on had so many similar abilities. Mages have always been able to do anything (with enough prep time). Prometheans have a very alchemic-ish theme, and alchemy was based on understanding the universe/God and using that understanding to change things. Changelings are based on fairies, and fairies have always been mystical creatures that can do anything. So the fact that these characters can replicate the power of any other character is not really that surprising. Vampires have had hundreds of different myths about them, all having different powers. White Wolf seems to combine these myths together (rather than having multiple species of vampires), which results in them being able to replicate many powers. Werewolves and Vampires were originally highly interconnected (for example a dead Werewolf would turn into a vampire), and Vampires have been able to turn into wolves since at least Dracula, so the fact that that they can both shape shift also makes sense. The fact that Werewolves share so many abilities with the other groups is slightly annoying, but I am assuming White Wolf is going with an altered Thiess interpretation of werewolves, where they are protectors against evil. This also gives them a rather shamanic background, which of course allows them to do anything. Really, the problem is not necessarily White Wolf, but more that the myths, which have creatures with overlapping powers.

As far as any character being able to easily copy the traits of another, using my rough knowledge of the abilities of Vampires and Werewolves I will demonstrate how hard it is for a mage to copy their powers. To copy both the shape shifting and mind control powers of Vampires (at the lowest cost), I would have to be of the Mastigos path. To control the minds of humans I would need Mind 4. If I started out with Mind 3 it would cost me 14 experience points. To get an even greater degree of control (Mind 5) it would cost me 14 more experience points. To shape shift I would need Life 4, which (assuming I had Life 1 already) would cost me 14 points. So to fully replicate the mind controlling and shape shifting abilities of a Vampire it would cost me 42 experience points. Replicating the effects of a Werewolf would be rather difficult as well. Assuming I was a Thyrsus, (and assuming I was Life 3) I would need 14 experience points to bring me up to Life 4, which would just allow me to assume the form of a wolf. If I wished to assume the Urshul form I would need Life 5, which would again cost 14 experience points. I do not think it would be possible for me to assume Gauru form, but if it was it would take Life 5 as well. The mental effects that the forms have would probably require at least Mind 2, which would probably cost 7 experience points. The effect that Lunacy has on recording objects would probably cost Matter 1, which would be another 7 experience points. So, just to copy the shape shifting abilities of Werewolves would cost around 42 experience points. Also, many of these spells would be vulgar, which means that paradox would attack me. In addition to that I would have to run multiple spells simultaneously, which would tax my spell tolerance. So yes, I could mimic all the abilities of another supernatural group, but it would be really annoying.

In the games, crossovers are optional, which is why so much of the material is repeated. Simultaneously, the rules have to allow crossovers and to make sure one group does not completely destroy another they need to give them comparable abilities. If you dislike it you could just use house rules and remove the offending abilities. If you want really unique supernaturals, White Wolf has released two books of based on them (Second Sight and Immortals).

It's actually even more experience points than that; "new dots times [trait value]" means you pay the cost of each new dot-value individually. (So the cost for Mind 4 and 5 for a Mastigos who started with Mind 3 would be 6*[4+5]=54 experience points. The cost for going from Life 1 to Life 4 for the same character would be 7*[2+3+4]=63 experience points. That Life 3 Thyrsus would take as many experience points as the Mastigos to get to Life 5, and would require Matter as well as Forces to cover both electronic and chemical recording media, and assuming you start with Mind 2 for the sake of minimizing costs, that's still at least another 7 experience points for a total of at least 61 experience points if you set things up optimally at character generation.)

But it's still possible, and that's what I'm getting at, and what would be easiest would be to become a Child of Proteus (I believe that's what they're called), just to avoid paradox. And it isn't the myths fault, ultimately it's up to White Wolf to choose what abilities to give to what creatures, and I feel that they are way to lenient and instead of focusing on clever uses of sub par powers then just, "Oh, I'll do something else instead", if you give each supernatural creatures less powers, and focus their interests you force the players to be more clever, I want One Piece, not Bleach.

Eyebeams are really unpractical, you don't need your hands free to cast anything, so...why?

And what is originality? What is something original, I want White Wolf to have a new take, a new perspective, a new look at something, something that makes you think and ponder and wonder, something that makes you look at something in new and different ways.

Well, it wouldn't be a very long lived bloodline, but you could justify self hating terrorists.

Why? Wolves aren't evil for killing humans because I understand why wolves do it, there is no justification for the actions of the Abyss, True Fae, Idigam or Qashmillim, they don't always kill to protect themselves, and I don't think they kill to eat, so there murders aren't justified.

The Orphans of Proteus have one specific form that they can turn into, and they need the third attainment to actually change completely into an animal. Also, you need to be a Thyrsus and non-original legacies require a teacher.

Except that it takes time to get to the point where "Oh, I'll do something else instead" becomes a regular and practical option - you get a relatively small number of powers at character generation and buying down Morality for experience points generally only nets you one (maybe two) relatively weak powers. (There are obvious exceptions, like the half-price benefit for new versions of existing Contracts of Elements and Contracts of Fang and Talon, but neither of these is the norm, nor is it an especially divergent "something else.")

You need your hands free to cast most rotes. (You need both hands free to cast vulgar rotes.) Hence the "improvised" proviso in the initial suggestion.

Which is above and beyond the definition of originality and into the realm of "eye-opening," "thought-provoking" and "life-changing." Some people want to play the classics.

And how would you work the metaphysics? The Beast itself is violently apprehensive of sunlight. It's part and parcel of the whole bit about sleeping through the day and sticking to the shadows.

Says who? Let's tweak the metaphor for a moment: do you think rats understand why some humans are so insistent on killing them while others put them in strange movable living spaces and give them food?

Not if you're a mage, then you get a practically infinite number of powers at char gen.

So, if your hands are free anyway, then why not just shoot lasers out of your hands?

Really? The definition is Merriam-Webster states "a work composed firsthand", i.e. a new take on something. And so what if it's fun, we're not discussing how fun the game is, we're discussing how good of game system it is, and it isn't original.

Eh, the Beast can be frightened, maybe by taking on aspects of the sun into themselves the Beast can be tamed.

No, and to rats, we're horrible unknowable monsters. I'm talking as a human, and from a human perspective, the True Fae are horrible unknowable monsters, the Idigam are horrible unknowable monsters, the Qashmillim are sometimes horrible unknowable monsters etc.

Constraints of the Arcana say "Hi." You're not doing any Making or Unmaking spells at chargen without Arcanum 5, for example, nor are you making a lightning bolt without Forces.

There seems to be a fairly unreasonable assumption here that makes little sense given the fact that we're already using improvised (unreliable) and vulgar (Paradoxical) magic.

"New" does not mean "mind-blowing," "earth-shattering," or any of those other portentous hyphenated words. It, in fact, means "not done before." ("Good" and "original" are neither mutually exclusive nor mutually inclusive. Please stop tying things together that really aren't.)

... Sunlight literally disintegrates vampires, and at a rather disquieting pace. The Beast is not a thing you can unconditionally get rid of as easily as learning a Discipline. This is roughly along the lines of expecting a non-suicidal Kindred to greet the sunrise (and "non-suicidal" is an important proviso, because, you see, it's kind of difficult to get any kind of sustainable bloodline Discipline going without having its practitioners stick around long enough to Embrace childer and pass on their knowledge, which will take a while, since the childer need to reach at least Blood Potency 2 to be able to activate the bloodline as well as learn all the basic powers of the Discipline, which will take another ninety-one experience points minimum.) Also the Beast is, to a certain degree, you. The very best you can reliably achieve with regards to the Beast is minimizing the impact it has on you. Even the two core Disciplines involving Predator's Taint don't remove the risk of frenzy in oneself. It would be like trying to get rid of your own fight-or-flight response along with the other basic drives like hunger. The best you could manage would be reducing the effects it had on you and possibly sublimating it towards something different.

Which is exactly my point.

You still can do a lot, making and unmaking are only a small part of the mage's deck.

What the hell is the point of shooting lasers out of your eyes and what point were you trying to make?

I never said mind-blowing or earth-shattering, I want a new take on the supernatural, and White Wolf doesn't deliver, these are, (In your own words) amalgamations of myths. Not really anything more original than downloading a bunch of legends, putting them in the blender, and pushing puree. And I have criticized the actual mechanical quality of the engine, now I'm criticizing the lack of originality, which is part of how good a game system is.

No, not get rid of, gain some control over. I never said it would be very long lived, I doubted the possibility of it existing, but you could justify giving vampires solar powers.

And that point is?

If you don't get the point of laser eyes, I don't think it can be explained to you.

The take seems pretty original to me. Are tribal werewolves who punch ghosts and killed their dad not a new take on myth? I'm left with the impression that you'd walk away from Watchmen calling it just another superhero story.

You're also missing out on Patterning and Unraveling, and (for nine out of the ten Arcana as your best-case scenario) you get no Weaving, Fraying or Perfecting. The remaining six Practices are significantly more limited than "practically infinite."

You can do so with your hands free, for starters. Also, they're ostensibly an aimed spell, so the way the spell works is changed, most notably in the fact that unless otherwise stated the target gets no Defense except at point blank range. Also also, they're eyebeams.

Your exact words, emphasis mine: "And what is originality? What is something original, I want White Wolf to have a new take, a new perspective, a new look at something, something that makes you think and ponder and wonder, something that makes you look at something in new and different ways." Neither of the bolded portions are necessary for originality. (Your criticisms of the mechanics included such gems as "the d10 system is boring and generic" and "[…]the best shot in the world with a sniper rifle[…] take[s] multiple hits to kill someone!" — Three words: Fighting Style: Sniping.)

Creating a bloodline takes time. So does creating a Discipline. So does learning one. Permanent alterations to the vampiric state that aren't weaknesses are usually Coils of the Dragon or similar effects, which are a distinct thing from Disciplines and even more difficult to make.

As far as the beasties are concerned, we're rats. At best.

No, I don't get the point of eyebeams, I really, really don't get the point of eyebeams, and I really don't get why you're emphasizing them.

Watchman was new because it was a Deconstruction that was never seen before, guardians of the borders between man and spirit isn't new, (see religion).

I'm saying you aren't limited to the rotes in the book, and you can improvise and unlimited number of spells as long as the fall under the limitations of your mastery of the arcana.

...okay, but don't you need both hands free to cast improvised rotes anyway? I remember you saying that.

Okay, what's your definition of originality? Oh, you want to mention the Fighting Styles, okay, hot shot, I'll do that. They're broken, they're stupid, they change the game and turn players into invincible lords of death that can mow down mooks and most supernatural creatures without even trying, multiple attacks are ridiculously broken, they can turn an average shot into a badass, and they are way to cheap to buy up. Fighting Styles take a baseball bat to the collective knees of balance in this game. And my point still stands about the lack of difference between the best fighter in the world and the worst.

Yeah, and I'm saying it's still possible to justify a bloodline based around the sun.

And? We still don't understand them, and since morality is based on perceptions, they're evil.

The rotes are a fairly representative sample of what you can do with the Arcana at a given level, and the Practices even more so. The absence of a rote for a spell can be devastating at low Gnosis and Arcanum.

...Do I need to point out that there's no such thing as an improvised rote? Really? Okay then: Rotes are a completely separate and incompatible form of willworking from improvised magic. One involves codified gestures and Imagos. The other involves making things up on the spot and does not necessitate gestures. These are mutually exclusive methods.

Offhand? "The quality of being novel ('new or unusual in an interesting way') or unusual ('remarkable or interesting because different from or better than others')." In other words, "Not done before." (No, your point really doesn't still stand, regardless of whether or not you decide to throw in sarcastic nicknames. There is a mechanical difference between the best and worst fighters in the world, and a profoundly pronounced one at that. I'm not getting into an argument about multi-attack tricks; absolutely everyone acknowledges that they're a broken mechanic in plain physical combat. However, I've yet to see anyone claim that they destroy the entire game who wasn't completely fixated on combat as the only means of conflict resolution. Seriously, this can be thwarted by such brilliant things as the first dot in Dominate. Or armor.)

I have given at least three reasons that your Dangerous Forbidden Technique concept does not work. I could see a type of sorcery or ritual magic being based around it, possibly, but not a conventional Discipline.

...Seriously? Really? Should I just reel off the list of ethical philosophies that disagree with this notion?

Don't be a Grammar Nazi you know what I meant, didn't you say improvised spells need both hands free?

And I don't see how White Wolf qualifies for either of those qualities, so my point still stands. A mechanical difference, but an above average fighter is less than half as good as the greatest fighter in the world, and they have a decent chance of hurting them, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense, guns are really, really not very deadly, and you think armor can save you? Um, armor piercing can be gotten easily, the armor that can shrug off armor piercing is cumbersome and noticeable it's expensive, and won't help that much in melee.

Does it say anywhere that bloodline limits special powers have to be disciplines? Why couldn't you a bloodline only sorcery?

I really, really don't want to get into that debate with you, but I will throw some ideas around. Just because a lot of religions preach that there is objective morality, doesn't make it true, the fact that all these moralities are different is rather telling, I believe in a subjective morality, and you don't, I doubt that argument is going to get anywhere.

I said "sometimes you need your hands free" by way of an explanation for why one would bother with improvised vulgar magic. I said that you need your hands free to cast rotes. Improvised magic does not require your hands to be free and therefore permits you to use your hands for other things. Rotes involve mudras that require the use of your hands. I hope that is clear. (How does the aforesaid warrant an accusation of Grammar Naziism?)

Thank you for moving the goalposts. You said the difference between the best and worst fighters, not the best fighter and an above average fighter. In the initial scenario you are comparing someone who rolls a chance die on all of their attacks to someone who can average at least three successes per strike. A decent shot with a pistol can have you laid up in the hospital for a week with one shot.

Armor Piercing is not a quality that can be trivially applied without supernatural aid; it's also not cheap. Armor itself comes in multiple forms (including magic) and is generally rated only slightly better or worse for general defense versus ballistic defense.

The one bloodline associated with a unique type of ritual magic - The Iltani from Ancient Bloodlines happen to have Merges Sorcery listed in their section and they go back further than 600 BC - don't have it as one of their bloodline Disciplines - they get Animalism instead. Further, check VtR Core, page 259: "Theban Sorcery, Crúac and the pseudo-Discipline of the Coils of the Dragon may never be a bloodline's fourth Discipline." Given that ritual magic works in a different manner from regular Disciplines (having multiple separate powers at each dot rating) and the only bloodline that involves unique ritual magic (And even then it's not unique because only the Iltani can learn it; it's unique because the Iltani jealously guard the secrets of the rituals and hunt down anyone else who learns it) doesn't get it in-clan. Which means it takes even longer to teach and learn.

Nowhere did I say anything about objective morality. Claims that morality - morality as a concept - is based on perceptions, however, will be met with some amount of skepticism.

Ah, that's what you meant, but why select the eyes as the starting point of the lasers? You could just as easily shoot them out of your shoulder, chest, or wall, (And you got on my back about improvised rotes, therefore the accusation of being a Grammar Nazi.)

Yes, in every system there are differences between the best and the worst, world of darkness just isn't realistic in those differences, a decent shot should kill you and alter your life forever, not get you laid up in a hospital for a week.

Um, actually plenty of things have natural armor piercing, daggers, epees, rapiers, fire axes, ice axes, warhammers, screwdrivers, power drills, some revolvers and pistols, SM Gs, anti-material rifles, sniper rifles, and you can special armor piercing ammunition. See, it's possible without magic.

Kay, no Cruac, Theban Sorcery or Coils, there Aint No Rule against ritual magic as a Bloodline only special power.

Yeah, you implied it to be so, Subjective Morality is based on one's individual perception of the world, you were opposed to that and that kinda puts you into the Objective camp. And so what if it will be met by skepticism, you can't judge another mans action by your own code.

Easier to aim. Why would you shoot from any of those places? (Except that that had nothing to do with grammar - "improvised rote" is an oxymoron, plain and simple.)

Have you tested this? (And yes, "gun nibble" is another common complaint. There's a number of combat hacks in Armory: Reloaded that can help fix this.)

"AP ammo is rare in non-military calibers and is illegal for civilians to possess in any nation with gun laws." And are you really that likely to randomly come across someone carrying military-grade weapons (or, for that matter, a fencing sword) on them? Or someone who's going bother with the awkward process of weaponizing a power drill? Or someone with a war hammer? (Which, incidentally, is exceedingly impractical both for the nigh-inevitable Size penalty — it's Size 4, and so you'd need to have at least Strength 4 to effectively wield it — and for the rules of its use — it takes a full turn to properly recover from your own attack with the weapon or else you suffer a further -3 penalty.) But all this is comparatively irrelevant because, of the major multi-attack Fighting Styles (ones that allow for more than one extra attack - Kung Fu, Aikido, Shurikenjutsu and Combat Marksmanship), only two (the latter pair) allow for weapon-based armor-piercing (the former only with edged weapons of Size 2 or smaller that are designed for throwing). Kung Fu, meanwhile, gains a whopping single point of armor-piercing from the Focused Attack maneuver. Nowhere did I say it was impossible without magic. I said it was non-trivial without magic, which it is — you can't just apply the armor-piercing quality to anything.

And indeed you are correct on this, upon further inspection — the Architects of the Monolith and Család bloodlines both possess a unique form of ritual magic as a unique Discipline. (Therefore we can safely say that the three "off-limits" Disciplines are as such due to their Covenant ties rather than anything to do with the Blood.) However, my point about the difficulties of teaching still stand; dots in a ritual Discipline get you one free ritual per dot. Any other rituals need to be purchased (and thereby taught and learned) separately. On a related note, looking at all existing ritual magic effects, most are relatively specific buffs or one-shot effects. You could possibly build a ritual Discipline around the sun, but the metaphysics would likely fight you every step of the way.

Your exact words: "morality is based on perceptions." Followed by a claim that because the beasties do things that look evil to you, they're evil. Subjective Morality was not the obvious conclusion to draw from that. The initial conclusion I drew from this was that you were suggesting that morality is based on other people's perceptions. We have an entire trope about how something does not stop being wrong just because nobody but you knows about it. Has the source of my confusion been made clear?

Regardless, I maintain that you can't accurately say that the various beasties are evil from their own perspectives.

Okay, so you get an aiming bonus, alright.

Tested what? Getting shot, no, but getting shot changes your life forever, there is fairly substantial reports on the matter.

Okay, what...crafts two or three? With resources three, you could make your own ammo, and fencing swords aren't that rare actually, I think you could probably buy or order one without to much hassle. Yeah, warhammers aren't practical, but you can still use them. And you don't need to weaponize powerdrills, just grab one and lobotomize the mother fucker.

Eh, yet again, Aint No Rule against it.

I understand the source of our confusion, (though it seems to have been fixed now). Alright, morality's based on your own perceptions and to a human viewpoint, these extra-dimensional freaks are horrible slaving soul-devouring monstrosities!

Yeah, but I maintain that it doesn't matter that these beasties aren't evil from their own perspective, because we can only make decisions on what we can understand and comprehend. And they aren't evil because they think differently from us, they're evil because they murder and rape human beings.

You might if your Storyteller shares the same reasoning, but my point was more about straight line-of-sight than mechanical benefits. (Also because — and I really cannot stress this enough— they're eyebeams.)

That a decent shot — and my example gunman is looking at a Dexterity and Firearms of 3 each with a heavy pistol or a heavy revolver — can average a week of hospitalization before the wounds cease to be a threat to the target's well-being (see "Health and the Human Body," Armory: Reloaded page 159) with one shot anywhere on the body (so there's about as good a chance of hitting them in the shoulder or the leg as hitting them in the head) is pretty effective. Called shot effects are largely up to the Storyteller, but extra damage or an instant-kill for the right target is hardly out of the question. This becomes even more likely with hacks like Aggravated Called Shots.

(I've taken fencing; the competition swords aren't honest-to-god weapons and, while certainly a safety risk without the proper equipment and safeguards like blunted rubber tips, they aren't exactly inconspicuous or commonplace, much less something to bring along in case you're expecting trouble; a baseball bat would serve you much better.) Resources 2 to buy a reloading bench (Which provides a +2 bonus to the Dexterity+Crafts roll and therefore two extra rolls) and at least Dexterity and Crafts of 2 each (thus giving six rolls of six dice each, averaging about twelve successes in three hours)... and AP ammo is still a limited resource and still illegal anywhere you can get away with carrying a gun. Usable or not, where would you get a war hammer? ("Weaponize" means turning something into a weapon or using it as one. If you're attacking someone with a power drill, you have weaponized it. That aside, lobotomizing a person is both way above and beyond any reasonable semblance of self-defense — and therefore likely to get you arrested — and almost invariably calls for an immobilized target, which means you'd need both Weaponry and Brawl to pull it off without fortuitous circumstances; the drill adds nothing to your dicepool without the optional "Crafts 3+ ignores the improvised penalty" rule and in the event that you do manage to do alright with it, you're dealing lethal damage that you'll have to explain to the authorities.)

Ain't nothing saying it's gonna happen, neither.

Except that because they don't think like we do, they can't really be said to be evil in any meaningful way. They could, however, be said to be insane from a human perspective, which does mean something. The True Fae, for example, completely fail to understand how the earthly world works on much more than a superficial level, having no sense of empathy whatsoever. And yet to seriously call them evil as a group would be like calling sociopaths as a group evil; it's inaccurate and possibly insulting — there are sociopaths out in the real world who nevertheless manage to not behave like slashers, just as there are True Fae who manage to go their whole existences without doing much worse than making a changeling by way of introducing a mortal to the alien laws of Arcadia.

Eh, eye-beams remind me of Cyclops and Superman, my all time two least favorite comic heroes ever.

I'm saying a decent shot should cripple you for for life if they get a direct hit. And called shots fuck everything up, so I try to ignore them.

(And I'm talking real swords, they are available, you have to know where to look, so get Streetwise, and swords are useful because of AP) And if you're going to hunt down armor wearing vampires, legality is the last thing on your mind. Lobotomize was a euphemism for shoving a power drill through someones skull, and it isn't hard to weaponize a portable hand-held device that's sold for cheap. Just say you're a DIY guy and some crazy tried to kill you, and hope you get a good lawyer.

Hey, we're in America, and you're innocent until proven guilty here!

Do you think the same way I do? No, and you're not insane, if you did something that I would morally reprehensible, are you evil, yes, in my eyes, that's the difference, I honestly don't like the term insane, since everybody's insane to someone else, evil is the same way, but...I say evil is more universal than insanity, just my opinion.

And a direct hit would be somewhere on the order of an exceptional success, or enough to put an average person into the wound-penalty zone. Hell, depending on your definition of "direct hit," that might mean a killing shot... which would almost certainly constitute a targeted attack.

Looking through Armory and Core, I can't find a single melee weapon — swords and knives included — that provides more than one point of Armor-Piercing. When did either of us say anything about hunting vampires? This discussion on armor-piercing arose, ostensibly, from my bringing up armor as a method of circumventing multi-attack Fighting Styles. Was it my mention of Command (Dominate 1)? Because that was just one example of a supernatural power that could thwart the lot. And seriously, why would attacking to kill be your first choice to begin with? You can knock them out, you know.

...Forensics. There are people who are trained to be able to figure out approximately how a fight went down and since "he fell on my drill" is about the only defense that would get you out of a manslaughter charge, feel free to explain to anyone who asks that your only choice when dealing with your supposed assailant was to stick a power drill in his brain. Legality matters. (So does Morality, for that matter — I think it's safe to say an impromptu lobotomy is unlikely to be an action the average person would take.)

...To clarify: They do not think like I do. They do not think like you do. They do not think like humans. They do not even think like animals. We are talking about entities that come from outside conventional material reality. Their thought processes are going to be completely unlike anything humans know of. These thought processes fit the definition of "insane" as provided by my dictionary ("in a state of mind that prevents normal perception, behavior, or social interaction") far more than a difference of opinion or interpretation does. When your default state of mind uses moon logic, you are insane from a human perspective.

It's quite hard to kill a vamp, you might as well go directly into lethal, and beating a Werewolf to death with a club is so retarded I'm not going to bring it up. And there are firearms martial arts that grant multiple attacks, combined with dual wielding pistols (Which is quite an effective strategy if you can afford the merits) and automatic fire you can lay down...five or six shots a turn? With armor piercing, that's what I'm calling broken.

Bribe em', or burn the corpse.

...okay, that has nothing to do with my post, but the point still stands, they also have a completely different morality than humanity, making them, by your own definition, evil.

There is one Firearms-based Fighting Style with multi-attacks, there is nothing suggesting Gunslinger and Combat Marksmanship stack in any way, and the entire construct is thwarted if you take any action to defend yourself against an opponent with a quicker Initiative. Again, where did I mention vampires, much less werewolves? (Guns are going to be no more useful against a vampire than baseball bats in the first place unless you pull out the dreaded called shots; armor-piercing does nothing extra against unarmored targets, so that screwdriver/power drill is going to do you less good than a kitchen knife or some other sharp object with an actual Damage rating.)

The former gets more into specific-build territory (a handyman with Politics and Resources 2+ is getting into the territory of "needs explanation") and the latter runs the risk of getting into even more trouble if anyone finds out.

I provided a definition of insane. I provided no definition of evil, save that calling a beastie such misses the point. The things that they do are evil from a human perspective. This does not mean that they themselves are evil; they can do no wrong, for they know not what it is.

You only need one fighting style if it's that broken, and guns are going to be better than bats because of one, armor piercing, two, the aforementioned multiple attacks (When did it say it couldn't stack?) three, guns do a lot of damage, and one advantage of guns is their range, so hopefully even if you're a little slower you'll still be able to blow them full of holes before they get close. And you were talking about supertnaturals, so I thought it would be a good thing to mention them.

Yeah, murder two is...twenty five to life? I would risk the incineration.

Woo, you can quote Mark Twain, that obviously means that you're right! Morality is subjective, and unless you yourself are Above Good And Evil, you'll find them evil, unless your moral code condones murder and rape, and if so, you have other problems.

I just told you how armor piercing guns would do you no better against a vampire than a baseball bat - the bastards are naturally bulletproofed and so only take bashing damage from firearms. You can get the aforesaid multi-attacks with other Fighting Styles, too - Two Weapons 3 can be used with knives or other sharp weapons, for instance. (Explain to me how they do stack. Gunslinger says you can make a second attack. CM5 says you can make a number of extra attacks equal to two less than your Composure. Having two attacks in one turn and having four attacks in one turn does not add up to having five attacks in one turn. And for good measure, "All attacks made with this maneuver must be single shots" handily stops the two from stacking.)

You're blatantly switching your arguments for guns around. Do they do too much damage or not enough? Pick one and stick with it.

So you're basically invoking the Godzilla Threshold of murder. Fun.

I find them amoral. There's a difference, roughly equivalent to that between saying someone who doesn't know any English is stupid for not being able to read it and simply saying that they can't read it. Thank you, though, for insinuating that I condone rape; that was classy of you, really.

Yes, and baseball bats don't pierce armor, guns can, baseball bats do bashing, so do guns, guns do more damage than baseball bats...ergo, why not use guns in melee with vamps, if you have Combat Marksmanship they won't get their defense. One attack, plus three extra attacks, plus extra gun=five attacks, that seems to make sense, unless I'm missing something.

No, they're either just as good as swords, (and they aren't) or you're in a fucking John Woo movie, there's no middle ground in this universe.

Considering that you're killing horrific creatures of the night, yes, yes I am, unless you want to go to jail for your, supposedly, good deeds, then yes, you would break the law even further to continue hunting down horrific monsters of the nigh.

Is there a difference between amorality and evil? Above Good And Evil is generally a sign of a villain.

And I'm not insinuating you condone rape, I'm outright stating that you condone rape (and murder, you forgot murder) if you don't have a problem with these monsters raping and killing people. And leave sarcasm to the professionals, alright?

Armor which they will not necessarily have. If they have Celerity they're applying non-armor penalties no matter where they are in relation to you. A baseball bat has Damage 2. That's an identical modifier to a light revolver or a light pistol, with the added bonus of not needing ammo or Resources 2/3 to purchase. (SOP provided by Armory: Reloaded says the convention is that maneuvers that do different degrees of the same thing overlap (i.e. use the highest such benefit) rather than stack. Add to this the Core concept that you can't do multiple things that forfeit your Defense in the same turn (e.g. charging and making an all-out attack at the same time) and the incredibly awkward question of where the off-hand penalty fits in the ensuing combo and Occam's Razor says "just use the higher of the two if both could apply.")

Pick one. Or expound.

Again, where are you getting this assumption from? The discussion of armor-piercing was brought up in response to armor as a deterrent to multi-attack Fighting Styles, which anyone can have. Further, how do you even know this is in fact a "creature of the night" and not just some crazy guy who found his way into your garage hopped up on PCP?

It's the difference between kicking puppies and just not being good with dogs.

Hello, excluded middle, how've you been? The defining features of a beastie in no way necessitate either of these things; once again you're taking far too broad a view. If I took this view of morality with regard to things that don't even understand the question then consistency would demand that I absolutely apply that same standard to people.

You're the one who brought up armor, and it's a fair point about the stacked actions.

Alright, guns are extremely dangerous weapons that easily kill him a man with little effort, a good shot is much, much deadlier than a good swordsperson, that isn't the case in World Of Darkness.

People can fire off multiple shots in as many seconds, however, nobody can accurately fire off multiple shots at different people in as many seconds, ergo, the John Woo comparison, Gun Kata doesn't work!

See? The answer isn't to make your character a badass with guns, it's to make guns more badass.

Is there a functional difference? I'll never judge a man on his intentions, I am not psychic, so I don't know if that man is bad with animals or a bastard, but when I see a man kicking a dog, I think, "Asshole!"

What? Your last sentence was completely incomprehensible to me. In fact your first sentence didn't make much sense either, where the fuck is there middle ground, I had one ground, Rape and Murder are wrong!

Yes, as a method of thwarting multi-attack Fighting Style maneuvers. You then proceeded to bring vampires into the equation for no apparent reason.

Range. Loss of Defense. The ability to attack without your target starting off knowing where you are. These are not insignificant advantages.

Notice how big the penalties get for either of the methods of rapid-attacking multiple people?

How much do you know about how bullets work? There are people who have survived headshots. There are people who have died of a shot to the foot because they went into shock. The benefits firearms provide are enough for the game to function without turning them into an "I win" button.

There is in fact a functional difference between kicking a dog and having it bite you. That you are capable of confusing the former with the latter says more about you than it does that man. And like it or not, intentions matter. If I'm at target practice and freak circumstances conspire to cause the bullet to ricochet behind me and kill my instructor, I am not evil for that strange and tragic chain of events. If that man just smells funny and is otherwise a perfectly kind person, the ill will animals bear towards him is in no way evidence of wickedness. (You may not be psychic, but you do have ears and vocal cords — ask.)

Your initial statement demands that either I find the beasties evil or I condone rape and murder. Your evidence for the beasties being evil was that some of them do those things — rape and murder are in no way defining features of a beastie. By this same logic, since some humans do those things, humans are evil. Given your... fervor... for killing the supernatural, I trust I don't have to draw you a picture?

Well, vampires are just awesome, and I mentioned armor piercing as an answer for the armor probelm, (Most of which isn't really practical if the value is higher than two anyway, so having AP one is generally enough).

Damage, injury, harm, crippling capabilities, killing people, hot lead tearing you a new asshole. Those are not there in realistic amounts.

Do you know how many people have been shot? That's like saying, "Well, there was that guy who survived getting a spike driven through his skull, so spikes through the skull shouldn't be an I Win button." Ridiculous! Of course there will be oddities, but generally, getting shot will kill or cripple you.

-3 at four extra attacks? That's not very high.

You're not evil? Says who? The person who killed the other guy, right? Yeah, getting the truth out of a human is hard enough, something that can't even understand humanity? Good luck.

My fervor is for killing the aforementioned Eldritch Abomination who is a soul-destroying, kidnapping, murdering, rapist with no ability to get along with human kind in either a healthy or productive manner, murder isn't necessary, but I don't really think that anything else could work. If the only way to deal with a serial killer would be to blow their brains out, pass me the shotgun. I don't propose hunting down beasties that don't do anything to humans, I propose killing the monsters that prey on humanity.

Awesome though vampires may be, they really didn't have anything to do with the topic. (Magic armor says hello.)

Armory: Reloaded. Combat hacks. There are plenty that make guns more deadly. This includes converting a gun's Damage rating into automatic damage on a successful attack, causing a point of bashing damage per turn after any attack that does two or more points of lethal or aggravated damage until you're stabilized by medical attention, increasing the effects and scope of wound penalties, causing highly damaging attacks to risk permanent damage, and approximately quadrupling the healing times for each type of damage. Between these five hacks, someone who gets hit by a decent shot with a round from a light pistol takes at least three points of lethal damage, plus a further point of bashing damage per turn after that until someone succeeds on an Intelligence+Medicine roll with a penalty of at least -3, and (assuming a Stamina of 2) they're suffering a -1 penalty to all actions, unable to spend Willpower for heroic effort, and risking the loss of Attribute dots or the acquisition of Flaws. In addition to all this, the lethal damage alone is going to take at least three weeks to recover from. Heck, any one of the latter four combined with the Automatic Damage hack makes guns much more worrisome. Lethal and/or crippling enough for you?

Except "spike through the skull" falls into the jurisdiction of the dreaded called-shots.

Yup. Personally, I'd double the cumulative penalty so that it would actually mean something in the face of diminishing Defense, but oh well. A significant issue with Fighting Styles seems to be the simple fact that they're Merits and therefore ridiculously cheap to buy with experience points.

...Are you saying I'm evil for circumstances completely beyond my control and foresight (i.e. what "freak accident" means) causing someone's death? I'm curious, what exactly are your criteria here? (Intention and circumstance matter and observation can usually fill in the blanks. If provocation from either side was involved, for example, that generally makes things either more or less straightforward.)

There are other methods available to you. Your previous statements made no attempt to distinguish between the monstrous beasties and the less rapey kind. I apologize for my confusion, but it wasn't entirely clear.

Who has magic armor? Mages, (mages can do anything, so tying them down=impossible), Prometheans, (Armor is obvious) and Changelings, (Armor is very obvious), see? There are problems with armor, plus it's powers are generally pretty expensive.

I thought Armory: Reloaded didn't count? And yes, those all work, now why they didn't put that in the main book I'll never know.

Alright, spike through the skull, what? Four ag? You could walk that off, no permanent damage done in a...third of a year? Something like that.

Two legitimate problems with balance in the game, this could be fixed with decent editing, which, alas, they lack.

I'm saying I don't know whether you're evil or not, and I generally err on the side of evil, call me cynical. Let's use a case that's a little more probable, you're cleaning your gun with a buddy, it goes off shooting him, should I assume it's "A freak accident"? No, I'm not going to, you may be innocent until proven guilty in the eyes of the law, but I'm a little less open minded.

Well, I'm glad we've got that cleared up, but the problem with Exorcism and sealing them? Sealed Evil In A Can never works, yeah maybe you're safe, but a thousand years down the line we're all fucked. And exorcism? Well it may get rid of them, but it's hardly a permanent solution, and is doing either of those things simpler than blowing their seven bulbous and pulsating brain sacks open?

There are such things as non-fatsplat magical powers, you know. (Care to elaborate on which of the myriad meanings of "expensive" you mean?)

At what point was this decided? (WoD Core came out in '04. A:R? '09. Hindsight is twenty-twenty and the playtesters didn't have nearly the wealth of time the playerbase had at their disposal post-release.)

If your ST is feeling generous, then sure. Regardless, that character is essentially out of the game for the current story without crazy luck and/or supernatural healing.

Playtesting constraints, hindsight, etc.

Erring on the side of assuming malicious intent doesn't quite work if the full context is available. Even if you hadn't been there at the time of the occurrence, chances are that if the gun really did just go off and shoot my buddy, then (not being a sociopath) I'm going to be a little freaked out for some time afterward and someone jumping to the conclusion that I deliberately shot my buddy (which is already somewhat suspect thinking; if he's my buddy and I possess the training and documentation to possess a firearm, I'm going to have the entire Gun Safety Basics pretty much drilled into me and so I would possess neither significant motivation to kill nor sufficient irresponsibility to do something like wave a gun around with my finger on the trigger) is going to probably be one of the first things on my mind. Hence, I will call 911 or whoever else is appropriate to call for shooting accidents.

Since the game is a storytelling game, though, the beastie will typically have the narrative sense to stay stuck until at least the dramatic climax, if not a later story in the chronicle.

Expensive as in costs a lot of experience to get it to an useful level, as opposed to just buying resources five.

Errata.

There's no rule stopping you from running around with four ag, hell, if you're an average adult, you won't even get penalties!

Errata.

The full context? You shot your friend, and since you're bringing up how anybody who has a gun wouldn't accidentally shoot someone, doesn't it make the idea that the shooting was an accident a little hard to take? And people never kill people they like...If I Cant Have You, Et Tu Brute, Face Heel Turn, Green Eyed Monster, those are tropes for a reason.

This game is also dark and gloomy, The Oubliette could never work in the World of Darkness, hell, it's almost selfish to avoid killing the monster, git er done! Kill that sumbitch dead while you can, don't foist it on some one else.

In exchange for not having to lug around a physical suit of armor or purchase one or worry about people tracking that purchase or you get the idea.

Errata involves corrections. It does not involve sticking entire new optional rulesets in. How is this a legit explanation for "A:R doesn't count"?

...Until someone punches you in the throat and you fall unconscious. Having half your Health bar taken up for a week or two, surprisingly enough, is going to cause problems. (Also, wound penalties are based on your remaining open boxes. Four closed boxes on an average [Health 7] adult is enough to get you the first -1.)

Your example gave no such specifications; it is therefore assumed to occur in a vacuum. If my friend has done nothing to warrant me shooting him deliberately, my training tells me not to be irresponsible in the handling of my gun, and I am a sane, functional member of society, (and if my gun still manages to kill my friend by going off while I'm cleaning it — despite the fact that it should not be loaded) then that leaves freak accidents. Besides, who are you in this hypothetical situation?

By this idiotic excuse for logic, the beasties wouldn't have managed to stay locked up in the first place. (Also, horror game. Sometimes the protags die. This is to be expected, especially when your Storyteller tells you up-front that he's running a CoC-style game.)

And that's worse than having a sphere of energy that disintegrates bullets? What's more noticeable: A force field or a bulletproof vest?

Those rules are a correction to a broken and unrealistic combat system. Because it isn't well advertised? It's not deemed essential?

Hmmm, fair cop there, and who says you're going to be punched in the throat, not everything has to relate to violence, I'm saying you could rip out the spike, slap a band-aid on it, and go back to work.

Alright, it's a vacuum, so where does the sane, functional member of society come in? I never mentioned that. And I'm looking at just the shooting, nothing else, and me? I'm the police. I don't have any details yet, that doesn't mean they don't exist.

If they managed to stay locked up, we wouldn't have to deal with them, now would we? And where did I mention staying alive, this is in the minuscule chance you get an opportunity to do something to the beastie.

I do not think you realize how magic works in this setting. If your forcefield is highly visible and supposed to last you awhile, you're doing it wrong.

That is your opinion. You are entitled to it, but that does not add any weight to it. (It's not deemed essential because the game functions perfectly fine without them. And what books are well-advertised?)

You still have a colossal hole through your head and you're still eating a minimum of a -1 penalty for the week, which tends to do things like cause accidents. Like falling. Or screwing up every third job at your workplace. Or dramatically-failing a Social roll with a street thug and infuriating them and then they punch you in the throat anyway. What's the best way to avoid all this? Spend the week healing.

"Sane, functional member of society" is assumed in the "takes place in a vacuum" part of the scenario — everything is assumed to be perfectly ordinary in the absence of qualifiers like, "So you're a crazy bitter hobo who somehow got his hands on a gun, and you're polishing your shiny new gun when your bitchy hobo friend Steve walks up to you and starts giving you shit." (And no, you're looking at the aftermath of a gunshot. There's a distinction, not unlike the difference between "a crate of fireworks going off on a hot dry day" and "a bombing.")

As in they'd never stay locked up ever, even for two minutes. What if it can't be killed? The most basic beasties in the game (run-of-the-mill spirits) are continually reborn as long as they have any Essence left when you kill them. Going out in a blaze of glory against an entity like that when you have no idea how much Essence it has is going to put it off for maybe a month or two, tops. And if for some reason it's not fettered or possessing a host body and you're hoping to get it to run out of Essence by stalling it, it gets yanked back across the Gauntlet into the Shadow where you can't do jack shit to it. But, of course, this is all assuming it's kind enough to materialize so you can hit it. This is one of the most basic beasties there is. Locking them up is the least agonizingly difficult way to get them to stop bothering the world.

Mages are the only supernaturals that could have a magic shield that isn't noticeable, Prometheans grow armor, Changelings control elements as a shield, and...does anybody else get one? And I never mentioned longevity, I simply said, bulletproof vests are more practical than creating a magic shield.

Uh, hate to burst your bubble, but this is all our opinions, nothing more big guy. We honestly amount to about jack shit to White Wolf, White Wolf's fans, hell, even the most hardcore tropers have given up on us, it's just us two, staring each other down at the ends of the earth.

You obviously don't work at the right places if you have to roll, I figured with all the fatigue penalties, curses and injuries, the only job a Wo D character could get would be pretty abysmal, and you'd be capable of doing while you're falling down drunk. And what sort of life do you live in where you have to persuade street thugs not to punch you in the throat? Where the hell do you live and what do you do for a living? Why not spend the weak healing...while doing other shit also.

Alright, I'm sorry I never read the unwritten rules, I'll try to next time, and making assumptions about peoples lives can be dangerous, a street thug could punch you in the throat. Okay, I'm the police watching the aftermath of the shooting, does it really make a difference? And for a given value of bomb, and a given value of fireworks, the two could be the same.

If it can't be locked up and can't be killed? Fuck, we're screwed. And I assume if we're pulling out the Heroic Sacrifices, our hypothetical team has done enough research to know at least some of these things. And yeah, that works for the basic Mooks, but haven't you heard of the Sorting Algorithm Of Evil and The Worf Effect? Villains require crazier and crazier stunts to finish them off.

Yes. Clearly there is no such thing as, say, basic non-interposition-based damage prevention. Or the Hard Body Corporeum Transmutation (looks completely normal). Or Red Rage Of Terrible Revenge or any of the kith blessings that grant armor (The Mask veils those). A bulletproof vest can be forgotten or destroyed and you have to waste time putting it on.

Yes, because clearly something like, say, an Manipulation+Expression roll to compose a report or an Intelligence+Crafts roll to figure out in what way a person's computer is broken or a Dexterity+Drive roll to operate heavy machinery like a bulldozer does not exist at all. (You seem to be assuming that the conversation begun with the topic of throat-punching. The thug punched you in the throat because you really fucked up on your Social roll and pissed him off, possibly saying something untoward about his mother in the process. Head injuries can make you do this.) Because healing gives priority to the lowest type of damage first. The moment you take a point of bashing damage, the timer resets on that point of lethal or agg and adds fifteen minutes to boot. (While we're on the subject, what gave you the idea that a spike through the head would only be four agg?)

Once again you're discounting the importance of intent. In the case of the box of fireworks simply exploding, the event is an accident. If someone is found to be responsible, they might lose their job and/or pay damages for being ridiculously irresponsible, but they're not getting incarcerated for an act of terror. A bombing, meanwhile, means someone took the time to ensure that that crate of fireworks dealt serious damage to the building and possibly the personnel. Someone is going to prison for that.

Continuing with the spirit example, odds are quite good that the thing came in through a verge, which are usually keyed and therefore somewhat predictable, so the nearest door back in is locked until someone, say, spills blood in front of the old tree behind the abandoned mental hospital.  ^*

The mooks don't even get the ability to act outside their purviews until Rank 3, which takes time, and the more powerful a spirit is, the faster it loses Essence unless it's tied to an object or possessing someone, both of which render it much easier to get rid of — destroying a spirit's fetter forces it back into the Shadow and serial possession chews through Essence like a rabid beaver through balsa wood and is negated by unconsciousness.

Aren't all the mage armors vulgar? And doesn't Red Rage rely on you knowing about the enemy before hand? You can put on a bullet proof vest and if someone sneaks up on you, or drives by with a machine gun, you'll be safe. And a flak jacket doesn't take mana.

You don't have to roll unless it's something important. I'd assume that the dead end job that a wod character would have it all be rote actions.

Eh, and a throat punching would ensue only on the case of a botch, and -1? Ain't enough to make you critically fail a roll. And where what job would you have that would involve talking to street thugs, that's my question. Four agg, what else would it be, a really strong guy who's really good with spikes would do about four agg.

Intent doesn't change the amount of property damage and lives lost, intent is not something that you can ever be sure of really knowing, so how can I judge a person on an uncertainty, I can only go on what I see and what I can feel. And when I see a guy kick a dog, I'll think "Asshole." If I see that guy later get bit by a dog, and then he kicks it, I'll think "Justified." But it doesn't change what I saw the first time, because I can never be certain.

And that's why killing the sumbitch is a better answer, finish things!

What if the purview of the spirit is "Being a dick." And knocking it across the Shadow =/= Getting rid of the problem.

Entropic Guard, Fortune's Protection, Unseen Shield, Organic Resilience, Unseen Aegis, Misperception, Magic Shield, Untouchable, Ephemeral Shield, and Temporal Dodge are all covert and can be made day-long with a single point of Mana and are otherwise scene-long, so no, just the opposite. (With Arcanum 3 you can make them day-long without Mana cost by drawing a rune on yourself.) Red Rage can occur "during or immediately before combat" and so if you suspect you're going to be getting into a fight it offers as much benefit as you need. A bulletproof vest costs money, provides no head or limb protection, and offers minimal protection against anything that's not gunfire. What kind of paranoid person would go around wearing a bulletproof vest all the time, anyway?

And you don't think the extenuating circumstance of a sucking head wound might call for rolls where you might not normally need any? (Rote actions are still rolled, too.)

On its own, no. Further penalties like the dude already looking for an excuse to do you harm, though, could do it quite well. What makes you think this was a job? (Fun fact: The skull is the hardest part of the body. If you've got a spike through your skull, you have not been hit with an attack. You have been subject to a goddamn Phineas Gage reenactment. Explosions were likely involved.)

We have an entire legal distinction for which intent matters. A child doesn't bother to take intent into account. A paranoiac assumes people are always going to lie. Assuming that a lack of perfect certainty means anything leads to thinking nothing anyone says matters, and that way lies solipsistic madness.

...When we have just determined that killing the beastie is nigh-impossible without access to the Shadow. I'm sorry, were you not paying attention?

The purviews are nouns that determine/are determined by their Influences. A fire spirit is going to have Influence (Fire) and a madness spirit is going to have Influence (Madness). The closest you get to Influence ("Being A Dick") is something like Influence (Divisiveness) or Influence (Conflict), and in all cases that means there's been enough of the thing's purview to feed it to Rank 3+. It's the same reason the fuckers are nigh-immortal. (It's stopping the problem for some time and probably allowing you to live to do it again. How is this inferior to a plan that involves you dying "heroically" and it coming back anyway without a vanishingly low level of good fortune?)

Okay, (stupid non-vulgar armor, that also bothers me, the complete lack of balance in the Arcana) but ambushes can counter Red Rage, I mean, who just thinks, "It's quiet...too quiet" then hulks up? Bulletproof vests don't set off magic detectors.

I don't know, why change the rules? Rote actions are still rolled, but they're practically impossible to fail.

I seriously doubt a -1 is going to be the difference between life and death. And I assumed it's your job since my suggestion was to stick to your job and heal up. And have you heard of the jaw? Eye? Ear? Those locations are thin enough to be pierced without an explosion.

Kay, that's the law, this is me, you're not going to convince me that my paranoia is unnecessary, that's something that I am going to have to decide for myself, and I realize that I'm a pretty cynical person, I think of it as a Charm Point.

Didn't I just say that I hoped we'd have done some research and prep before killing Cthulhu, which might involve the creation of a portal to the Shadow?

Kay, the purview isn't the be all and end all of spirits, you could be a fire spirit and also be a dick, and you don't have to be evil to be antagonistic to your causes, maybe all the normal fire spirits work for the dick spirit. And if you kill it, just because the same type of spirit doesn't mean it'll be the same spirit. And what's senseless about hope? Beyond hope being pretty senseless?

(Balance, you say.) Your assumption that every combat is going to be an ambush is decidedly ridiculous. Bulletproof vests are, however, noticeable.

How is it changing the rules? You don't have to roll Stamina+Resolve to stay conscious if you haven't been awake for over 24 hours or reduced to 0 Health by bashing damage, but those are extenuating circumstances that necessitate rolls where you wouldn't normally need one. (Rote actions also aren't just something you do as a day job. Look at how the book describes mundane rote actions.)

On its own, no, but it's one less die you can stand to lose. Also, two words: daily commute. (Those locations are also thin enough for the brain to be significantly injured. Have fun with that -5 to all Mental rolls.)

A door into the Shadow is a door out. If the method of entry was particularly difficult, you have another conundrum of closing the gate and potentially stranding yourself in a hostile otherworld even if you do manage to kill your target or leaving it open and risking further intrusions.

It actually is. Spirits are their natures, and their natures extend from their purviews — all gun spirits are vicious, violence-prone and cold, all tree spirits are slow to move and think, etc — so please stop talking out of your ass. (Fire spirits working for the "dick spirit" — what the hell did that spirit arise from, anyway? — gets into the realm of spirit politics, whereby you're pretty much screwed in a straight-up fight and would be better served making use of a liaison.) If you "kill" a given spirit — discorporate it rather than draining it of Essence — then that same spirit is what's coming back. If you actually managed to destroy it — you depleted its Essence and then reduced its Corpus to 0 — then odds are good you're in the Shadow, where there's other spirits who saw, felt, or otherwise found out that you're messing with the pecking order — and you're fair game for them to mess back.

I didn't say every combat situation ever, I said that it's possible, and bulletproof vests aren't that noticeable, you can hide them. (And yes, I do say balance, Mind and Death are broken as shit.)

Because you're neither fatigued or at zero health? I'm also sure that your job would offer you directions.

Daily Commute? Do you know that you don't have to make drive rolls unless you're doing something dangerous, driving to work won't require a roll. (What about BART or Subway, surely they won't require rolls?) And where are the rules for brain damage in the book?

Yeah, open up the door, kill the sumbitch, get locked behind and die heroically, sounds good to me.

Yes, and just because you're a fire spirit that doesn't mean you can't be an asshole. And the dick spirit? It comes from assholes who act like dicks to people, why wouldn't there be jerk spirits running around? (Where did that notion come from? Spirits can have interests beyond their purview, Luna for example is interested in non-moon related things, so is Helios, and what about the Idigam? What are they spirits off.) Nooo, Father Wolf died, he was destroyed, he didn't come back, he was a spirit, you could say that he returned as the Gauntlet, but guess what? THAT ISN'T HIM! And seriously, did you catch the bit about Heroic Sacrifice? Dying would be worth it to kill some of these spirits.

Bulletproof vests are also not going to help you in an ambush where the gunner has time to aim and therefore offset the -3 penalty to a called headshot. (Death. Really. *sigh* Let's hear it, then.)

You have a hole in your head. (If you are working at a job that doesn't expect you to know how to do your job without direction after basic training, something's gone wrong. Something has gone dreadfully wrong if you have a job that allows you to come in with a hole in your head.)

Who said anything about driving? Thugs can ride the bus. Subways, too. (There are no concrete rules specifically for brain damage in the book for much the same reason there aren't rules specifically for getting punched in the nads; there's a number of systems you can use depending on the situation. Brain damage could manifest as a lingering penalty to Mental rolls. It could manifest as Intelligence damage. It could just result in instant character death. The system's not meant to be completely perfectly realistic — it's a storytelling tool as much as a game, and if you think that the rules have to govern absolutely everything you clearly haven't paid attention to the bits in the books where it says that the rules do not get the final say; see the WoD core book, page 194.)

And leave everyone else you knew to grieve and wonder what the hell happened. As the same thing happens again two weeks later and you're not there to stop it. Truly a brilliant plan.

Define "acting like a dick" in the form of a noun. (All of those are high-ranking multi-purview spirits more akin to gods than mooks. The idigam are spirits of things that have no clear physical-world analog. They're spirits without natures, which should be impossible. It's what makes them so bizarre — there's some of your Fear Of The Unknown cropping up.) Father Wolf wasn't simply discorporated. Where the hell did I say anything about Father Wolf returning as the Gauntlet? (Yes, totally worth it.)

Better than spending mana. (Suppress Life=Most broken spell ever, it's a covert One Hit KO that doesn't cost any mana.)

Where, in the book does it state anything on holes in heads? (This is WoD NOBODY CARES.)

Alright, the rules don't get the final say, so basically you're talking out of your ass and you have no legitimacy at all on the matter, I could argue with you and neither of us would get anywhere on the matter. And why the hell wouldn't White Wolf add rules for dismemberment and brain damage, things that are quite probable in one of their games.

Hmmm, if only people who knew they were going to die left some sort of...note or something, man, wouldn't that be incredible.

Dick god, commands mooks to act like dicks=dick mooks. Acting like a dick, Jerkass, Kick The Dog. Father Wolf was killed, you've been saying that killing spirits is pointless because a spirit of the exact same thing will come back, soooo, where the hell is Father Wolf 2.0?

Which you can get out of with one extra dot. Hell, with Fate 2 you can give it a day-long Duration just by assigning a common or easy condition for its removal. (Like, say, being caught in the highbeams of a car.)

You mean Suppress Other's Life? Let's actually look at that, shall we?

The effects are the same as the "Suppress Own Life" spell.

Your insistence that I provide examples from the book for everything is getting incredibly annoying, particularly when you choose to ignore or dismiss any examples I do provide that happen to contradict you. Argue in good faith or shut up.

It's also the WoD. People will care, even if it's just because of the reduced productivity or the threat of lawsuits.

It would be irresponsible to include rules for something as esoteric as brain damage in the core book. As for dismemberment, there are rules for that in the books for the games where it is unavoidable (i.e. where a power calls for or applies to attempts to remove a limb), and otherwise the Storyteller can assign a Flaw after a certain amount of targeted damage has been dealt.

Some sort of magical note that grants immediate competency in spirit-hunting to any who read it, yes.

Those are not "as good a definition as any." What is the word — note singular quantity — for the type of behavior that constitutes "acting like a dick"?

I have been saying that it is possible to "kill" a spirit without actually killing it. That's what discorporation is. Discorporation means that specific spirit — not another one like that spirit, that specific spirit — is not dead and will BBL. Since it has been thoroughly agreed in-setting that Father Wolf is dead, he is not coming back.

Kay, you suppress their life, tie them up and Coup De Grace them or throw them into the ocean. The the roll is uncontested, so yeah, it's a One Hit Kill. Who cares if they come back to life if there throat has been slit.

Why is it getting annoying, because it shows that this system isn't complete? And I drop evidence because, in legal parlance, I'm the prosecutor, it is my role to find guilt, and your job to refute it, you refute my points, I bring up other points, the game continues.

Hey, your supervisor is probably to scared to stick his head out or addicted to some evil dream cult and lost inside his own head.

They could mention organ failure or organ damage, it'd take...two paragraphs at most and it's not like being crippled is that esoteric.

You have friends, or a journal, or a series of vlog's, or leave it up to somebody else.

Malicious behavior for your own amusement.

Yes, and it's possible to kill a spirit in a way so it's Killed Off For Real, that's my suggestion, not banishment, not exiling it to the shadow, murdering it FOREVER, that's my point, and you keep on saying "But they're just in the shadow." NOT IF YOU FINISH THE JOB!!! (Which is quite possible.)

Holy fucking hell, when did this argument go from whether Wo D sucks or not to rule-lawyering?

112: When Phred decided White Wolf pissed in his Cheerios long ago, I assume.

The more hyperspecific you make your examples, the less helpful they are for proving your points are generally true.

It's getting annoying because insisting that the dev team think of literally everything is completely irrational and some people are going to have the same problem with a fixed system that you had with Equinox Roads and the True Fae. Also, look at the last game that had detailed rules for organ damage and specific rules for everything.

In which case you are not working for a normal person.

And who's going to believe you?

Single word, Phred. Double at a stretch.

Phred, you need the ability to go into the Shadow to render the complete destruction of a spirit at all possible, never mind practical. Also, there can and will be consequences to destroying a spirit who's heavily influenced the local area, which makes for a good story but is also not something a sane person typically sets out to do.

How about Death's control over shadow? Or Forces being awful? Or Mind's non-vulgarity? Or any of the thousand of unbalanced game elements?

Organ damage is hardly an unreasonable request for a game about GOTHIC HORROR!!!

Where the hell did you get Like Reality Unless Noted? Have you read the back's of their games? The Core says, "The world is not what you think, beneath sky scrapers leering gargoyles, factories belching smoke and streets packed with the human throng lurk things we are not meant to see. Creatures dwell in the shadows and hidden places. They watch you, stalk you and prey upon your body and soul. The life you lead is a lie. Your darkest fears aren't make-believe. They're real."

Er, your Nakama that helped you trap the monsters? Other hunters on the internet? Those guys for one, and maybe you'd interest someone who's already suspicious.

Why does it have to be one word? Define fire in one word, or hatred, or war, or life in one word.

Mortals can learn magic, pussy magic, but it can make a portal into the shadow. The consequences of destroying the asshole spirit would be to make the place nicer, and nothing is free in life, there's always a price, and the price of destroying an evil spirit might be worth whatever may come after, or not, you can't see the future. Sanity? Why the hell are you mentioning sanity in Wo D, especially for a Mortal Hunters game, those guys are nuts, sane people don't walk up to Dracula and punch him in the face.

"Mortals can learn magic, pussy magic, but it can make a portal into the shadow"

I'm gonna go ahead, give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume the corner store and local library both stock books on this and regular people can distinguish the real thing from similarly mystical-looking crazypeople gibberish.

Character made his way over to the Occult section of the bookstore. He'd been to three others in town. He thumbs through the selection. YES. This store was fully stocked! Spirit Banishing and You!, Exorcism for Dummies, 'Oh God, Why Does Everything Taste of Ash', Or: What to Do When Possessed, this place had them all! But Character didn't have enough Resources for all of them, went home empty handed and OH GOD WHAT'S THAT ON THE CEILING.

In short, possible and likely are different things.

Please expand upon all of those, Phred, because I'm very much doubtful that I can take your word for it.

Clearly.

It's a common notion, supported by the fact that there are cities, factories, and Detroit. Also the fundamental setting assumption that happens to be an extension of the aforesaid common notion.

If you're a mortal and you are attempting to deal with a powerful spirit in the Shadow once and for all, you are going to need backup. Other hunters on the internet are not guaranteed to be in your area. Someone who's already suspicious of what?

Fire, Hatred, War, and Life, respectively. It has to be one word (possibly two) because "being a dick" is ridiculously non-specific, and "malicious behavior for your own amusement" only slightly less so. Existing spirit Influences are things like Foxes, Accidents, Fear, Sickness, and so on. There is not, to my knowledge, any single-purview spirit of Walking Like A Chicken.

Sanity Has Advantages.

"Death's control over shadow? Or Forces being awful? Or Mind's non-vulgarity?" Um, Death mages can control shadows, forces is pretty much useless, their invisibility is inferior to mind invisibility, flight is slow, awkward, high level, expensive and not very useful, hell all their spells are like that, forces sucks after two dots in it. Mind's non-vulgarity makes it ridiculously broken, there, what more can I say about that.

Er, darkness, madness, monsters, death, decay? Limbs being severed by insane scientists? Bad beasts breaking your bones and rupturing organs? That seems in genre.

Read the little opening pages in each book. Ans did you have that many urban legends growing up? Cause I didn't. And the book is full of demonically evil corporations, kidnapping faeries and other such strangeness.

Exactly, but the final blow will be delivered by you, the heroic sacrifice, and your friends get the hell out of dodge. And people suspicious of the supernatural, a.k.a. P Cs.

Define war, take as many words as you need, because war is pretty non-specific. Pettiness? Spite? Schadenfreude? Their are spirits of them.

Yep, and most hunters don't have them.

I'm well aware that the Death Arcanum covers shadows and darkness. I fail to see what your point is in mentioning this.

Forces invisibility can thwart technology. As for flight... Been addressed, dude.

Mind will help you very little against things without minds. Like traps. Or fire. Or gravity. Yes, getting things with brains to do stuff is a versatile powerset, but it's still a limited purview.

Again, there's existing systems that can be used for limb removal. If you know of any strict mechanical rules that could and should be universally used for losing specific organs that don't amount to "bleed out and die," by all means share with the class.

No, but then again I didn't happen to live everywhere. You may have noticed that very few of those mini-fictions say where they're taking place. (The fact that strangeness exists within the setting means precisely nothing; the setting is modern Earth and all the supernatural stuff is consigned to the shadows. The place is more cynical than our world, but it's still recognizably modern Earth with regular human society. This is a common notion in fiction as a whole.)

Yes, clearly this is a viable plan. It has only three Attributes and its Defense is derived entirely from the higher of two of them. If its Ban doesn't involve losing its Defense (entirely probable given the Law of Averages) then it's very likely that it's reducing you to a chance die just by having regular freedom of movement, particularly if it's of a high Rank like our example is assuming, and so strength of numbers is your best bet for actually getting a solid blow in. Also, I return your attention to that whole "door in is door out" thing. (Yes, you're going to have the PCs go tell the PCs. Oh wait.)

War is one word. "Define" was here being used to mean "summarize." You could have used any of the examples you gave instead of going for another multi-word phrasing and I wouldn't have complained. In any case, each possible purview that fits into "being a dick" has its own limitations and the spirit that possesses them going to be different depending on the specific purview.

When did we determine that we were talking about Hunters here?

Um, it makes absolutely no fucking sense? Shadow is the absence of light, now, who has control over light?

It's also vulgar, mind invisibility is straight up superior. (And about flight, uh, they never gave an answer.)

Uh, alright, mind is useless in a small purview of areas, same with forces, except replace small with gigantic.

You do realize that people have lost limbs and are still alive, right? And how about for every certain amount of Ag you take you get permanent penalties to certain rolls, seem fair?

So, why bother pointing it out if it's so common? Wo D is a modern gothic horror game so yeah, it's going to have some similarities, that doesn't mean that your boss is going to care about his workers brain injuries. Keep your head down and don't help anybody else, two important themes for wod.

Good Job completely misreading my statement, why the hell are we talking about ease of killing the soul crushing monstrosity? I never said it'd be easy or simple or anything like that, and I assume at this point in the game you have the ancient fork of doom and a mansion of explosives. And perhaps the killing of this spirit was in the backstory of a game. Or your P Cs aren't the only one who can do what needs to be done.

Alright, I'm glad I can understand what you're asking now. Yes, there may be different flavors of dick, but they're all cock.

When I started talking about hunting down supernatural creatures (Little h, not Big H, hunters).

Yes, because there's definitely no precedent for darkness-based magic that defies the laws of physics.

If you have higher Gnosis than 1 you can completely negate the Paradox without even taking bashing damage. Or, if you prefer not to waste precious Mana, you can take the one-in-three-per-die chance of success on the Paradox roll and simply suffer through the resistant bashing damage for the next fifteen minutes or so. (They did, actually.  ^*

With Forces you can pull off Celerity effects, turn aside bullets, mess with the weather, cut the power to an enemy's base, hijack radio transmissions... You really don't think control over pretty much every energetic phenomenon is going to be useful?

Yes. Show me a person who's lost a vital organ and has not received/cannot receive a suitable replacement, however, and nine times out of ten I can guarantee you that person is going to be an ex-protagonist. (That would depend heavily upon what rolls you were penalizing; a significant number of those could be replicated by hacking dots of Physical Attributes off the character.)

Because you seemed to be ignoring it, what with lines like, "Hey, your supervisor is probably [...] addicted to some evil dream cult and lost inside his own head."

If it's in the backstory then it's out of the gameplay and rather less impressive on account of it being out of the players' hands, in which case there is no plot on account of everything being done already. Unless, of course, the beastie's come back, in which case we're thrust back into the realm of mechanical concerns. (i.e. If you throw out the matter of ease of dispatch, you throw out the mechanics of the encounter and therefore any satisfying outcome. If you want the destruction of the spirit to actually matter, you have to bring the mechanics back in and with them the discussion of how easy or hard it's going to be to even hit.) You probably wouldn't even have heard of the ancient fork of doom unless the thing was supposed to be killable or the Storyteller's messing with you. Besides, what if you're going up against something like the Prince of Spite with a Rank of 6+? (Part of the advantage of a horror setting is that there is no mandate for the PCs to "win.")

Yup. Different operational standards, though. The thing about spirits is that a good chunk of them can manage to screw you over even with the Gauntlet in the way. The big advantage to coming over to the material world is that there's less jockeying for Essence.

Which started off as "Mortal Hunters" and described sanity as a thing that was in short supply.

Except mage is fairly rational (well, as rational as magic gets) with the purview of their spells. Death messes with ghosts, and can kill and decay shit, where the hell does darkness fit into that?

So basically paradox is ineffectual and means nothing, alright, got that.

Time can do the same speed stuff, space can do even better and matter can do a lot of the same things. Forces has very little that it does best, at least life (which has many flaws) has healing.

The spike-through-the-brain dude, people who have been stabbed through lungs have survived. The dream cult is the "unless noted" part, and does the supervisor of a dead-end job give a shit about their employees in this world?

If it's in the backstory it could be a Hope Spot, the knowledge that winning is possible, or you could explore the consequences of a world without this spirit, or fight the spirits that try to replace it.

And? If they are these spirits of dickishness, (of whatever variety you choose) and they're in the mortal world, isn't that more of reason to get rid of them? They're wandering around causing trouble for people.

Exactly, that's kinda my point.

As far as Awakened magic is concerned, darkness is an active force rather than the simple absence of light. Note that Shadow Sculpting, Animate Shadows and Summon Shadows all do things that shadows shouldn't be able to do by the mundane definition, especially the latter — you can lift and block things with shadows at that stage. (There's also the thematics of shadows fitting in the the Arcanum's purview of non-living ephemera; technically speaking, Death as a whole is similar — it's just the absence or cessation of life in mundane/rational physics, but it's treated as a distinct concept by Awakened magic.)

It can be mitigated, is what I'm saying.

Matter can't mess with temperature or magnetism or any of the other forces except in very indirect ways. Besides, you could make the same argument about Life with Matter or Spirit with Death or Death with any number of other Arcanum using that logic. What would you use to tweak the weather other than Forces? What would you use to alter gravity? How about magnetism, fire, electricity?

Spike-through-the-brain dude hasn't had an entire vital organ removed and as an exceptional occurrence is within the one time out of ten that that wouldn't be the case. Besides, I said lost a vital organ — you can still function with even half a brain (properly removed), and a punctured lung isn't much of a problem at all (if it's been patched up properly), but in an uncontrolled setting where bleeding out and dying is a real possibility, "you're going to die very soon without immediate medical attention" is about as much as you actually need for most stories. (And the "unless noted" part is not universal — cultists are not the norm unless there's a Fight Club scenario going on in the story or something.)

All of which are very handy story seeds, but none of them actually present the PCs with the challenge of destroying the spirit without bringing the spirit's game traits into question.

Those spirits of dickishness arise from and encourage dickishness in the mundane world. Spirits treat the material realm as a giant Essence farm, and if a dickishness spirit exists and has increased in Rank enough to plot and be a serious threat, then it's because there's been enough dickishness in the locale to create and feed it. Influences cost Essence to use, so most low-Rank spirits are going to be relying on existing instances of their purviews, which is a lot harder to do when you're a spirit of a thing that's very temporary — most rain spirits, for instance, only last about long enough for the single shower they're associated with to taper off. Spirits of abstract concepts like emotions are even harder to feed consistently without a reliable source like a place that encourages that emotion — grief spirits might find the local funeral home or cemetery to be a useful feeding ground, but where do you find a place that fosters dickishness?

Somehow I don't think it is.

Why? It seems like an odd distinction to make, death covers death and ghosts, unless shadows are related to those things that doesn't make much sense.

Rather easily, is what I'm saying.

Matter could alter weather by changing the molecular makeup of the sky, and fate could make a storm just happen. And matter can alter conductivity, so I imagine it could do the same to magnetism.

You could suffer organ damage without dying, people get shot through the stomach, which will kill them eventually but if they go to a hospital they'll live, with some permanent damage, but oh well.

Wait, who says the P Cs know how it was done, all they know is that it can be done. And I'm pretty sure a half ton of explosives will finish a lot of things off.

High Schools?

Really? Cause my point is anybody willing to wander the mean streets trying to kill horrific and super powered monsters with nothing more than a baseball bat and your wits is insane, maybe not "Mother is always with me, mustn't disappoint her." crazy, but still nuts, even if you work for the government or are demonically powered or an evil hedonist of corporate stooge or whatever.

There's any number of potential explanations - darkness is the death of light, Darkness Equals Death, shadows are sometimes used as a metaphor for the soul...

I'm doubtful of that, because if it was, you wouldn't have started this thoughtstream with complaints about Forces invisibility being vulgar.

Target factors render Matter-based weather changes nigh impossible without an extra dot and at best you could make and control a fairly large cloud. Magnetism is related to electricity, but notice that Matter doesn't let you make a material that gives off electricity. You might be able to make something magnetic, but that's not the same thing as making something a magnet. (Fate does not work that way. You could finagle a storm with enough tweaks in the right places at the right times, but that's more akin to going through an elaborate and ill-advised plan to steal an item that you could easily afford if you hadn't spent all the money on the stuff you needed for the plan.)

The "if you go the the hospital you'll live" thing is a significant part of my point. If medical attention sufficient to prevent death is available, you don't need much more of a system than extra points of damage and the odd lost Attribute dot. If such care isn't available, odds are you're going to die anyway. What else would you need?

And if it can be done, and the intention is for the PCs to do it, then the thing's game stats are going to have to come into play at some point and therefore the question of how easy or hard it's going to be to kill it matters. (And how do you intend to get a half-ton of explosives into the Shadow and move them to the beastie's location and use said incendiaries at the right time without knowing where its Essence level is at, especially as a mortal? Seriously, you're relying on long shots and unreliable examples to make your point here.)

Mm-hm. And what particular flavor of dickishness would that be? And how would it mix with the other sorts of Essence a school would generate?

You made an explicit distinction between hunters and Hunters. Make up your mind.

Eh, I'll accept that Hand Wave, it still bothers me that death got another fucking thing (It can do spirit lite, matter lite, prime lite, and now it can do forces lite).

It's still annoying, but it really isn't that big of a deal, and if you're invisible, how can people unravel your spells anyway?

With an extended casting you could effect a gigantic area if you stack enough bonuses. And blowing all your points into fate is more effective because fate can do practically anything.

What about permanent damage after the surgery? People survive gunshot wounds to the stomach, they're never the same afterward.

I'm relying on long shoots and rough examples because killing a spirit powerful enough to ruin the life of an entire town is very, very powerful, and very, very hard to kill. And who said that stats don't matter? There are rules for creating how level spirits, soooo, what more do you need?

Selfishness, betrayal, ambition, lust, desperation, greed, hate, anger, fear, despair (Kay, a lot of those art dickishness exactly, but they generally lead to dickishness). Teenagers have strong, varied, and uncontrollable emotions, and they'd probably mix into some evil blend of negativity (High Schools, whether good or bad, I'm not going into that right now, are full of some pretty emotionally fucked up peoples, and Wangst is very, very common, even amongst the popular, rich, successful kids, tell me about one high school student who was never depressed and I'll tell you about a liar).

Hunters are from Hunter The Vigil, hunters are anybody who hunts supernaturals, see the difference? And no matter the difference in training and equipment, both are absolutely insane to do what they do, comprende, ese?

People can't, but reality can in startup. Paradox isn't spell-unravelling; that's Disbelief.

For a cloud. How is this worth it? (Fate can benefit practically anything. Kindly illustrate how Fate is the "make anything happen" Arcanum.)

Stamina dots.

"Good Job completely misreading my statement, why the hell are we talking about ease of killing the soul crushing monstrosity?" suggests a certain lack of care for the mechanics of the encounter, since ease of killing it is determined in no small part by its stats.

Liar speaking, here, then. There's also the entire set of non-emotional spirits in the different parts of the building. (You'd surely get a couple Knowledge spirits hanging around the library, or at least Book spirits. The nurse's office alone could have spirits of Sickness, Health and Lies. Let's not get into the cafeteria's population. And of course, you wouldn't find it that surprising if Boredom and Apathy spirits were in just as great a quantity as everything else, would you?)

I see the difference. I also note that the former is generally the system to use for the latter in any case where the protags are expected to stand a chance of winning rather than just surviving.

Alright, that's how it works, but people do make spells unravel a lot faster right? So, is it just being in the vicinity of the people or does detection also play a role? I could look it up, but I don't really want to.

Winds of Chance, provided you put enough juice into it. Perhaps an improvised spell, provided you have the raw materials (Clouds and such).

And other attribute loss depending on the situation, but would you suggest a system, or leave it up to ST caveat?

Seriously? You were never irrationally emotional or unemotional when you were in High School? And I doubt the book spirits as strong as the emotional spirits. And apathy by itself is pretty terrible, when combined with dick spirits...

I actually prefer the four men with shotguns approach to hunting then the big organization one, and I also dislike the special hunter rules with will power and careers and tactics. It makes Humanities greatest defenders...inhuman.

And yes, I did look up one thing and not the other, it's how I roll.

Disbelief makes ordinary people who witness Awakened magic forget or misremember evidence of vulgar or improbable magic based on their Willpower. Unraveling, meanwhile, is the related result of the same circumstances (and a Resolve+Composure roll on the witness's behalf every ten minutes within the scene) subtracting from the spell's Potency and thereby eventually dispelling it. Paradox is just the dicepool the Mage rolls before casting a vulgar or improbable spell, whose successes subtract from the spellcasting roll and may lead to the spell going awry.

The book notes that that's largely a roleplaying consideration, there's no note for what extra Potency does, and there isn't any "extra juice" option really available except for extra targets and longer duration. As a one-dot spell, it's not likely to pull the kind of drastic shifts on par with changing the weather to suit your needs; sometimes you just need to make it snow, for some reason. (Besides, if things really worked that way then the Acanthus would be the best path by a wide margin rather than the Mastigos being only slightly so.)

Personally, I'd leave it up to ST fiat based on the scenario; there's already a shitload of available tools to use between Flaws, roll penalties and the aforementioned Attribute damage.

(You said "depressed." I dunno, maybe I just managed to keep perspective.) Well, there are rather a lot of books in the library. (I note that as spirits draw their natures from their sources, anything with a decent quantity of apathetic Essence is going to be pretty sluggish in itself — why plot to ruin a whole town when there's a handy food source right there?)

Hunter is the "four men with shotguns" game; the Tier system means that the "big organization" type of Hunter is just one level of play. Your four-men-with-shotguns game is a typical example of a Cell. The special rules are essentially a bit of an extra to give to ordinary mortal characters; think of it as Protagonist Power. (I'm not really seeing the "inhuman" in a free Skill Specialty, an expansion of the universal Heroic Effort rules and the ability to coordinate. As far as inhumanity goes... maybe after going through a couple trigger points one's priorities might shift. Y'know, just a bit. The Code is not for pansies, after all.)

So if you're invisible, and thus unwitnessable, can you avoid disbelief?

Couldn't you improvise a level three version of the spell that's just The Same But More?

So, just pick a penalty of your choice according the injury and roll with it? A one paragraph bit of advice would've been nice.

Depression is the first emotional state that came to mind. A lot of books...that nobody cares about? Do ancient ruins that nobody visit have powerful spirits of the ruins? And a Nihilistic spirit could form out of all the despair and apathy spirits and try to spread it's influence over the entire school.

But you don't need the hunter book to play the hunters that I'm interested in, and I think the special rules should apply to all basic human P Cs then, not just hunters. Hey, what's inhuman about callousness and brutality? Those are very old cultural traditions!

You're unwitnessable, but your lasting and prolonged spells aren't — if you made a rock levitate for a scene (maybe you needed a handy bridge, I dunno) and a Sleeper witnesses this floating rock, Disbelief will occur and the Unravelling will begin. If the accumulated successes on the Resolve+Composure rolls exceed the spell's Potency, that rock will not remain airborne. (Also, there's the old technicality of someone spilling something colorful and/or sticky on you — you're not intangible, after all — or hearing you for long enough to suspect that someone's there — you're not inaudible, either — which might prompt an Unravelling.)

The Perfect Moment is a two-dot spell that allows for small social changes — maybe you act in the right manner that the car salesman (or, continuing our weather example, a cloud-duster) takes a shine to you — and Shifting The Odds is essentially a more specifiable Winds Of Chance (allowing for a specific thing to more easily come to pass rather than just having things generally go the way you want them to). There don't seem to be any similar story-affecting powers at the three-dot level or above.

I kinda figured the fact that the rules existed at all was sufficient, taken in combination with what they mean. (e.g. the One Arm Flaw usually means you're missing an arm.)

Well, there's certainly going to be a number of architectural spirits in the Shadow's mirror of those ruins; a goodly chunk of them might be dormant, true, but they can wake up in the right circumstances. (Despair spirits are going to be despairing. Apathy spirits are going to be apathetic. Even if such a spirit does extend its influence — and its Influence — over the whole building/grounds, that's a much more subtle threat than something on par with breaking into the material realm and snatching up souls.)

The Risking Willpower rules are pretty much there to slightly even the playing field between Them and The Monsters They Fight — sometimes you're playing an investigatory game and so need no such advantage, after all — and making those the default way Willpower worked (as is the implication of making those rules the way normal humanity works) leads to some problems, such as explaining in-setting why supernaturals lose the ability to risk Willpower, what rolls are eligible without the Vigil as a defining limit, or why anything ever goes wrong on its own, since risking Willpower provides such an awesome benefit in exchange for a risk that is greatly diminished on any roll for which the benefits push success into a high likelihood. (A dicepool of four has about a 75% chance of getting at least one success.)

Soooo...you're invisible, but the invisibility isn't invisible? Or is that wrong?

I'm taking that as a "not possible".

Yet again, agg is heavy, bone deep damage, and they throw in no rules about it permanently hurting you. It's like making a game, and not throwing in rules about dying, because you "can just assume" this, that, or the other.

A Nietzsche Wannabe spirit, what about that, and what if a nihilism spirit mixes with a spirit that would drive it to spread it's influences. And something could be even more dangerous if it didn't go into the mortal world and snap up souls.

Why does there need to be a rule to even the playing field? That's what makes being a hunter fun, you're a normal dude with a mission, that's it. (And unless the vigil is some sort of supernatural force in its own right, how do you explain Hunters getting the ability to risk willpower? Are the Hunters embracing some supernatural force to hunt supernaturals? If so...that's not a very original plot line, and Hunter already did that with the conspiracies.)

Okay, you know how usually, in fiction, throwing a substance (usually paint or flour) on an invisible person reveals their presence? That's the kind of circumstance that might cause an invisibility spell to Unravel. Same for leaving footprints that stop in a place where they clearly shouldn't without a source (say you walked through a mud puddle and tracked dirt over the carpet, haven't left the carpeted area yet, haven't taken your shoes off, and someone follows the tracks to your location). Or you punch someone.

Probably not, yeah.

Agg is pretty much only definitively "the sort of damage that you will absolutely die from." I don't think getting a couple vital arteries nicked to the point where your Health track's filled with lethal means spontaneous organ failure or bits dropping off once you start bleeding out.

Spirits use their Influences in the Shadow all the time, though; without some damning evidence, the average man with a shotgun is not going to think to look in the separate plane of reality. Any story dealing with spirits that doesn't feature protagonists who are aware of the Shadow is going to rely on spirits who have either materialized or made their way into the Twilight. (Souls provide Essence, as does the ability to be near a physical thing that it reflects. Further, being on the physical side of the Gauntlet means it's easier to draw Essence from its sources thanks to the lack of penalty. Inimical though physical reality is to spirits, it's got its attractions.)

Because all it effectively does is give you two free Willpower and one of the benefits of that Willpower (+3 dice, 9-Again, Exceptional Success on three successes) per scene in which the Vigil (in other words, the supernatural-hunting "job" about which you as a Hunter obsess) is being carried out. Risking Willpower is pushing yourself. Hard. It's used when you need something to succeed and/or succeed thoroughly. It's not a supernatural force, it's just a way of representing an all-or-nothing gamble the Hunter is making; remember that if a roll that you risked Willpower on fails, it dramatically fails. (Do you find yourself regularly having to outrun, sneak up on, precisely hit, or otherwise deal in a stressful manner with creatures like vampires, werewolves, or other such Creatures Of The Night in your day-to-day life?)

I see, so what happens if you make yourself invisible, but you hover? No tracks, and since nobody can see you hover...

The way they talk about agg in Promethean describes it as bone deep structural damage to the actual body, holes in flesh and chunks of missing muscle, stuff like that, like how you can get your eyes beaten out of your head and stuff like that, (bashing to agg), or a machine gun slicing through an arm (lethal to agg).

The average man with a shotgun...and exposure to the supernatural, the thing that drives them to the supernatural, and once you start hunting vampires, maybe your research will lead you to something else, and that will lead you to something else, or maybe you were walking home and say a brief glimpse of the shadow, or slipped into do the the carelessness of a mage.

...I kinda see what you're saying, but I'm not buying it. People hunting tigers don't get super strength, they get normal human strength (since I assume adrenaline is calculated into the stat), we have no idea how people act to the supernatural, so White Wolf is pulling something out of there ass on that. And if it's a reaction to the supernatural, why can you use it against the average crazy human cultist? Or the vicious attack dogs? Or climbing a regular building? Is fear of a vamp stronger than fear of a bear? And yet again, why is this Hunter only? Shouldn't this bonus apply to any human experiencing supernatural terror?

Don't fly through any clouds of sticky particulates and you should be stellar. (Worth noting is that in spite of the Unravelability of Forces Invisibility, it's got another big advantage on Mind Invisibility: it doesn't autofail as soon as you do something attention-grabbing.)

I'm not sure you get what I'm referring to here; I'm talking about the normal circumstances of having your Health track filled with Lethal damage. At which point you upgrade one lethal wound per minute into an agg wound. Promethean is an odd duck in that you just keep going even if your lethal track is filled, and so there needs to be some incentive to cut and run once damage starts upgrading to agg (and loss of limb function is a fairly good incentive).

Right, except your average man with a shotgun is not necessarily your average Hunter. Even if you did catch a glimpse of the Shadow and survive somehow, getting there is a stretch; crossing the Gauntlet is at least a mid-level supernatural power or an innate supernatural gift — you're going to have to do some hunting to get a way in unless the Storyteller drops the location and conditions of a keyed verge into your lap.

You can't use it against the average crazy human cultist or attack dogs or anything like that. The book gives examples of what rolls related to the Vigil are. It's Hunter-only on account of the mechanic being based more on the Hunter's commitment to the hunt than on their own body. (If you're in the midst of experiencing supernatural terror, I'll be frank: you're not resolving to do shit, never mind hunting things.) Also, there's a sidebar that covers exactly the rationale for why Hunters get to Risk Willpower. (The whole section on Willpower is rather informative, really — see H:tV pages 64-67, "Willpower.")

That's easily broken, and if you cast this spell on other people then you could magically destroy them with no one the wiser.

Uh, I think blood loss of that degree would lead to necrosis, sepsis or something else.

Research man! That's what a game could be about. See spirit. Research spirit. Find gate to shadow. Enter gate. Kill spirit.

That's better...kinda, but couldn't the obsessive desire to succeed regardless of what happens to you apply to both Hunters and Cultists? Or anybody unbalanced enough to be that devoted?

I think you're missing some important things.  ^{To review:}

Over the course of seven minutes on average, I'm inclined to blame copious blood loss. The human body does not become a rancid meat-balloon when rendered comatose. And again, see "if you're going to die then there's no need to track organ damage, and if you're going to live, the doctors will have fixed it with the damage."

And what have you got to go off of? Spirits could look like anything.  ^*

What are the cultists pursuing? What are they fighting for? What are they after that's so taxing that they feel the need to take such a big risk? As antagonists, cultists usually have some degree of narrative protection. Hunters don't, hence the whole "candles in the darkness" metaphor the game mentions here and there.

That being said, there's nothing stopping you from giving the ability to other groups.

Dude, that whole hidden paragraph trick is awesome! And I was talking about turning a guy invisible, and then blowing them up with magic, and since nobody can see the effect the magic has on the world, no disbelief (Well, none beyond the person you're blowing up).

But gunshots fuck people up for life, you don't get shot or beaten so badly you could die of blood loss, heal up and walk out the hospital without a care in the world, there is permanent damage involved.

Is an unsettling obsession with the supernatural a Hunter only thing? I thought it was a major part of the game (well, for mortals). "Day eighty four, the marks appeared again, they're changing, but there is a pattern, and I do see it, but whenever I try to predict what'll happen, it changes, almost like it knows it's being watched, like it knows that I'm keeping track of it." That doesn't have to be a Hunter. And research spirit could lead to kill spirit and that could lead to find spirit then that leads to find way into the Shadow.

Magical powers, immortality, their god, wealth, fear, loneliness, their little brain. And what if you're playing a cultist, couldn't you be just as driven as a Hunter if you want to make it a PC only attribute.

I would, if I ever wanted to play a Wo D mortals game again.

(It's a nightmare to format, I know that much; the edit function seems to have something against backslashes.) That still takes archmastery of the Arcanum (you can't cast another spell if you're in the middle of concentrating) and the guy you're blowing up, if he's a Sleeper, is still going to aggravate that Paradox roll. (Disbelief is largely a concern for Prolonged effects; attack spells are usually Lasting, which means there's nothing to Unravel.)

And would you want to read a story or play a game about that, with excruciating mechanical detail given to the effects of various damaged organs, or would you rather just be able to get your rolls dealt with without a shitload of cross-reference? Yes, the game simplifies some things, but it never purported to be a perfect reality-simulator and the way things are set up in the RAW are perfectly serviceable and likewise perfectly hackable.

Unsettling obsession on par with "THAT FUCKER KILLED MY FAMILY" is generally Hunter's shtick. If you're playing a game wherein there's more to the investigation than "find some or all of the necessary information to figure out what the hell's going on," odds are pretty good it's a Hunter game. ("Research spirit" is a Big Fucking Process, though; just researching a Ban is a process that's stated to take up about the length of an entire story arc — even just taking the route of making an extended roll loses you a number of dice [and therefore extra rolls] equal to the spirit's Rank, and you need three times that to get a regular success. [Oh, and it relies on what is self-evidently a rather esoteric Skill for the average Joe on the street.] Finding a road into the Shadow, meanwhile, adds in another Long Hard Road to go through and has a whole shitload of qualifying factors, depending on your plans. And of course, because this needs reiterating: if the spirit doesn't have an Essence-draining Ban and you have no means of draining its Essence yourself, it's not gonna die.)

To repeat: If the antagonists' plan is a long shot, the protagonists have no reason to care about the plan before its execution unless such a reason is contrived, created, or drawn upon by the story.

You could indeed make a cultist with Hunter-level drive. (Hell, you could even make a Hunter-cultist.) That was what the whole "there's nothing stopping you" bit was about.

Could your buddy invisibilize the dude, and then someone else paralyzes him or something, and then you could leave him in the woods somewhere?

It wouldn't be that tough, I'm not asking for GURPS I'm asking for a simple penalty, or just a flaw or something like that. And realizing that there are consequences for your actions can increase drama. And being crippled by injuries could cause someone to turn to unsavory methods to heal themselves.

Eh, extended rolls are kinda pointless but I see your point about it being a loooong fucking quest. But couldn't you kick the shit out of a spirit, weakening it enough for other spirits to eat it?

Not if the consequences or methods to achieve their plan are harmful. If someone is building up rage spirits to merge them together to form a RAEG GAWD!!! Then spiritually aware Hunters could notice.

That'd be way more epic than an average Hunter game.

What would the point be? You'd still need an Archmaster of Forces (unless you think having the target's concentration decide the duration of the effect is a good idea), plus you'd need to throw on another spell (or some other manner of inflicting paralysis), plus it would only last a few days, tops — you'd need seven dots in Forces to be able to cast Prolonged Invisibility on another person with the Advanced Prolongation factors — and I'm still not seeing what the purpose of this convoluted plan involving archmaster-level invisibility is.

There is a simple penalty. Ignoring this particular set of penalties without magic relies on a Merit that has to pull double-duty between wound penalties and fatigue penalties and messes with your sleep requirements in dealing with the latter. You could certainly cobble together Flaws for missing specific organs, but I don't think it's really necessary to include a "Missing Organs" Flaw in the main book. (For the record, there is a "Crippled" Flaw.)

Thing is, if a spirit's powerful, it's harder to steal Essence from it, which just leads back to the problem of discorporation again. It's why spirits usually limit their predation to weaker spirits like motes.

Now, see, that's an example of creating or drawing upon a reason to care. If the bad guys' plan isn't blatantly obvious in its startup stages, it's that much harder to spot it and therefore thwart it. Further, advancing a spirit in Rank, while mostly a story-based process, is something that usually takes somewhere on the order of months to decades, so pulling it off in the span of a story is going to call for so much of a shitload of rage spirits it'd pretty much be noticeable to some degree even if one didn't know about the spirit world. A week of mob violence and increased manslaughter rates would be maybe about half of the lead-up. And, having this and possibly a deal with spirits on their side, the bad guys have obviated their need for something as low-key as Risking Willpower.

Kidnap and killin', but Mastigos could probably do it much better, super persuasion, "Come this way please." and port em to your buddy with a club.

Damaged organ rather than missing organ.

Weaken it and get an equally powerful if less aggressive spirit to eat it?

Exactly, a perfect lure to bring someone from outside the supernatural world into it, a cop investigating a string of vicious murders, a reporter searching for the truth, a parent looking for their child. And just because they created the Spirit Storm doesn't mean they can necessarily control it, maybe their nihilists that want to destroy as much as possible, but still have the force of will to goad the spirits towards their enemies.

Phred, using magic to kill people is A Bad Thing. Worse than just ordinary murder, since it's pretty much the metaphysical equivalent of strangling someone with a rainbow. And again, what is the goal here? Why was making someone invisible before you killed them such a broken thing?

Same problem and still not enough incentive to come up with specific rules that couldn't be replicated by a simple lost Attribute dot.

Assumes that a) such a spirit locally exists, b) such a spirit is inclined to help, and c) the PCs somehow know this. Oh, and of course d) the PCs are capable of either of those tasks. Stealing Essence is a contested roll, and the winner takes the loser's Essence — even if they didn't initiate the contest. And then there's the matter of having all that aspected Essence going into a formerly non-hostile spirit.

I'm sorry, what?

I've played to many LARPs with utter sociopaths that try to break the system...which mainly consists of not using anything that's actually in the Mage book and being catty bitches, but that's a different issue. So the only game breaking going on is sucking all the fun out of the system.

Which is what I'd do, I still think a little section on it would've been nice.

Aren't spirits pretty much selfish d-bags, no matter what they are? If they see a weakened rival or food wouldn't they take the opportunity to finish them? And hell, would it be Wo D if the consequences far outweighed the original problem?

I'm saying that have a flock of wild rage spirits that are tearing the city to pieces could inspire strong willed individuals (P Cs) into investigating something they'd never even think of under normal conditions.

Answer the question, please.

Spirits also generally aren't impulsive enough to eat absolutely anything made of Essence, particularly when there's a significant difference between the aspect of the Essence and their own nature. (It is going to take some convincing to get Whimsical Grin to devour Twisting Iago when the former has been living in an amusement park basking in Joy and Mischief throughout its existence and the latter is Made of Dickitude.) Spirits are their natures and they are what they eat. You would be hard-pressed to successfully convince a spirit to eat Essence that's not only probably quite different from their own, but belongs to something you just (presumably) battered into slumber. (And if they do agree...) You think it wouldn't?

And this has what to do with how non-Hunters should get the benefit of Risking Willpower?

Most games have an emphasis on murder, probably because I and the people I play with are sociopaths...must be the water.

What about a spirit of impulsiveness? Or a cruel spiteful bastard that would ruin itself just to kill an enemy? Or an idiot who really doesn't know better? And you might not even have to convince a spirit, just injure it and feed it to the metaphorical sharks.

An Evil Counterpart team, Psycho Rangers who use similar tactics in a cat and mouse game across a broken city, each trying to trick the other and manipulating their environment in this...GAME OF DEATH!!!

Answer the question.

No matter what it is, eating a powerful spirit is going to have some significant impact on it. So now you've powered up another big spirit that is now significantly more dickish. That only dilutes the problem, it doesn't solve it.

We have those. They're called "other cells."

Uh, I have. And invisibility to kill people isn't broken, I was doing this thing called "pondering".

Maybe the new dickish spirit doesn't have such an interest in humanity, if you give superpowers to a geology spirit I think you're good.

Not a dedicated cell of super cultists, I would've liked a Cult PC book.

To what end?

A geology spirit who just ate a minor god of dickishness is going to be more amenable to feeding on Dickishness Essence. The problem remains.

Chapter Four of Second Sight. Seriously, man, it seems like you're not even trying.

Someone can ponder for the sake of pondering, it's called philosophy.

But geology spirits aren't going to affect the world super fast, you've delayed the problem, which is a good thing.

Wow, one chapter...that's what I wanted. First of all, I don't have all the books, second of all, one chapter is hardly enough to go into detail, I want to play a cultist, I want to a book of potential cults, I want a list of potential cult story lines, I want Cultist: The Chanting.

We're having a conversation. Sticking random pondering in the middle of an extant discussion tends to confuse the issue. You still have yet to explain what on earth the point was to the entire "what if you made someone else invisible?" tangent.

Except that discorporation is also delaying the problem and requires a good deal less legwork.

 ^Ahahahaha.

I don't have all the books either, but that doesn't stop me from using the motherfucking Google.

To cast magic on them without others seeing the effects, reducing the unraveling.

Yes, but a far less permanent delay.

Kay, what about heroic cults that try to use magic to better people? Or a fertility cult that's trying to counteract the sterilizing influences of their company, or a vengeance cult dedicated to bringing doom upon those that would harm others? Cults don't have to be evil, and the examples they give are almost universally so. And cults are a whole hell of a lot more varied in what they do than vampires (Who suck blood, or angst), or hunters (Who...hunt).

But Digital Piracy Is Evil!

Unravelling does not work that way. Again, see the whole "seven dots in Forces" thing. Also the whole "three or four ways to spot invisibility" seminar.

Discorporation buys you at least a couple weeks. Feeding buys you no time and extends the influence of the dickishness with a completely different Ban.

I do not believe you know what a cult is.

And looking on Amazon or, god forbid, their website, is not. Research.

Yes, which is why it was pondering.

Not if the spirit has a much different way of destroying something, it's like amputation to save a man's life, yeah it isn't great, but it is a solution. Or an organ transplant, you're still going to die before you time, but you have more time.

"The word cult pejoratively refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered strange."

Like...what I just said. A cult has different connotations, I'm not talking Scientology, I'm talking Free Masons.

Yes, I can see their covers, and then I can see what each of their chapters contains, and then I can read all these books that are oh so useful because I have the time to care about a great game like World of Darkness.

Except that in this case the disease you're cutting the man's arm off to prevent can be held off by medication and cutting the arm off just means you'll have a zombie arm coming after you later.

Except that Werewolf, Mage, Vampire, Geist, and Hunter (at least) all have some manner of cult-modeling available.

That you refuse to look around is not anybody else's fault.

Medication that will shorten your lifespan, make your throw up, and could kill you if mixed with alcohol.

They're close, because they have magic and live in the shadows? Not close enough.

Never said it was. I also don't have to look around to please you.

Most folks would take that over having to suffer through Zombie Cancer.

Ahahahahaha. Let's review:

1. Vampires have at least two religious groups in the core quintet of covenants.
2. WoD Werewolves are based on the "hounds of God" interpretation, are tasked with regularly dealing with things very like demons, and are involved in a holy war.
3. All of the core Mage orders are mystery cults.
4. The formation of a krewe involves the development of a mythology and the most basic level of krewe is called a cult.
5. I can see at least one Conspiracy that involves a non-mainstream religious model based on the conceit that its members are the spawn of Lucifer.

No, but if you don't then you forfeit your right to bitch at me about the stuff you're looking for not existing (when you didn't look) without a negative response.

In like fifty years!

But they all have magic powers! They are certain that magic exists. They don't have to fight and struggle and scrape just to get a tiny piece of magic, so no, that's not really close enough.

I don't bitch at you, I ask questions, ese.

Or two months. Location spirits are still spirits and so they need to harvest Essence as often as any other sort does.

Vampire blood-magic requires the appropriate Covenant Status to learn, werewolf Gifts and Rites require literally hunting down spirits that can teach them, mages need Order Status to learn rotes, long-lost Conspiracy-level krewe benefits can generally only be passed on anymore by something as rare as a mentor-student practice way off in the world, and since when has any of that been a qualifying feature of a cult?

I see a large number of "what-ifs" and requests for clarification. I also see a great deal of bitching. It is looking increasingly like you are arguing in bad faith. Since I have a limit on how much futile shit I'm going to argue, I'm going to give you an opportunity to stop being quite such a dick, wakatta?

But wouldn't turning a city into a Wretched Hive be better than having rage spirits drive people to Domestic Abuse, if evil spirits are as invincible as you say, then the only answer would be to convert the evil into the least dangerous form possible?

Religions, and cults too, (I'm not going to make a distinction, it's really only the controversy of what philosophy the espouse) rely on faith, it's all about faith, it's what they believe in their heart of hearts, sans proof of course, because if you have proof, it isn't a religion anymore, it becomes a science. Supernatural magic is observable and produces repeatable results in controlled environments, ergo, no longer magic. Understand what point I'm trying to make?

I don't bitch at you, I bitch at the game, you just happen to present for the bitching, and I won't be offended if you leave, I'm surprised you're still here, actually. And about not being a dick? No, mec.

The Wretched Hive option means the city naturally fosters more evil, which means more evil spirits form, which means the things gradually conglomerate into bigger evil spirits, which leads to the same problem except without the option of ruining the locale to fix it. The only way to actually fix a problem of that magnitude requires a coordinated combination of physical/social engineering and spiritual ass-kicking. Generally this sort of thing is out of the depth of normal people for sustained repeat performances. That's what werewolves and mages are for, mostly.

Except that most of the cults and religions I know of don't preach the idea of magic being something you can do anyway — the belief system is generally bigger than that — and a non-negligible portion of supernatural powers are either not observable (and therefore unanalyzable), non-falsifiable (and therefore untestable), or (and this is the big one) rely on dice rolls that are penalized by mundane attempts at scrutiny. Again, you seem to be missing how science works.

You've been bitching at me about the game. This is a thing that happens when you rant to someone on a topic. That being said,

Thank you for this insightful review of books you haven't read.

What more can a human who's seen to much do? Give up? Runaway? Kill yourself?

Pentecostals? African Tribes that believed that prayer would make them immune to bullets? People believing that following the teachings of a series of books about people who have dead for several hundred years and has been translated multiple times gives them a direct link into the mind of God and will give them immortal life in a paradise after death? Religion is not about fact, it's about faith. Vampires can rip peoples heads off. Werewolves can travel into the spirit realm. Mages fly hover slowly. These aren't necessarily reliant on faith, they can be of course, a mage could be inspired by his faith, but it's not as much faith in a higher power as much as faith in oneself.

What do you think of Dragonlance? Or Star Wars EU? Or Warhammer 40 K? Or Marvel Comics? Or DC? Or Physics? Or Religion? Or Politics? Have you read every book/seen every episode/heard every speech? No? Really? Do you still have opinions on them? Yes? Really? You mean that you can have opinions on something without knowing everything about it? Wow, thanks for that.

And I have read a lot of the books, I've read Promethean, Core, the Armories, Mage, Changeling and a lot of the supplementary books, Vampire, Werewolf, Hunter, Antagonists, Cults. This is a main line review, and the main line is repetitive, restrictive mediocrity, sure it's a bad system, I mean, I've heard of FATAL and GURPS, but it isn't great either, FATE and ORE are out there.

Tee. Ell. Dee. Arr.

...What did I just read?

^...You actually read all of that?

Wow man this seems like funny!

Bockmarked. I will read it all soon, and then tell you my opinion

(Note thougt that I havet played this game, hell I didnt even knew about it before I knew this thread!)

Poor Won Sab

And by that I mean, I have an even worse lack of knowledge than Phredric, but I agree with Won Sab not just because my instincts tell me so, but because Phredric's a freaking Jerk. [strike:End of comment, and I probably won't be reading this thread or review again.]

Edit: On second thought, no. I don't freaking want to argue with Phredric, but I'm going to point out that that last post of his was arrogant, condescending, and in his posts, he apparently picked up a conclusion that many people that I think (relatively) intelligent and rational don't freaking have. If he's still here, I ask him to not reply, even to tell me that he isn't going to dissuss this. Why, because that post would be dripping with percieved superiority and ignorance (if he asks just how he's arrogant and condescending, I'll scream!)

Just read this. ALL of this. It was fun.

Won Sab, great job! You stayed relatively objective throughout most of this (I would have given up WAY sooner) and argued very well. Also, you are rather articulate, was fun to read.

Phredric, you need to read up on some concepts, because it seems morality, objective and subjective statements and last but not least originality do not mean what you think they mean. Also, you should work on your attitude. Puts people kinda off, you know? You raised some fair questions, but handled the answers poorly.

Winner: Won Sab, undisputedly.