aWoD: Continued

[Orca]

It should be possible to use Cel/Dom or Dom/Pot to drive people into a frenzy IMO. This could be positive (like a D&D bard) or negative (taunting or insanity).

If you want an animal form for stealth rather than war, Fort/Obf or Obf/Pot might be the prereq.

[Judging__Eagle]

Frank, those are great.

Putting "changelings" as part of the 3rd Transhuman slot solves two minor issues, and helps add in some more Transhuman types than "Changelings" alone would.

Quick question... how well would this work in terms of say non-tabletop gaming?

Like, I know that some people do V:tM non-table tope role play; but I've never actually seen it, and know that it's mostly rock-paper-scissors.

(I'm reluctant to call any of what they do "action", since if they don't break a sweat, they're not performing any real "action" in terms of what other live action rp systems)

[virgil]

Any kind of travel form, be it turning into a swarm or a cloud or simply stepping into shadows to use as quick jumps through the void.

Is there anything that covers interacting with dreams, be it communication or even pulling sleepers into Maya Freddy-style?

[Quantumboost]

Earth Meld is listed under the Troglodyte entry as Obf/Pot, so that slot isn't really open without modifying that entry.

Among the ones listed in the original Devotion listing:
Flesh Craft was mentioned as being pretty iconic for WoD, it could fill the Dom/Pot slot.
Gift of Sight looks like it would fit as Auspex/Presence.
Mask the Blood, if it isn't covered by some other Obfuscation power, would fit well as Fort/Obf.

I haven't played WoD and don't have hangups as to what needs to be in there, so these are pretty much just suggestions for defaults.

Edit: Just noticed, the Mi Go still have Body Weaponry (Basic Protean) under their powers - that should be switched to one of the Lure of Destruction substitutes since Protean isn't on the table anymore.

[Orion]

I still think Flight belongs in Fort/ something, either Fort/Pres (displaced body cleansing, probably to Fort/Auspex, or in Fort/Obfuscate.

Auspex/Celerity might be a Foresight like effect, or a contingent Augury.

Why do Golems have obfuscate, and frankensteins don't? Fraknestein's monster is known for sneaking around, spying on people, and murdering them in the night, while Loew's golem is known for stampeding around tearing down a whole town.

[Grek]

Loew's golem could also turn invisible and summon ghosts.

[Username17]

Earth Meld is listed under the Troglodyte entry as Obf/Pot, so that slot isn't really open without modifying that entry.

Oh snap. Good catch, it was floating text. Good to get that back into the Devotion list where it belongs.

Edit: Just noticed, the Mi Go still have Body Weaponry (Basic Protean) under their powers - that should be switched to one of the Lure of Destruction substitutes since Protean isn't on the table anymore.

Good catch there too.

Flesh Craft was mentioned as being pretty iconic for WoD, it could fill the Dom/Pot slot.

With Beastform going to Animalism, it is very tempting to simply fold Fleshrafting there as well.

Any kind of travel form, be it turning into a swarm or a cloud or simply stepping into shadows to use as quick jumps through the void.

Transformation into a bat or snake is Animalism. Transformation into a cloud of vapors is Chasing the Storm. Is there another travel form that people want?

Is there anything that covers interacting with dreams, be it communication or even pulling sleepers into Maya Freddy-style?

Absolutely. It's called Veil of Morpheus and it's an Astral Sorcery path. It's a fixed discipline for the Verbena and the Pods.
When you dream, dream of me.

Quick question... how well would this work in terms of say non-tabletop gaming?

A LARP overhaul should be very doable. Hard, but not impossible to do the Khaibit and Mi Go schticks, hand symbols for Hide from Notice, Mask, War Form, and Majesty already exist. Uniform disciplines make that sort of thing easier than oWoD, and oWoD made the Mind's Eye Theater hop so easily that the game improved.

It should be possible to use Cel/Dom or Dom/Pot to drive people into a frenzy IMO.

That sounds reasonable.

Cel/Dom: Quicken the Blood
Dom/Pot: Will to Power

-Username17

[virgil]

How are Luminaries detected? Are there any Devotions or Disciplines (since I saw at least two you haven't detailed yet) for creating traps/wards? What about curses? I suppose would be long term alterations, such as suggesting they perform a task or turn them into a pig (is there an offensive transformation?) and place an 'escape clause' on it.

[Grek]

Aura Perception, I think.

[Username17]

Path of Blood
Given time, blood does become thicker than water.

The Path of Blood delves into the intricacies of life and death from a very liquid and visceral standpoint. Deep familiarity of this sort with blood gives advantages. The character gains a +1 bonus to Medicine and Survival for having this discipline. The bonus increases to +2 if they have Advanced, and +3 if they have Elder Path of Blood.

Basic Disciplines

• Blood Bondage
  The character can invest a power point into a sample of their own blood, allowing them to transfer power points to others – even to character's who cannot normally have power points or who are at their limit of power points. The character's blood is also horrendously addictive; like freebase cocaine.
• Thaumaturgical Forensics
  The character can make accurate pronouncements about biological samples and give weird CSI tirades given access to creepy magical equipment. The character makes a Logic + Medicine or Logic + Research check. The kinds of information gained varies by the number of hits. Examples follow of investigating the origin of a lock of hair and investigating the source of a lethal wound:

  	Hits	Hair Sample	Wound
  	1	“Human Woman. Blond.”	“Burns. Nasty Ones.”
  	2	“She's still alive.”	“These fires burned by magic.”
  	3	“She's a Luminary.”	“A Firestarter did this at short range.”
  	4	“Her name is Susan.”	“The Firestarter was a Baali Witch.”
  	5	“She is currently in Dresden.”	“His name was Karlov.”
  	6	“She is thinking about betraying her friend Elizabeth.”	“This was a fight over money.”

  
  

Advanced Disciplines

• Blood of Acid
  The character can bleed like one of the xenomorphs from Aliens. Anyone who is within melee range when something inflicts damage on the character is subject to being sprayed with black caustic fluid. Little droplets of the stuff sent in such a circumstance are sufficient to constitute a damage 3 attack. If the character is conscious, they can actively attempt to get their blood to go onto a specific person and try to stage it up with a Strength + Survival or Strength + Combat test. The character can also use their blood in more controlled fashions – that stuff will burn through the lock on a fire door in a few minutes.
• Theft of Vitae
  The character draws blood and power directly out of a victim. Little spheres of blood fly out of the victim towards the character, who thence absorbs the droplets in some suitably dramatic fashion such as having them pop into the character's mouth or outstretched hand. The character uses a Complex action and makes an opposed Agility + Larceny or Logic + Medicine test against the target's Strength. Every net hit causes the victim an unsoaked damage level and if they have any power points they lose one of them per net hit. This power does not cost power points, and indeed the character gains one power point per net hit (up to their normal maximum).

Elder Disciplines

• Crimson Death Given a sample of blood from a target, the character an send a lethal curse against them that will brutally murder them no matter how far they have traveled. The character burns the blood sample and spends an hour sending evil thoughts into it and spends a power point. The character makes an opposed Logic + Medicine or Logic + Survival test against the target's Strength. On a success, the victim snaps into a dozen pieces or more, looking momentarily like they were painted upon a broken window pane. Blood gushes from every crack, and they fall into chunks dead as dry bones.
• Blood Puppets The character can take control of victims by puppeting their blood around. By spending a power point and a complex action, the character can turn a number of people into marionettes. The character makes a Willpower + Medicine or Logic + Operations check, and takes control of a number of human extras equal to the number of hits for the remainder of the scene.

[Username17]

Necromancy
“Everything ends and everything dies. That is not a good thing or a bad thing. It's simply inevitable. More than any other truth, the end cannot be eternally avoided.”

Necromancy is the incredibly creepy sorcerous path of handling the dead. Necromancers can see Ghosts and things that are in Mictlan without actually putting themselves into those areas and the potential harm's way that could entail. Characters with advanced Necromancy can intuitively sense what items constitute a Wraith's fetters and where the fetters of a viewed Wraith might lay. A character with Elder Necromancy can feel the presence and knows the goals of all Poltergeists and Shadow Gates within 100 kilometers of their position. Ghosts intuitively know that a Necromancer can sense them, and they react accordingly.

Basic Disciplines

• Compel Spirits The character can send Ghosts from Mictlan into the material world or vice versa. By spending a Complex Action and making an opposed Willpower + Empathy or Logic + Bureaucracy test against the Ghost's Willpower, it can be sent to the Material, the Shallow Gloom, or the Deep Gloom, at the necromancer's option.
• Summon Spirit By naming a dead person or holding up a part of their body, the character can draw their Ghost to themselves unless it has been bottled, destroyed, or subsumed into a Poltergeist. The character makes a Logic + Medicine or Logic + Operations check, with a difficulty of how exactly they can describe the Ghost they are looking for.

Advanced Disciplines

• Nightcry The character screams a wail of pain and despair into the deepest portions of Mictlan, and draws a Poltergeist to their position. This requires a Power Point and a Complex Action. By making a Willpower + Empathy or Logic + Bureaucracy test against the Poltergeist's Willpower, the character can compel it to begin its rain of destruction upon a target of their choice. What else the Poltergeist does from being in the material world is totally up to it.
• Reanimate The character makes a body into a Shambler or Soulless. A Shambler comes into existence under the control of the necromancer, and a Soulless does not. If the body was once a Luminary, their spirit is drawn back into their body and they become (an uncontrolled) Revenant. A necromancer can only maintain control of 2 Shamblers per point of Willpower they have. If they make more Shamblers than that, they lose control of some of their Shamblers at random at some inconvenient time in the next day or so. Reanimating the dead is hard (Threshold 3), costs a Power Point per corpse, and has an expected time of 1 Day (net hits reduce the time normally). It is a Logic + Medicine or Logic + Operations check. Remember that Shamblers don't have the capacity to follow complex orders.

Elder Disciplines

• Resurrection The character can return life to someone who is dead. In order to work, the character must have access to the target's ghost and an “appropriate” body. The target's own body is appropriate, as is any other body of the same sex and build. Resurrecting the dead is hard (Threshold 3), and requires a Logic + Medicine or Willpower + Empathy check with an expected time of 1 day (net hits reduce the time normally). Resurrection costs 3 Power Points. Resurrecting a Revenant retores them to humanity.
• Zombie Mastery The character has no particular limit for how many Shamblers they can create and retain control of with Reanimate (if they have that ability). In addition, the character can take control of Zombies of any type (Shamblers, Soulless, or even Revenants). This takes a Complex Action and costs a Power Point. The character makes a Logic + Operations or Willpower + Tactics test and takes command of a number of Zombies equal to the hits. Revenants are allowed to resist with Willpower. Commanded Zombies reel and cease brain eating while shuffling about as if struck until given orders.

Obtenebration
“Spooky. Seriously.”

Obtenebration is a sorcerous discipline that governs and depends upon shadows. Darkness is in no short supply in something called the “World of Darkness” and areas with no light at all can be thought of as being like some singular giant shadow. Even extremely bright lights cause objects to cast shadows that are really quite noticeable. As such, in a general sort of way, the fact that Obtenebration requires shadows to function is pretty much a formality. However, if characters are in the process of sky diving or are in the areas of exceptional ambient light, the powers of Obtenebration can seriously be neutralized. Having Obtenebration makes a character sneakier and spookier, giving them a +1 bonus to Stealth and Intimidate. This bonus increases to +2 with Advanced, and +3 with Elder Obtenebration.

Basic Disciplines

• Eyes of the Night The character can see and hear out of distant shadows. The character can see in darkness at any time (unlike Supernatural Senses, this use does not render the character susceptible to glare), and by spending a Power Point they can draw their senses from a pool of darkness that is within 100 meters per Potency. The character makes an Intuition + Empathy or Intuition + Perception check, with a threshold based on how accurately they can describe the shadow they wish to peer out of.
• Shadow Play The character's lighting appears to have been done by professional special effects technicians. They can manipulate shadows and to a lesser extent light as well. This gives a +2 bonus to any attempt to become the center of attention or to escape unnoticed. This bonus increases to +4 with Advanced Obtenebration and +6 with Elder Obtenebration.

Advanced Disciplines

• Call the Lamprey The character can through force of will drain Power out of a victim through their shadow. By spending a Complex Action and making an opposed Intuition + Larceny or Intuition + Combat check against the target's Willpower, the character can cause unsoaked damage equal to the number of net hits, and regain a number of Power points equal to the number of net hits.
• Solid Darkness The character can spend a Power Point to fashion steel hard tendrils of solid shadow and use them to grasp, carry and tear. The darkness can extend out to a meter per Potency from its source Shadow, and has Strength equal to the Character's Intuition. Solid Darkness is completely silent, and can rather easily grab someone by complete surprise.

Elder Disciplines

• Parambulum in Tenebris The character can step into one shadow and come out of another one that they can perceive. The transportation itself is a Simple Action that costs 1 Power to activate. No intervening space is used, and nothing can block the movement. The character may take anything and anyone they or their shadow tendrils can carry.
• Shadow Body The character can transform into an intangible shadow form. A body of shadow pass harmlessly through physical objects save for those of a material they are vulnerable to. Entering or leaving the Shadow Body is a Complex Action. Assuming the Shadow Body takes a Power Point. Being made out of pure shadow makes it very easy to hide in areas which have any dimness worth mentioning. But it's also super hard to explain from a Masquerade point of view.

[MartinHarper]

Resurrection The character can return life to someone who is dead. In order to work, the character must have access to the target's ghost and an “appropriate” body. The target's own body is appropriate, as is any other body of the same sex and build.

Does the existing body need to be unoccupied/dead?

[Quantumboost]

Does the existing body need to be unoccupied/dead?

I'd say that's thematically appropriate and very creepy. My vote is for yes.

In any case, you can just kill the occupied body if the decision is that it needs to be dead.

[Gelare]

Does the existing body need to be unoccupied/dead?

No way, the body can totally be occupied. Haven't you read stories where the necromancer is trying to return a loved one to life with the body of someone who looks like her, while the victim is screaming on the altar, trying to break free? Come on, classic.

[erik]

Perhaps you can still fufill that genre notion by killing the previous host a little just before the possession such that the eviction of the old host is essentially part of the ritual.

[MartinHarper]

No way, the body can totally be occupied. Haven't you read stories where the necromancer is trying to return a loved one to life with the body of someone who looks like her, while the victim is screaming on the altar, trying to break free? Come on, classic.

That is classic. Perhaps there should even be a mechanical benefit for doing it the creepier way.

[Judging__Eagle]

Your reanimated friend has a completely whole body. Not a killed one that will eventually start to rot.

There was seriously a Steve Martin comedy movie that had this as a premise. He had his dead wife's soul inside him, and they could alternate controling the body when the other was asleep.

Eventually they were able to xfer her soul into his 'new' girlfriend's body; and she got complete control of the new body.

Mirrors would reveal the woman's true soul.

Which is consequently -very- AWoD; seeing as Mirrors tend to be gates to other planes and shit.

Sometimes it just pays to be willing to watch anything at least once.

[Prak]

Your reanimated friend has a completely whole body. Not a killed one that will eventually start to rot.

There was seriously a Steve Martin comedy movie that had this as a premise. He had his dead wife's soul inside him, and they could alternate controling the body when the other was asleep.

Eventually they were able to xfer her soul into his 'new' girlfriend's body; and she got complete control of the new body.

Mirrors would reveal the woman's true soul.

Which is consequently -very- AWoD; seeing as Mirrors tend to be gates to other planes and shit.

Sometimes it just pays to be willing to watch anything at least once.

Be honest, that's where your idea for you rifts character came from, isn't it?

[Judging__Eagle]

Nope.

My Rifts character is a really twinked Atlantean Line Walker (Atlanteans are human, his family are adventurers, and have learned what Wormwood does to people born on it, consequently, he was born on WW, making him an MDC creature from the get-go), that I had built for an other online forum years ago. Koumei let me remort from level 13 or so, into being a level 1 Godling.

The backstory is long, convoluted, and involves dealing with a bunch of stuff. Ending with "instead of dying, I lose all of my powers, and get turned into a Godling, that can just regenerate all of their missing organs and blood, instead of worrying about a magical vampire plague that's eating me alive. Now, I'm retired, and grow ley-line infused weed b/c I'm still suffering from PTSD; except that I recently got a call about a job for Tolkeen, and my patroness says I should finally get off my butt".

Lots of Godling powergaming shenanigans were used to give the character high level spells; and the Lesser Rune weapon was forgone, and instead replaced with "many credits". Things like picking up both Line Walker, -and- Shifter; and then using the Shifter option to be a servant/agent of a Diety of Knowledge/War (Athena) to get up to 13th level spells, in a 1st level character. The character nearly never has to run out of mana; can lift a small-sized tank, and can 'maybe' fight with a Juicer to a standstill.

There's no soul jumping from body to body all "Stranger with the Burning Eyes" style; or even... argh there's actually a really good short story about that sort of character too.

The character concept I'm using is more "ok, you're powerful, I'm going to give you a non-mortal body, b/c your mortal body is going to break under the strain it's in. I'll be expecting you to put what you're being given to good use. Yes, that means wanting to kill what destroyed your last body."

[Username17]

Descent of Entropy
Everything ends the same way: it no longer matters and no longer persists.

The fires of Limbo have long dulled and all there is left is misery and ash. Those who delve into the knowledge of entropy learn grim ends of human nature and command the power of wickedness to compel disease agents to action. To those who follow this path, the inevitable unraveling brought about by time appears entirely normal and expected. A student of the Descent of Entropy gains a +2 bonus to diagnose an ailment, reconstruct an event from evidence, or repair an object that has fallen apart. These bonuses increase to +4 at Advanced and +6 with Elder Descent of Entropy.

Basic Disciplines

• Abyss of the Body The character carries hideous diseases that can be foisted upon others with a touch, a bite, or a kiss. A character with Abyss of the Body is not themselves affected by disease, and they can carry all manners of normal plagues and pass them normally. In addition, each character who has Abyss of the Body can voluntarily transmit a purely magical disease. The disease they have at their disposal to use voluntarily is chosen when the discipline is learned. A character inflicted by additional magical diseases is still immune, but has no control of its transmission. Abyss of the Body can be learned multiple times to control multiple diseases. When spreading a disease voluntarily the character achieves physical contact and uses Strength + Survival or Charisma + Medicine against the victim's Strength.

  	Disease	Delay	Effects
  	Chud	Minutes	Victim dissolves into white goo.
  	Cooties	Seconds	Victim driven mad with lust.
  	Doom Flies	Days	Victim eaten up by maggots, explodes into swarm of flies.
  	Rage Virus	Seconds	Victim transforms into Soulless.
  	Thing Infection	Days	Victim fills up with roots, Triffid bursts out of their husk.
  	Z-Virus	Until Death	When Victim dies, it rises as a Shambler.

  
  
• Light of Ennui The character becomes a beacon of apathy and despair, foiling attempts by those caught in the metaphorical glow to care. The character makes a Charisma + Artisan or Charisma + Empathy test against the Willpowers of everyone within close range. Everyone affected is unable to muster an emotional response to much of anything. Frenzy doesn't happen, and all appeals to emotion and even magically created emotions fail unless the speaking character can muster more hits than the Light of Ennui. Lighting or dousing the Light of Ennui is a free action. The Light of Ennui sheds literal light in the Dark Reflection, and is enough to see by.

Advanced Disciplines

• Aura of Decay When the Aura of Decay is activated, things fall apart into grime and dust. This can be directed somewhat, but generally anything within a few meters of the Character will degrade as if left unattended for days and weeks in mere moments. Objects that are literally on the person of someone will not be devastated by decay unless the character focuses in on them and marks them for destruction. The character can focus in and make a Strength + Artisan or Charisma + Medicine test against a target's Intuition to corrode a specific person's equipment as a Complex action. Activating or deactivating the Aura of Decay is a Simple Action. Normally it is far too slow to affect a fast moving object, but by spending a Power Point, the speed of corrosion can be enhanced to the point where it will tear items out of the air before the reach the character. Disposing of an incoming thrown piece of wood is easy (threshold 1), stopping bullets is hard (threshold 3), and corroding one's self a path through being otherwise run over by a truck is crazy extreme (threshold 5).
• Contradiction The character can tempt a victim into doing something they would never do, something wildly against their nature. The character can make an opposed Charisma + Artisan or Charisma + Bureaucracy test against the victim's Willpower. This takes conversational time, and is absolutely powerless to convince someone to do something that they are merely moderately opposed to.

Elder Disciplines

• Howl of the Abyss A scream of unutterable anguish permeates the Material World and the Dark Reflection for a round. The fires of Limbo belch into the material world. Smoke and ash blows through cracks in the world. And Mirror Goblins spew forth in a brutal wave. The character spends a power point and makes a Charisma + Artisan or Charisma + Bureaucracy test and a number of Mirror Goblins show up equal to the square of the number of hits. Any other creatures within a few meters of the character's location in either the Shallow or Deep Limbo may attempt to escape to the Material World as well.
• Wind of Pestilence Black winds carry ghastly plagues that doom everyone they touch. Everything the shadowy air caresses is exposed to a magical ailment of the character's choice. The winds come out as either a cone that extends for a hundred meters per point of Potency or as a circular maelstrom that is twenty meters in radius per point of Potency at the character's option. The character spends a power point and Complex Action to make either a Strength + Artisan or Charisma + Medicine test. Potential victims may resist with their Strength, and the character can nominate one target per hit to be avoided by the gale.

[Sir Neil]

...corroding one's self a path through being otherwise run over by a truck is crazy extreme...

Yes, yes it is. The FX budget for this guy is massive, but so worth it.

[Avoraciopoctules]

Is there any risk of accidentally corroding the ground beneath your feet, dropping you into an instant pit?

[Quantumboost]

This can be directed somewhat, but generally anything within a few meters of the Character will degrade as if left unattended for days and weeks in mere moments.

So... no, you probably won't corrode away the ground underneath you, unless the ground is made of something that degrades fairly easily. Rock tends not to decay much over periods of weeks; even actively eroding it doesn't go that quickly. You might have to be somewhat careful if dealing with floors made of wood or iron when standing in the same spot for a bit though.

[Avoraciopoctules]

Yes, and more so when you speed the process up. Of course, that problem would fairly easy to eliminate if it is noted that when you burn power for faster decay, you also get more control over what is eroded. That way, you have less risk of falling through the sidewalk when you disintegrate a slab of concrete thrown at you.

[Username17]

Well, you're touching the ground beneath your feet, so it's just as safe as the clothes on your back.

Anyway, how would you like to be able to suppress Astral, Infernal, and Orphic sorceries?

-Username17