aWoD: Continued

[Username17]

It is a professional grade task to summon one of the Sidhe (threshold 2), it is totally extreme to summon an Akuma (threshold 4), and it is flat super human to summon one of the Ifrit (threshold 6).

I thought that Akuma were weaker and generally less awesome than Sidhe. If so, why is it harder to summon an Akuma than a Sidhe?

This is a good question. And indeed, a Sidhe is a much better thing to be than an Akuma is. On the other hand, summoning an Akuma is a better deal. Much of the weaknesses of Akuma basically don't matter to a summoner whose intention is to use them as minions. A sidhe has almost 50% more starting disciplines and doesn't have to deal with crippling stupidity. But if you're bossing it around, an Akuma's crippling stupidity is actually good for you.

For a D&D analogy: a Sidhe is a Drow Cleric; an Akuma is a Dire Bear.

-Username17

[Grek]

The Sidhe appear as relatively attractive, if distant and cruel humans. As the only type of Demon that is not constitutively required to eat or torture people to death, they are the most likely to have neutral or positive relations with residents of the mortal world. Nevertheless, Sidhe very rarely behave in any manner that could be even generously described as less than unnecessarily dickish. While they gain no literal sustenance

Truncated.

[A Hammer]

Unleash the Dark Soul The character summons a Demon. It is a professional grade task to summon one of the Sidhe (threshold 2), it is totally extreme to summon an Akuma (threshold 4), and it is flat super human to summon one of the Ifrit (threshold 6). If the character knows the name of a specific entity, they may attempt to summon that one in particular to the material world, and the threshold is reduced by 1. If a proposed target's escape threshold is higher than the summoning threshold, use that threshold instead of the base (although still reduce it by 1 for a known name). Unleash the Dark Soul uses Intuition + Empathy or Charisma + Bureaucracy. It takes an hour, and can also be used to spring any specific creature whose name is known from the shallow or deep Dark Reflection.

About how big a dicepool can a character with access to Elder-level Disciplines be expected to have, at minimum? Demon-summoning looks like something that would be awfully difficult to do in practice.

[Username17]

About how big a dicepool can a character with access to Elder-level Disciplines be expected to have, at minimum? Demon-summoning looks like something that would be awfully difficult to do in practice.

Minimum? Like zero dice.

More realistically, a character adds their Potency to their caps, and is probably going to want to be maximizing their relevant stats and skills. Sometimes they'll even be able to line up some magic bonuses.

But I would expect to see an Elder Discipline on something with a Potency in the range of 3 or so in most cases, which means that a would-be summoner is actually quite likely to have a Charisma of 9. A 15 die pool doesn't sound at all weird to me. I'm actually a little bit afraid I made it far too easy. Even a min/maxer who went straight for Unleash would go in with 10-12 dice and by spending an Edge could pull an Ifrit out. Not control it or anything, but the option is certainly there.

-Username17

[Vnonymous]

Water is an absolutely terrible weakness.

Firstly because it means that Baali are now forbidden from showering. Furthermore, considering blood has water in it, why the fuck are there any vampires with this weakness?

And how do wererats get this, characters who traditionally travel through sewers, which have (although soiled) lots and lots of water in them!.

Water is just far too common in the world to be a weakness that doesn't utterly screw anyone who has it.

A baali can no longer have a cool drink on a hot day, nor can they do any rituals involving blood!

Now, making something like Holy Water a weakness, that's ok. Its' going to be something that doesn't pop up all the time, like water.

As written, that system means that baali can never ever go for a swim. Wererats and Nosferatu are going to be completely unable to navigate sewers. Baali are still largely physically human, so they're going to be unable to do anything at all ever because they are literally made out of a substance which removes their powers. They are ALWAYS touching water.
Also what the shit was up with "The burnt up soul of a baali witch is dampened by cold water". That doesn't make any sense.

This also means that all of these supernaturals will be utterly destroyed if they happen to live somewhere that snows.


The other weaknesses listed are a pile of garbage as well.

Troglodytes are stopped dead in their tracks by a flashlight?

That's fucking stupid.

And why do we need someone with the superpower of "walking through fire" to have fire make them weaker? That's moronic.

Making an iron a weakness for player characters is moronic too(and seriously, magnets?)

And what's this noise about Verbena being weak to fucking forests? Almost every part of this writeup is garbage.

A much, much better way of doing weaknesses is to do them the way that they have already been done - as part of the individual monster's entry.

Furthermore, if you're making a weakness, it can't be something so ridiculously common. Salt or preserved meat is acceptable, but water is entirely useless without specification. (I guess Baali can never travel by sea or go to Antarctica or in fact any tundra ever - they just have to spend those encounters playing smash bros). A weakness has to be something that people can find and get, but not something that is so absurdly common that they're going to run into it all the time. Any character who is expected to keep the masquerade(like all of them) can't have a weakness like water (Baali can never have baths or showers!) or whatever.

And it REALLY can't be something that they're going to run into when doing what people expect of them! Wererats and Nosferatu being weak to god-damn sewers? Baali unable to do anything involving blood? Verbena getting weakened by forests? Androids being weak to iron, EVEN THOUGH THEY MOST LIKELY HAVE IRON AS PART OF THEIR BODY? Having weaknesses is something that is pretty cool - but your writeup is entirely not.

[schpeelah]

Well, at least Grek is trying to do something about the whole issue. Right now we have 2 working vulnerabilities and a completely unbalanced set of weaknesses (Sunlight - 50% of the time unless underground, Sacred Ground - only certain places (though likely the places the adventure wants you to go to), Alcohol - consciously crippling yourself).

[A Hammer]

Minimum? Like zero dice.

More realistically, a character adds their Potency to their caps, and is probably going to want to be maximizing their relevant stats and skills. Sometimes they'll even be able to line up some magic bonuses.

But I would expect to see an Elder Discipline on something with a Potency in the range of 3 or so in most cases, which means that a would-be summoner is actually quite likely to have a Charisma of 9. A 15 die pool doesn't sound at all weird to me. I'm actually a little bit afraid I made it far too easy. Even a min/maxer who went straight for Unleash would go in with 10-12 dice and by spending an Edge could pull an Ifrit out. Not control it or anything, but the option is certainly there.

-Username17

Does 'overcoming the Gauntlet' mean the same thing as escaping the Dark Reflection?

What is clear is that Demons have a tremendous difficulty leaving the Dark Reflection: their Potencies are considered four higher for purposes of overcoming the Gauntlet.

What I'm trying to get at is that if it does, All Ifrit are pretty much going to have escape thresholds of 8 or above, which puts the minimum summoning treshold at 7 (assuming you have the name of a four-potency Ifrit). Unless I'm being retarded, that'd put the minmaxer at the low end of the probable dicepool range at a noticeable risk of failure even while throwing down an Edge.

If the Gauntlet is separate from the generic escape threshold of a demon, then this post can be safely ignored.

[Username17]

Basically I'm fine with Wood/Iron/Silver as ways to dish out aggravated damage. Silver would be a lot better as a vulnerability to have (in that no one is going to randomly have a silver weapon on hand unless they are Larry Talbot), but fucking everyone thinks of silver weapons first thing when they are confronted by the supernatural. When copper coated lead bullets don't work, iron bullets aren't attempt #2, silver is.

As for daylight powerlessness, it's a pretty classic one. I don't think it can be easily jettisoned. What comes next is one or two ways to damper the powers of a character which are overall similarly crippling. Avoiding direct sunlight is frankly not that difficult, especially when so many of your opponents are also trying to avoid it. The thing is that while sunlight is a thing that just happens (avoidable as it may be), pretty much any other occurrence that might rob a creature of their powers is definitionally something that is inflicted upon them by someone on purpose.

It's a tough nut to crack. Whatever it is that dampens the powers of a werewolf is something that Dracula is going to pour all over his floor.

In other news, I think I didn't post this one yet:

---

Progress of Glass
“We do not always see where we go. But we always go.”

The Progress of Glass is a path of Infernal sorcery that deeply investigates the connections between existence and the Dark Reflection. Followers of the Progress of Glass are able to handle different perspectives very easily – some would say that they have already driven themselves mad. In any case, spending so long gazing into mirrors has left them able to write in mirror writing or use reflections for targeting without penalty. Also they end up being very good at driving. A user of the Progress of Glass gains a +2 bonus on Driving tests, a bonus that increases to +4 with Advanced and +6 with Elder Progress of Glass.

Basic Disciplines

• Distant Reflection The character can peer into a reflective surface and see what is reflected off of another reflective surface elsewhere. The character must be within 100 meters per point of Potency of both surfaces, and must have a pretty good idea of where both surfaces are (and yeah, they have to be able to see at least one of them). Using Distant Reflection requires a Logic + Operations check or an Intuition + Perception check. The expected time to get the vision is an hour, but net hits reduce the timeframe.
• Deny the Gauntlet The character can remove the difficulties in moving across gateways into and out of the Dark Reflection. The character spends a Simple Action and makes a Logic + Operations or Intuition + Stealth test and the gauntlet is removed for a specific gateway for a Round. Net hits increase the timeframe. The gauntlet is not hampered for purposes of keeping creatures held in Limbo by Name Bindings.

Advanced Disciplines

• Mirror Pocket The character can create and subsequently access a virtual space within reflective surfaces. Things can be stored in and retrieved from the mirror pocket with relatively little fuss. This looks like a cartoon activity: the character's had passes into the surface causing it to ripple slightly and then some object is left within or drawn out – in either case demonstrably having more volume than the mirror possibly could. Creating a pocket costs a power point, but putting things in or taking things out is free. The character makes a Logic + Operations or Intuition + Stealth check and the mirror pocket has a depth of 20 cm per hit. If the character has Elder Progress of Glass, the depth is 50 cm per hit.
• Rain of Glass Shards of blackened, jagged glass rain down and tear the flesh from the bones of everyone in the area. A Rain of Glass can be sent out as a cone up to 30 meters in length per Potency, or fly out in all directions to cover a cylinder centered on the character with a radius of 10 meters per Potency. Using this ability costs a power point and takes a Complex Action. It does a base damage of 3, and is activated with either an Agility + Combat or Logic + Operations check and resisted like a normal explosion.

Elder Disciplines

• Doppelgänger A reflection is given life and given the task of supplanting the original person. The character makes a Logic + Expression or Intuition + Perception check, spends a Complex Action and a Power Point and then the Doppelgänger takes form by spending a Complex Action crawling out of the mirrored surface upon which the reflection was cast. It then sets about attempting to murder the original and then take over their life. The Doppelgänger is wicked and generally under the command of the character's. When a victim has a Doppelgänger created of them, neither they nor the duplicate cast a reflection until one of them is dead. The double has the base attributes of the target, and the degree of mimicry is set by the number of hits:

  hits	Effects
  1	Extra, no supernatural powers, memories, or even coherent speech.
  2	Can speak like the victim.
  3	Has an Edge stat if the victim does.
  4	Has the memories of the target.
  5	Is a starting supernatural of the type of the victim if the victim is supernatural.
  6	Has a Potency of the victim or the character (whichever is less), has disciplines that the target has.

  
  
• The Smoking Mirror The character controls the vertical and the horizontal. The character spends a Complex Action and a power point and then they can determine what is seen and heard for the rest of the scene. The area covered is limited to Line of Sight, and extends out to 30 meters per point of Potency. The character makes a Stealth + Intuition or Logic + Operations check and observers can only see through the illusion if they get an equal number of hits on an Intuition + Perception test.

-Username17

[schpeelah]

I'm not arguing against Sunlight Weakness, after all you are not supposed to to magic during the day anyway because of the Masquerade. Sacred Ground will probably rarely come up, but if it does, it would be where all the important stuff happens and alcohol is either a combat action or werewolves not drinking ever. Unfortunately I can't think of any replacement other than other celestial bodies showing up, werewolves having powers only when the Moon is on the sky (all day during the 1-3 days of full moon and not at all during the new moon) and mages being dependant on their signs of zodiac or the Jupiter or something like that. Possibly three different patron stars/planets/constellations of the three power sources. Or not.

A Sorcery Discipline granting a bonus to driving is somewhat silly. Can't it be a Perception bonus whenever reflective surfaces are within sight thanks to paying special attention to reflections/mirrors generally being in favor of the character and warning him of danger?

Is a Mirror Pocket linked to a specific mirror? It doesn't say it outright, but suggests it and the ability would be too good otherwise. What happens to objects stored when the mirror is smashed? They appear, are sent to Limbo or lost forever? Can an appropriately large mirror store a person and if so, do they get a resistance roll? Can trapped persons be visible in the mirror (it works that way in fiction usually). Can you access another character's mirror pocket and if not, can you retrieve objects hidden somebody who is now dead. Are there ways to identify a mirror as containing a mirror pocket?

Can a Doppelranger become more real (up to at least 4 hit version I think, otherwise it won't be able to take over target's life) after they kill the target? Since it's a reflection come to life does it have it's left and right the other way than the target? Can you tell them apart using magic (Aura Vision and Thaumaturgical Forensics seem applicable)? Does a Doppelgänger have a true name of any kind, is it different from the target's (being backwards for example) and if not, how does it affect magic that uses names (like summoning or Scorch the Gateway )? Does the Doppelgänger know it's a copy and to what degree (my vote is they are convinced they are the real thing unless doing Doppelgänger stuff requires otherwise)?

[TavishArtair]

I don't think we should really look to make the weaknesses "balanced" to be honest. We already have an explicitly imbalanced power-schedule scheme. The only thing we do have to make sure of is that all supernaturals have a reasonable way that the mob can corral and kill them... it might take a Van Helsing type leading them to get that to happen, but the only really hard guideline is that they should be vulnerable to a gaggle of humans as long as they want to be anywhere near a city. Any vampire (or Nosferatu, whatever) can be dragged out into sunlight (or really, have his house blown open). The mob can arm themselves with iron knives, silver bullets and wooden stakes.

To borrow a page from Sirlin, you could say, that whereas most fantasy games aim for a kind of "Guilty Gear" kind of balance, where everyone has a lot of defenses (a set shared, more or less, between characters) so they don't get randomly punked, and their own unique moveset besides, we're aiming for something more like MvC2 balance: if these things are matched up against each other evenly, it's largely by accident. There should be a counterpick somewhere in the game, though.

[Ice9]

While they might not need to be balanced, I don't think anyone should have too crippling or too irrelevant a weakness either. I'm going to go by the theory that weaknesses should be either prevalent or obtainable, but not both.

Sunlight is prevalent - it's in a lot of places during much of the day. But it isn't obtainable - you can't bring it with you when you fight a vampire at night.

Being especially hurt by iron weapons is obtainable - anyone can get an iron weapon - but it isn't prevalent; not many weapons are iron by default, and for that matter being attacked with a weapon doesn't happen all the time.

But being hurt by water is both prevalent and obtainable, and I think it's a bit too crippling, unless you restrict it to very specific types of water. Same thing with being hurt by the mere presence of iron. Sacred ground is neither prevalent or obtainable, unless you let ground immediately count as sacred with a quick ritual. As such, it's often going to be a mostly irrelevant weakness.


Incidentally, this pretty much just applies to PC types. Foes with no weaknesses or really crippling weaknesses are fine.

[Ganbare Gincun]

More realistically, a character adds their Potency to their caps, and is probably going to want to be maximizing their relevant stats and skills. Sometimes they'll even be able to line up some magic bonuses.

In the description of Akuma, you mentioned that their nonstandard attribute array did not include their Potency modifier or their constant Giant size. Just to clarify: does a creature's Potency score grant a flat bonus to all of their attributes, or does it just allow them to spend points to raise their attributes beyond their normal "racial maximum"? What kind of mechanical bonuses does Giant Size give a given creature? And how many dice is a typical magical item going to grant a creature that uses it?

[Vnonymous]

Weaknesses like "water" and the like are just right out because forcing people to sit out adventures because their character is useless there is stupid.

Tavish is entirely right with regards to the weaknesses.

An extra benefit of this is that we don't need to shoehorn in weaknesses for types that traditionally didn't really have meaningful ones.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Weaknesses like "water" and the like are just right out because forcing people to sit out adventures because their character is useless there is stupid.

But I want the witches of the Dark Reflection to cry out "I'm melting! I'm meeellltiiiinnnggg..."!

That said, taking damage from water would be pretty horrible for were rats. Their polluting it, however, is completely reasonable and cool.

[Username17]

Eclipse Phase should be getting an indepth rant/review later on, but suffice to say I do really like the idea of characters having ideologies. That was handled fairly well in that system. So yeah: Master Passions, Driving Passions, Ideologies.

Back on the subject of disadvantages, people do need supernatural weaknesses shoehorned into them even when they aren't obviously applicable from the source material. It helps make people feel like they are part of the world that there is "stuff" they can do against their enemies.

-Username17

[Gelare]

I am on the edge of my seat for that Eclipse Phase review. Haven't seen a thing about it other than the name and front cover, but I'm intrigued.

[Avoraciopoctules]

Eclipse Phase has a website, though the forums are painfully designed. Seriously, I have never seen a forum whose formatting I liked less in my life.

http://eclipsephase.com/

Here are the selling points for the game as quoted from their website:

System

Eclipse Phase uses a variant d100/percentile system with some twists. The game is fast and simple, streamlined so players can dive into the world and action without being burdened down by complex rules.

Selling Points

For Players

The ability to switch your body at will, from genetically-modified transhumans to synthetic robotic shells, optimizing your character for specific missions.

The ability to back up your character’s mind and be restored from backup in the case of death--a built-in system of “save points” and functional immortality.

Characters are skill-based, with no classes, so players can customize their team roles and specialize in fields of their choosing.

A focused set of psi rules enable some characters to enhance their cognitive abilities.

Playing a role in a secretive and dangerous conspiracy that seeks to save transhumanity.

For Gamemasters

A setting custom-built for numerous scenario types, from faction-based intrigues to high-tech dungeon-crawls, from mind-scarring mysteries to dangerous exploration of alien worlds via wormhole gates.

An eclectic assortment of intriguing factions, from techno-anarchists to future-chasing hypercorps, from soul-trading criminals to uplifted animals.

A range of NPC antagonists to choose from, including rogue AIs, extreme posthuman factions, stand-offish aliens with their own agendas, and transhumans infected and transformed by the virulent Exsurgent virus.

For Retailers

Eclipse Phase will be released as a hardcover, full-color core rulebook.
The core book is just the start of a new supported game line that captures the essence of a popular new genre of science fiction.

Brought to you by the people who were the driving force behind the changes made with Shadowrun, Fourth Edition.

[Gelare]

Man, it's interesting that they come right out and say, "Look, you can have save points!" I'm sure there's lots of implications, but at the very least it seems to encourage risk-taking. I'll hold the rest of my comments for the actual thread about it.

[Vnonymous]

Basically I'm fine with Wood/Iron/Silver as ways to dish out aggravated damage. Silver would be a lot better as a vulnerability to have (in that no one is going to randomly have a silver weapon on hand unless they are Larry Talbot), but fucking everyone thinks of silver weapons first thing when they are confronted by the supernatural. When copper coated lead bullets don't work, iron bullets aren't attempt #2, silver is.

As for daylight powerlessness, it's a pretty classic one. I don't think it can be easily jettisoned. What comes next is one or two ways to damper the powers of a character which are overall similarly crippling. Avoiding direct sunlight is frankly not that difficult, especially when so many of your opponents are also trying to avoid it. The thing is that while sunlight is a thing that just happens (avoidable as it may be), pretty much any other occurrence that might rob a creature of their powers is definitionally something that is inflicted upon them by someone on purpose.

It's a tough nut to crack. Whatever it is that dampens the powers of a werewolf is something that Dracula is going to pour all over his floor.

Yeah, this is where I think we're going to have a problem.

Dracula is going to want to put holy water, silver, alcohol, grains, iron, earth from other countries over his holy-ground situated over a river.

And the werewolf is going to do the same thing except replace silver with garlic or sunroofs. You're going to want to weaken everyone who isn't you, which results in a huge clusterfuck of weakness causing substances.

At this point it looks like you might just be better off making weaknesses drawn from power source or the individual monsters as suggested earlier.

[Username17]

At this point it looks like you might just be better off making weaknesses drawn from power source or the individual monsters as suggested earlier.

Individual monsters is even worse, because that would be like 18 different pieces of crazy things you have to keep in a suitcase of supernatural hunting. Power sources is unacceptable because you'd end up with 2/3 of vampires who didn't give a fuck about daylight.

No, the only option is to have 2 or 3 things whose presence dampens the powers of supernaturals, and just acknowledge how fucking arbitrary that is.

-Username17

[Prak]

Yeah, this is where I think we're going to have a problem.

Dracula is going to want to put holy water, silver, alcohol, grains, iron, earth from other countries over his holy-ground situated over a river.

And the werewolf is going to do the same thing except replace silver with garlic or sunroofs. You're going to want to weaken everyone who isn't you, which results in a huge clusterfuck of weakness causing substances.

At this point it looks like you might just be better off making weaknesses drawn from power source or the individual monsters as suggested earlier.

It's basically the problem Superman's got. Everyone's got fucking kryptonite. Some of them have even been able to create islands laced with the stuff. Eventually some vampire or mage or someone is going to accumulate enough of whatever werewolves are vulnerable to and build his place with floors of the shit, if possible, if it's a liquid, like alcohol, he'll probably have a fire sprinkler like set up with the stuff.

Hell, I've heard OWoD stories of people tricking werewolves into eating silver by putting it on fries (though it shouldn't have worked because it was silver nitrate, or something, not pure silver). Eventually someone's going to do this with whatever werewolves are vulnerable to (alcohol in the batter, I guess.)

And unlike Superman, it's kinda unlikely that anyone's going to be able to team up with a Child of Aether that dresses like a bat to track down every piece of whatever they're vulnerable to and destroy it. Though it is classic for vampires to try and destroy/blot out the sun, werewolves advocating prohibition or trying to find every single piece of silver is kinda... weird. And ratfolk trying to get rid of or pollute every single molecule of water is... futile and bad for life everywhere.

Alright, that said, there are interesting story possibilities if you've got people going around trying to destroy weakness materials, and there are interesting story possibilities in people going around trying to accumulate enough weakness materials to make their lairs inhospitable to their enemies.

I guess, regardless of what the weakness material is, people are going to try and accumulate a bunch of their enemies' material and destroy their own on sight.

[CatharzGodfoot]

I can totally see the Marduk Society building a giant Bond-esque mirror satellite to illuminate an entire city at night. And Moliarti building a giant satellite to blot out the sun over an entire city during the day.

[Ganbare Gincun]

I can totally see the Marduk Society building a giant Bond-esque mirror satellite to illuminate an entire city at night. And Moliarti building a giant satellite to blot out the sun over an entire city during the day.

In the original World Of Darkness, the Technocracy used a system of orbital satellites equipped with mirrors to constantly bathe Ravnos in sunlight when he awakened and started tearing up shit in India Godzilla-style. This did a good job of damaging him, but it was insufficient to kill him. And that's when they deployed the neutron bombs.

[cthulhu]

I could never work out how the technocracy could lose at anything.

[Prak]

I could never work out how the technocracy could lose at anything.

they don't, they just use advanced holograms to make it seem like they lost so they can laugh their asses off at people's false hope.