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Comrade Koba
Jul 2, 2007

theironjef posted:

Our first three or so episodes are completely terrible, to be fair.

This made me go back and check, which in turn led to the discovery of the old (2013-ish) Afterthought videos. :allears:

How much money do we need to drop on the Patreon to make you do more of those?

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Evil Mastermind
Apr 28, 2008

I've been running 13th Age organized play for about three years now, and I can say it's really not Pathfindery at all. It plays very quickly, and it's a good way of easing people out of "D&D thinking".

I'm not saying it couldn't let go of one or two things, but in practice I feel it works better as D&D than 5e did.

Like, you know how I always say that while Dungeon World hangs on to too many D&D-isms, but because of that it works really well as a bridge to help people move from D&D to other indie games? I feel that 13th Age is in the same wheelhouse, only with more crunch.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

JackMann posted:

Sorry. I just prefer the written reviews for a few reasons. For one thing, it's a lot easier to stop partway through and come back to it. For another, I like your jokes and asides that you're not getting into as much here. I like being able to just stop and internalize the information without having to scramble for the pause button, and to be able to just scan back through the last line without having to try and get the track back to where it was.

It works with something like System Mastery because Jon and Jef are good about bouncing things off of each other, and I'm okay with dealing with the problems of the format there. However, I just don't feel like going audio here gains enough to be worth the issues. Granted, you're also doing this for the first time, but I feel like you're just not as entertaining here as you are when you write and post.

It's fair enough. I think some of the upcoming parts might be more entertaining when I get fed up with some of these stupid adventures (I don't think it's a spoiler to reveal that they're pretty dumb), but I'll let folks make that judgement. I figured this was a safer space for self-indulgence.

It's all already done so I won't be changing horses mid-stream, but things will be back to text with the next book.

Green Intern
Dec 29, 2008

Loon, Crazy and Laughable

theironjef posted:

nothing builds a rhythm like the beats of conversation.

Put that on a shirt or a mug or something.

gourdcaptain
Nov 16, 2012

Alien Rope Burn posted:

Thanks for the feedback! It's sufficiently niche that finding another person willing to talk with me about books like this feels unlikely - I was always kind of shocked occamsnailfile was willing to work with me on going through some books that are obscure even by Palladium standards. It's an experiment, though, so I'm willing to accept it might not be the best idea. Most of what I listen to myself are two or three person podcasts, so it's probably a stronger format in general. I realize the "single person rants about something" is strangely something I see a lot more on youtube than podcasting.

I think the reason you see more of those on video platforms is it's easier to keep up energy when you have visual accompaniment - either someone taking about it onscreen and getting their mood across more strongly or being able to show visuals from the work in question. Also, if you do more of these it'd probably be worthwhile to get a better hosting platform than Dropbox especially if it's a free account (recently Strike had some issues with that, and maybe set up an RSS feed to make it easier to get into Podcatching apps. That's only if you decide to commit to this, though.

theironjef
Aug 11, 2009

The archmage of unexpected stinks.

Comrade Koba posted:

This made me go back and check, which in turn led to the discovery of the old (2013-ish) Afterthought videos. :allears:

How much money do we need to drop on the Patreon to make you do more of those?

Oh man, I always forget those are on the internet still. Jon's still super into that as a concept. We basically need a decent location to film, and then we can do some board game reviews, live conversation interviews, maybe actual play stuff, I dunno.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

gourdcaptain posted:

I think the reason you see more of those on video platforms is it's easier to keep up energy when you have visual accompaniment - either someone taking about it onscreen and getting their mood across more strongly or being able to show visuals from the work in question. Also, if you do more of these it'd probably be worthwhile to get a better hosting platform than Dropbox especially if it's a free account (recently Strike had some issues with that, and maybe set up an RSS feed to make it easier to get into Podcatching apps. That's only if you decide to commit to this, though.

Oh yeah, dropbox is definitely just me presuming the number of people listening is only in the single or low double-digits at most, but I don't know how many lurkers are out there. If I wanted to do something more serious I certainly wouldn't be opening with Rifts Index & Adventures Volume 1. :v: But if it becomes a bigger thing I'd have to look to an actual proper means to host podcasts.

Nuns with Guns
Jul 23, 2010

It's fine.
Don't worry about it.

PurpleXVI posted:

Based on this review, I'm kind of baffled why anyone would play 13th Age. It feels kind of... Pathfindery, an attempt at "fixing" D&D without actually understanding what needs fixing.

Having never read 13th Age myself, the way people talked about it I always thought it was far more FATE-esque, a lot more narrative.

Some of that is the general exhaustion a lot of people here feel towards D&D and D&Disms. (Which is understandable when you have a hobby overrun with permutations and knockoffs of it.) If you need a game that does D&D, 13th Age is a functional and simple (core book formatting aside) version of it. It falls flat for a lot of people because the more unique and appealing aspects are often underdeveloped and don't deliver on the interesting potential they have. It also manages to twist its ankle on some of the D&Disms it feels obligated to retain, which is especially grating

Maxwell Lord
Dec 12, 2008

I am drowning.
There is no sign of land.
You are coming down with me, hand in unlovable hand.

And I hope you die.

I hope we both die.


:smith:

Grimey Drawer

PurpleXVI posted:

Based on this review, I'm kind of baffled why anyone would play 13th Age. It feels kind of... Pathfindery, an attempt at "fixing" D&D without actually understanding what needs fixing.

Having never read 13th Age myself, the way people talked about it I always thought it was far more FATE-esque, a lot more narrative.

To me it's my go-to if I want to run a slightly more narrative kind of D&D, with much simpler rules than 5e or 4e. It's not a pure FATE game but it does encourage a certain player buy-in to the setting, the balance issues are all within the realm of easily glossed over in play, and it's just a lot easier to pick up.

Like, I feel that beyond any comparisons to 4e the problem with 5th was it didn't simplify *enough*- it kept too much fiddliness.

RocknRollaAyatollah
Nov 26, 2008

Lipstick Apathy


Chapter Two and Chapter Five: The Clans of Caine and the Gifts of the Blood

In this segment we are going to look at the Brujah, Gangrel, and Lasombra. I would do four but the next one is the Cappadocians and they get their own review because of Necromancy. :hb:

Brujah
Nicknames: Zealots, Philosopher-Kings, Rabble (Derogatory)



The Brujah to me have always been the standard, generic vampire. You could argue the Ventrue are kind of that but the Brujah always struck me as your standard Blade, Anne Rice vampire. In the metaplot they’re kind of generic vampires too because they are the base of the Anarchs and the Sabbat. They’re also one of the many groups involved in the Russian Revolution and the Soviet Union, which actually goes back to their backstory.

Brujah, the clan founder, was a hot head that often came into conflict with his contemporaries due to his passions and drive to understand the Cainite condition from every angle. In order to temper this he sired Troile after Noah’s flood.

Editorial Note: Troile’s gender is ambiguous and not because of any descriptors or Troile being androgynous. I’ve seen Troile described using feminine pronouns and this book uses masculine pronouns. It doesn’t really matter too much because they are long gone by this point in time and they're possibly buried with the ruins of Carthage, which we’ll get to that.

Troile was embraced because he was cold and calculating while Brujah was ruled by his passions. Brujah believed this would check him from overstepping and going out of control. The opposite actually happened and Brujah attacked Troile and in self-defense Troile accidentally diablerized Brujah. The other Antediluvians were understandably pissed and Troile defended his actions, claiming it was necessary to use murder in order to preserve the peace that existed between Cainites and mortals. The Antediluvians were convinced and Troile lived. Caine returned and didn’t agree with Troile and cursed Troile. Troile and all Brujah descended from him would be cursed by three times the passions of Brujah. Troile would wander and eventually come to Carthage, where he would attempt to recreate the First and Second Cities. This worked until the Venture and Malkavians of Rome destroyed Carthage. Troile is believed to have perished in Carthage.

Editorial Note: It’s heavily implied that Troile is buried under Carthage and may or may not have been recovered in modern times. The fall of Cathage is also more than just the Ventrues being dicks too, the Baali are involved and Troile had possibly turned to infernalism. Either way, the finer details don’t matter because it’s about the broad strokes.

I kind of think this is a bad write up because it’s all about Troile and their downfall. While this does give some ideas of how Brujah are and why they always keep trying to build vampire utopias, it doesn’t really tell you much about them as individuals and their role within Cainite. I guess they are generic vampires after all and generally fill the role of generic fighting person half the time due to their discipline set. They’re called Philosopher-Kings but they don’t really tell you why. They’re also called Zealots but you’re not really sure as to why.

Appearance: Brujah generally dress like people of their station in real life dress. They embrace everyone from clergy and knights to peasants. It’s all based on the time, place, and needs of the sire. They tend to stick to knights and clergy though because they want people who have an education and high intelligence, though the two aren’t mutually exclusive at all.

Havens and Prey: Brujah seek out large groups of people and tend to dwell by them. When they’re embraced, they usually dwell with their sire but I imagine that’s common. Recently likeminded Brujah have been forming communal havens where they philosophize and training together. They refer to them as “packs” and that’s a little something we call foreshadowing because the Anarchs and Sabbat operate in “gangs” and “packs”. Many of the institutions in Masquerade can be seen forming in the Dark Ages and that’s kind of cool.

Clan Disciplines: Celerity, Potence, Presence

Weakness: Brujah suffer from the terrible curse put on Troile and frenzy rolls are two points more difficult than normal. They can also never spend Willpower to avoid frenzy but can spend a Willpower to end a frenzy.

Organization: Brujah are often at odds with each other but if they can ever agree on something and dedicate themselves to a cause as a group, they’re pretty powerful. Usually a sire and childe will have a teacher, student relationship but the childe will eventually get their own big ideas and run off. Brujah will often organize in small groups too, like in the haven section, and are usually bound by a common philosophy.



Gangrel
Nicknames: Outlaws, Wolf’s-Heads



The Gangrel are pretty much clan Wolverine and are generally the other combat clan in the game. They have a nice discipline set for it so it’s not a bad fit either.

The Gangrel are essentially forest dwelling loners. They in many ways generally loath humans and humanity and prefer to live in solitary and rely on loyal animals, whom most can communicate with through Animalism. Although they prefer to be loners, they do interact with humanity and other vampires when they chose to, not because they have to in order to survive. They do this because they like to walk their own path and NO DAD, I DON’T NEED YOU OR MOM TO HELP, I’M MY OWN MAN.

Appearance: The Gangrel are pretty mutable and practical in their dress. They dress however suits their needs and don’t really care what others or society thinks. Some Gangrel may be particular about the image they present to their herd because they want to make it known that they are their herd and theirs alone.

Haven and Prey: Gangrel pretty much live where they want to, they’re outlaws. They live wherever they can and it’s not noted here but Gangrel with enough levels in Protean can sleep wherever they like. Some Gangrel tend to their herds like farm animals, watching over them and practicing husbandry, while others operate like spiders, luring in their prey.

The Embrace: The Gangrel tend to brutally embrace people, grabbing them, embracing them, and then abandoning them soon after. They usually watch their childe from afar but it sounds super traumatic, more so than the usual embrace.

Clan Disciplines: Animalism, Fortitude, Protean

Weakness: When Gangrel frenzy, they take on physical or mental traits that resemble those of local vampire myth or regional predators or scavengers. Overgrown eyebrows and patches of fur are examples given. The traits gained raise the difficulty by 1 on a relevant pool and give one automatic failure on that test.

Organization: There is no set organizational structure for Gangrel and it differs from place to place. Sometimes they organize themselves, sometimes they don’t. Most hierarchy tends to come from respect earned through deeds or displays of power.



Lasombra
Nickname: Magisters



The Lasombra are one of my favorite clans and were originally intended to be a shadowy, har har, antagonist clan. They’re one of the leaders of the Sabbat, along with the Tzimisce, but this is some time before then. White Wolf tends to have a dark, shadowy leader clan in their breakdowns and the Lasombra fill that role, like the Shadowlords do in Werewolf or the Unseelie Courts in Changeling. The Lasombra have a pretty great write up and it’s pretty flavorful.

The Lasombra are the children of Lasombra, most vampire clans are named after their Antediluvian but no all, and he is still around in a way. He’s in torpor in the Castle of Shadows, being watched over by his eldest childe, Montano. Montano is kind of his kind of the manager of Lasombra’s affairs and handles contact or traffic into Sicily by Lasombra. Lasombra doesn’t really contact people from beyond torpor and is allegedly troubled by dark dreams and the Abyss, which is a real place in the World of Darkness.

The Lasombra themselves are usually tied to religion, being true believers in it or using its trappings for personal gain. At this time there an ongoing war in Iberia between the Christian and Muslim Lasombra over dominance of the peninsula, the Shadow Reconquista. Christian Lasombra send aid to the Christians through the Church and the Muslims have begun soliciting outsiders like the Assamites for aid. Jewish Lasombra are typically neutral but the Gentiles vie for them to come over to their side. The Christian Lasombra are also home to the Cainite Heresy. They believe that vampires, due to Caine being marked by God, are themselves holy beings akin to angels. This tends to be viewed as blasphemous by outsiders and a dangerous belief the exposes vampires to mortals.

Appearance: The Lasombra are a diverse bunch and tend to dress extravagantly, even if they are a religious official who is not supposed to do such. It’s all about displaying one’s rank and power.

Haven and Prey: Some Lasombra from wealthy backgrounds maintain their family estates and pretend to be their heir or ancestors. This allows them to feed on their family and servants while maintaining their holdings. Others establish secluded, lavish estates to not draw attention on themselves. The Caninite Heresy often feeds on their congregations, telling their parishioners it is a blessing to be fed upon by such a being.

The Embrace The Lasombra usually embrace childer who were among the wealthy or powerful in life. They will also frequently embrace those from more humble backgrounds if they displace ambition and intellect.

Clan Disciplines: Dominate, Obtenebration, Potence

Weaknesses: The Lasombra cast no reflection and they take an additional level of aggravated damage from the sun or sunlight. They are creatures of darkness after all.

Organization: The Lasombra have a secret society call the Amici Noctis, the Friends of Night. Membership is by invitation and they only invite those who have proven their value to the clan. Within the Amici Noctis are the Courts of Blood, whom any Lasombra can petition to deem a Lasombra unworthy of being a Lasombra. If found unworthy, that vampire can be diablerized without penalty from the clan. If a Lasombra is diablerized by another without the Courts of Blood approving, they are themselves marked for diablerie. They’re powerful in Central Europe but Montano has banned them from Sicily and the Shadow Reonquista has pushed them out of Iberia due to their avowed neutrality in the war.



Disciplines
For the write ups on Celerity and Presence, please see my previous post here.

Animalism
Through this discipline the vampire taps into their beast and can communicate or command animals. Without this discipline or the Animal Ken skill, animals will react negatively to vampires because they’re dead and wrong. The reaction is different but it’s your standard, horror movie, animal freaks out because of a monster reaction.

Level One – Whispers to the Wild: This power allows a vampire to reflexively communicate with an animal. If they change themselves to make animal sounds easier, such as turning into that animal, they can communicate easier. The animals will not do anything that puts them in danger or is grossly out of nature for them. They could even run and alert their master if they feel threatened. It’s Doctor Doolittle, not Dominate.
Level Two – Call the Wild: The vampire can call out to a type, either broad or narrow in type, and they will peacefully come to the vampire. If the vampire calls all the wolves in the area, they won’t immediately start mauling them for instance. The number of animals summoned depends on the number of successes made on the test.
Level Three – Songs of Serenity: The Cainite can exert their beast on others, cowing them and making them complacent. It can either be done through fear or by soothing them by bringing them down to your level. This power works on mortals and vampires. Mortals who are affected by this power can’t gain or use willpower. When the power is used on a frenzying vampire, they get an additional roll to resist frenzy and vampires under the effects of this power can’t be driven to frenzy.
Level Four – Subsume the Spirit: The vampire can possess an animal through eye contact. The number of successes determine what powers the vampire can use while possessing the animal. Five successes can allow the vampire to even use powers like Thaumaturgy. When the power ends, the vampire displays nervous ticks and behaviors similar to those of the animal for a number of nights equal to the number of successes made on the activation. They can shake these for a willpower point.
Level Five – Unleash the Beast: The vampire forces their beast from their body and pushes it into the body of a vampire or mortal. If the vampire fails the activation, the vampire enters frenzy. If they get one success on the activation, the beast possesses a random bystander, on two the user is stunned but the transference is successful, and on three or more the beast is transferred without incident for the user. With their Beast gone, the user can’t use or regain willpower and can’t frenzy. The victim, if a vampire, their difficulty to resist frenzy is up by 2 and if they are a mortal, they now have a Beast like a vampire. The user of the power has to coax their Beast back, either by showing they’re the superior host or they can kill the current host.

Dominate
Dominate is essentially the vampire mesmerism power of legend. A vampire, by making eye contact, can force their will upon a target and force them to do what they command. The power has three limitations, you can’t use Dominate on a vampire of lower generation, it just doesn’t work and automatically fails, you have to have eye contact, and the vampire has to be able to verbalize their commands in a common language. The vampire can use gestures or imagery but I would argue the ST has to determine how well the target understands.



Level One – Command:The vampire can make a simple, single word command that a target must obey if they succeed a test against the target’s willpower. The command can’t be life threatening, directly harmful, and contrary to their Nature. It can be something like, “Stop.” Anything that’s in a sentence doesn’t work. The number of successes determines how successful the command will be interpreted. Indirectly harmful and conflicting commands are more difficult.
Level Two – Subjugation: This is the advanced version of Command. The Cainite can issue a longer command to a target after a period of mesmerism where they don’t break eye contact or are interrupted. The vampire can choose when they act on the directions. A subject can’t follow two dominate instructions at once and the process doesn’t create false memories or illusions. You pretty much get your own Manchurian Cadidate but they will remember the process until…
Level Three – The Forgetful Mind: The vampire can remove memories and replace them with ones of their creation. The more thorough and precise the vampire is, the more effective the rewriting is. The more successes you get, the more memories you can alter. A vampire can also see the signs of use of Forgetful Mind with this power as well.
Level Four – Conditioning: After an extended test gaining a number of success equal to 5 times the target’s Self-Control or Instinct, the vampire can strip a subject of their personality and fully control them. Once under the effects of conditioning, the target can be Dominated by the user without eye contact and the user is at -2 difficulty to use these powers against them. Other vampires who attempt to dominate the target have to do so against the master’s willpower if higher and the target of Conditioning can spend a willpower to interpret this Dominate command as contrary to their nature.
Level Five – Possession: The vampire, after engaging in a clash of wills with a target, erodes their willpower to 0 and possesses the target’s body. The more successes the user gets, the more disciplines they can use in their new body. Like with Animalism, 5 successes lets the vampire use all of them. If the original body of the user is destroyed, they can remain in the host body but must test to stay in the body every sunrise. If they fail this test and their body is gone, their soul is lost in the astral plane. The vampire can’t be embraced in the new body, they just die. I imagine this is because a vampire’s soul is already “dead” but that’s a vague and complex thing that comes out WoD metaplot chat.

Fortitude
A character’s level of Fortitude gets added to all Stamina dice pools, including their soak rating for bashing and lethal damage. The vampire can also use their Fortitude level in dice to soak aggravated damage, which vampires normally cannot soak and mortals can never soak. Once per turn they can spend a blood to automatically soak their Fortitude rating in damage, including aggravated damage that is not from fire or sunlight. It’s generally a good investment as a discipline and greatly increases the vampire’s survivability.

Obtenebration
Obtenebration is the control and shaping of shadows. No one really knows where this power originates, as it seems like it’s drawing on more than simple shadows. Ancient Lasombra believe it draws on a primal being, such as Ahriman from Zoroastrianism. Others believe that is draws from a realm of shadows, such as the Hell of the Abrahamic faiths or the Tartarus of Ancient Greece or Roman. More scientific Lasombra believe it’s the manifestation of the Lasombra’s vampiric nature made manifest. Which is pretty Lasombra because they’re all about having the will to power. The power, regardless of its origins, is terrifying and unnerving, defying explanation and natural law.



Level One – Shadow Play: The user can move and control existent shadows, they cannot create them with this power. The shadows can be moved from their original sources as well. These shadows can be used to improve social rolls, making the target dramatic or intimidating, or to help stealth rolls.
Level Two – Nocturne: The vampire can summon a cloud of darkness that engulfs an area and blocks out light. The cloud is 10 feet in diameter and can be created within 50 yards of the user. The creator has to concentrate on it as well or it disappears once their concentration is broken. Perception checks receive a steep penalty but uses of supernatural sight powers, Auspex or Protean, and the Darksight merit reduce this. The cloud, a breach from the Abyss, saps two from Stamina pools and if this reduces a mortal to zero, they suffocate.
Level Three – Arms of Ahriman: The vampire creates tentacles of darkness that they can wield and manipulate as though they are appendages. The character can create one, six foot tentacle per success that must originate from a source of darkness within 20 feet of the caster. The tentacles share the Strength, Dexterity, and Stamina of the user and can be made stronger or longer by spending blood. Each tentacle has 4 health levels and doesn’t soak aggravated damage. The use of this power requires concentration too so you’re not illuminating a manuscript or anything while you beat a peasant to death with your shadow arms. It’s expensive too if you decide to beef up the tentacles because modifications are done on each tentacle individually.
Level Four – Nightshades: The vampire can create shapes and illusions out of shadow. Each success can create a human sized illusion or can be pooled for a big one. It’s hard for onlookers to see through these illusions, which is a difficulty 9 test. The user can alternatively show the onlookers the Abyss and its denizens, casing fear in those without Obtenebration, lowering all their dice pools by 2 and initiative by 3.
Level Five – Tenebrous Avatar: The vampire can become an avatar of the Abyss after spending 3 blood points and spending 3 turns transforming. The vampire cannot deal or receive physical damage but can summon the Arms of Ahriman from themselves for a blood point. The vampire can also engulf a victim in shadows, which reduces their dice pools by the user’s Obtenebration rating. If the target is a mortal, they are smothered if their stamina is reduced to 0. This is a level 5 power and the max Stamina for a mortal is 5, you do the math. The vampire, once becoming darkness, destroyer of worlds, takes twice as much damage from sunlight and fire and 1 to the difficulty of Rotschreck tests. Unsurprisingly, beings of darkness from the darkness Hell dimension hate fire and sunlight.

Potence
Each dot of Potence adds one die to all Strength-based dice pools. Spending one blood turns a dice roll into a number of automatic successes equal to the vampire’s dots in Potence. This also translates over to damage rolls in hand to hand combat. This power has a lot of utility and can be pretty powerful at higher levels.



Protean
This is a transformative power that focuses on the user, unlike Vicissitude, and allows them to take on qualities of their beast. The vampire can use most Cainite powers once changed but it’s up to ST discretion. Items close to the vampire’s person and not bigger than a large hip bag. That means things like cloaks, swords, or large packs are going to get left behind.

Level One – Eyes of the Beast: The vampire’s eyes glow and they can see in the dark. This power lowers dice pools for social rolls with mortals, obviously because you are a satan, but raises dice pools for intimidation.
Level Two – Feral Weapons: The vampire can reflexively push talon like claws through their hands, feet, or even from their head or face as horns or tusks. The claws deal Strength +1 aggravated damage so the vampire would be pretty lethal to other vampires and rip through mortals like tissue paper, remember they can’t soak aggravated damage. This can be combined with Potence by the way if you can afford to use both at once. Climbing becomes more difficult because you’ve pretty much become Lady Deathstrike. I would also rule that fine manipulation is impossible because you have unwieldy monster claws.
Level Three – Earth Meld: The vampire can merge with the soil after spending a blood point and a turn becoming one with the earth. The vampire can sense danger and rolls their Road rating to arise and deal with the threat. Digging out the vampire requires a five success strength roll and the vampire will awaken, angry and ready.
Level Four – Shape of the Beast: The vampire can change into the shape of animal that’s determined by the local vampire myth. The process takes three turns. Most vampires in the Christendom can turn into a bat or wolf and it’s always a flying form and nonflying form. In this form they can use disciplines if it makes sense but a wolf isn’t going to be doing Necromancy. The rules for a wolf, bat, and rat are presented. The wolf and rat can do aggravated damage but their strength is reduced to that of their form. A vampire in rat form isn’t going to be caber tossing.
Level Five – Lurking Mists: The vampire can spend a blood point and turn into a cloud of mist. This transformation takes three turns and allows a vampire to move through cracks and move across the narrowest of ledges. They can be blown of course by a strong wind but they can’t be broken apart. The Cainite can also use any disciplines they would physically be able to use but they can’t attack anything, including other vampires in mist form. The power is pretty straightforward and I would imagine it’s incredibly useful on your average blasted moor or moonlit bog. Only aggravated damage can harm the vampire but fire and sunlight do one less die of damage.

BONUS ENTRY: Abyss Mysticism
Abyss mysticism is a series of rituals that are an outcropping of Obtenebration. You can’t do Abyss Mysticism without having ranks in Occult, at least 3 ranks for Occult, or Obtenebration. It’s also harder to do rituals without an Occult specialization in this area. The level of rituals you can do is capped by your highest ranks in either, up to level of 8. Among the Lasombra it’s kind of a niche thing. Most view Obtenebration as a tool and not something to study further. These rituals also involve communing with a Hell dimension so most religious Lasombra avoid it for that reason and those on a Road other than the Road of the Abyss quickly give in to their beast due to studying the Abyss. Using these rituals marks the users and can confer Flaws on the user because again, you are tampering with a Hell dimension. No seriously, this is where God sent the fallen angels as revealed in Demon the Fallen. It’s the closest thing there is to a Christian or Islamic Hell in the WoD.

Level One – Pierce the Veil: The caster conjures a ball of darkness they look into that gives them the Darksight merit. The vampire’s eyes turn jet black and have no reflection in order to reflect taking on the mien of the Abyss. If they fail, nothing happens, if they both, the effect becomes permanent and they gain it as a flaw.
Level One – Eyes of the Abyss: The caster summons Abyss elementals through a ritual where they crush a bare flame with their hands, not that easy for vampires. Once they succeed the Rotschreck test and the Occult test, they summon a tiny Abyss elemental. The elemental is incorporeal and obeys all commands. It can mentally communicate by entering a person’s shadow but if they communicate with a non-mystic, they have to make a courage test and gain a derangement if they fail. On a botch, the derangement is permanent. The elemental ca fly 30 yards per turn but is instantly destroyed by fire or sunlight. A level two version, Talons of the Abyss, exists and is the same but the shadow elementals can interact with corporeal world and attack.
Level Two – Subsume the Darkness: The user meditates on the Abyss for a full turn and calls upon it to heal any damage they have. A both causes one level of aggravated damage. Each success allows the vampire to heal 2 levels of lethal damage or 4 bashing with a blood expenditure, about double healing, and ignoring generation limits. The Abyss in turn consumes blood the vampire gains from feeding until it has been paid back the difference in healing costs. The ritual stains the user’s soul, causing the mystic’s blood to turn unnaturally black, to a degree where it absorbs all black. Any mortal who sees the vampire’s blood has to make a Courage check or be shaken by the sight, taking penalties.
Level Three – Balthazar’s Revelation: The ritual originates from the Kiasyd bloodline, who are originally a Lasombra bloodline and are now much broader during the dark ages. The user enchants a small object, like a coin, and the person who picks it up is afflicted by a derangement of the caster’s choosing and sees shades and other entities if they fail a Willpower roll. It’s a level 9 difficulty but they subtract their Obtenebration rating from that. This hampers their Perception and Courage rolls.
Level Three – Calling the Hungry Shade: The caster paints a circle in their own blood and summons a hungry shade. The shade’s state levels are equal to the vampire’s Obtenebration levels but caps out at 4. The difficulty for the summoning is 9 but it lowered by each additional participant up to the main user’s Occult rating. The shade is the size of an adult human, has the same rating in Obtenebration of the caster and any other disciplines the caster knows equal to their Obtenebration levels. If the ritual is botched, the shade attacks the summoner.
Level Three – The Third Eye of Richard Argentis: The caster spends 10 minutes and summons an eye on their forehead. When summoning it, they choose how much blood they invest in it, and it will reflexively protect the user from ambush. The eye will spend one blood to automatically react to the surprise and summon and Arm of Ahriman that can act immediately. The user can expend more blood traits from the Eye to summon more. Once all the blood is expended, the eye dissipates.
Level Four – Reflections of Hollow Revelation: The mystic summons a Nocturne, the suffocating shadow cloud, and shapes it into a scrying orb. With it, the mystic can look upon one object, place, or person that they have personally witnessed. This lasts a scene or until the target leaves the vicinity. This requires concentration and makes the caster less aware of their surroundings. Characters with Obtenebration or Auspex have a chance to notice someone or something watching them from the shadows.
Level Five – Whispers in the Dark: The vampire summons a Nocturne like in Hollow Revelation but thinks on a single question. The caster then swallows the Nocturne and goes into torpor as their consciousness goes to the Abyss. The caster makes occult checks until they’ve amassed enough successes to answer their question. Each roll takes place over a night and if the caster fails a roll, the gap between nights gets longer and longer. The caster, when returned to their body, is forever tainted by the Abyss. They have a -1 difficulty to intimidate targets and +1 difficulty on social rolls. This is not cumulative so you can do it multiple times and not accrue more penalties.

The next post in this review will cover the Cappadocians and Necromancy. :ghost:

RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 19:41 on Apr 1, 2017

Cease to Hope
Dec 12, 2011

RocknRollaAyatollah posted:


The Gangrel are pretty much clan Wolverine

so they're a canon mystery that was finally resolved by the third successor publisher and turned out to be a huge boring disappointment?

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!
I feel like the One Unique Thing is underrated because even though there isn't much to it. There's something about just telling people "It's okay to play a fantastical concept." that's pointedly freeing after decades of D&D players wagging a finger if you wanted to play a svirfneblin, or have met a god once on the road, or even just coming from a royal background. In short, getting poo poo for anything that isn't being a peasant from one of the corebook races. It may seem forced but fantasy games have been restrictive as gently caress traditionally, which is ironic when you consider the name of the genre.

RocknRollaAyatollah
Nov 26, 2008

Lipstick Apathy

Cease to Hope posted:

so they're a canon mystery that was finally resolved by the third successor publisher and turned out to be a huge boring disappointment?

This is pretty much all of Vampire the Masquerade but replace third publisher with the second. Sometimes White Wolf themselves did that in the Gehenna book but I think they did that to poo poo on their often terrible fanbase and their slavish devotion to continuity.

EDIT:

It's not to say Onyx Path is bad, they're not, but Masquerade had so many loose stories and mysteries where the mystery itself was more interesting. Most of them had no real bearing on the game itself and half of them I think came from the fact that writers never got to play out their scenarios or storylines. It was very much like comic books in that regard.

RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 19:59 on Apr 1, 2017

Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

Alien Rope Burn posted:

I feel like the One Unique Thing is underrated because even though there isn't much to it. There's something about just telling people "It's okay to play a fantastical concept." that's pointedly freeing after decades of D&D players wagging a finger if you wanted to play a svirfneblin, or have met a god once on the road, or even just coming from a royal background. In short, getting poo poo for anything that isn't being a peasant from one of the corebook races. It may seem forced but fantasy games have been restrictive as gently caress traditionally, which is ironic when you consider the name of the genre.

Basically, yes. It also helps tell people 'You can have a cool concept in one sentence', which can be very helpful sometimes; there's a sort of tendency towards 'I need to have a ton of backstory to have an interesting character' in fantasy.

OUT is fine, even good. Icons are even fine in their current state as mostly-mechanically-irrelevant but a quick little way to describe who you expect to oppose or work with. The problem with icons isn't the paucity of mechanics, it's that there are mechanics, and the game should either decide it wants to go all in on them as a resource system and implement them more mechanically, or back off a bit more and make it even easier to make up your own icons. The basic idea of 'There are very important organizations and people, and you, through luck or design, really matter to a couple of them' is also a good idea for helping people get past the idea of playing as nobodies. Icons and OUT work fine for concept generation and that's their most important function.

Doresh
Jan 7, 2015

Cease to Hope posted:

While I can't say I miss fallen paladin shenanigans, 13th Age doesn't carve out any new replacement niche. Heavily armored holy warriors who support their allies already exist: clerics. The relative paucity of player options in 13th Age means many classes have "take an ability from a different class's list" as an option, which means the paladin is even more obviously derivative and unnecessary than usual.

Imagine a fantasy heartbreaker where the "classes" are just talents you pick.

Evil Mastermind posted:

Like, you know how I always say that while Dungeon World hangs on to too many D&D-isms, but because of that it works really well as a bridge to help people move from D&D to other indie games? I feel that 13th Age is in the same wheelhouse, only with more crunch.

I'm kinda weirded out that "People got so hooked on D&D that we are now doing careful babysteps to get them away from that stuff" is a thing.

Gobbeldygook
May 13, 2009
Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

Put this racist on ignore immediately!

Doresh posted:

I'm kinda weirded out that "People got so hooked on D&D that we are now doing careful babysteps to get them away from that stuff" is a thing.
They have to carefully ease the poor, stupid peasants into S.M.U.G.

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



Doresh posted:

I'm kinda weirded out that "People got so hooked on D&D that we are now doing careful babysteps to get them away from that stuff" is a thing.
A gigantic chunk of the hobby in terms of population are people who play D&D. Not "Roleplaying games, mostly D&D" but "D&D." If they're aware of other games that aren't "basically D&D" at all it's probably like "Vampire," or maybe "there's a Star Wars one isn't there?"

So in a lot of cases it's not "you're dealing with people who have been literally brainwashed/mind controlled/damaged/whatever," it's "meet them halfway with your new thing." Then maybe in a few months they'll get on board if you want to run Apocalypse World or DDPF or WWWRPG or whatever the gently caress.

Doresh
Jan 7, 2015
I just don't have the mindset of someone who is all about one rules system and one alone.

Nuns with Guns
Jul 23, 2010

It's fine.
Don't worry about it.
D&D is a big drain in terms of price and time (to read the books/roll the characters/design the campaign/run a session), and it's ubiquitous to the hobby. So you get a lot of people hit hard by the sunk cost fallacy and the assumption that every other tabletop game must require the same level of money/work.

Cease to Hope
Dec 12, 2011

Doresh posted:

Imagine a fantasy heartbreaker where the "classes" are just talents you pick.

wasn't this the elevator pitch for GURPS?

Dareon
Apr 6, 2009

by vyelkin

Nuns with Guns posted:

D&D is a big drain in terms of price and time (to read the books/roll the characters/design the campaign/run a session), and it's ubiquitous to the hobby. So you get a lot of people hit hard by the sunk cost fallacy and the assumption that every other tabletop game must require the same level of money/work.

I was that way for a while. Learned with D&D in the early 90s, and the only other systems I became aware of were more complicated things like RIFTS, so I figured ttrpgs were all huge mathfests with a dozen unique nouns and acronyms. I was probably correct at the time, because early 90s.

My mind was loving blown when I got introduced to PBTA and FATE.

gradenko_2000
Oct 5, 2010

HELL SERPENT
Lipstick Apathy

Nessus posted:

A gigantic chunk of the hobby in terms of population are people who play D&D. Not "Roleplaying games, mostly D&D" but "D&D." If they're aware of other games that aren't "basically D&D" at all it's probably like "Vampire," or maybe "there's a Star Wars one isn't there?"


This is true. There are any number of people for whom the hobby isn't "roleplaying games" but rather "D&D". It's kind of like going up to people and asking them if they want to play "Catan" rather than "boardgames"

This is also exacerbated by the ability to rewrite huge swaths of "Catan" so that you end up using it to simulate the Ardennes, the Battle of Hoth, Hastings, and Helm's Deep.

(and I mean this very literally in that there are some pretty committed people out there who convert D&D 5e to Star Wars, Dark Souls, and Mass Effect. On top of the official LOTR sourcebook and the Magic the Gathering setting books)

theironjef
Aug 11, 2009

The archmage of unexpected stinks.

gradenko_2000 posted:

This is true. There are any number of people for whom the hobby isn't "roleplaying games" but rather "D&D". It's kind of like going up to people and asking them if they want to play "Catan" rather than "boardgames"

This is also exacerbated by the ability to rewrite huge swaths of "Catan" so that you end up using it to simulate the Ardennes, the Battle of Hoth, Hastings, and Helm's Deep.

(and I mean this very literally in that there are some pretty committed people out there who convert D&D 5e to Star Wars, Dark Souls, and Mass Effect. On top of the official LOTR sourcebook and the Magic the Gathering setting books)

I have whole section of emails from people trying to get us to review D&D that's MLP flavored. It's not gonna be funny, we review games, not internet subcultures having bad conventions three years ago.

LaSquida
Nov 1, 2012

Just keep on walkin'.

theironjef posted:

I have whole section of emails from people trying to get us to review D&D that's MLP flavored. It's not gonna be funny, we review games, not internet subcultures having bad conventions three years ago.

Unrelated to MLP flavored D&D, do you guys happen to have a copy of Waste World to review?

Count Chocula
Dec 25, 2011

WE HAVE TO CONTROL OUR ENVIRONMENT
IF YOU SEE ME POSTING OUTSIDE OF THE AUSPOL THREAD PLEASE TELL ME THAT I'M MISSED AND TO START POSTING AGAIN

gradenko_2000 posted:


(and I mean this very literally in that there are some pretty committed people out there who convert D&D 5e to Star Wars, Dark Souls, and Mass Effect. On top of the official LOTR sourcebook and the Magic the Gathering setting books)

I gotta say that I literally did not understand the appeal of Tomb of Horror style D&D until I played Dark Souls and had fun dying to brutally hard enemies and strangely placed traps. It all sounded like total bullshit until I cleared Sen's Fortress, now I get the appeal. The game knows it's trying to gently caress you over, you know it's trying to gently caress you over, we're all on the same page so let's crawl through some dungeons.

This is all assuming the game is playing fair, which I understand isn't always the case.

Cease to Hope
Dec 12, 2011

gradenko_2000 posted:

and I mean this very literally in that there are some pretty committed people out there who convert D&D 5e to Star Wars

including WOTC, who did so profitably and reasonably successfully for a decade

JackMann
Aug 11, 2010

Secure. Contain. Protect.
Fallen Rib
There's definitely room for Tomb of Horrors style gaming. It's just that a lot of gamers don't get what you need to do to make it work, and how it works against other styles of gameplay they might be trying to get at the same time.

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!

Count Chocula posted:

I gotta say that I literally did not understand the appeal of Tomb of Horror style D&D until I played Dark Souls and had fun dying to brutally hard enemies and strangely placed traps. It all sounded like total bullshit until I cleared Sen's Fortress, now I get the appeal. The game knows it's trying to gently caress you over, you know it's trying to gently caress you over, we're all on the same page so let's crawl through some dungeons.

That being said, I think things are different when it's a single player game where nobody has to sit anything out because their character fell into a Pit of Infinite Fuckery. You die in Dark Souls, you're back in about thirty seconds back at the fire. You die in Tomb of Horrors, if your lucky they have a wish or something to drag you back with, otherwise, tough luck, you're at least out until they can ship your bits to The Chapel of Express Resurrections.

I think if you want to have that kind of game it's perfectly legit but there are issues with that sort of game that old-school D&D barely addresses if at all.

Robindaybird
Aug 21, 2007

Neat. Sweet. Petite.

There's a reason why some people run Tomb of Horrors with Paranoia-style Six Pack sheets - still hard, but less sitting around because you died in the first room.

theironjef
Aug 11, 2009

The archmage of unexpected stinks.

LeSquide posted:

Unrelated to MLP flavored D&D, do you guys happen to have a copy of Waste World to review?



We do not and it looks awesome!

LatwPIAT
Jun 6, 2011

RocknRollaAyatollah posted:

It's not to say Onyx Path is bad, they're not, but Masquerade had so many loose stories and mysteries where the mystery itself was more interesting. Most of them had no real bearing on the game itself and half of them I think came from the fact that writers never got to play out their scenarios or storylines.

One of the few things I don't like about Revised and V20 is that they've been pushing the "Only 13 vampire Clans"-angle hard. There's a lot of build-in ambiguity and mystery in the setting about the origins of vampires and while orthodox Noddism claims that all vampires descent from the thirteen grandchilder of Caine there's different origin stories all over the place, like the Baali claiming to be descended from a fourteenth Antediluvian who only converted existing vampires, the Nagaraja who claimed to have been spontaneously created by necromancers, the early Tremere who were clanless vampires, etc.

Revised and especially V20 has made sure we know which of the 13 Clans each and every bloodline belongs to; no mystery origins or questions about vampire origins here!

Alien Rope Burn
Dec 5, 2004

I wanna be a saikyo HERO!


Rifts Index & Adventures Volume 1, Part 2: “G.M. Note: The scout’s fever makes him immune to the creature’s mind control powers, something that may serve the group well.”

There are times when trying to write a blurb for Rifts Index & Adventures Volume 1 review that I have to think “Hundreds of thousands of years as a species has brought me to this. To this.” Then I drown my sorrows in chocolate banana milk like the damned useless monkey I am.

This is probably one of the rougher parts since I was just getting into the swing of things? Well, it’s a rough adventure. For rough GMs. I tried listening to this in the car and, boy. Podcasters make recording stuff sound easy, literally.

Here’s part 2 of the review! Death is now closer for us all.

Also, here’s the visual guide for part 2.


A man named Redge.


The “Cloud Thing”.

Next: Caverns and Dragons. (It's time for some accuracy over alliteration.)

DAD LOST MY IPOD
Feb 3, 2012

Fats Dominar is on the case


maybe it's just hometown (review) pride but I will defend the TOMB OF HORRORS to my dying day. Any sap can kill off PCs like chaff. Traps within traps, metagame fuckery, that dispel magic trap... the TOMB OF HORRORS has style.

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



Isn't the whole thing with Tomb of Horrors that it was an adapted con module, so either you'd have one-off characters or you'd bring your character from your home game and, presumably, could honorably go home and pretend the whole thing didn't happen if you got super hosed?

I mean unless Gygax burned your character sheets. Maybe he did. Possibly after rolling up a fat doob with his ill-gotten licensing profits.

ZeroCount
Aug 12, 2013


When we played through the Tomb of Horrors we just let people who died make new sheets and rejoin the party as soon as they were done.

Mr. Maltose
Feb 16, 2011

The Guffless Girlverine
I remember one of those Gary's Soapbox articles in Dragon where he talks about a con game where a player died doing something stupid and Gygax just taking his character sheet from him so unless you were keeping copies you would lose a dude.

senrath
Nov 4, 2009

Look Professor, a destruct switch!


Robindaybird posted:

There's a reason why some people run Tomb of Horrors with Paranoia-style Six Pack sheets - still hard, but less sitting around because you died in the first room.

The only time I ever ran Tomb of Horrors I asked the players to prepare a backup character so they could jump back in if they died. I later realized I should've had them bring more than one backup, but we all had fun anyway.

Count Chocula posted:

I gotta say that I literally did not understand the appeal of Tomb of Horror style D&D until I played Dark Souls and had fun dying to brutally hard enemies and strangely placed traps. It all sounded like total bullshit until I cleared Sen's Fortress, now I get the appeal. The game knows it's trying to gently caress you over, you know it's trying to gently caress you over, we're all on the same page so let's crawl through some dungeons.

This is all assuming the game is playing fair, which I understand isn't always the case.

The 3.5 version, at least, was pretty drat fair. Nothing in it really messes with how 3.5 works by default, to the point where it's possible to build a character to solo the thing that can be run without foreknowledge of what to expect and do it at a level below what the module expects any PC to be.

I'd comment on the earlier versions, but I've never actually played them.

Doresh
Jan 7, 2015

theironjef posted:

I have whole section of emails from people trying to get us to review D&D that's MLP flavored. It's not gonna be funny, we review games, not internet subcultures having bad conventions three years ago.
You mean that thing that started out as a fan project and then turned into an actual 3rd party campaign setting (or even Pathfinder-style Heartbreaker)? Man, that's like the 50 Shades of RPGs.

Count Chocula posted:

This is all assuming the game is playing fair, which I understand isn't always the case.
Dark Souls is fair and let's you respawn. The Tomb does neither.

Bieeanshee
Aug 21, 2000

Not keen on keening.


Grimey Drawer

LeSquide posted:

Unrelated to MLP flavored D&D, do you guys happen to have a copy of Waste World to review?



Wow. That looks like Human Occupied Landfill if it was an Atari 2600 cartridge.

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ZeroCount
Aug 12, 2013


The problem with running the Tomb is that certain parts of it have gotten iconic enough to spread through the public consciousness regardless of whether you played it or not. A lot of people know about the orb of annihilation trick for example and are never going to fall for it.

EDIT: Then again, the Tomb's reputation precedes itself so anyone mentally prepared to play it isn't going to be sticking their arm inside a statue's mouth anyway.

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