|
I am so happy that I caught up with the thread in time to see you do 7th Sea 2nd Edition, Mors. 7th Sea has long been my favourite RPG setting, and I was overjoyed when they announced 2nd Edition. However, I will not claim that it is without fault. I'm also pretty sure this is the book that contains what could, for lack of a better term, be referred to as continuity issues. The Corebook did a fair bit of copy/pasting from the 1E stuff, and from hereon out you start to see where they change things. It's never anything huge, but there are a few points where something here is noticeably different from the concept as mentioned in the corebook.
|
#
¿
Jun 27, 2018 21:05
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 16, 2024 11:15 |
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:7th Sea 2 - Pirate Nations: Prison, Pork and Power I just find it infuriating that they didn't bother to think ahead before making the Corebook what changes they might make. It's not like they didn't know they'd be making Pirate Nations and stuff. Argh. Also I forgot to mention it but any pirate ship with a Storm or Sea Losejas is set for life, either because they can cause sudden tidal waves, pinpoint where ships are and stuff or, and I think this is way more useful, they suddenly have control over the wind. I can only believe that literal murders would happen over the chance to recruit one.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 28, 2018 17:31
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:
gently caress yeah. I love Aragosta, mainly because I'm a complete sucker for pirate stuff and Aragosta is the most pirate.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 30, 2018 19:26
|
|
|
Alien Rope Burn posted:Having read Born Under a Black Flag, this was clearly written before the book was seemingly outlined or plotted. For fucks sake, is this series allergic to decent continuity. If you've already established something, stick with it. I don't have a problem with Reis being a woman, and at least they half assed an explanation for the misgendering that she got in the corebook. But they didn't even try that for Allende
|
|
#
¿
Jul 1, 2018 13:57
|
|
|
OvermanXAN posted:I don't know why there would be any assumption that a tie-in novel should trump rulebook statements as far as what's canon to the setting goes, even if it's written by the setting's creator. As for character genders... At a guess they were rushing to get the core book out and just copypasted a bunch of stuff they hadn't determined details on yet from 1E to meet deadlines. It's stupid but I can't really blame them. I don't think anyone's arguing which one is more canon than the other, more that it's dumb that John Wick can't keep the setting straight.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 1, 2018 16:40
|
|
|
I absolutely adore the ATC. I studied History for my undergrad and saw how companies such as these basically hosed over every non-European nation on the planet, so getting to bloody their nose a bit is wonderful for me. But, and I hope I'm not stepping on Mors' toes (and if you think I am, I'll take this bit down) but the ATC being so irredeemably evil fixes one of the biggest problems with old 7th Sea: for a pirate RPG it was pretty hard to justify being a pirate. Giving the players something despicable to fight against, whilst also allowing them to be raiding ships and stealing cargo is a real step up. Previously you could kinda go after, say, Vodacce ships because they're pretty bad but it was pretty hard to be both a Hero and a Pirate. At least in my opinion.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 3, 2018 01:09
|
|
|
I always found it a bit strange that Avalon, being pretty explicitly the most magical of countries, is the only place where there is a defined, limited number of potential sorcerors, seeing as how each Mystical Knight has precisely one person using their powers at any given time. Almost every other magical system in the setting that I can think of has no limit to the number of practitioners, except for the super magical one. And I also hated the goat man being a member of the council of reason, entirely because of my own personal biases. I never find the whole magical creature side of things terribly interesting, being far more invested in the assorted human dickbags trying to do things for the PCs to put a stop to. Although that might just be because I find it a lot easier to have a plot focused around villains scheming and plotting than about monsters doing monster things (which of course meant my players decided to be monster hunters when i ran my game)
|
|
#
¿
Jul 14, 2018 17:44
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:7th Sea 2: Nations of Theah, Vol. 1 - Not The Most Evil Capitalists In The Game, Because ATC . I hate the changes to Val Mokk and Sela Cole. For those who don't remember, in 1st edition Val Mokk was still the head of the Vendel, but he was a thin, tall man best compared to Vetinari, and was also a hero who wanted the best for the Vendel but also had an awareness of the possibility for Capitalism to damage. Sela Cole was still the new head of the Blacksmiths, but was a tall, broad shouldered woman who, whilst a fantastic Smith and leader, was a terrible politician due to being a bit shy and awkward. The two of them also had a shared attraction, a live of romantic literature and a complete inability to make the first move, leaving a clear plot hook for the players to play match maker. Maybe it's just me being a grognard, but I much, much prefer the 1E version to these ones.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 19, 2018 13:29
|
|
|
Finish up the Duology and look at my favourite nation. Nations of Theah Vol. 2
|
|
#
¿
Jul 21, 2018 22:21
|
|
|
I forget, which of the Torg Eternity High Lords is the one from OG Torg?. I always thought that was a cool lil' thing
|
|
#
¿
Jul 24, 2018 00:51
|
|
|
Evil Mastermind posted:None of them, but there's an implication that Quinn Sebastian might be from the original timeline, because the book states he knows as much as someone who went through the original game. Right, yes that was it. Guess my brain got a couple wires crossed. It's still a cool thing though, and I could see it being used by a group that had played both games in a pretty interesting way
|
|
#
¿
Jul 24, 2018 00:59
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:7th Sea 2: The Crescent Empire - Lasers Are Magic. So, now that we've covered it, I can talk about this I loving hate Ashur. I hate literally everything to do with it. I hate its fluff, I hate its mechanics and I Reeeeeeaaaaallllllyyy hate it's magic. I get why it's there. They had been playing assassins creed. I don't get the Lasers but whatever. But everything feels like it should be in a more high powered, more traditional fantasy game. Their leader is the immortal boy sage, who is capable of making people into super cool light bending assassins who also has access to the almost literal garden of Eden. Their magic gets three tiers, which includes the loving Low Orbit Ion Cannon. Sure they can use it only once a story but that's still access to the Low Orbit Ion Cannon. I know I'm not being super coherent but just... My eyes slide off anything to do with Ashur because it's just completely dull to me
|
|
#
¿
Aug 15, 2018 21:35
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:I think having a group that represents the Coptic and Miaphysite Christians in the same way the Vaticine is Catholics is important, and having the Anashid take the place of the Nizari Ismaili is...a choice, certainly, and not a terrible one. Having Assassins fits because Alamut was a real place that had real Nizari fanatics trained to lie or kill to defend the Ismaili. I even like the religions represented in Ashur and I love the Orthodox doctrine and the take on Jesus they went with. I have no issue with the basic idea. The metaphor works. It's just that once you get any deeper, at all, the whole thing gets real stupid (in my opinion). Assassins? Good. Assassins that protect a religious minority? Also good. Assassins that protect a religious minority, who have laser powers and are commanded by an immortal boy sage? Nope, nope you done hosed it all up. If we go near the region in my game, which is mostly set in Eisen so it's not overly likely, I'd fix Ashur the same way I'd fix Assassins Creed: Assassins are a political and social class, and nothing else. They don't experience a thousand deaths, they just train to murder. They don't have an immortal leader who leads to religious implications, they just have a dude. Or a lady. I really, really like the rest of Crescent Empire, but you just have this big shiny "This should be in Forgotten Realms" problem. At least, in my opinion.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 16, 2018 09:12
|
|
|
Mr. Maltose posted:Yeah, I don’t see “assassins that control light” as anything more beyond the pale then “musketeers that rip bleeding holes into unreality”. My issue is mostly with scale, and the fluff that surrounds it. Porté can rip a bleeding hole in reality but you need to do damage to yourself to use it, and you can maybe take your group through it. The Lasers get the Low Orbit Ion Cannon. Sure you can use it only once a story, but thats still more than your Porté can do to level a city block. The closest you get is the Samartian devil dealers, and they have the counterbalance of "Sure, you can ask for the big thing, but it will 100% definitely gently caress you over in the long run." This has no such restriction or counter balance. Take away the third tier, and change the fluff that I hate, and Ashur is fine. But the Man in the Mountain is so baked into the country that you'd have to rework a lot of it.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 16, 2018 11:11
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:7th Sea 2e: The New World - Evil Gods Welp, it's official. I can never let my players read this book, otherwise it's just going to be jokes about alien mantis people kidnapping the old gods.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 6, 2018 16:57
|
|
|
FATAL AND FRIENDS: Chapter 0: Introduction I love Vampire: The Requiem. The original corebook was one of the first RPG books I ever owned, and despite having never got a chance to truly play it, I remain up to date with all of the releases it has. Which brings us to today’s subject: Half Damned. One of the more recent releases for nWoD Vampire (I know, Chronicles of Darkness but this is my personal little bit of groggery), Half Damned deals with those on the fringes of Vampire society: The Dhampir, The Revenants, and The Ghouls. (These are, in order: The offpring of a vampire and a human, not-full vampires that often form from corpses and humans fed vampire blood like the weirdest form of blood doping, giving them superpowers). So, in a nice change of pace for a World of Darkness book, the moment we’re past the table of contents we aren’t plunged into a fiction segment, but a brief overview of the components of the book, as well as a discussion of the themes relevant to each. For Dhampir, it’s about family, which manifests either in “Ooooh let’s go all in on spooky vampire poo poo” or “gently caress YOU VAMPIRE DAD!” with a side helping of being an oracle. For the Revenants, it’s about pining about becoming a Real Vampire, being angry because you can’t control your emotions brought about by being a vampire, and trying to find a place in Vampire Society (so that you can become a real vampire). For ghouls, it’s about being an eternal servant, about being a blood addict, and about trying to climb that final rung to become a Real Vampire. Next it talks about inspirational media and is mostly pretty boilerplate. It goes through the ones for each segment of the book, and is weird about its formatting: Some things are Bolded like this whereas others are “just put in quotation marks” with no real rhyme or reason that I can see.  See what I mean? EDIT: Mors Rattus posted:That's actually a fairly standard style for citing works - bolded means it's a book, while quotes is a movie or TV show. Citation of the two differs, y'see. As Mors pointed out here, it's actually a form of citation that I was unfamiliar with! Whoops! Nothing particularly interesting in the inspirational materials list beyond recommending the Anita Blake books, which from what I’ve heard are not something anyone sensible should be reading, and the fact that it highlights a First Edition VtR book for Dhampir, but not the one for Ghouls. This book serves as somewhat of an update for both of them, and so it’s funny that only one is mentioned here. As a final point, these are probably going to be coming out thick and fast, as I am currently unemployed and have very, very little better to do with my time, and this is an interesting book for a number of reasons. I wouldn’t be surprised if I get another segment out today, also because this segment is short as hell and there’s not that much to say about it. Next time: “gently caress YOU VAMPIRE DAD” Part 1 Hattie Masters fucked around with this message at 16:18 on Apr 2, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Apr 2, 2019 16:07
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:That's actually a fairly standard style for citing works - bolded means it's a book, while quotes is a movie or TV show. Citation of the two differs, y'see. Huh, I honestly didn't know that. Thanks for pointing that out!
|
|
#
¿
Apr 2, 2019 16:19
|
|
|
I remember when the Exalted Questionnaire was first making its rounds, I was in the initial stages of joining an Exalted game that I would later mention in the RPG Stories thread (and not in a good way.) One of my first red flags was that most of the players didn't see why the questions were incredibly stupid.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 2, 2019 17:03
|
|
|
Dhampir, Part 1 This is where we get our first hit of White Wolf Fiction, which isn’t very interesting and involves a vampire throwing a hissy fit at a Dhampir, who does something that isn’t well explained that spooks him. So, Dhampir. The chapter proper starts with a particular eye-rolling paragraph saying that they aren’t just a watered down vampire, they are “whatever [they] say [they are], and gently caress you for thinking you know better.” This tells me nothing at all about what they actually are, so I’m left feeling pretty cold. Thankfully, this is immediately followed by asking an interesting question: Why would a Vampire create a Dhampir? It notes that accidental Dhampir are basically impossible, as creating one requires both means and motivation. The motivations are varied, the examples given range from the earnestly wanting a family, to “gently caress you, you can’t leave me we’re gonna have a kid”, to having a useful pawn in Vampire Politics, to “gently caress it I’m sure I can use this for Vampire Science!”. So far, so Vampire. There’s also rules for a roll to prevent yourself becoming attached to your new half-vampire baby in between the Means and Motive. The only interesting thing is that an Exceptional Success on this roll causes an immediate crisis of conscience, whereas the regular success doesn’t. So, we know why they would make a Dhampir, but how do they do so? Content Warning: Here be Sex stuff, as well as discussion of things that can cause miscarriages. Nothing that immediately makes me go “oh god that’s awful” but if you don’t wanna read about Sex and Pregnancy Stuff, skip the rest of this post. Honestly, the first time I read this section back in 2017 I said to myself “I need other people to know about this because this is both incredibly dumb and really funny to me.” The first method described is just simple plain Missionary Sex For The Purpose of Procreation. Sometimes it works. It’s very rare though. The second is embracing a woman who is pregnant, and it explicitly says the later you do so, the better the chances of the baby surviving. The next bit discusses the reverse situation. Supposedly, if a man impregnates a woman and then is turned into a vampire, it can cause his sperm to retroactively become vampire sperm and the baby to be a Dhampir. This was the bit that made me have to stop reading for a bit because the idea of Retroactively Magical Vampire Baby Batter made me laugh enough to draw me out of things. Apparently, ghouling the mother or just injecting the father’s vampire blood into the foetus can help this too. The following paragraph then immediately contradicts the first one, saying that no you can’t just have regular sex with a Vampire, you have to do weird stuff. This is partially a prelude to introducing Cruac and Theban Sorcery rules for creating a Dhampir, but it just seems odd to me that you have the text contradicting itself on the same page. So, thoughts. A lot of this is very interesting from a reader’s point of view, but it begs the question: Why? Maybe this is my own personal biases coming through, but I find the idea of saying at the gaming table “Yes I want to have vampire sex for the purpose of procreation for [insert reason xyz], now gimme dice I gotta cast my sex magic.” If I was going to be playing a Dhampir, I wouldn’t need to know the methods used to birth me. The motivations bit is far more reasonable, as it can inform player backstory and relations with the setting, but the rest just seems a tad gratuitous, especially since it contradicts itself. I’d say this is one of the weaker parts of the Dhampir section, but from what I remember, it gets better from hereon out. Next time: gently caress You Vampire Dad Part 2: Covenant and Clan opinions
|
|
#
¿
Apr 2, 2019 20:14
|
|
|
As the reviews have gone on, I've gone from thinking RIFTS is hilarious and poorly made, to thinking that Kevin Siembieda is an awful person who I can't think about to long without angrying up the ol' blood. Also not that anyone is waiting on it but I do plan to return to Half-Damned. Life has been... not amazing to me lately.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 17, 2019 15:54
|
|
|
Alien Rope Burn posted:[*]Burkha the Magnificent (9th Level Mystic): A Rahu-Man (four-armed giant) who's convinced the fall of Tolkeen will cause a domino effect leading the Coalition overrunning most of North America. This turns out to just be a delusion on his part, because of insert reason of your choice here. He'll probably live and... join... the resistance. Get in line, Burkha. Yes because the expansionist, fascist, genocidal empire definitely won't be a threat to more places if it wins and thus has more territory, resources, and fuel for rhetoric. You're just being silly! Get hosed, Kevin.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 19, 2019 10:11
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 16, 2024 11:15 |
|
|
I’m hungover, I’m tired and I want to talk about Vampires. So let’s resurrect this sucker. So, when we last left off we discussed how Dhampir are actually made. Now we get onto more of the fluff aspect of the section, discussing where and how the dhampir fit into vampire society. Each covenant gets its own little spiel on how they view dhampir, how the dhampir are used by them, and why it can sometimes kinda suck. They are as follows: Carthians: Carthians like dhampir. Sorta. They like them as they can be useful, and there are some straight up Dhampir Supremacist elements apparently, and there are others that don’t like them so much they go on secret raids and make kangaroo courts. The Circle of the Crone: The Circle of the Crone, being big into generic witchy stuff, really like Dhampir and have their own rituals for causing it, which even includes occasionally just having a vampire baby for no reason other than to satisfy a ritual and create dhampir orphans. The Invictus: To be an Dhampir in the Invictus is to have a really, really bad life. The book outright states this, in almost those exact words. They are treated as slaves and property, and in the covenant all about ladder climbing, you aren’t even allowed to touch the ladder. There’s also a mention of a “half-blood director” who might be pulling strings but it doesn’t really give anything more than a vague “this might be a thing” The Lancea et Sanctum: The Vampire Catholics raise Dhampir to be vampire killers, and apparently some of the vampire kiddos end up getting really into the dogma and become travelling preachers, preaching fire and brimstone. One of the more interesting approaches in the book, to be sure. The Ordo Dracul:Chances are you’re gonna be a guinea pig for your vampire parent’s weird experiments, but you can get in and be treated as a proper member. But because you can never actually learn the Coils of the Dragon, you’re never gonna be in the inner circles of the covenant. The following section is on how the clan of the vampire parent affects the child and to be honest it is not especially imaginative. Take the basic stereotype of the clan and apply it to child raising and personality. Surprise, the Daeva’s kids tend to be hedonists and are raised by narccisists. Surprise, the Gangrel’s kid is flighty and violent. The actually interesting bit is the coda: How the other supernaturals interact with the Dhampir. Werewolves are… mostly okay with Dhampir. They know that they can be dangerous and a mess, but apparently mostly stay out of each other’s way. Mages like using them as catss-paws (sic) against the forces of the Abyss, and apparently Daeva Dhampir and Thyrsus get on like a house on fire. Changelings and Dhampir are noted as geting along very well indeed as their backstories (assuming the Dhampir is on the run from Vampire Daddy) are not entirely dissimilar. Demons and Dhampir was not only the most disappointing D&D rip-off, but the most interesting of these little write ups, as apparently Dhampir cause Demons to get very uncomfortable. Why? Because, to quote the book quote:To look at a dhampir is like an uncanny valley effect, almost but not quite Unchained, and so very wrong. Demonic instincts misfire and misjudge them, subconsciously assessing them like fellow Unchained, leading inexperienced demons to feel out of control. Unsafe. And if there’s one thing they hate,it’s feeling unsafe — off-balance and vulnerable. Next time: Are you there God? It’s me, Half Vampire Margaret or Growing up as a Dhampir
|
|
#
¿
Aug 17, 2019 17:53
|
|