/cofd/&/wodg/ Chronicles of Darkness and World of Darkness General

Why?

Forces has needless speedbumps that Dave promised to do away with.

Prime is absolute wank and fails to do anything it's supposed to do. And the things it CAN have weird caveats and don't fit all the Practices like they should.

Got any examples?

Dispel Magic and Supernal Dispellation.

Forces - Earthquake being in 5 dots, despite causing bashing damage. People argue that because it affects surrounding buildings it needs to be higher than 3 dots, but that's what the Scale spell factor is for not raising the Practice. Also it's in Unmaking, which is beyond retarded.

Prime - Everything. Phantasms and create Tass are replaced with Platonic Form, which is useless at actually creating Phantasms or Tass. Dispelling is now so underpowered it is useless. TRUTH is added as a purview but it doesn't expand on it beyond the lowest practices. Mana manipulation is pushed back a few dots for no good reason, another speedbump.

Dave hates Obrimos and I have no idea why.

Some new information from DaveB on Deviant from the forums. Not a lot, but could be quite interesting once we see what happens.

>We're looking (and Deviant is still pre-writing, we're talking experiments with dice pools that don't even have names) at Deviant having more than one of some traits that have been singular so far, combining some things that are normally separate, and lacking others entirely.

I see nothing wring with these.

Call me stupid here but I'm really having a hard time seeing how dispelation is underpowered now (honestly, you guys at these threads are way better at seeing these system related things than me). As for the platonic forms, I agree.

Getmians (exalted) already have duplicates of a single trait held by other splats.

Beasts already lack a fuel trait held by others.

Nothing original here

Unless you spend 2 Reach, you have to eat a gigantic dice pool penalty (bigger than you'd think after needing to boost Potency above the enemy Mage's Withstand) to make it last longer than 1 turn.

Either of those options cripples you when you also invariably need to spend Reach on Sensory Range and Instant Casting.

>I have mostly written off Mage 2E as usable at least until they actually make a printed version, but this is a thing that is quite apart from what Time/Fate can or can't do.
That's pretty fucking stupid, desu fampai

You can't ask the Ether because the Ether doesn't know. It just knows the underlying symbols. If YOU don't know what you say is true, the spell can't.

You don't even need a lore explanation: there's a mystery for you.

It should be Making, logically, but I can see why it would be Unmaking. Should really be a bigger version of Shaping, in Matter.

That's far from "unusable". Not even as bad as 1e.

>It should be Making

It should be Fraying. Affecting a wide area is only applicable if you want to spend dice penalties on Area, just adding more dots to the arcarnum needed is exactly the type of speedbump that Dave promised 2e would remove. It's in the wrong practice for no reason other than perceived game balance (which considering that Time 2 can kill you before you were born is retarded).

>*Affecting a wide area is only applicable if you want to spend dice penalties on Scale

Tell me about Getmians.
Mummy also did both energy and morality different.
I was trying a D&D morality hack... Two Werewolf style Alignment tracks. Good/Evil and Law/Chaos, with Neutral in the middle. Some acts would even "break towards Neutral". Doubt that's what Dave means, but two moralities, at odds with one another, would be neat.
Making or Unmaking Matter.
Making Forces. You create a major disturbance.

Matter isn't all fun and roses either.

Alter Integrity is still not fixed, literally years after Bill Bridges promised to look into it.

We still don't know what happens if you turn iron to oxygen and someone breathes it or you burn something with that oxygen and then collapse the spell.

Et fucking cetera.

Matter got fucked over too, but at least Moros have Death still

Obrimos have nothing.

>Tell me about Getmians

They have Yin & Yang essence pools, their Charms (powers) have different effects depending on which pool you use to power them.

>Obrimos have nothing.
and they can't even use Death!

I WANT TO GET OFF MR BROOKSHAW'S WILD RIDE

>We still don't know what happens if you turn iron to oxygen and someone breathes it or you burn something with that oxygen and then collapse the spell.
Those are dumb questions that should be up to the ST. I'm boring, so for me the answer is "nothing".
What's wrong with alter integrity?
Neat, I guess

Death is best.

>Anyone got suggestions for core Mysteries?
Less mechanics, more questions like this
notice me user-sempai

>Those are dumb questions that should be up to the ST. I'm boring, so for me the answer is "nothing".
What do you mean by that? The oxygen doesn't oxygenate, or what? Or it doesn't turn back at the end of the spell, making the effect a Lasting change to the Fallen World, or WHAT? "Nothing" can't happen, something would have to happen one way or another.

>What's wrong with alter integrity?
It has the option to be Lasting and thus can stack with itself an arbitrary number of times, yet no one actually uses it for anything. It should make un-Dissonance-able superbuildings possible at the very least, or unbreakable armor and weapons, at the personal scale.

I mean that after it gets respirated, it went turn into iron and kill someone. It becomes part of their Pattern, just like regular oxygen.

I don't see the problem with alter integrity. I wouldn't let it stack, but also super-amazing mundane material causes Dissonance. At least, that was how it worked in 1e. If its so great, why do you say no one uses it?

>what are Rotes
>what is Advanced Duration
>what are Aimed Spells

>alter integrity
>Withstand: Durability
Every time you make it better, you have to take more penalties to affect it again. It can reduce something to the durability of a sheet of paper, but that's more immediately obvious to sleepers.

In 1e, there used to be a combo where an item could be turned into an improvised weapon that has a damage code equal to its Durability and magic didn't have Withstand. Alter Integrity was Covert and Lasting by default to boot, so stacking it to countable infinity was mechanically trivial. Haven't heard of any ST that ever allowed it though.

>>alter integrity
>>Withstand: Durability

You can Informed-scum around it, since Withstand doesn't work against critsuccesses, but ok, that's a valid argument for it being somewhat fixed.

>I don't see the problem with alter integrity. I wouldn't let it stack, but also super-amazing mundane material causes Dissonance. At least, that was how it worked in 1e.
Except it doesn't produce dissonance the same way holes from consecutive fireballs or healing several distinct wounds with Life wouldn't, since it's Lasting and thus fully a part of the Fallen World, and the item it affected is not an Enhanced Item, but just a better item.

>I mean that after it gets respirated, it went turn into iron and kill someone. It becomes part of their Pattern, just like regular oxygen.
This means you can get Lasting matter transmutations by running a (transmute undesirable thing to desirable thing) — (transform desirable thing chemically, mundanely, into a compound of desirable thing) — (transform it back).

This is a thing that should be clear from the text. It's not a minor thing that can be adjudicated, it's a major fucking thing which has implications for a lot of stuff!

For example, you can't use transmuted gold for producing orichalcum because it's not fully "real" gold, and the spell knows it's partially not-gold, so the sublimation process doesn't work and you need to have 10 kg of mundanely sourced gold per 1 kg of orichalcum. If your rule works like you say, this means you can at Matter 4 turn sand into gold, transform it to auric trichloride, then collapse the spell and heat it to get undispellible, Lasting, fully "real" gold.

And that's only one major thing I can name, there's probably dozens more.

>Informed-scum
Requires ST consent, which fixes the problem for the ones that don't want to deal with that shit. (or they just mandate that you explain what your intent is with every spell in setting terms and they'll decide the conditions you get)

>Enhanced Item
>Additionally, dots can be spent to directly enhance the item.
A dot can provide +1 to the item’s bonus as a tool, a point of
Structure, or a point of Durability.
It's literally an Enhanced Item without the sanctity of merits provided by spending exp for it, just like player made Imbued Items don't give you the merit, but all its benefits.

>transmutation
Chemistry and nuclear physics are part of the Lie.
Symbols react to one another in different ways, which would either be left as a Mystery or explained in the Sings of Sorcery chapter for Alchemy. Likewise, the mechanics for sourcing orichalcum and other perfected metals haven't been introduced in 2e, outside of a nod to the Forge Masters' existence.

There's a bit of a disconnect between Living and Nonliving patterns, despite the main difference from 1e (indefinite durations) being gone in 2e. Their interaction with fallen materials for sustenance and the like doesn't introduce a symbol of "x molecules of H2O" into the pattern, but influences other symbols as the nonliving pattern is subsumed. Drinking water might remove Dehydrated. Drinking alcohol might add Intoxicated. If you need a mechanical way of approaching it, think of programming/metadata tags.

Nonliving patterns under magic reacting with other nonliving patterns and the specific result of the aftermath are a niche case that the writers neither considered, nor gave a shit about. Magic is supposed to be intent driven. What do you want?

>Money? Funky chemistry?
Dots in Resources, there are RAW spells that can do it.

>Meeting a story specific material component?
Work with your ST. If they wanted to make it trivial, you'd be using Down and Dirty spellcasting already.

>You can Informed-scum around it, since Withstand doesn't work against critsuccesses, but ok, that's a valid argument for it being somewhat fixed.

Isn't Informed on information only?

Informed applies to skill rolls.
It's basically saying "you've researched enough to guarantee success, roll to see if you do extremely well instead".

However some people like to think it applies to spellcasting where you're using a Rote.
I do not.

Question for Mage the Ascension: would a character with Life 3, Prime 3, and Spirit 3 be able to "diablerize" people for Quintessence/Tass?

Maybe Deviants will have separate tracks relating to how consuming their power is and how it affects their mental state?

Wait is that all?
so let me think for a bit...

Suppose someone cast a ward on their apartment(room not building; you walk past the door without a glance), lets say, Incognito Presence (Mind ••) pg 160.

Suppose I want to get me and some buddies into said apartment, and better, I'm a Mastigos with a single dot in prime. I don't want my idiot friends provoking clash of wills and letting him know we were at his damn house, so we are dispelling it.

So, for a single scene, I want in. I cast dispel magic. 1 mana for casting a non ruling spell.

I have Gnosis 2 and prime 1(3 dice), so I suck, lets add a point of willpower(6 dice), my mage too(7 dice)l, and concentration as we are just looking around(9 dice).

As for reach, I want advanced duration and instant casting. 2 reach. I get 1 for free and am using my favorite tool so paradox chance die.

Now for dice penalties. I NEED 3 potency for this spell to work. Period. -6 penalty.

So in the end I have 3 dice, costs 1 mana(if I was Ob it would be free and my pool would be bigger), and a paradox chance die, but I get to walk into his house without provoking clash of wills and letting him know me and any number of friends(the spell is off for everyone, not just me) visited. Just enough time to hide some stolen shit under his bed(they are doing it I'm concentrating damn it). This lasts the whole scene.

So, 1 dot seams nice to have to fight other people of the same path as you.

Problem being, in concentrating on the apartment so you could even construct the Imago for the casting of the spell, you'd provoke a Clash of Wills.

>Now for dice penalties. I NEED 3 potency for this spell to work. Period. -6 penalty.
I fucked up. Forgot the 1 free point. -4 penalty. so 5 dice at the end.

shitty spell example yes, but my point is still there. dispel magic isn't total garbage, its a 1 point wonder that without a rote you can use to help fight off other mages of the same path.

Though yes, ignoring that little niggling problem, Dispel Magic is fantastic, and it's a good idea for the Obrimos to try and teach his Cabal the basics of Prime if only so that you can Dispel a wider range of Arcana.

Wait I just thought of something.

Could a Obrimos cast Dispel magic with advanced scale with like a -2 penalty and dispel all the spells owned by anyone with the Obrimos's arcanum who have fewer then potency dots in said arcanum in that whole apartment building?(if they were good)

lets do a new example.

So an Obrimos with prime 2, force 1, fate 1, mind 1, time 1 and Gnosis 1 wants to tell everyone with those above magic hanging around, "go fuck yourself"

He has 3 dice at start, add a rune carved into the dirt outside and a tool and he has 6 dice. No cost just time.(lets be honest here, a mage built like this would have this spell as a 3+ rote and not scratching the ground with a rune, but we are not adding a rote bonus because we are better then that.)

1 reach for advanced duration, 1 reach for advanced scale, 1 reach for instant casting and for fun 1 advanced potency. 4 reach. 2 free. With dedicated tool this is a chance die.

With a -2 penalty he can raise the potency of this spell to 3. 4 dice and a paradox chance die to tell everyone in "A large house or building" who has 2 or less in any of the above arcanum to go fuck themselves as their spells are shut down for the scene. This spell would require a potency 5 dispel magic to suppress(the effective caster level would be prime 4 thanks to advanced potency).

IF the mage is willing to drop a Willpower then they could risk raising this spell to be potency 4, turning off all spells cast by peasants who don't have at least 3 dots in the spell they are casting.(a mage with a good rote might be able to risk going higher, but again we are better then that)

So, is this possible? a part of me thinks it could be broken or I'm wrong. It is very likely I'm wrong. I hope.

Well firstly your Rune takes 3 hours to draw.
Also you're also investing a lot of points in low-rating Arcana.

But kudos, you can blanket dispel an apprentice's hung spells within a building's area, including every spell you decide to cast.

It's hardly broken.

What happens if your Withstand trait rises after you already have a spell cast on you? Does it not affect them? I couldn't find anything concrete in the book. If it does push the potency down further, you could Wards and Signs after the fact to just ignore spells cast on you (especially ones not normally allowing a Withstand because W&S applies to all spells). Even better, but perhaps OP, is if the spell's origin/controller gets to decide whether it actively withstands or not - throw it on an enemy and watch all their spells wink out.

Withstand is only considered when the spell is cast...
Most of the time.

If you're adding your skill, it's a skill roll.

[citation needed]

[counter citation needed]

You're the one asserting a positive. "It doesn't say it's not one" could be used to justify literally anything.

Eh, +2 Reach makes Exceptional Luck blanket affect casting rolls, sooooooo...

From a rules standpoint, I can see how that would be interpreted.
But looking at the fluff of the Informed skill, and Mundras, your personal Skill Mundra is only a key to unlocking Supernal power, and cementing the Imago in your head.

I don't really see research as helping with that.

oWoD question, whats the black spiral?

"The Dancers' totem is Whippoorwill, whose mad call the Dancers emit during their hunts. They name themselves after a mysterious Labyrinth that exists in the realm of the Wyrm; they are said to "dance" this Black Spiral to gain dark powers and wisdom. Indeed, to dance the Black Spiral and survive is considered by the Black Spiral Dancers to be the most sacred of feats.

The practice of "dancing the spiral" to find communion with spirits can be traced back to many ancient shamanistic traditions, including those of the Picts. Led by the guidance of their spirit totems, those who walked the spiral could commune with the elemental forces of the world. As part of this, saner Black Spirals profess that the Wyrm originally represented a force of balance, not only between the Weaver and the Wyld, but between light and shadow. The Wyrm's servitors prevented either force from growing too powerful and upsetting the balance of creation. When the Weaver trapped the Wyrm, this balance was shattered. To being anew, the Pattern Web has to be torn down and the world be reduced into ist basic components."

From the wiki page on Black Spiral Dancers.

gay old werewolf shit

So how bad is Beast. I've heard conflicting reports about how it is. Though they all mostly agree that it's improved from the leak or preview or something.

>Damn I was hoping it was closer to being finished.

It's aimless and a bit of a mish-mash because of them having tore-write the fluff without changing the mechanics after the leak backlash, but personally I like it.

Mostly what said. I had some strange hopes on the build a monster front, as well as the connection to other splats that I'm not sure exactly how they would have manifested if I had gotten them, but I don't get the feeling it was attained. I wouldn't say it's flat out terrible anymore, but it doesn't really scratch any itch I need scratching.

Oh, also, me too on the Deviant front. I'm a big fan of pretty much all of the inspirational material. I've got a crazy idea in my head of a minor Ring working with a Fractal and a Deviant spawned by a GM-controlled Cult-Corporation.

oWoD kind of bad.

Fuck you don't spread lies

You're right, I'm sorry.

It's fucking terrible, not kind of bad.

Original Beast was a cringeworthy bullshit stat about otherkin taking "justified" revenge on the cis white males for being what they are.

New Beast is about being a monster who eats tears and tries to justify their bullshit by "teaching lessons". It's devoid of direction, has mostly justified villains, and tries to remain relevant and excuse this lack of actual cohesion by parasitically feeding off of more popular splats, who are all their "family". A claim to which most other splats should respond to with disgusted retching. Oh, also certain elements are horribly bullshit. Not quite "Fate Arcanum" bullshit, but still ludicrously so.

>and tries to remain relevant and excuse this lack of actual cohesion by parasitically feeding off of more popular splats, who are all their "family".
BROTHEEERRRRR!!!!

>A claim to which most other splats should respond to with disgusted retching.
Or at the very least confusion.
>Vampire is using Obfuscate to stalk someone so they can feed.
>Notices a cardboard box has been following them the whole time.
>"What the hell are you doing here David?"

Does anyone know if the Black Death era in the Dark Eras Companion is still a Promethean/Vampire crossover, or is it just Promethean now?

Why does everyone give Fate such shit?

It makes you omnipotent and Time makes you invulnerable

let me sum it up with a story of my pnp with my friend who i fucking hate
>he was trying to be one of those people that helps homecoming players i think i don't remember

Me: whats happening
Beast: welcome brother to the world of the beast
Me: not that furry shit
Beast: don't worry that only happens in your lair
Me: my what...also do i need to drink blood or something
Beast: nope you only need to scare people cause reasons
Me: so i don't need to hold on to my humanity or try to get my soul back or anything other then scare people....why?
Beast: because we must teach peop-
Me: why if they would must likely relapse back into it or learn it on their own without us.
Beast: because we are beast that must teach humani--
Me:humanity that they could learn this without us
Beast: look.... your a beast that must teach humanity
Me: why can't we fight the beast and make heroes something that hunts us or some shit why do i have to teach a homeless guy not to be homeless
beast er i mean friend: ok lets switch to VTM fuck this
Me: metaplot ahead

Cont next post

Because it's bullshit powerful even at just 2 dots.

How do Fate and Time do that better than other arcana?

Only if your ST is shit with Informed.

Steadfast says hello

Except for a few edge-cases, Beasts are only good at killing and not being killed.

They have excellent mind-control

5 people this time
Me, luis,chris,fuckface,GM

GM: we are playing beast this time guys
Luis,chris,fuckface: wtf is that shit
Me: it's a game where you play a furry hipstershit that has no reason to exist other then teach people how not to fuck up.
GM: no you play a beast who must teach humanit---
Luis: can i teach a bitch to swallow
Chis: i think i want to teach someone the meaning of not living with blood
Fuckface: guys lets just play plz i never played this with anybody cause they don't know how to play it but i want to try.
Me:why would you want to play a game that allows you to become a monster that is the opposite of being a monster.
Luis: vampires are all about trying to keep there humanity, were wolf is about sniffing ass and trying to blame humans for stuff,mage isabout not fucking up badly or getting a paradox up the ass, Frankenstein is about trying to be human, hunters is about hunting monsters and not becoming them,giest is about busting ghost and not being afraid of no ghost, demon is about super spy shit, mummy is about return the slab or suffer my curse,Changeling is about finding inner peace with what you and living with it and also not being taken back to that hell you where in and finally the last being beast the game tat has you playing a hipster that got nothing better to do but eat fear and teach humans that something something i don't no
Me: fuck this i'm going home

end
Fuck beast whoever made it is a prick that didn't understand what white wolf was and played to much DnD and wanted more furry shit with no horror

While the penalties are steep for doing so, you can always decide to risk losing Integrity rather than follow through with the orders, unlike with Vampires and Mages. This level of awareness and free will sucks for the Beast because unlike Dominate, the victim can try to find ways to resist, like by interpreting orders or trying to get into a situation where you can't hear the Beast. While this isn't usually a big deal, it isn't going to do you any good against something that lacks an Integrity track.

You Must Obey is a good Nightmare, but it isn't the be all end all of the mind control powers. Also it was one of the exceptions I was thinking of. Beasts can also be pretty stealthy and with the right build extremely persuasive, but Vampires are better at it.

>and with the right build extremely persuasive
Though mostly just for things that others can do mundanely. Most of their tricks just make social maneuvering easier, they generally don't allow bypassing it or using it to make people do stuff a mundane mortal couldn't make them do.
Most people just misunderstand what impression levels in Social Maneuvering do and what Social Maneuvering is used for, so they think Beasts' social powers are better than they actually are.

Or you could be a mage with Time 4 and instantly open up all Doors in Social Maneuvering with no Withstand.

Beast: The Primordial summed up in a single short video: youtu.be/pWdpB-OYtO4

Did they remove You Are Meat?

>A dot can provide +1 to the item’s bonus as a tool, a point of Structure, or a point of Durability.
>It's literally an Enhanced Item without the sanctity of merits provided by spending exp for it, just like player made Imbued Items don't give you the merit, but all its benefits.

Except it's not. It is an item enhanced by magic, sure, but not an Enhanced Item (as seen in the Enhanced Item definitions, that requires the item to be enhanced with a persistent/long Duration spell, not a Lasting spell, and therefore be subject to Dissonance.)

Yes, this is really confusing.

It funny to me how wrong you are.
I've already disproved this, weeks ago find something new to bitch about.

Bitch please, DaveB already said that was working as intended.

Thinking of rolling a brujah. Are melee weapons just objectively better than unarmed?

I still don't get the flavour behind that effect. Adding Doors because you know the immediate future kind of makes sense. But how does it make it so much easier for you to just blast through most people's social defenses? At the low end you just go straight through 4 Doors.

Dumb ass fucking read the spell. It lowers it by 1 door per potency not all. It lowers the doors because you see what is needed to be done too open them before hand, and you simply go through those motions.

You formulate the _perfect_ thing to say over a cycle of retries, with a perfectly crafted demeanor, perfect posture, cadence of voice, word choice, accent choice, semantic structuring.

Basically you come up with a semantic attack on their brain, in an effective instant. I would have pegged it at Mind 3 Time 3 or maybe Time 3 Mind 2, but whatevs

>It lowers it by 1 door per potency

>minimum Potency 4

>-2 penalty for Potency 5

>-4 penalty for Potency 6

?????

Two things you claimed it got past all doors which is wrong.

And secondly doors can be higher then the characters resolve or compose. By having things like Closed Book &/or having the first dot in Etiquette. Let alone if the task is a breaking point, is against their virtue.
I'm not saying that every person will have any or all of these but you will eventually run across them.

>Two things you claimed it got past all doors which is wrong.
It's fucking right in practice.

>And secondly doors can be higher then the characters resolve or compose.
Acanthus with Fate 2 and Time 4 = Steadfast on Prophecy, jacked up to Potency 10+ with an autosuccess.

Congrats you worked for it.

Yes

What if what needs to be done is to badger them for like a week until they finally get frustrated enough to do it because they are a stubborn jerk?

Fate can do everything. I'm not even kidding. It has THE best buffs (and debuffs, it's the same spell), and it has another spell that's literally "do anything that is even remotely possible".
Time, on the other hand can do stuff like re-write the past utterly, to transform humans into supernaturals (only lesser templates, though), and retroactively kill people.

>Two things you claimed it got past all doors which is wrong.

Yeah yeah, the maximum possible for a normal human is five doors, and the default value for the spell is four doors. For all intents and purposes, it's all doors.

>transform humans into supernaturals (only lesser templates, though)

That's only at Fate 5. Nothing to do with Time.