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

Didn't they tone that down in 2e? Also, doesn't Paradox pose a large obstacle in using their abilities to the fullest extent? Is this the same meme as claiming wizards are best thing ever in D&D?

Paradox is insignificant... At the beginning. The more your Gnosis rises and the more powerful practices you use, the more important it becomes.

However there are plenty of ludicrously powerful spells which you can get all the reach you'd ever need for with a rote. Many of those exist event at 2-3 dots.

Most certainly. Though it's not ideal from a pilgrimage perspective.

My first (and only) Promethean game was solo for most of it's run, with other solo games crossing over every now and then. Spoilers: I'm Lace

I'm thinking about running a one on one to ease into a real game, and I might try doing the same thing with two or three people; them playing a one on one game, but that crosses over with each other when I can, and then becomes a real game with a group; might also help that first session trouble of getting everyone together.
"You all meet a Qashmal..." is my other idea.

Mages can't "do everything the other splats do and better", and the point of the game isn't to be "balanced" with everything in the first place. Mages, in general, as a splat, could, theoretically, do just about anything that other splats could do. But the problem with that is people who dismiss or hate on Mage without knowing it tend to think that means any and every Mage can do whatever they want with a snap of their fingers regardless of how much Experiences they've spent on the character.

Mage requires a lot of Experiences, too; it's the most restricted splat in terms of power growth. Also, Paradox is pretty crazy, even early on, where you'll be wanting to Reach more and more without dumping all your points on Rotes (because despite what some people will tell you, Rotes are not the only thing you'd ever want to buy). And it definitely gets worse when your Paradox pool starts so high that you're rolling successes at only one Reach.

Ooh, that's another good idea for a Yantra. Grants a bonus or 8-again or a free spell factor... but gives 1 auto success on the Paradox roll.

>Is this the same meme as claiming wizards are best thing ever in D&D?
Well. In D&D you actually do have a situation where the wizards tend to be able to do everything the non-wizards can, and then some; but the wizard and the fighter are also supposed to be working together and fighting the same things, despite one of them being dramatically more flexible (a fighter can never end an encounter by casting Sleep or Soul Jar, and any encounter needs to plan for that... not so for fighters).

In CofD, things aren't operating on the same playing field to begin with. A Vampire is going to have trouble with the Strix, let alone actual deep-in-the-Shadow Spirits like a Werewolf would face.

What Arcana and practice to hover around like a badass?

RAW, Forces 3-4
Using either Perfecting to "perfect" kinetic energy into lifing you, or Weaving Gravity into following your instructions.

لان في كثرة الحكمة كثرة الغم والذي يزيد علما يزيد حزنا

Suppose I get the Shadow Name Merit where I personify a character pure of mind body and soul who is steadfast, resolute, and also virginal blessed by the Divine ala Joan d' Arc and you end up losing your virginity. Do you lose the Merit?

So how do you around while floating? You can control you movement while spell is active?

You don't lose the Shadowname Merit for acting unlike your Shadowname. That's sort of the point.

So your 2pure4u virginal yamato nadeshiko unbending beauty with the Shadowname Jean D'Arc might be the greasy lowlife who keeps getting her casual prostitution and bar fights overlooked because she's a Criminal Informant. It's a separate persona that's so unlike your mundane day-to-day persona that no one could ever tell the two of you were the same person. It's like if Bruce Wayne were secretly Batman.

No, the Merit only relates to the manner in which you practice your Magic, when you adopt that persona.

You could be the biggest whore in all of bristol, rape your father, and beat a Changeling to death over half a pint. Then you put on your Mahou Shoujo costume, and start casting flashy, pretty spells with the full dice pool modifier.

I can only assume it's intentional, but ANY time you post, it is obvious that it's you Aspel.

I want to run a game where players are highly experienced Mages with at least 4 in one Arcana and 3 in a secondary. How much XP should I give out

It's not any. Or intentional. I just don't try to hide it and like inserting myself into every conversation.

>Fighting evil by moonlight
>Glassing cunts by daylight
I want this as a real character

Don't give out any; just set them up so that they've got Gnosis high enough to support that and give them X dots of Arcana.

I'm definitely thinking that she meets another Promethean at some point, forming a tiny throng for a few sessions. That way she can learn complex refinements and it might be interesting to play out how the throng dissolves, even if the other member is an NPC.

When doing one on ones, don't be afraid to have a lot of NPCs. They may not always be able to help her, but having allies is always useful. You can also give her "hints" about what to do through NPCs.

I see geckopirateship has been gunning hard for the Whiniest Shit title on the OP forums.

Don't let it spoil your mood, user.

when your Grimoire's Rotes change.... Again...

Should have relinquished with a Willpower Dot.

How do you guys do NPCs in cofd? Do you fully stat them out? Or give them those simple dice pools?
I'm planning a Mage game with a number of cabals. I'm planning to stat up the members but I don't really want to be rolling up every Sleepwalker who might not ever need those attributes.

I give each NPCs the following dice pools:
Expert - 7
Amateur - 6
No idea what they're doing - 2
Everything else - 4

That wasn't clear. Every NPC gets one dice pool at each level, the rest is at 4 dice. If it's an important NPC I'll stat them out completely or maybe give it a few extra dice pools at various levels.

Dude really needs to learn to disengage.

8 months ago. My schedule changed and I haven't been able to get back. And I can't get motivated to learn 2e Mage.
Know the rules better than any of your players. High expectations mages can break anything if they can think of it.

>Didn't they tone that down in 2e?
No.
>Also, doesn't Paradox pose a large obstacle in using their abilities to the fullest extent?
Less than sun for a vampire.
>Is this the same meme as claiming wizards are best thing ever in D&D?
Mages are capable of doing anything another splat does, just with some work. But unlike dnd you're not playing a group with all different splats (unless you're a pillock). In a mage game everyone's a mage.

>I see geckopirateship has been gunning hard for the Whiniest Shit title on the OP forums.
He's been banned since Saturday

I wonder if he's finally gonna jump ship to oWoD after Promethean 2e made him so mad.

I tend to just wing stats, based on what'd fit for the moment.
I do write them down after I've used them though, for consistency's sake.

If I plan for their stats to be important at all(eg, if I expect the PCs to fight them), I stat them up, otherwise I leave them with nothing until I end up making them do stuff, then write down the dice pool I gave them so I can use it as a basis to stat them up later, if I need to.

Have I misunderstood Scrutiny now in 2e, or has it been completely neutered compared to 1e?

did they even have scrutiny in 1e?

She.

Eh. Yes.
That was kind of the core of how Mages found stuff out.

Don't assume people's pronouns

Nooo! Don't enter the splatter zone!

There's a curveball. I need to stop being so whatever the thing is where you assume people online are like yourself.
>That was kind of the core of how Mages found stuff out.
then you mean mage sight, not (just scrutiny)
no it's been expanded a lot for 2e to allow for a lot more potential for stories

Hey Dave why does the Time 4 spell Rewrite History still allow mages to turn certain supernatural back to humans. Isn't that against what was said in imperial mysteries?
Or does it work like the errata'd Temporal Summoning?

Oh, my mistake, I don't browse the forums unless people bring it up in here. Either way, I wish she could have just focused on making the games she wanted instead of what actually happened.

>then you mean mage sight, not (just scrutiny)
>no it's been expanded a lot for 2e to allow for a lot more potential for stories

Scrutiny was what you did when you had Mage Sight up. Stop mincing words, please

Look, my issue is this: It looks to me as if you need to have THIS SPECIFIC Mage Sight up to study something now (in 1e it just gave bonuses), and it takes a TON of rolling, and unless you are really good, you won't get shit.

I assume I'm wrong, because I don't see others complain... But I don't get HOW I'm wrong.

Dave, we certainly appreciate the recent Mage errata and SoS spoilers, but any chance you have an ETA on the Mage FAQ? There are so many questions that need answers...

Also, with respect to the perfected materials spoilers, in 1e, when metals were perfected by going into and out of Twilight, they lost most of their mass in the process. Is this still the case in 2e?

Why does a mage need Matter 3 (and extra Reach) to perfect things like fire. Should perfecting specific forces only require Forces 3? Similarly, can Prime be used to ease or expedite the creation of perfected materials. As discussed in the OPP forums, the whole perfecting process seems like it really should be handled by Prime, not Matter, Forces or Life.

Thanks.

So, for tl;dr reasons, my players have managed to get their hands on a supernatural drug. And they want to synthesise it. How the fuck do I go about handling that? Int+science to figure out what's in it? How many successes should be a standard amount?

Successes = Potency of drug + Supernatural Advantage of the original creator

>Scrutiny was what you did when you had Mage Sight up. Stop mincing words, please
It's a specific term for a mechanic in 2e, it's not mincing words, it's being clear
>I assume I'm wrong, because I don't see others complain... But I don't get HOW I'm wrong.
you are, maybe you should read the books and see the difference

Focused mage sight is how you figure out what something is yes. However it is not the be all end all of detection.

So lets say the Rat a rather simple minded Acanthus walks into a room and notices the smell of rotting cheese. "My peripheral mage sight!" he declares, focusing his will he looks for the cause of this disturbance.

He hallucinates, seeing small things running threw his fate(and cloths, and hair and skin). He panics, seeing no one in the room he focuses on the magic crawling threw him. The opacity is 3. Wanting knowledge now he grips some of the little bastards spends a willpower and demands a Revelation. He rolls Gnosis 1 + Fate 2 +3 – Opacity 3. rolling 3 dice he garners 1 success, learning surface information.

The tiny things running threw his pattern are revealed to be black beetles, the signature nimbus of his nemesis of the same name. Looking closer he can tell his fate is being weaved... but into what? The spell is fresh, new! The beetle must be close! He scrutinizes the spell.

the Rat rolls 4 dice, getting 3 success, a miracle. The opacity drops and still no sign of the beetle.
rolling again, then again now on the third turn the opacity is down to 1. Still, the beetle hasn't attacked.
He rolls 1 last time the opacity falls to 0.

He learns the truth.

His Fates were tied to another(Shared Fate (Fate •••)). Following a thread he found a window that he was certain wasn't there before. The thread crossed from his building to the one next door. There in the window, plain as day was the man who shared the Rat's fate.

A man unconscious, tied to a chair in a room filled with explosives, poison gas canisters, and a rather angry looking cocker spaniel. A giant timer counted down above the mans head, painted over with black beetles. 2 seconds left.

It was at this moment the spell concealing the Constant Presence (Time ••) falls off.

The Rat cursed.

If it's supernatural maybe make separate rolls for Science and Occult. If they only succeed in Science, they might not be able to replicate the supernatural properties, and get something different.
What does it do? Where did it come from?

Yeah. Sure. I get this. It's just that it looks a lot more cumbersome, and much harder to actually get any information than it was in 1e.

To begin with, he wouldn't have had to have Fate/Time Mage Sights to see this. Any Mage Sight could see any magic. You just got bonuses on scrutinizing things connected to your sight.

Scrutiny existed in 1e. It let you know the Resonance of something, and a few other things. You might even have needed to scrutinize something to dispell it, I can't recall. You needed 1 success to know the basics and what the spell was, then you used more to find out things like it's "Qualities". It wasn't that great a system.

>Look, my issue is this: It looks to me as if you need to have THIS SPECIFIC Mage Sight up to study something now (in 1e it just gave bonuses), and it takes a TON of rolling, and unless you are really good, you won't get shit.
>I assume I'm wrong, because I don't see others complain... But I don't get HOW I'm wrong.
None of that is really an issue. It also gives a lot more information, and a lot more meaningful information. 1e's didn't really give you anything at all. Certainly not things comparable to what 2e does.
Also, you still don't need a specific Mage Sight to see magic. You need a specific Mage Sight to analyze specific effects.

It's cumbersome, but it also does more.

I decided to actually read some of the fiction anthologies.

Bought Fallen World Anthology.
So far I've had a depressed lesbian mage story (1/10, wouldn't read again)
and a BLM gun-control story
(6/10, actually wasn't too the worst)

I hope these pick up though, it barely feels like the setting of mage is being leveraged here.

Looking forward to the rest. Interested in your opinion.

the strix fiction anthology is the best
the promethean one sucked shit

>Any Mage Sight could see any magic.
I'm pretty sure this is still the case. You'd need Mind sight or Death sight to see, say, Obfuscate, but if it's a Supernal spell, any Mage Sight works.

Promethean one made me cry in the story with Israel Hands and Hendaid Bran.

And most of the Mummy fiction is dope.

One of the best mage stories is actually in the Beast Anthology. Read "Premeditation." It was written by DaveB, and is largely about an adventure in the astral with a mage, beast and bastet.

yeah but you're a pussy with shit taste

Good on DaveB, keeping Changing Breeds canon.

>that's the best mage story
we won't be seeing mage fictioninthe future

Man, I didn't even know if it was a good or a bad ending. It rattled me all the same.
Definitely a highlight of the Beast Anthology.

I think they murdered an innocent girl in the name of helping the old crow?

love you too, user

>I think they murdered an innocent girl in the name of helping the old crow?
It's been a while but I don't remember registering that. I was more rattled by Crow's ages of experience and higher thoughts being suddenly wiped clean.

Last one I'll probably have time for today.
Angry detective mage hunts down a lady
(6/10, I enjoyed it. A little over-written at some points, but it did the job.)

Then they wont mind if I write some of my own.

Mystery system is the best way Ive ever seen to keep mage fresh and Ive already written some fun shit i may end up putting here with it if anyone is interested.

It just made me happy to see some of the NPCs again. I normally hate canon characters, but the old Promethean guys are all very near and dear to my heart.

>I think they murdered an innocent girl in the name of helping the old crow?
>this story made me cry
>I don't really know what happened in it

I want her coat

you've always been able to write wod/cod fan fiction
few people do it

Yeah, so would you bother reading it?

I read it months ago, man.

if it was good, or revolved around a splat I liked

Strix Anthology is the one with the most reprints from other books, right? I really liked the one story that the Monsters and Other Childish Things guy wrote, Noblisse Obliege. Was that an original one or a reprint? If it's a reprint, what book was it in?

What sources do you use for monsters in hunter games? yokai.com/ is one of my favorites

Folklore encyclopedias I find at the library.

I'm a nerd, so I tend to know more than enough weird out there shit.

My one attempt at an actual Hunter game involved a Slasher based on Kuchisake-Onna. I've also wanted to do a barghest.

I listen to a lot of podcasts. Blurry Photos is a comedic cryptozoology/conspiracy poscast that does some great monster episodes, and Ken And Robin Talk About Stuff are a pair of RPG writers that do a lot of occult and horror stuff.

Rewrite history literally has a reach for removing the template, so it obviously doesn't work like temporal summoning. Additionally, the statement in imperial mysteries is about permanently removing/changing a template. So, I'd say, working as intended.

Is there anyone in the Rochester area who would be interested in joining a nWoD game irl?

...

Yes, it does exactly what it intends to do. What part of that is confusing? Do you think they meant "you can do this thing we said you can do... but not really"?

It does what it says it does. I'm confused as to... why there's confusion.

Also, I'm now imagining a Mage that basically gives out free Humanity to Changelings or Vampires. First taste is free, but after that you gotta pay.

Change that to Dallas and Id say hell yeah.

I posted it to further show the point, not to disparage it.

I think they wanted to kill someone but stumbled upon an ODing junkie and they decided to stay for her final breadth

Yeah, that's what happened. The story was a very nice conclusion to a lot of popular NPC Promethean storylines, and to me kind of closes the book on Promethean 1e.

So, I've decided to run a Promethean the Created game, a little onshot for some friends. I was planning on basing it around one of the universal milestones of the pilgrimage, potentially the one regarding making a "new" promethean. I'm a bit hung up on the setting though, I was thinking France or Canada(the former simply because it seems like a neat place to set a promethean game and the latter for the relatively low population density and the dangers implicit in surviving the winter in some areas), but I can't quite decide yet. What do you lot think?

Very few people, if the internet is anything to go by: fanfiction.net/game/World-of-Darkness/

archiveofourown.org/tags/World of Darkness (Games)/works

Oh. Okay.

>In the city where Anyone Can Be Anything, it turns out that a rabbit can be a vampire. Whether she likes it or not.

The Vampire Rabbit of Zootopia

I think it is just hard to organize and see. People don't look for it.

I was just thinking of adding to those two archives. We should start filling it up!

>Very few people, if the internet is anything to go by: fanfiction.net/game/World-of-Darkness/
>224 stories
I'd knock that up from few to many.
there's a separate folder for VtM
fanfiction.net/game/Vampire-The-Masquerade/
with 199 stories
and other sites
literotica.com/s/my-little-ventrue-ch-01

You only need Forces 2 to float by shielding yourself from the forces of gravity. With forces 3 you can actually fly around and move.