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

>Salvation Army panhandler

Careful, that could be a local member of the Guardians of the Veil in disguise.

>demon the matrix
>beast the otherkin
>deviant the universal soldier

I thought wod was about universal monsters and folklore.

Naw it's more like urban superheroes

Nah, that's WoD

Cofd is /x/ - the game

Excuse me, while I have a strange interlude.

Guardian's Cabalmate was duplicated by Paradox. The copies begged for mercy, but the Guardian killed them without second thought. After all: All clones are false.

The Guardian can't maintain close relationships. He's limited to having sex with prostitutes. He wasn't surprised to learn they fake their orgasms. He already knew: All moans are false.

After his training he learned that the riddles he was given to solve were just made-up nonsense. It was an important lesson: All koans are false.

Who likes both CofD and WoD?

I've been wondering this for a while, and the official forums have been a bit inconsistent. I'm aware that bonuses from equipment cap out at an additional five dice, however that doesn't say anything about bonuses or modifiers from supernatural or other sources. Do bonuses rolls in general cap out at 5, are you only allowed to receive 5 dices per source, or does the +5 bonus limit only apply to equipment and other sources are not beholden to that limit?

Of all the things to hate in vampire, why hate the thing that makes it the most fun? I mean, unless you're running it as Call of Duty: Bloodsuckers or summat.

IIRC in 1e it was 'each modifier can only give a maximum of +5, but you can stack modifiers'. I want to say I recall the modifier being 'no more than double your pool from any number of sources'. So if you have a 9, you can't get more than +9 on top of that.

Favorite game line in terms of themes and a e s t h e t i c s is Geist. My least favorite part is that the game got basically no support :(

Second favorite game line is Werewolf. Least favorite part was the stupid spirit baby thing but they got rid of that in 2e.

I'm one of the few people who like Beast. Sue me.

youtu.be/-h5WrWncDZw?t=6m49s

It makes no sense and gets in the way of personal struggles.

>least favorite part of favorite gameline

I have two relevant ones.

I hate the Sabbat. particularly the 'playable' Sabbat, which I feel takes from the horror/unknown of the enemy, or the alien-ness of when you have a Sabbat on a Path show up in a position of leadership in a Cam/Anarch game.

I hate Childlings in Dreaming. I hate the fact that a playable option is age 8-13 and the stuff that the 'romantic modern fantasy' thing of dreaming draws into it.

I remember their pack started taking on characteristics of 'santa's elves' and in the end they needed to enlist the help of a 'grinch' spirit to purge their totem and move on with their lives.

It was completely goofy and I'm going to steal the idea for my next werewolf game during the holidays.

Is it a cop-out to say "the non-existent fanbase?"

Because if so, my answer is how clunky Utterances are.

Did you find a few nuggets of gold that you expanded on, or do you enjoy all of it?

>how clunky Utterances are.

My god, you must be absolutely dying waiting for the Dark Eras Companion with DaveB's Mummy 2e compatibility and mage crossover rules!

Also know as "How to make Mummies your bitch: Mage edition"

I've yet to see a source on the claim of a 2e update in there.

Also I'm way more excited for the two Roman settings and the Black Death one. Sekhem sorcerers! A new Lineage!

Do you mean how you pay full price for an Utterance without getting all the benefits, unless you've spent all your XP's into Pillars?

It's pretty flavorful in-Universe. Mummies have incomplete mastery over ancient sorceries, that they're (probably) not supposed to have.

For players, however, it's an exercise in frustration. It's like buying an online-only, single player game.

If Mummy and Mage 2e are to crossover, Mummy needs at least a patchwork 2e conversion.

I like the vigilante aspect of it, honestly.

I think you can make really fun Beast characters and that with a good supplement or two it can be a pretty solid gameline.

Which supplements would these be?

How do you stop gross Gangrels from fucking your waifu?

The antagonists book should be solid, and then I have high hopes for both the Player's and Storyteller's supplements. If we can get stuff that gives Beasts more to fight and do and characterize themselves with, it'll be fine.

I'm hoping we get material for playing as Beasts whose Horrors are of mythic importance or have memories of previous hosts.

Glue her vagina and anus shut

>Which supplements would these be?

Beast 2e, this time without Matt as the developer.

I think that Heroes need to be completely remade to work. The archetypal Hero image should be, I would say, Gaston; one of the important things about him is that he wasn't a lone actor, but was able to raise a mob around him, and I feel that the mob should be an important trait of Heroes.

What's the difficulty rating to persuade her to go along with this plan?

Just make them into Ahabs.

It is very good for that. Oddly, a strong proponent of the game said on the forums that they're more disturbed by the punishing narrative than they are by teaching narrative. I don't know if they reject vigilantism outright, but it goes to show how different the attitudes of fans can be.

I feel Beast could be great to depict cycles of abuse. Beasts would carry the traumas they received as humans and shared them with the world as monsters. The game would explore the horrible bits in the world that make people into victims and monsters, how easily one can shift into another. The game as written allows that, but doesn't tap into that potential.

If she doesn't love you enough to do it, she's not really your waifu

That's too sympathetic. Heroes need to be, well, clearly defined villains. Avatars of ignorance and fear of the Other.

How do you reconcile that with Beast being the Other that feeds on fear?

Or it can be about going Johnny Estacado on scumbags.

Good point. Are Tzimisce even capable of love?

Heroes are the reason that Beasts need to be careful about their feeding, because Heroes also draw upon fear of the other, and can turn formerly cowed mortals into bloodthirsty fanatics, given time. And an empowered Hero's rampage won't leave just the Beast dead.

>Johnny Estacado
Well, yes. It handles escapism very well.
So, basically they force Beasts to understand their surroundings and the consequences of their actions in order remain safe, thus encouraging character growth? I like that a lot. I just strongly disagree Heroes need to be simple-minded villains. Yes, when pit against an ethical Beast you get a fun cliche-reversal. But if I want to play a villain protagonist, fighting an actual good guy is way more fun.

Need some help with the game I'm DMing, any idea what kind of creature could I use for changing weather in an 'innocent' way? One that wouldn't cause much suspicion among Kindred or Kine would be best, especially since the Kindred involved are rather powerful so any over-the-top solutions would be easily detected. Any ideas?

>Being a do-gooder white knight
Reminder that only autistic people fantasize about killing "scumbags"

>But if I want to play a villain protagonist, fighting an actual good guy is way more fun.
Then fight hunters. Heroes (at least in this version that I think would help fix Beast) are sociopathic parasites who manipulate others to draw upon their fear for power and pleasure, and gain even larger boosts of it when they or their mob successfully kill a Beast.

Me

Mechanically, Heroes don't even really pose much of a threat to most Beasts.

What would be the benefits of using such a Hero instead of evil hunters?

Magical mob-related powers, for instance. Unlike hunters, Heroes generally operate in the open. Not that they openly start talking about actual monsters nowadays, but they certainly direct people's attention to the source of what they might fear.

I do.
I think they both have enough differences to find nice pros and cons that allows me to enjoy both.
WoD is more of an artistic setting with heavier storytelling and makes for more dramatic games with a heavy gothic feel.
CofD is more free in its design, so your stories might not be as deep or impactful since you don't have to adhere to certain rigid goals, but the freedom it allows makes for much more fun games that allow you to experiment and kinda just do whatever you want.
Essentially WoD is a PS4 game and CofD is a Nintendo game.

If Bailey and Brockshaw end up doing it, the CofD 3E Beast might actually end up decent. Just... just keep McFarland and Hill far, FAR away from it.

Serious question here: Have you even read the book? There is so much made about this power. There was even a contentious section in the Hero write up about how flame wars and internet trolls are the kind of incitement that Heroes can cause, where people who are well intentioned or doing something for what they see as a good cause become hateful vile and vicious to attack and tear down the outsider.

Even the sample module has the hero's minions, and the thin plot has you face not one but TWO Heroes, since one of them is a sort of trainee enthralled with the first Hero.

David Hill is hit or miss. Like DaveB, he's been involved in almost every CofD book, particularly with a lot of the mechanics, particularly Merits.

I would have no objection to him as an author, simply leery with him as the sole developer.

Do you think introducing good hunters into the equation would take something away from the bad ones?

Could you expand on that? Given how many writers work on a single book, it's hard to say who wrote what. Even McFarland worked on Demon, which was well received.

Mechanically speaking, a Hero is almost completely incapable of threatening a *single* Beast, much less an entire Brood. Taken together with the fact that Matt felt compelled to note that Heroes are completely incapable of cooperating with other Heroes, it completely neuters them as actual threats. They exist purely to be stand-ins for whatever people the ST and players feel they 'should' be allowed to hate, toture, and kill, and be morally justified in doing so.

I was fairly sure that vampires were not capable of real love unless it's "inherited" from their mortal life. Blood bond fuckery is the only similar thing they got, that's why they do it.

I loved Beast.
I agree with the common irritation that Heroes suck though. It's like they were trying to make a really good thematic antagonist for Beast, and what better enemy should THE bad guy have other than THE hero? The concept is really nice, but the execution is pretty shit because hero's kinda come off in the actual narrative as these weird mixtures of Hunters + Slashers where you can't really tell what their thought process even is aside from "KILL MONSTAR!!!11!1!".
However, the rest of Beast I absolutely adore. You get to finally be THE bad guy which most games don't even let you do. Most other games are like, well, you can do bad things but it HAS to be because you had a hard past and now you're all edgy and emo Shadow the Hedgehog about it because it has to fit the narrative. But with Beast, you can just DO it. You don't have to be a crybaby wristslitter to blow up that building, you can do it just because it's your nature. Alternatively, you can group up with some other supernaturals and be a reliable ally if you want to go more of a non-villain route as well, it allows for some nice freedom when deciding what you want to do or what you want to be because you aren't held back by a ton of morality systems or anything.
I also love the 'make your monster' function too. You can be anything you want basically. You can be some eldritch abomination from space, you can be darkness incarnate, or you can just simply be a kraken or a dragon or some shit, whatever you want to be, you basically can.
Most of the gripe I hear about the game is about the heroes and the otherkin junk. I do agree that heroes need work, but otherkin?
We're playing a game with werewolves, fairies, and sentient space robots. The whole game line was otherkin long before Beast came around.

>Most other games are like, well, you can do bad things but it HAS to be because you had a hard past and now you're all edgy and emo Shadow the Hedgehog about it because it has to fit the narrative
Just play a Ventrue, they're almost all naturally psychopaths.

>flame wars and internet trolls
Its nice to know such Toxic behavior is endorsed. Seeing as Beast are monsters and all. That's really sub par 'villainy'

That's why you make them a threat narratively.

Honestly I think that a "we're not so different" villain is more in line. As in "how is the Hero different from the Beast".

You can harp on that all you want, but you know it's not true. It's not even remotely true. There are entire genres of media--popular genres--about people killing scumbags or at the very least beating them senseless. Not just Batman going out and rearranging the skeletons of criminals, but almost every action movie. Almost every action video game.
Mafia III, Dishonoured II, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Watch_Dogs 2, Call of Duty Whatever, Uncharted 4, Deus Ex: Black Lives Matter But Also They're Part Killing Machine So Our Metaphor Is Bad...
and that's just me remembering recently released games this year off the top of my head. And being strict about "killing" the "scumbags".

Hell, new Star Wars movie dropped and even though last year's entry had a big "look, those faceless goons are people", it still had quite a few faceless pawns of the scumbag First Order knocked down in droves.

It's far from just "autistic" people who fantasize about killing "scumbags". It's all of us. In fact, we don't even need it to be scumbags. Plenty of movies or games have characters running from the law, only to get cops and law enforcement killed by the bucket. We just like badasses who shot, punch, or sword fight their way through a dozen dozen guys.

Don't act like Beast is some sort of strange thing in that regard.

Internet trolls are on par with rapists and Nazis, as we all know.

>I agree with the common irritation that Heroes suck though. It's like they were trying to make a really good thematic antagonist for Beast, and what better enemy should THE bad guy have other than THE hero? The concept is really nice, but the execution is pretty shit because hero's kinda come off in the actual narrative as these weird mixtures of Hunters + Slashers where you can't really tell what their thought process even is aside from "KILL MONSTAR!!!11!1!".
They "kind of" stepped away from that, but it's clear at moments they really didn't want to.
>I also love the 'make your monster' function too. You can be anything you want basically. You can be some eldritch abomination from space, you can be darkness incarnate, or you can just simply be a kraken or a dragon or some shit, whatever you want to be, you basically can.
Oh yeah!
>Most of the gripe I hear about the game is about the heroes and the otherkin junk. I do agree that heroes need work, but otherkin?
>We're playing a game with werewolves, fairies, and sentient space robots. The whole game line was otherkin long before Beast came around.
I guess people were disappointed you couldn't turn into a monster and lay waste on your enemies. The otherkin comparisons were unnecessary and unhelpful. True, you could fuse with your Horror, but even the True and False sidebar forgot about that.

Watch_Dogs 2, if the first game was any indication, is about a very autistic batman poser.

Also Deus Ex's analogy falls completely flat because it hasn't been fucking relevant since the civil rights movements in the 60s. Unless you think that somehow racial segregation is still balls to the wall in the U.S.

But I digress; Batman-esque "I can do no wrong and I am killing people who are as stupidly nonredeemable as Mengele" is autismal to the max.

Uhm, I've never read mage but changing weather sounds kinda magical. So maybe a newly awakened mage or something just testing out his powers? Like I said, I've never read mage so I don't know if that's how they work though.
If you want really innocent though, Promethean wastelands start changing weather around them at higher levels, so you could have a newly formed promethean in town that doesn't know what he is or what he's inadvertently doing.

Once I read a comment that was like so opposed to my beliefs I had a neurotic collapse and they had to move me urgently to the safe space to play with crayons and cover me in blankets I just like feel so attacked

Honestly I think playing the blame game is stupid.
MacFarland didn't just work on Demon , he's the line developer. Same for Promethean.

>Matt felt compelled to note that Heroes are completely incapable of cooperating with other Heroes
There are two of them in The Morning After.

>endorsed
I said that they're what Heroes are like. If you think the villains doing something is endorsement, you need to read better. You can argue that it's endorsement because Beasts are shitty, but I believe there's an old adage about the number of wrongs it does or doesn't take to equal a right...

Whether Beasts are good or not, Heroes aren't. They're bad guys that think they're good guys, and they cause problems for everyone involved.

Beasts aren't even THE bad guy, though. I mean, they can be shitty, sure, but no more so than any other group. If Beast was all about being an unabashed monster period, there's so much more they could have done.

Also, I hate the "make your monster" function, and feel it's one of the ways the game falls flat. Family and Atavisms are really all you have to choose from, and that's not much. I'd rather something like Kith and Seeming, where you get to REALLY choose what kind of monster you are.
I wonder how Beast would be if you let players pick a Seeming from Changeling 2e...

>Honestly I think that a "we're not so different" villain is more in line. As in "how is the Hero different from the Beast".
I'm a bit confused. Is it the Beast that looks at a Hero and sees their dark reflection, or is it the other way around?
I guess you either had to leave or I tired you out. Just let me say I appreciated your polite and thought through responses.

+1 for being a dignified conversationalist

In theory, Beast is the game about playing truly, *unapologetic* mosters. In practice, the actual book is remarkably reluctant and aprehensive about embracing the whole-hearted monstrousness of the titular Beasts. The book jumps through some truly absurd hoops to paint the Beasts' actions as somehow morally "right" and "just", a lot of the time by having them victimize the "right" sort of people. It just really rubs me the wrong way.

So the Prime • spell "Dispel Magic" says you can take 2 Reaches to make the effect Lasting. Do you still need to buy up the duration, then, or is the spell you're targeting simply destroyed regardless?

I don't know why I thought of that, but here you go:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitsune_no_yomeiri#Legend_related_to_the_weather
What kind of weather changes do you need, and what should be the reason for Kindred and Kine to care?

I think they tried to make Beasts seem more like vigilante's rather than villains in the revision after people complained that 'bullying is wrong' or some crap if I remember right. So I blame that more on the public than the writers.

>Family and Atavisms are really all you have to choose from, and that's not much.
What about Family and Hunger? What do Kith and Seeming have that these don't?

Nope, it was like that in the original draft as well.

Wasn't the public against the smugness and victim blaming, or was I in a bubble?

Just bought a hard copy of Werewolf the Forsaken 2nd edition and while I was waiting to get the book I was wondering if you guys could catch me up on anything new fluff wise that's different from 1st edition?

>What's your least favorite part of your favorite gameline?
The favourite game line is W:tF, and my favourite part of that is the werewolf culture itself.

If a spell is lasting, you don't need to worry about Duration, the moment it is cast, its full effect is applied.

Reason it isn't bullshit is you need Prime 1, and every other relevant Arcanum at 1, and even then you still need to beat what is quite likely some significant Withstand if you're shit at Prime.

Another Apologist Beast thread come on guys. They're monsters, humanity is better without them live with it already

Watch_Dogs 2 is about taking people down for internet points and being a caricature of a hacker. It's not much like the first.
And Deus Ex probably could have done better at the metaphor if they tried harder and there wasn't baggage from the last game. But racial segregation is still a problem. In fact, the country still has the scars from the segregation of the 60s and before youtu.be/8r6GBo_7UNc?t=620 Skip to 10:19 for a surprisingly good rundown of how.

But you're missing my Goddamned point, and I feel like you're doing it on purpose.
You can go on throwing around "autism" until it means nothing anymore, but that doesn't change the fact that a large part of human culture is made up of stories about murdering motherfuckers and feeling justified in it. Fuck, we use Nazis and Orcs and Zombies for just that reason, so we don't have to bother with something like "he killed my dog and stole my car". And if you like violent media--which considering you're on Veeky Forums, and talking about roleplaying games, I'll assume you do--chances are you've watched and probably enjoyed a movie or played a game where you're just killing people without thinking of the moral consequences and feeling justified because they were in your way, or even just wearing the wrong jersey.

"Action" as a genre is built on the heroes killing a ton of people and being morally justified. Or just not caring about the morals.

You can't tell me it's only autistic people who think like that (and sidenote: no, that's not what autism is) when THIS is a thing youtu.be/HjNQLXXwYfw

Oh wait. Least favourite. In that case it's the fucking art in all the fucking books. It is fucking shit.

A lot of people were expecting shape changing, true.
But I feel like the route they went with was fine. Werewolves and Changelings already have spook forms, so adding a creature with just a bigger, stronger spook form would be a little redundant and ruin the theme of Beast being good for crossover play. Most people wouldn't want a party member that's just them basically but stronger.
I like with what they went with because it reinforces the theme of how the life of a Beast parallels epic tales of Hero vs Monster. The monster doesn't just pop out at the start of the book and eat the hero. After a narrative of the hero overcoming obstacles and infiltrating the beast's lair, they finally have an epic showdown, and that's exactly how it works in Beast, literally. Your true form and the full prowess of your might are at max in your lair, where the hero HAS to go to actually kill you.
The whole thing plays out like an actual tale and I think it's pretty badass.

The biggest backlash I recall was listing MRAs as examples of Heroes.

I mean they arn't wrong, but realistically speaking, Heroes would come from all kinds of internet fringe groups from both the left and right.

Watch Dogs 2 is actually a step up from the thematically dull first game. You arn't a guilt-ridden Punisher with a computer but rather a guy who wants to take down a corrupt and invasive system.

It's also the most progressive a game can possibly get without feeling preachy and making me want to hate it. I'm honestly surprised at how much grace a minor character who is a black transgendered woman was given.

Oh well. That is pretty gay.
At least I can still make my PC a villain.

>werewolf sex no longer leads to evil spirit children that murder their parents
>Forsaken tribes have different prey they focus on hunting (Blood Talons hunt other Uratha, Bone Shadows hunt spirits, etc)
>wolf-blooded and (to a lesser extent) humans have larger roles in packs
>wolf-blooded are totally resistant to lunacy
>lunacy can make a normal human into a wolf-blooded

>Your true form and the full prowess of your might are at max in your lair, where the hero HAS to go to actually kill you.
Going into a Lair is not necessary. The Hero can approach the Beast outside of it. Of course, a cornered Beast will retreat into its Lair if it can. Lack of Lair tilts and a gaping head-wound can do that.

>t.hero

Okay, she's already bound to my character, and vice versa. We should be set for unlife, right?

I take it the Pure are still a thing?

I'm saying vigilantism is autistic. Sorry, I wasn't super clear on that. There's a thin line between Ahnold mowing down goons because he's a badass and Observe_Canines batman posers.

Watch_Dogs 2 still seems utterly lame to me. I just can't get down with a revolution unless I'm blasting the damn commies all the way back to Siberia
WOLVERINES!

The Beast. The whole point of Heroes is that they're incapable of self-reflection. Beasts are at least aware they're part of the Primordial Dream (somehow, I guess?) and their place in the world. Heroes are solipsistic.

I feel like it doesn't do this nearly as much as people act like. I also feel like it's better for the game that Beasts go "well, but, I mean, we're NECESSARY!" and try to justify their existences. Especially when unlike Vampires they don't have Covenants to do that.

I thought you could only make something Lasting if you could first get Duration up to Indefinite?

Family is too bland. Every Anakim has the same trait and that's it. If there were more Families, sure. There are something like 100 Kiths. Unfortunately there are only five Families. Makes it feel more generic. Kith also pairs with Seeming, so you've got that to really make things feel unique.

>I mean they arn't wrong, but realistically speaking, Heroes would come from all kinds of internet fringe groups from both the left and right.
But that's what the section said. It used left leaning groups as well. It just happened to name drop "gamergate".
Also, most interesting part of all I've heard about Watch_Dogs 2 is that despite the cringey hacker stereotype teenager dialogue, the characters are genuinely well written and friends with each other, and that makes you care about them. I've heard the same about FFXVI or whatever. I hope that's a new trend: Character groups that feel like real emotional human beings with each other, even if the actual writing is corny or bad.