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

>3 gangsters should be a good
I mean 3 for each of them. 15 in total.

So its robot Tzeentch.

That could become overkill. Okay here is the thing user; if you run that fight as is, by RAW, then you have 10 additional actions more than your players are allowed access to. This is called Action Economy. When you have a widlly disproportionate action economy vs your opponent, you will generally win unless you options per action are terrible, such as having Str 1 Brawl 0 and trying to fist fight an angry Uratha.

I don't know how well built your PCs are but that could be rough for them. The ones with the clubs, not so much, but I wouldn't go overboard with the guns if your PCs aren't powerhouses designed for that kind of fighting. Even with damage behind coverted to bashing it wouldn't be hard to fuck up a vampire if 2-3 guys keep putting bullets into them.

Vampires
Werewolves
Mages

What factions in each are best at chimpingout?

Alternatively, if this is a scenario the neonates bungled their way into, or it was a trap set by someone else, then it could be a decent lesson in learning to not underestimate armed mortals in large numbers.

Always remind them that they can run away; there is no reason to fight to the death, especially for vampires.

Werewolves hands down. WtA chimped out so hard they broke their own goddess and murdered half her children.

WtF werewolves chimped out so hard they ruined their own race and dominance over the spiritual world and mankind.

You could very well destroy the God-Machine. It's an end-game thing, though, and should require a large amount of work, because doing so is literally game-ending.
It's just that the books leave it up entirely to the ST what the G-M actually is, so doing it requires a lot of work from both the players and the ST.

Werewolves.
One of their main themes is chimping out.

>What factions in each are best at chimpingout?

werewolves, though you may need a particularly creative ST to really drive the YOU ARE VULNERABLE TO A CHIMPOUT AT ANY STRESSFUL MOMENT

How do the Strix mesh with the God Machine?

Like shadows and cogwork.

That is to say, who gives a fuck?

Strix are faggy bitchboys who pick on one of the weakest splats.

Good thing big strong Mages are here to protect their Vampire waifus for flappity-faggot birds~

Better question- why in the fuck are they fighting 15 gangers with clubs and bats? Hell, why are 15gangers hanging around in one place? That sort of congregation is rare. Gangs usually keep in small clumps to avoid getting all busted at once.

So what are Strix made of?
I'd find it fucking hilarious if Death 1's Shadow Sculpting could fuck with their "physical" form.
A horrible shadow-bird transformed in an armchair made of shadows by one of the weakest fucking spells in Death's arsenal...

Fuck it, I'm writing that up as an actual spell.

Any Mage with an inkling of Death is going to be an anti-Strix terror.

Is it bad that I actually want to see a Mage defending the honor of their Vampire spouse by trashing the Strix?

>This is called Action Economy. When you have a widlly disproportionate action economy vs your opponent, you will generally win
Ok, so what proportions I should use in order to design a balanced combat? 1 to 1? What about the fact that vampires are generally stronger than humans? Much stronger.
Thanks for your answer, btw.

That'd need Death 3, at least, probably, considering you're reshaping a being. Also, probably withstood(by Resistance, b/c ayy simple attributes).

You can gang up on players just be aware of their combat stats and don't go overboard with firearms because iirc vampires can't apply their Defense vs Firearms without discipline powers.

They can probably take a beating and kill some gangbangers with knives and bats, but a bunch of young turks unloading into them every round is going to get messy fast.

It's all fun and games until you bring out the Moros housewife.

Well, my players want to bust their weapon storage to arm themselves. Those places should be well guarded, right?
%%Their objective is just to intercept farther weapon selling, but they've got greedy.%%

So basically some leech married pic related

I can see Withstood being a factor in a Mage vs Strix encounter, but I honestly don't think you would need three dots in Death to sculpt the angry owls.

Death already has a lot of special exceptions (that are entirely sensible) as far the Arcana go, such as transforming into a shadow without the need for Life.

Sort of, but maybe not that well. Could be stashed in more secret places, or maybe Jamal just shoved them in the back of his truck and threw a blanket over them.

If they're storming a house or complex you could have them spread out, some chilling and bullshiting and getting fucked up, while an unlucky few have to stand guard or patrol the perimeter.

No no, there are no autoguns.
I am using standart enemy template from CofD corebook. Gangsters have like 7 for firing action. Thought now that I think about it... 15 enemies with THAT kind of stats + colts are a bit too much, right? From the other hand it is not like I am going to make them focus their fire at someone.

Exactly that. Especially if she happens to be from Japan.

>If they're storming a house or complex you could have them spread out, some chilling and bullshiting and getting fucked up, while an unlucky few have to stand guard or patrol the perimeter.
Yeah, that's a good plan. Vamps can easily heal themselves using enemies blood, so long run combat against groups of enemies should be an easy cake.

So is the G-M an exarch level threat? Or is it just another malignant high rank ephemeral entity?

See, but unless we're talking a lawless wasteland where the cops stay out like the slums of Mexico City, the gangers will likely only have a few, trusted guards. See, the more dudes you have nearby, the more likely people will notice- and that means the cops are more likely to come. These places rely on stealth, not heavy guards. And even then, they'll be divided- guard duty is boring, so some will be eating, some will be fucking around, some in the bathroom, ect.

7 dice to shoot with? Yeah it could be too much if your PCs can't apply Defense vs Firearms. Again, even if it converts down to Bashing damage, it will still fill up and spill over.

But honestly? I keep the encounter as-is with those stats and would let your PCs know ahead of time that they will have to play Smart if they want to cash in on this. Surely they have at least a few dots in useful powers that could cause confusion or split the gangers up so they're easier to kill? Misdirection, but also shock and surprise. They aren't military, they're hoodlums. They won't react well when a blood soaked monster comes bursted through the third floor window and decapitates one of their niggas.

Probably right under the Exarchs.

Yeah, as a GM you should approach situations like this as if it were a stealth game. Likewise, your PCs should also treat it that way.

Remember also that these are gangers. They're not well educated, trained, or often that intelligent- they also see themselves as tough motherfuckers, and thus don't really expect other people to challenge them. So they're likely to panic, make bad decisions, and otherwise fuck up and be very disorganized in a sudden attack. Give them some time to organize and fire themselves up and they'll be dangerous, but without that they're idiots. Most aren't very good at shooting either. 1 or 2 dots in firearms at most.

Veterans, are, of course, a slightly different matter.

>preemptively murdering someone who is gonna murder you first.
It seems like that would count, to me. Killing in self-defense, in the heat of the moment, is one thing, but premeditated murder is another, even if you do have an understandable reason for it. You are making a calculated decision to end somebody else's life.

You could have 1-3 of them actually have some experience, maybe even ex-military or whatever, but the rest aren't cold-blooded killers despite their posturing.

This. Even a dangerous gang will usually have a very small core of actually scary fuckers- and then a bunch of guys that look tough and are willing to hurt people if they're not in danger- but in a firefight will spray gunfire wildly, scream "OH SHIT!" a lot, and then run away unless they think they can win. Gangers have awful morale. Even the ones that can shoot well tend to turn to shit once things get scary, because they're 90% posturing.

I went with Patterning, as you're changing the Strix (which falls under the Arcanum of Death) into something else under the purview of Death (Shadows).
Much as how my "Vampire into Vanity Set" spell works.
Except in this case, much easier.

There's an argument to have it under Weaving instead, but this way nobody can complain that Strix aren't "necessarily" made of shadows, and you can render them completely incapable of taking any action (so long as you can keep beating them at a Clash of Wills).

You can already shape the Strix using the Compelling Practice.

You are right guys. I should think about their behavior. I believe vtr doesn't have any rules about how mortals react on supernatural shit while in combat? Something about Integrity breaking points?
Btw what about dirty combat?

They're gangsters, how often do you think they bath?

Of course it'll be dirty combat

That depends greatly on the nature of their existence as "shadow-creatures" which might not be true shadows, or need to take a certain form to manifest powers.
I mean, you don't necessarily lose the ability to walk just because someone's shaved your legs.

My version bypasses all considerations of what they actually are, and shuts them down hard by forcing them into existence as something else.

So you just want to ignore cross-splat physiologies and go straight for their throats?

Thinking like a true mage there, user.

KILL ALL SPOOKY OWLS

>This kills the Owl

You're right. It'd be 2 dots, like Shape Ephemera.

Even more hilariously, it doesn't.
It does however lets you leave them in a little heap, sweep them out into the street, and leave them for the sun to deal with.

According to the Demon STG, it's about equal with the Exarchs. Granted, that's in-setting speculation from Demons based on observances of G-M and Exarch activity.

According to Imperial Mysteries, the God-Machine was a former Supernal god kicked out by the Mage lords of Atlantis.

Apparently he is trying to rebuild himself and re-assert his place as a true god.

That's one interpretation of that section, written and released in a book before the God-Machine chronicle was.

Eh, different splats different interpretations.

Considering the Exarchs represent the fundamentals around the God-Machines very existence, I would indeed consider them to be above it in power.

They already won their right to rule, remember.

You'd also need forces in addition to life.

...

>Take archery merit
>See two fangers sodomizing each other in alley
>Stake 2 for 1

Double up boyssssssss!

...

Hey guys, I saw my cousin's character sheet and he had a dot in entropy. So should I kill him to preserve my family's honor?

Get Mind 3 and open his perception to how much cock he's sucking

Render him impotent with your life magic user.

The Entropy hating weeaboo is back, I see.

What happens to the souls of vampires (Masquerade) when they die?

If they're lucky, they stop existing or pass on. If not, I believe they have a chance at becoming Wraiths.

>What was/is your biggest pet peeve about your favorite setting?
Changeling the lost is most definitely not a setting for people new to CofD and is harder to explain in concept since there are no defined character archetypes

Are there any merits that enhance throwing weapons? I want to play a Dio inspired character in my next game.

Anime is dumb.

You're dumb.

There's a 2-dot Throwing Weapons style in Hurt Locker.
First dot gives +Athletics to initiative when using a thrown weapon, second dot lets you inflict the Impaled Tilt to an individual if you successfully damage their arms/legs/hands with a thrown weapon... At the cost of losing your Defense for the turn. So fuck that.

Otherwise, not really.
If you're playing a Mage though, you can use Forces 2 to enhance thrown weapons with a Reach option. Which with additional reach can let you knock people down, or stun them with just a dagger.

I was originally leaning towards a vampire with celerity for obvious reasons. But on second thought Time magic would actually let me stop time.

The real question is if I could throw volleys of knives during a Time stop.

I don't think so, user.
Taking any such action would cancel the spell, even if you coordinated with someone else for you to remove that knife from the spell the moment it was thrown.

Out of all your WoD games who was your favorite NPC? I remember during a vampire game our group became friends with a priest who I swear was based on pic related (most likely was considering the ST was a big deadwood fan).

The group almost came to blows trying to decide if we should turn him to save him or not when his health started failing. In the end we didnt and let him go with God.

It wouldn't cancel the spell.

>"He may move freely, examine objects, take any Mental actions, heal, touch things, and even cast spells with himself as the subject, but not physically move, consume, or injure anything — any attempt to do so immediately ends the spell, but returns the subject to the timeline having just completed the action he attempted."
Nope, it does.

>take a step forward
>you move your clothes which instantly ends the spell

Yeah, that's the problem with that spell, it doesn't specify nearly enough what the limits on movement are.

I mean, sure it really shouldn't break because you blow air in someone's face, but what about running along a rope bridge, climbing creaky stairs?

Much of this stuff would seem to be "common sense" stuff, but it would still help to have some direction.

Alright, through circumstances which i still do not understand, yesterday i somehow obtained a card from the Vampire: The Eternal Struggle from some guy on the street.

It reads Praxis Seizure: Cleveland, what do i do with it?

Huh, had no idea they could become Wraiths.

Okay, another Masquerade question: does consensual diablerie still leave the tell-tale sign on one's aura?

Yes. Though I've no idea why any vampire save a very inhuman elder would do that, since diablere involves drinking the soul, which makes it a fate far worse than final death.

The soul eating is what causes the black. Just drinking someone's vitae isn't enough to diablerize them.

I came across something in some VtM book where a mentor/teacher of some sort did it to pass on their knowledge. They might have been a Cappadocian?

>Kill Middle
>Fuck Right
>Marry Left

Cappadicians are weird, so they might. Still a fate worse than death. And any theoretical coughharbringerscoughsonsofsamedi Cappadociqn remnants would not be fond of it, given that Giovanni diablerized Cappadocius himself.

Some Salubri purportedly have their childer diablerize them upon achieving a necessary level of personal enlightenment. Though Salubri also definitely qualify as a weird bunch.

>ywn diablerize your Salubri waifu

Why even Jyhad?

>you will never have a Cappadocianfu who's willing to comfort you when unlife gets you down

Final death NOW!

Could you incapacitate a vampire by punching/shooting him in the bails? Do they have the appropriate nerves?

What is the best vampire clan and why is it the Ventrue antitribu?

Would a mage ever willingly date a vampire?

Best clan is Dark Ages Tzimisce.

>you will never tenderly and lovingly diablerize your Cappadocian waifu
>you will never feel her squirms and quivers of delight turn to convulsions of fear and agony in your arms as you ravish her body and pull out her metaphysical essence
>you will never embrace her supple, naked soul with your own

Just stake me now.

Changeling was the first nWoD book I ever read. It made the others slightly disappointing.
If I ever get a game, I'm playing an eight year old boy who traded seven years of service to get his sister to a better place and another seven to remove the "one stolen child a generation" curse that his ancestor called down.
His sister is still a spoiled Fae princess and well on her way to True Fae. But she got him a long break between his first and second terms of service.
Guess how many generations will descend from his father between the two?

Keep it. Make a plotline out of it. Have a mage and a freehold take advantage of yugioh to put vampire politics in the hands of the gestalt results of thousands of children playing a card game.

>Best Clan
>Iconic is a magical tranny

Nah m8. That's a man butt

You mean Sascha Vykos?

Don't give a shit about that Byzantine buttboy.

And I picked Dark Ages specifically because Vicissitude wasn't still so widespread throughout the Clan.