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So I want to have an Unchained antagonist from the Demon: The Descent splatbook in my Vampire the Requiem, Requiem for Rome campaign.

I'm thinking he could have a cover in the Frumentarii, who serve as a sort of secret police for the Romans, and would give my yet unnamed Demon some significant mortal muscle to call on if he needs it.

What I'm unsure of are his goals. Obviously fighting the God Machine, but I guess the area I'm stumped on is how that goal could lead to conflict with the Camarilla and by extension the Players. I suppose I'm also not entirely sure how to build the antagonist to make him a good match for the most powerful society of vampires in history.

Also it's unclear to me if Demons have always used Circles and Agencies or if they would have utilized cults or some other organizational methods during antiquity.
 
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Old Guard said:
So I want to have an Unchained antagonist from the Demon: The Descent splatbook in my Vampire the Requiem, Requiem for Rome campaign.

I'm thinking he could have a cover in the Frumentarii, who serve as a sort of secret police for the Romans, and would give my yet unnamed Demon some significant mortal muscle to call on if he needs it.

What I'm unsure of are his goals. Obviously fighting the God Machine, but I guess the area I'm stumped on is how that goal could lead to conflict with the Camarilla and by extension the Players. I suppose I'm also not entirely sure how to build the antagonist to make him a good match for the most powerful society of vampires in history.

Also it's unclear to me if Demons have always used Circles and Agencies or if they would have utilized cults or some other organizational methods during antiquity.
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If you want your Demon to have conflict with the vampires then just make something they care about Infrastructure. Or maybe going after local Infrastructure makes life harder for the vampires in some way. The leeches have almost no way of knowing that something they benefit from or manipulate in some way is part of the Machine so they will assume it's an attack on them.
 
cmwatford said:
If you want your Demon to have conflict with the vampires then just make something they care about Infrastructure. Or maybe going after local Infrastructure makes life harder for the vampires in some way. The leeches have almost no way of knowing that something they benefit from or manipulate in some way is part of the Machine so they will assume it's an attack on them.
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Some kind of infrastructure within the Necropolis itself maybe? I don't suppose I ever have to specify what it does, just use it as a mcguffin to spark conflict between the Demon and the PC Vampires.
 
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I think the general structure of circle and agency is kind of eternal but they could have used different and less anachronistic lingo at the time.

I think when you have a mashup of the unchained and vampires an important overlap is always the humans between them. They're both social manipulators with some kind of cover identity who manipulate humans to their own ends, and often rationalize the ways they're parasitic. So take part of that, some ethics or emotional thing about the herd that you know your players feel strongly about, and give the demon a contradicting agenda for those people or their neighborhood/subculture.
 
I'm aware this is slightly offtopic for the thread, but it still feels relevant - so I'm going to post!

To put it shortly, Falconian Productions has been organizing this for a while, with me and a number of other wonderful people from the Far Horizons Co-Op. We've put together an outline, two preview cults and an extremely swanky cover for a collection of system- and setting-agnostic cults, designed to be easily-integrated into any given setting, and modified to suit a plot with minimal editing on your part. Perfect for any DM who wants to throw a cult into their game, but doesn't want to do all the work to set it up, or just wants ideas for occult weirdness. I don't think I have to explain how that could gel with a World of Darkness campaign. We've even put out some specific ideas for adapting it to Vampire: the Masquerade!

There's a video review on YouTube giving an overview of what we've got so far here, and you can take a look at the two preview cults for free - but there's going to be fifteen in the final version.

We had a bit of a rough start to the Kickstarter, so we're going around trying to round up enough support to get us over the finish line in this last week. If you're at all interested, we'd be very grateful to get paid to put this piece of work out there for people to use. Any help you can offer is very much appreciated - even if it's just spreading info around and getting more eyes on the project.

If you want to support us, please pay a visit to our Kickstarter here!
 
Potato Anarchy said:
I think the general structure of circle and agency is kind of eternal but they could have used different and less anachronistic lingo at the time.

I think when you have a mashup of the unchained and vampires an important overlap is always the humans between them. They're both social manipulators with some kind of cover identity who manipulate humans to their own ends, and often rationalize the ways they're parasitic. So take part of that, some ethics or emotional thing about the herd that you know your players feel strongly about, and give the demon a contradicting agenda for those people or their neighborhood/subculture.
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Thats a very good angle, and one I needed to think about for most of the night, a vampires herd could be an excellent way for a Demon to get eyes and ears where it needs them by buying aspects of various herd members life, or outright taking the place of one via a Pact. Does the Thralldom aspect transfer? I understand that Demons can only get the mortal aspects of a persons soul, so them making a pact with a vampire would get them the Cover, but only as a mortal, the Demon wouldn't get any vampiric abilities out of it. Am I correct in how it works?
 
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Old Guard said:
Thats a very good angle, and one I needed to think about for most of the night, a vampires herd could be an excellent way for a Demon to get eyes and ears where it needs them by buying aspects of various herd members life, or outright taking the place of one via a Pact. Does the Thralldom aspect transfer? I understand that Demons can only get the mortal aspects of a persons soul, so them making a pact with a vampire would get them the Cover, but only as a mortal, the Demon wouldn't get any vampiric abilities out of it. Am I correct in how it works?
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Yeah, a demon can make a pact for individual pieces of a vampire's (un)life, but they can't affect the supernatural parts: a pact might gift a vampire with a more funds or a mortal herd, but it couldn't improve the vampire's disciplines or blood potency, and the demon wouldn't be able to take the vampire's clan for themself though they could take their reputation or Touchstones.

As for the thralldom thing... I think that would work? You could probably buy a bloodbound ghoul in a pact, since what you're buying there is the relationship itself rather than the vampiric ability to form bloodbonds. You wouldn't be able to keep feeding the ghoul, of course, but it'd work in the short term. You could also buy a bloodbond or vitae addiction from somebody if you wanted a cover as a ghoul. You wouldn't get the powers that ghouls have, of course, but you could fake things with demon stuff for a while.

Also, in addition to the failings you mentioned, a soul pact with a vampire inflicts agg damage on the demon equal to the vampire's blood potency when they cash in on the pact. So not only does soul pacting with a vampire get you a shitty cover, it also hurts like a bitch. It might still be worth it, since there's an embed that lets you pass as other splats and an exploit that lets you copy low-level powers from them, so you actually could make use of a vampire cover for a while as long as you avoided any real scrutiny. It'd definitely be unusual though, and likely done with a specific objective in mind rather than just for the security of having another cover.
 
I have started a new Quest, in collaboration with @BungieONI ! Ever wanted to be an eldritch demigod of dust and ancient necromancy, running a cult and seeking ancient relics in the long-ago times of 1999, London? If so, look no further!

Also, that's a very specific wish.

forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Deathless and Nameless (Mummy: the Curse Quest) Mature

It's 1999 and you've woken up feeling like a god. Unfortunately, most gods don't need to deal with chronic amnesia.
forums.sufficientvelocity.com forums.sufficientvelocity.com
 
So I finally started digging into Deviant, and I kinda love it. For one thing, the splat is very mechanically distinct: no power stat that governs the size of your resource pool, no 0-10 morality meter that starts at 7, the powers rated 1-5 work in a very different way, the classic 5x5 is a lot less pigeon-holey (and doesn't include any social clubs), they've got a whole second health meter to track how fucked their powers are, etc. I think Demon was the last time I was really impressed by a splat breaking the mold, but Deviant blows it out of the water.

It's also really flexible in terms of both flavor and mechanics, while still having a very clear and distinct vision of what these characters are/what genre it's portraying, which is very impressive. The whole interlocking scar/variation thing is just really cool and flavorful, and reading through everything I kept thinking of how certain characters in other works of fiction were totally Deviant characters and you could easily model them as such (Twig was the one I kept coming back to, which is fun because I really doubt the authors have ever even heard of it). I feel like I could have a lot of fun just making a bunch of characters for this game.

I haven't gotten into the conspiracy rules yet, but just the fact that there are conspiracy rules instead of just a lot of fluff bits telling you that the game is about fighting conspiracies is very promising. The whole package just feels very focused and easy to work with for the GM, there's zero question of what the players will spend their time doing like there can be with some of the other games.

I also feel like the flexibility of the splat would make it relatively easy to do a crossover game? Like, the normal issues with crossover are 1) differences in power levels, 2) giving the different splats a reason to work together, and 3) different splats dragging tons of lore behind them and diluting the focus of the setting (e.g. spirit stuff might be forced into the background if you only have one werewolf, which is weird and a bummer for that werewolf). But with Deviant, it's pretty easy to solve those issues if you're just slotting one or two Deviants into an otherwise mono-splat game.

Deviants can have vastly different power levels, so you just tune it to be on par with everybody else. The focus on fighting "the conspiracy" is really easy to fit into the other splats' stuff, you just make sure the conspiracy is run by the Seers of the Throne or the Ordo Dracul or whoever (this does mean the Deviant is forcing the direction of the game a bit, but not nearly as bad as other crossovers, and some sacrifices are to be expected in a crossover game). Lastly, it's really easy to make sure the lore and flavor of your particular Deviant fits with the rest of the game. If it's a werewolf crossover, then you got superpowers from snorting werewolf blood or got a spirit shoved inside you or whatever. It doesn't even need to be THAT direct a connection, the point is that you're not dragging a bunch of necessary setting elements behind you like most other splats: a government supersoldier program can fit just fine into a vampire game even if there was no vampire blood involved in the process.

I know I'm gushing a lot, I'm just really impressed by this game. I really want to give it a run, but I don't have a group right now and my schedule makes it kinda hard to fix that. I might run a Deviant quest instead? I don't know if there'd be any interest in that and I still need to familiarize myself with all the rules, but I'm giving it some serious thought.
 
Don Alverzo said:
I know I'm gushing a lot, I'm just really impressed by this game. I really want to give it a run, but I don't have a group right now and my schedule makes it kinda hard to fix that. I might run a Deviant quest instead? I don't know if there'd be any interest in that and I still need to familiarize myself with all the rules, but I'm giving it some serious thought.
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I would be interested in a Deviant quest. I was actually considering running a Conspiracy quest if I liked what was in the Devoted Companion.
 
Whew. For some reason, I kind of forget why at this point I decided to read this thread from the beginning.
Think it's taken me over a month now of casually reading on breaks or before bed. Amazing to see how the setting and game has changed, but I'm surprised there isn't more discussion about the 5th editions of vampire and werewolf, which I was looking forward to as I got closer to the present dates.

Also whatever happened to season 3 of the Rose Garden and has MJ12 said if Panopticon is as finished as its going to be?
 
wrecksalot said:
I would be interested in a Deviant quest. I was actually considering running a Conspiracy quest if I liked what was in the Devoted Companion.
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Neat! Might be a couple weeks before I find the time, but knowing I can expect at least one player should help me find the motivation.
Vendrin said:
Amazing to see how the setting and game has changed, but I'm surprised there isn't more discussion about the 5th editions of vampire and werewolf, which I was looking forward to as I got closer to the present dates.
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I think the problem with the 5th editions is that I don't really know who they're for? I have zero knowledge of werewolf 5th edition, but I know V5 changed the setting in really big ways, but I don't really think the people buying new Vampire the Masquerade books in the year of our Lord 2022 want big setting changes. The people who are still actively invested in oWoD stuff already know the setting really well, they know how to use the bits they like and throw out the bits they don't, they've shaped it to their liking and if you give them new metaplot that upsets everything they're liable to just ignore it.

I'm not a big oWoD person, but from what I can tell the stuff that people actually get excited for is the anniversary editions and things like that. The books that promise to put all the good stuff in one place, present rules that you can actually work with, and maybe tweak some of the more problematic 90's holdovers. They want the things they like cleaned up and packaged neatly, they don't want big bold changes.

And it's not like V5 is gonna do a great job of attracting new players. Not when it's embracing the metaplot and baggage of a 30 year old franchise while also being sort of a controversial mess on its own merits.

Somebody who doesn't already know VtM is gonna have a much easier time picking up Requiem, while somebody who does know VtM is going to prefer V20 (or whatever the preferred edition is) over this weird new shit.
 
QafianSage said:
I have started a new Quest, in collaboration with @BungieONI ! Ever wanted to be an eldritch demigod of dust and ancient necromancy, running a cult and seeking ancient relics in the long-ago times of 1999, London? If so, look no further!

Also, that's a very specific wish.

forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Deathless and Nameless (Mummy: the Curse Quest) Mature

It's 1999 and you've woken up feeling like a god. Unfortunately, most gods don't need to deal with chronic amnesia.
forums.sufficientvelocity.com forums.sufficientvelocity.com
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Man, I've been waiting for a Mummy: The Curse game on SV for a while!
 
Also speaking of Mummy, with 2E making them explicitly atemporal, there's a dumb concept I want to see done some time: a Mummy with the Resonant Lifetime merit, only instead of being some time in the past, it's the distant space future. As instead of needing to acquaint yourself with computers, it's needing to adjust way down in your estimation of all the different pieces of technology. Your cultist got his heart blown out? Eh, the cortical stack should be fine, just run him a new sleeve and- wait shit, you're still 500 years away from those. Maybe some medical nanites at least? No?

It's probably best as like a side NPC who this comes up with mostly as joke fodder, but it's theoretically possible and amusing. Just a Mesen-Nebu, busy trying to get in on the dumbass billionaire space race in order to get off this bloody planet for any amount of time because they've got a case of claustrophobia from being confined to one atmosphere.
 
QafianSage said:
I'm afraid you've just missed the closing of the first vote, but I should be putting up the second one soon - this evening, with luck, or tomorrow without.
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Speaking of this, just posted the new chapter!

forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Deathless and Nameless (Mummy: the Curse Quest) Mature

You rise towards the living world, and your soul rises with you from the depths of Duat. Five parts has the soul, five great Pillars - but one is most radiant of all, building for itself a raiment of raging Sekhem, honey-gold and hotter than a furnace. You chose it in that dark place before...
forums.sufficientvelocity.com forums.sufficientvelocity.com

May include JoJo memes and cool old ladies.
 
Don Alverzo said:
(I have no idea how to do that fancy thing that the person above me did, so you're just getting a regular link)
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That's what happens if you post an address without Linking it, like this;
forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Problem Child (Deviant: the Renegades Quest)

By crimes against both nature and humanity, you have been twisted into an abomination with superhuman abilities and crippling weaknesses to match. Now you must fight back against your creators while trying not to destroy yourself with your own powers. It'd probably be easier if you weren't...
forums.sufficientvelocity.com forums.sufficientvelocity.com
 
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Sydonai said:
That's what happens if you post an address without Linking it, like this;
forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Problem Child (Deviant: the Renegades Quest)

By crimes against both nature and humanity, you have been twisted into an abomination with superhuman abilities and crippling weaknesses to match. Now you must fight back against your creators while trying not to destroy yourself with your own powers. It'd probably be easier if you weren't...
forums.sufficientvelocity.com forums.sufficientvelocity.com
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Thank you! I'll make sure to remember that for the next time I engage in shameless self-promotion.
 
QafianSage said:
I'm aware this is slightly offtopic for the thread, but it still feels relevant - so I'm going to post!

To put it shortly, Falconian Productions has been organizing this for a while, with me and a number of other wonderful people from the Far Horizons Co-Op. We've put together an outline, two preview cults and an extremely swanky cover for a collection of system- and setting-agnostic cults, designed to be easily-integrated into any given setting, and modified to suit a plot with minimal editing on your part. Perfect for any DM who wants to throw a cult into their game, but doesn't want to do all the work to set it up, or just wants ideas for occult weirdness. I don't think I have to explain how that could gel with a World of Darkness campaign. We've even put out some specific ideas for adapting it to Vampire: the Masquerade!

There's a video review on YouTube giving an overview of what we've got so far here, and you can take a look at the two preview cults for free - but there's going to be fifteen in the final version.

We had a bit of a rough start to the Kickstarter, so we're going around trying to round up enough support to get us over the finish line in this last week. If you're at all interested, we'd be very grateful to get paid to put this piece of work out there for people to use. Any help you can offer is very much appreciated - even if it's just spreading info around and getting more eyes on the project.

If you want to support us, please pay a visit to our Kickstarter here!
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I'm bringing this up again, because we're in the last day of the Kickstarter, but we've had a massive swell of supporters in the last day, and I think we might (maybe) actually make it! Obviously if it doesn't get funded you don't get charged, but it'd mean the world if you could help us bring the Guide to Cults to fruition!

Link's here if you want to help out.


​
 
QafianSage said:
I'm bringing this up again, because we're in the last day of the Kickstarter, but we've had a massive swell of supporters in the last day, and I think we might (maybe) actually make it! Obviously if it doesn't get funded you don't get charged, but it'd mean the world if you could help us bring the Guide to Cults to fruition!

Link's here if you want to help out.


​
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I'm sorry for the spam, but we've got a handful of hours left in the Kickstarter, and under £1k total left to fund. If you wanna help out, now's the time!
 
So no idea if this is of interest to anyone else but here's a neat video I found about combining Old world of darkness with cyberpunk

View: https://youtu.be/pmzpYmNQJiE

It's technically two things in one
Covering a semi Official crossover between the two
And then his ideas on how to do so
 
Don Alverzo said:
I think the problem with the 5th editions is that I don't really know who they're for? I have zero knowledge of werewolf 5th edition, but I know V5 changed the setting in really big ways, but I don't really think the people buying new Vampire the Masquerade books in the year of our Lord 2022 want big setting changes. The people who are still actively invested in oWoD stuff already know the setting really well, they know how to use the bits they like and throw out the bits they don't, they've shaped it to their liking and if you give them new metaplot that upsets everything they're liable to just ignore it
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If Werewolf 5th edition manages to expand the Thirteen Tribes and Fera in an interesting, anthropologically and ethologically grounded way, in addition to advancing the metaplot and making the rules more elegant, I'd snap it up in an instant. I'd like it more than 20th, actually, which had no tribe or breed books and also had the genius idea of bringing back the Swords of Heimdall, thus leading to a million Internet arguments about the Get of Fenris that should have been buried alongside the eviscerated corpses of Nazi werewolves.

Basically, give me well-researched lore that's not two decades out of date.
 
Don Alverzo said:
I think the problem with the 5th editions is that I don't really know who they're for?
[...]
And it's not like V5 is gonna do a great job of attracting new players. Not when it's embracing the metaplot and baggage of a 30 year old franchise while also being sort of a controversial mess on its own merits.

Somebody who doesn't already know VtM is gonna have a much easier time picking up Requiem, while somebody who does know VtM is going to prefer V20 (or whatever the preferred edition is) over this weird new shit.
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No idea if it's doing runaway numbers or anything but it sounds like by both customer surveys and corporate intent, V5 is actually going for new players to a considerable degree and they're a big chunk of buyers. Not enough of a focus to actually get a reboot instead of a soft-retconned continuation*, but they're trying to be the Greatest Hits edition in a sort of two-laned crossover appeal to both old fans who aren't tightly tied to another edition and joining them to new players with whom to grow their customer base.

And I...sorta get it? I came up in NWOD and so traditionally disdain and judge owod grogs, but I think V5's virtue for new players more than design or lore or anything is its sheer scale and brio. It's there for people who are more excited by some fandom archaeology and engaging with something big and old and (psychotically) self-assured than by the self-directed toolbox work of playing and (especially) running NWOD. These people don't seem to overlap a ton with the Extremely Online RPG Fan chunk of fandom but I've been convinced they exist.

(*yet - i'm sorta hopeful that H5 portends greater willingness to mess with old canon now that Achilli is creative lead. maybe someday we'll get a "wod 1990" special book series that actually gives us a skeleton-closet-free take on some of the games with real modern rewrites)
 
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