Posts made by Arkandel

The book is out!

What about Renown?

Hey folks! Before you say anything please read the following two disclaimers. So if your response was going to be similar to one of the following:

1. "The World of Darkness isn't meant to be balanced between spheres!"

or

2. "I don't care about balance and/or mechanics!"

then you might be wasting your time reading this! I hope it has its little special niche among those who like to talk shop about dice and crossover mechanics as they relate to MU*.

So I spent a few days reading and re-reading the Werewolf 2.0 book, about an afternoon going through Demon (just so you know @Coin, they are also referred to as the Fallen so pfthp) and maybe one good solid through Vampire. It doesn't make me an expert but that's what this thread is for if my misconceptions can be dispelled.

TL;WR first: I think as of now Demon is at the top of the chain, followed closely by Werewolf, which is lagging slightly behind Vampire. The difference in power ranges doesn't seem to be remotely as huge as in the regular nWoD.

• Demon has too many toys (sometimes literally) to not be squarely ahead. It has more than one ways to deliver aggravated damage and a way to heal themselves and others even during combat. They have the (current) game's best item making from what I read, and excellent escape powers for when shit hits the fan, including burning a cover to fuel themselves. Hell, they can conditionally come back from death.
  They also have ways of attacking social dynamics which are pretty impossible to defend (and in a MU, can be as devastating as character death). They are also fantastic at information gathering - they are basically the best spies in the nWoD.
  Their one weakness is angels. If for any reason that's not a clear and present delimiter Demon has no built-in weaknesses.

• Werewolves are solid death machines. In this edition they can do so much to cripple and deal damage, plus so much ability to take it without going down they are in a really good place. Between Gauru healing, merits like Living Weapon, form specialization and pack bonuses/buffs, they are tremendously good.
  Their item making is also top-notch, with the built-in limitation Fetishes usually need to be fueled by Essence - thus they can't be loaners. They even have pretty good information gathering abilities although they're indirect, by utilizing friendly/recruited spirits for it.
  Their weakness in cross-sphere is aggravated damage. They can't deal it to non-spirits/Uratha, they can't do that much to heal it (they heal a point every two? days, but that's not going to be helpful in mid-scene).

• Vampires are considerably buffed in 2.0. They take bashing from just about everything that's not supernatural, they can spend vitae to heal or buff themselves, their default senses have been boosted and some of their merits and Devotions are scary. They also have the usual array of bloodsucker-things, including ghouls, Vitae addiction, etc. They can be sneaky as hell and their manipulative powers are about or even higher than Demons', and well above that of Werewolves.
  Where they fall short is that they have a choice of spending their resource; they can either heal or buff themselves on each turn. They also come with a natural item-making limitation (it's not a prominent part of the sphere), although on a MU* it's a good bet many will just have friends gear them up from other spheres or get HR'ed something.

Now... after all this, my assertion in all this is that each sphere has certain limitations which are meant to be there. I've the feeling these things were playtested a hell of a lot more than in vanilla nWoD, and so removing them to 'fix' them could topple the scale more than it would do good.

For instance if you allow Werewolves to heal aggravated faster it would automatically push them way higher, quite possibly past Demons. If Demons work at any time without without the non-theoretical fear of Angel involvement, they are even higher than they currently are. And if Vampires get native item making they could offset their other limitations.

Just some thoughts. I've kept it pretty generic until/if other people feel like chipping in.

@Admiral said:

In my experience the Invictus and LS are allied on every game, ever, and their alliances never break down or suffer even though invariably the LS gets the positions of power and the Invictus get nothing.

Don't neglect the fact some players only play one kind of thing. So if a few motivated, good RPers end up playing LS (or SL or whatever) on every game, that's what you get.

@Glitch said:

@Chime Is there any reason you're not naming this particular MU owner? Or at least the MU itself.

It could save someone here a bit of grief. I can't imagine many of us would want to play where someone of that caliber is staffing.

@Admiral said:

So should I plunk down my hard earned cash for the book? I'm kind of burned out on MUSHing and not sure I'd ever even play anywhere, but if the book is -that- good...

Edit to add: I am referring to the new Werewolf book.

I didn't think it added that much to theme compared to before (*). The 2nd Edition refined some issues, it emphasizes the Hunt as part of Uratha's being, it streamlined some concepts which used to be on splat books, it integrated everything into the GMC mechanics (Conditions are everywhere now), etc and brought Werewolf up closer to where they were supposed to be as well in terms of power.

However if you already own the 1st Edition book you probably wouldn't care much about these additions if you didn't plan to play. If you did though then yes, it'd be well worth it.

(*) In my humble opinion.

@Chime said:

Extra classy: he started replying to unrelated G+ posts I'd made.

And that guy is a MU* owner. It'd be so cool to play on one of his storied games.

While I was reading that log I kept thinking that guy was way ruder than he should be while asking for customer service.

But if he's not even a customer then all he is is an entitled douchebag.

@Kireek said:

I can't believe you Ark! How could anyone NOT want to play an Irraka after reading that book?

I thought about it. I just find it awkward to play an overly secretive/sneak character on a MU* since it often involves purposefully staying out of the spotlight, not sharing plot seeds with people, etc. Actively striving to remain under the radar isn't conductive to playing and meeting people.

There are other ways to do it, of course, but no concepts I really felt like playing leapt out at me (conversely that's also why I'm not thinking of a Demon PC). However playing a character inspired by Marv on Sin City did, so that's what I'm doing.

If anyone's been into the gunpowder-and-magic thing, The Autumn Republic is now out. Pretty solid read.

I really liked the book, although I only had an hour or so to flip through it and look at the theme - I still need to look over the Lodges and the organization @Kireek pointed out, and have barely looked at Rites (I've had enough magic shit for my PCs for a while ).

I'll be playing a Rahu ... something on Eldritch. If anyone wants to talk pack, PM me. Preferably if there's an alpha involved, the character I have in mind is no leader. I'm also pretty open to concepts for other wolves/WB who knew each other in their childhood or whatnot.

@Chime Wait, are you saying this guy is using a free service?

@Wizz said:

I just came.

Sharing is caring?

@Admiral said:

I thought you guys weren't opening with any supers? Or was that just for soft open?

Way I heard (or at least understood) it, they're opening Mortal/Mortal+ first, then when they are ready, with the GMC supers.

Maybe what @Thenomain means is that when that second wave comes they'll only include Vampire/Demon.

@HelloRaptor said:

Some of my favorite RP as a Purified was interacting with Werewolves, which was... pretty surprising really since I expected most of them to be total fucking assholes about it.

It's almost as if playing with good people is fun, and playing with jerks is not!

But seriously, I've found the same thing running PrPs with a mixed bag of Mages and Lost. Some Mage players are terrific, they pose and are very involved without trying to take over or show off too much. Others are less considerate.

Werewolf: the Forsaken Second Edition is now available for purchase.

@RDC said:

My answer to that is: Vampires cannot catch rabies.

I do not give two shits if vampires and werewolves fuck. I don't care if Blood Bathers and squirrels fuck. Whose genitalia rubs against whose or what is the furthest thing from my mind when staffing, aside from decisions that reduce or eliminate the amount of give-a-shit I have to have about who is rubbing what on what.

Hell, I may write an Acolyte Dead Wolf with a werewolf lover into game canon just to show specifically that I don't give a fuck.

Those are many lines written about something you don't give a fuck about.

Fair enough. You can lock the thread if you want, I wouldn't want any complaints to be launched (although no one discussed the actual means of obtaining content or named its sources).

For the record, the poll after 24 hours showed 78% downloaded/21% owned content among those who voted. Obviously some rounding took place.

@EmmahSue said:

I don't care about the numbers, but I am curious about the stance. How many folks download these books and say to themselves: "I am stealing a book, period, full-stop."? Is there open acknowledgement of theft, or is it handwaved and mentally shrugged off as Not That Big A Deal? I steal books too, so I'm not here to be judgey. I'm just curious if... not whether there's a sense of right/wrong, but rather if it's a question that even comes up anymore.

ES

My benchmark is whether an RPG book would be a reference for something specific or not, and that comes out of how much use I am or expect to make of it.

So for instance let's say I'm thinking I might want a Bloodline for a new vampire PC. I'd first go to a web page giving generic descriptions of all Bloodlines in order to see if one of them catches my eye. Now if one did, is it in one of the extra splat books? And is the book itself interesting enough to keep? Or would I be buying it for the 2-3 pages of that one thing I want for this one use?

But say, tomorrow the Werewolf GMC book is (heh, probably...) coming out. I bet I can find that sucker on a torrent within ten minutes, but I won't. Because I'll be making use of the material, reading through time after time, so it's actually something I want to own.

Obviously YMMV.

@Ganymede said:

pro-wrestling.

Allow me to place an exclamation mark here: !

It's really difficult to attain actual hard data on this sort of thing.

For example I've downloaded books I own physical copies of, just so I could paste from them (and because it was more convenient to grab "all nWoD books" than just some). I've also gotten them several times over the years due to a number of reasons. There's also the fact I've gotten books I'd never consider buying as I'd literally consider them taking up more room on my shelves than they're worth, and so it wasn't like they lost a sale from that.

But we might be able to see what the habits of MSB users in particular are, and their reasoning if they choose to post here about it.