in_nomine-digest Tuesday, January 22 2002 Volume 01 : Number 2522 In this digest: Re: IN> the War Re: IN> OK, a couple of things... Re: IN> the War Re: IN> Angel of Nowhere... Re: IN> Khalid's Choir IN> In Nomine/DC cross-over (was: a quick question) Re: IN> the War Re: IN> the War Re: IN> the War Re: IN> A quick question for you all... IN> Re: IN > Furry In Nomine Re: IN> the War Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 21:53:49 -0500 From: "Josh Moger" Subject: Re: IN> the War >Okay ... about Ba'al ... WHY is he powerful again? WHY is THE WAR a >powerful word? > Snip Baal is powerful because: A) He was directly worshipped by a number of people around the time of the Israelites. Pure, unadulterated, worship essence is heady stuff. >Flowers encompasses peace, understanding, healing, tulips and love, things >coming together in harmony. >War encompasses bloodshed, hatred => an offensive, pissed off divinity and >taking care of vets (apparently), and things moving against each other in a >effort to destroy the other one. > War also encompasses the sheer act of living every day, a constant struggle between life and death. Michael is supposed to be "He Who Is Like God", and like God, Michael is a force for existence against the forces of destruction and oblivion. (We really need to see some more stuff with Mariel...) > >Is it somehow important enough (judged important enough by the Symphony, I >presume) to be such a powerful Word? > Symphony? Perhaps... Canon-creators? Yep. My humble opinion is that the Word The War increases in power every single year. Why? Because that's another year that The War has caused some sort of effect upon reality. Thats the point of the demonic struggle- changing reality. In fact, the Symphony doesn't even play a big part in demonic Words. They're trying to destroy the Symphony, not take part in its existence. Baal's word encompasses the 20,000 year old demonic struggle against all of reality. >(and why is Greed a -minor- word and (Infernal) Fire a major word? >Shouldn't Greed bring far many more souls down to Hell than Fire?) > Woo-hoo. I can actually explain that one without trampling over canon to do it. Remember the little thing called the Great Depression? Mammon remembers it too. So does every other demon that saw Mammon's entire personal economy fall when the earth-bound one did as well. Mammon once had a huge system, a Bank in Hell that most economic transactions went through. He had it all, and though he's still got the rights to any soul that signs a contract on Earth, he now is ranked a minor Prince (though, age-wise he's still with the rest of the 'higher-ups'). By the by, the above was gleamed from the wonderfully canon-packed: Superiors 4 Rogues to Riches. Josh ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 03:05:50 From: "Perry Lloyd" Subject: Re: IN> OK, a couple of things... >Along this line, one thing that's always slightly bothered me is the fact >that Kyriotates, one of my favorite choirs, completely replaces a person's >mind, driving their host's conscious into the Marches, though I understand >that the ability to have multiple viewpoints gives Kyriotates an Angelic >comprehension of the Symphony. > >Has anyone else felt that way? I certainly have. I'd much rather have the kyriotates riding passively in multiple host's, overriding the host consciousness only when necessary in order to protect the host. Chiefly, their purpose would be to give people a extra nudge to commit good acts (ex: that rush of desire to protect someone), or to give them a boost to their physical attributes at a moment of stress (lifting a car). Or, even to just "whisper" suggestions in their heads which would be helpful (eg. further the Divine Word that the Angel serves) to Heaven's cause (and maybe even useful to the person as well). Thiswould help to explain Shedim's ability to actually be willing to give the Host some control (wouldn't a totally selfish Kyriotate completely push out the Host's mind entirely??), as it would still be hard-wired into them. It would ALSO go to explain why Kyriotates have a resonance for multiplicity and seeing things from multiple points of view, as they have been inside many people's head and have been exposed to many many many points of view, rather than the literal "seeing from multiple points (vantages) of view : one over here, one over here, another over here" ; that's just having many pairs of eyes. - -Perry perrylloyd@hotmail.com pl312993@oak.cats.ohiou.edu http://www.geocities.com/perrylloyd/ "And that's the hardest thing for a human being to do - be wrong. Do you know that people would rather die than be wrong?" - --from A Matter For Men by David Gerrold _________________________________________________________________ Rejoignez le plus grand service de messagerie au monde avec MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com/fr ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 22:23:25 -0500 From: Mike Bruner Subject: Re: IN> the War > >Okay ... about Ba'al ... WHY is he powerful again? WHY is THE WAR a > >powerful word? > > >Snip >Baal is powerful because: A) He was directly worshipped by a number of >people around the time of the Israelites. Pure, unadulterated, worship >essence is heady stuff. Not really a factor these days though. I think The War is strong simply because the war between good and evil is very much a large part of human existence (not to mention he apparently gains from "war crimes" and such as well; given how many true crapholes there are in the world where such things are routine I'm sure he has a lot of power from that). > >Is it somehow important enough (judged important enough by the Symphony, I > >presume) to be such a powerful Word? > > >Symphony? Perhaps... Canon-creators? Yep. My humble opinion is that the >Word The War increases in power every single year. Why? Because that's >another year that The War has caused some sort of effect upon reality. >Thats the point of the demonic struggle- changing reality. In fact, the >Symphony doesn't even play a big part in demonic Words. They're trying to >destroy the Symphony, not take part in its existence. Baal's word >encompasses the 20,000 year old demonic struggle against all of reality. Somewhat off; they aren't trying to outright DESTROY the Symphony, or else they never would have fought Legion trying to do that. What Hell wants is to change the Symphony to their desires as opposed to God's. Look at the angelic versus demonic resonances; angelic ones are pretty much all about understanding what reality/the Symphony IS (even the Kyrio to a certain extent is "view reality from different perspectives to understand better", which I imagine was its pre-Fall function) while demons are all about twisting the world to meet your desires. If they destroyed the Symphony, they never could change it. And obviously the Symphony does have an impact on them, or else they could never develop Tethers and such or gain power from increasing their Word in the world. - -- Mike Bruner-- mbruner18@home.com Before you try to beat the odds, make sure you can survive the odds beating you. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 03:24:03 From: "Perry Lloyd" Subject: Re: IN> Angel of Nowhere... > > Maybe you weren't _really_ a new fledge, but were part-created from > > the Remnant Angel of Nowhere...? O:> > >Oog. Creepy thought. > >(although I do get a weird mental image of "Heeere, Wordy Wordy Wordy. >Heeere, new home, Wordy, come back...." :p) Not really. Nowhere requires the concept of Somewhere to exist, everything is somewhere, but is anything nowhere? Of course, to be somewhere, something must be at a specific location which can be known, therefore nowhere refers to a nonspecific place which can't be known. So, the Angel of Nowhere can be ANYWHERE he wants and its wholly undetectable by any means (except, perhaps, by God). This Angel would specialize, I imagine, in bringing things from somewhere to nowhere, and then placing them elsewhere. Also, he provides for stuff that comes out of nowhere, probably whispering odd and off-the-wall suggestions into people's minds, as well as unexpectedly dropping safes and pianos onto Evil creatures. My question would be, does Limbo, which has a name and has been described a certain place, count as a place that is actually nowhere? - -Perry perrylloyd@hotmail.com pl312993@oak.cats.ohiou.edu http://www.geocities.com/perrylloyd/ "And that's the hardest thing for a human being to do - be wrong. Do you know that people would rather die than be wrong?" - --from A Matter For Men by David Gerrold _________________________________________________________________ Rejoignez le plus grand service de messagerie au monde avec MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com/fr ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 03:28:03 From: "Perry Lloyd" Subject: Re: IN> Khalid's Choir >Rolland Therrien wrote: > > Faith, as > > interpreted as Human belief, is something that must be approached with > > objectivity and reason, not blind obediance or fanatical belief. > >Actually, Faith is based on emotion. It needn't be based on blind >obedience or fanaticism, but it is inherently irrational (in the >literal, rather than pejorative sense). Oh, I was wondering what faith was in IN Canon. - -Perry perrylloyd@hotmail.com pl312993@oak.cats.ohiou.edu http://www.geocities.com/perrylloyd/ "And that's the hardest thing for a human being to do - be wrong. Do you know that people would rather die than be wrong?" - --from A Matter For Men by David Gerrold _________________________________________________________________ Discutez en ligne avec vos amis, essayez MSN Messenger : http://messenger.msn.fr/ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 20:43:24 -0800 From: Vaughn Romero Subject: IN> In Nomine/DC cross-over (was: a quick question) Perry Lloyd wrote: > speaking of which, has anyone done a DC Heros In Nomine cross-over yet? I'd > do it, but don't know the characters or the plot(s) well enough to do it. I am playing an IN-inspired angel in a DCU game now. The game is not a true cross-over, but here are my observations so far about trying to play an IN angel in a DCU game: 1. You had better like combat games, because DCU lives for the action scenes. 2. And in those action scenes brawn is much more important than brains (though YMMV). Carry a big stick. 3. But despite all your brawn, you will never kill or be killed by a demon as DCU is set in a Nerf gun world. It's real hard to feel you are wrath of God when you carrying a Flaming Nerf Sword of Justice!(tm) 4. Angels are nothing special. There are plenty of "mortals" who can clean your clock without breaking a sweat. Let's just say that Superman has more than 6 forces. 5. So what is the self-respecting angel to do in such a world? Well, I play up my codes of honor (cherub of Stone), find ways to introduce subtlety to the otherwise straight-forward war between good in tights and evil in cloaks (Hooligans with bats are destroying the mall? Cool, how do I become their leader?), and keep hoping that one of my critical failures will summon the Devil (Hey, those 6 dice of "Enemy: Forces of Hell" have to be worth something). Vaughn - - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - There is life, there is death And the difference between either one is one single breath ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 23:58:31 -0500 From: Eric Eves Subject: Re: IN> the War Josh Moger wrote: > War also encompasses the sheer act of living every day, a constant struggle > between life and death. Michael is supposed to be "He Who Is Like God", Um, does IN canon have his name as "He Who is Like God"? I asked someone who knows ancient hebrew and has a Ph.D. in Old Testament, and he assured me that the name translates out as "Who is Like God?" with a question mark in real life. A little thing, true, but if I didn't mention this, my campaign for the Word of Precision would be set back a bit. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 23:42:49 -0600 From: toadpooka@juno.com Subject: Re: IN> the War On Tue, 22 Jan 2002 01:57:06 "Perry Lloyd" writes: > (and why is Greed a -minor- word and (Infernal) Fire a major word? > > Shouldn't Greed bring far many more souls down to Hell than Fire?) Greed isn't a minor Word; Mammon is a minor Prince because of specific incidents that bankrupted his power. If it weren't for him having such a powerful Word, Mammon himself probably wouldn't exist at all anymore. Also, Haagenti has been working to expand Gluttony to include most forms of Greed, and Mammon hasn't been able to stop him. >From Whom It May Concern, Rich Ranallo "Rock and Roll will be the new planetary culture, believe it or not." - -Prof. Michio Kaku ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 07:37:34 +0000 From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> the War Perry's right. Baal's word is 'la guerre' as in (c'est la guerre). It's not just the war between heaven and earth. It's people who think war is just an excuse to commit atrocities. War for war's sake. Contrast that with Michael, who (according to canon) favours soldiers who fight so that one day the war will end. jo _________________________________________________________________ Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: http://messenger.msn.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 11:09:56 -0600 From: David Edelstein Subject: Re: IN> A quick question for you all... Perry Lloyd wrote: > > yeah, besides, we don't care who you are anyway, as people. > Your words, not mine. - -David ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 12:00:12 -0600 From: "Cthulhu" Subject: IN> Re: IN > Furry In Nomine Jonathan McDermott wrote: >What was the choir of Ophis? I think the IPG lists him as being a Balseraph, though I could be wrong in this (the old "books not with me" flaw). The INcyclopedia seems to be up and running again, so you could check there. Cthulhu _____________________________________________ Free email with personality! Over 200 domains! http://www.MyOwnEmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 12:17:46 -0600 From: "Cthulhu" Subject: Re: IN> the War Perry Lloyd wrote: >Okay ... about Ba'al ... WHY is he powerful again? WHY is THE WAR a >powerful word? >But ... the War seems only to emcompass the specific struggle between Good >and Evil, between Angels and Demons, Heaven an Hell. Now, this struggle, >I've been led to believe, is just a small part of reality (the Symphony) ... > >Is it somehow important enough (judged important enough by the Symphony, I >presume) to be such a powerful Word? Well, yes. Michael is in charge of War, as explained by several others on the list, yourself included, as being about struggle and taking care of vets and so on, so on. Baal (or Ba'al, I can never make up my mind) is *specifically* in charge of THE War - which is ultimatly about whether the world (and probably Symphony) meets its Fate or Destiny. Regardless of how many humans pay attention, this is of supreme importance. Of course, this goes on the viewpoint that angels and demons represent "cosmic good/cosmic evil", which depends on your style of play, but I think that that's a fairly safe assumption for most people's games. [dives for cover] Cthulhu _____________________________________________ Free email with personality! Over 200 domains! http://www.MyOwnEmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 19:54:56 -0500 From: "William J. Keith" Subject: Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity > IIRC, the thing where Superiors could have multiple concurrent >manifestations did make it into canon. The GMG, I think. If I am wrong >that, please correct me. If only Archangels get it (perhaps through the >Kyriotate resonance) then a solid word on that would help too. Nope, both sides get it. > With this in mind: What are the key differences between a Shedite >Demon >Prince with several manifestations possessing several hosts and Legion's >trick of rediscovering Kyriotate multiplicity? Scale, I am guessing, but I >wonder if some of the magic isn't lost when you have a Shedite, even a >Prince, able to do that. Gosh... that's an interesting question. I hadn't looked at it like that. Yes, we'd certainly want to preserve the uniqueness of Legion's achievement. About the only thing I can think of is a rather peculiar workaround... that somehow, there's only *one* Kyriotate in multiple hosts, whereas multiple instantiations of a Superior are more independent beings, not as able to share information between them. Not totally independent beings (otherwise a Demon Prince would never multi-instantiate, he'd never be able to trust himself to come back), but less of a single entity than a Kyriotate. To use a computer analogy, I'm guessing at something like the difference between a parallel-processor computer (the Kyriotate) and a networked set of computers (the multitasking Superior). The Kyriotate is still one integrated device. The Superior is a set of interrelated devices that can never achieve *quite* the same responsiveness. (Although probably Kyriotate Superiors can do it the best; LE Beth brought up the interesting idea that a Superior gets all the resonances for its side, and does them really well, but uses its own Choir's or Band's resonance at peak Superior-level efficiency.) And if this were so, it might mean that Archangels can still multi-task better than Demon Princes; the Archangels have access to the Kyriotate resonance. Hmm... I've also come up with a simpler answer. Perhaps projecting multiple instantiations is very power-intensive and concentration-consuming for the Superior, so it's far less efficient than multiple-possession by the Kyriotate resonance. There's only so many instantiations a Superior can create, whereas Legion was able to possess, and possess, and possess.... (In this situation, you might even have Archangels show a preference for using the Kyriotate resonance over projecting another instantiation; it's a lot easier.) Nice thought-provoking question, Sean! William ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 20:48:46 -0500 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity At 5:47 PM -0800 1/21/02, Sean McCarthy wrote: > I have not read anything from the list in months, so please excuse me if >this came up in my 'absence'. (All the mail is still sitting in a box on >my server, but I was distracted from reading...) > > IIRC, the thing where Superiors could have multiple concurrent >manifestations did make it into canon. The GMG, I think. If I am wrong >that, please correct me. If only Archangels get it (perhaps through the >Kyriotate resonance) then a solid word on that would help too. Superiors can have multiple manifestations. Kyriotate Archangels are _really_ multiple. (In our games, at least, the _number_ of manifestations is related to the power of the Superior. I.e., the new-minted NOT-and-never-to-be-canon Archangel of Sculpting can manage maybe 3 instantiations at a time, and one or two purely mental conversations via Ethereal/Celestial Song variations. Andrealphus, Prince of Desire, on the other hand, could probably manage a dozen with little problem.) However, IIRC, Superiors start having problems if their manifestations are too close to each other. (I hope this bit made it into the GMG in this universe, and not the one three back.) Sort of the "which right hand am I supposed to be using the sword with? no, drat, the _other_ right..." kind of thing. A Kyriotate can multi-task its instantiation, and therefore have a whole bunch of hosts there without running into the micro-lags that can spell the difference between defeat and victory for Superiors vs Superiors. (This is why people were _all there_ for the battle against Legion -- and thus vulnerable to soul-killing.) > With this in mind: What are the key differences between a Shedite Demon >Prince with several manifestations possessing several hosts and Legion's >trick of rediscovering Kyriotate multiplicity? Scale, I am guessing, but I >wonder if some of the magic isn't lost when you have a Shedite, even a >Prince, able to do that. Yes/no. Shedite Princes probably don't _like_ to do multiplicity, even though they can. Probably can, at least. O:> And they tend to run into the micro-lag problem. Legion didn't. More, he was able to tap into the Forces of his hosts and, er, add them to the collective. O:> So he had a fast way to grow, and grow, and spawn off more instantiations to do multiplicity things with, and grow, and grow, and run more instantiations, and... Think of Jordi. In a bad mood. Possessing every animal on the planet. In a _really_ bad mood. And if all of this is in the GMG from three dimensions back, figure that it's a reasonable enough way to run it in _your_ games (even convention ones) and have fun. O:> >ps: GURPS Furries? Really? Really. I wish the author would get over the attack of Life. *mutter* - --Beth, typing w/a uncoopertive baby (iolanthe) causing typos. arcangel is nursing a trout with ARMS! ARMS that reach out and try to pound the keyboard! You say "And teeth. Ow." ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 20:59:40 -0500 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity At 7:54 PM -0500 1/22/02, William J. Keith wrote: [...] >(In this situation, you might even have Archangels show a >preference for using the Kyriotate resonance over projecting another >instantiation; it's a lot easier.) It's also quieter -- there's no Symphonic disturbance to cope with. You simply grab your Servitor and speak through that vessel. O:> - --emccoy@nh.ultranet.com // arcangel@io.com In Nomine Line Editor RPG links; Random name list, Art: http://www.io.com/~arcangel/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 20:10:12 -0600 From: "Prodigal" Subject: Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity From: "Elizabeth McCoy" > > Andrealphus, Prince of Desire, on the other hand, could probably manage a > dozen with little problem.) So many jokes about Andre playing with himself, so little time... ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 21:31:37 -0600 From: David Edelstein Subject: Re: IN> Demon Princes, Multiplicity Elizabeth McCoy wrote: > However, IIRC, Superiors start having problems if their manifestations are > too close to each other. (I hope this bit made it into the GMG in this > universe, and not the one three back.) I don't believe that was ever mentioned. - -David ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #2522 ********************************