From owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Thu Sep 9 15:27:39 1999 Return-Path: Received: from lists.io.com (majordom@lists.io.com [199.170.88.15]) by pyramid.sjgames.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id PAA00629 for ; Thu, 9 Sep 1999 15:27:38 -0500 Received: (from majordom@localhost) by lists.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.1a) id PAA21256 for in_nomine-digest-outgoing; Thu, 9 Sep 1999 15:21:27 -0500 Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 15:21:27 -0500 Message-Id: <199909092021.PAA21256@lists.io.com> From: owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com (in_nomine-digest) To: in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Subject: in_nomine-digest V1 #1324 Reply-To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com Sender: owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Errors-To: owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Precedence: bulk in_nomine-digest Thursday, September 9 1999 Volume 01 : Number 1324 In this digest: Re: IN> "Rev. Pee Kitty, How do people play demon? Re: IN> How do people play demons? [ADMIN: STAY ON TOPIC!] Re: IN> "Rev. Pee Kitty, How do people play demon? Re: IN> How do people play demons? Re: IN> How do people play demons? IN> How do people play demons? Re: IN> How do people play demons? Re: IN> How do people play demons? IN> Extremist statements [ADMIN: DEAD TOPIC] Re: IN> Extremist statements Re: IN> How do people play demons? Re: IN> How do people play demons? RE: IN> Malakim RE: IN> How do people play demons? IN> Disneyworld (was How do people play demons?) RE: IN> Malakim RE: IN> Malakim IN> Rules Questions. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 15:05:33 -0400 From: John Karakash - Lucent ASCC Subject: Re: IN> "Rev. Pee Kitty, How do people play demon? Eddie wrote: > > I could not disagree more strongly with your statements. The whole reason > why society works is because we DON'T have all dark things buried inside us. > Because if did in my opinion it would only be a matter of time before we > were all arrested or should be arrested for acting on these dark desires and > needs. Remember those who practice aberrant behavior feel there will be no > repercussion's. (Criminals never believe they will be caught) There is a > difference between understanding such a warped prospective and actually > having it inside us. I agree with the Rev to a certain degree. We ALL have our 'demons' inside. People are complex creatures... the most complex on earth. The sign of a rational, civilized person is their harmful aspects are overridden by their will. With enough practice and effort it becomes automatic. Religious types used to flagellate themselves when they experienced lust because they felt this was a stain on their soul that had to be driven away. Instead of fearing our inner selves, a more balanced approach is to _understand_ them and make sure the harmful bits are safely locked away. Those who don't introspect like this, I feel, are the ones who are more likely to lose it because they kept denying themselves. Fear, violence, lust, greed, dominance, laziness. All these things make up, in part, every human being. Saying they don't exist is the purest of folly. Control, not denial, keeps us civilized. This complexity of existance makes for a MUCH better In Nomine game. Shedim, for example. Haven't we all been annoyed when some jerk cuts us off in traffic? If only for a moment, we fantasize about something happening to them (anything from a cop, to a flat tire, to a flaming fireball). A successful Shedite plays on this inner chords, overrides the person's normal control, and bring the impulses to the surface. Flip him off! Cut him off! Drive him off the road! Crash his car! Shoot him! Follow him home and burn down his house! (in that order....) ;) - -- ___________________________________________________ / \ | John Karakash - Lucent Technologies/Bell Labs | | (919)388-2665(COOL) MIB2300 | | | | The power to tax involves the power to destroy. | | -Chief Justice Marshall | \___________________________________________________/ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 15:34:13 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? At 1:36 -0400 9/8/99, emmanuel francois wrote: >Amo Nympham wrote > >>well, I've finally got a Shedite player, so looks like I'm off to start >>creating some NPCs for it to possess...bleh > >i was wondering, when reading the rules - how do people play demons? i >mean, i can see the GM doing it, but a PC? Having disturbed, callous, >ruthless, or even borderline sociopathic characters, who are still human >(or as appropriate for the game world), i can follow, but who would _enjoy_ >playing an actual Fiend from the Pit? > >We're not talking 'bad boy rebel with long hair and a leather jacket' type >of 'evil,' we're talking Sevant of Hell. A being who's entire purpose in >life (sort of - demons are pretty selfish) is to degrade, corrupt, defile, >and destroy all they touch. (And Shedim... *shudder*) [Ah, a variant on the perrenial topic of "how evil are demons"....] This is very much a matter of game style (what's often termed "contrast and brightness" around here, and now in the forthcoming GMG). If you equate "demonic" = "blackly evil", then you've essentially constrained the answers you're going to get to those games where people play yucky, scummy, nasty, etc. demons for the cathartic value... or just for the Hell of it. Canon IN is generally aimed for a less sharp contrast, I think, where demons are utterly self-centered, yes, but not all of them are actively evil. As an alternative view to the responses you've gotten about "it's cathartic/fun to play really nasty types", think of Hell as an utterly distopian society, with most demons simply having had to grow up in a place that makes Dickensian London look like Paradise. A lot of demons are just trying to survive in a place with an oppressive, tyrannical, and often totally arbitrary government system, whose currency is human souls. The people who rise to the top are the ones who learn to gather power over others, both to preserve themselves, and serve their own interests -- evolution at its worst. An example of how I envision the average demon's thought processes: - --- Survival is Job #1, and if your survival depends on someone else's non-survival (or degradation, or whatever does the job), hey, well, the alternative is to become the target, yourself. Yeah, you could run away, but the angels would either just kill you, or brainwash you into a puppet [or whatever propaganda the demon happens to believe]. And on your own, without some support base, you're just meat for the Game. And being tortured for a couple millenia isn't your idea of an ideal career choice. (And you've *seen* what they do to Renegades.) So you do your job (whatever your superiors, and ultimately your Superior, see as being in *their* interests), and take whatever pleasures you can manage, and do whatever it takes to keep your hide intact. - --- In this viewpoint, the primary demonic failing is lack of courage, or too strong a sense of self-preservation, combined with the carrot of being told (and shown) from "birth" that humans are inferior beings, fit to be nothing more than cattle. (And the kind of souls you get in Hell aren't going to change that opinion.) A demon who spends a lot of time Earthside will either stick to viewing the universe through a level of cynicism that would put Mark Twain to shame, or eventually learn that things are sometimes a little better than they expect. The latter then either have to tear things down to justify their own existance, or maybe just quietly accept the fact that they've been lied to (like this is news!), and try to keep their heads down, doing enough to keep them from getting sent back Hellside, where things are worse. A rare few manage to go Renegade, or even redeem, but that's *such* a crapshoot, and few demons know what the odds are on surviving these options -- the Game, of course, tells them it's 0%.... This model of demonic mindset leads to all sorts of interesting, and sometimes nasty, behaviors. Some demons are pretty reasonable people by human standards, and may disapprove strongly of many evils. And then their thinking will take a left turn into doing something totally appalling by human standards. Or they may be semi-apologetic about it: "It's me, or you, and I'd *much* rather it be you." Or they may justify it by the fact that they've seen humans doing much worse, so why shouldn't they do it, too? In a lifetime that spans centuries, and generally involves dealing with the worse parts of human society, you can see a *lot* of Truly Bad Things. And some demons genuinely enjoy playing with their human toys. Frankly, I think doing it as a mixed bag of Really Evil Demons, and Just Plain Folks with a Really Bad Childhood and a Boss from Hell, makes things much more interesting. Demons can be so much more than simple monomaniacally-evil villains. Yes, they're always evil, to a degree. And most definitely selfish. But the same could be said for humans. Sometimes the evil is nothing more than tolerating, or working for, a much bigger evil. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 15:52:54 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: [ADMIN: STAY ON TOPIC!] Re: IN> "Rev. Pee Kitty, How do people play demon? At 11:07 AM -0400 9/8/99, BillionSix@aol.com wrote: Stay on topic. People's dark influences are NOT going to stay on topic unless everyone keeps them there. If there's no IN content, then I'm going to get reeeeeaaaal cranky, because this is the kind of thread that can snowball into a mass of flamage and philosophy and psychology with NO gaming content whatsoever. And I'm not going to allow that. - --Beth, Demon Princess of Nitpicking http://www.sjgames.com/in-nomine/articles/INChar/Demons/Prince.Beth.html ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 15:44:45 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? At 10:36 PM -0700 9/7/99, emmanuel francois wrote: >Amo Nympham wrote > >>well, I've finally got a Shedite player, so looks like I'm off to start >>creating some NPCs for it to possess...bleh > >i was wondering, when reading the rules - how do people play demons? i >mean, i can see the GM doing it, but a PC? www.sjgames.com/in-nomine/articles/fiction.html Look at the Caliah stories by our own "Maya"/GR Cogman and the Caliah- Betharan story(s) by her and me. >We're not talking 'bad boy rebel with long hair and a leather jacket' type >of 'evil,' we're talking Sevant of Hell. This, you see, also depends on the Contrast of the campaign. Some campaigns (or even some demons within other campaigns) _are_ bad boy rebels. Oh, and then there's Mellor and Mallory, in my IN IOU. www.nh.ultranet.com/~emccoy/IOU/myINIOU.html , IIRC. Mellor's even a Shedite! - --emccoy@nh.ultranet.com // arcangel@io.com In Nomine Line Editor GURPS, Roleplayers, In Nomine stuff; Art: http://www.io.com/~arcangel/ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 15:46:10 -0500 From: Earl Wajenberg Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? Tim Groth wrote: > Also in In-nomine demons aren't manifestations of pure evil. [...] > Demons are just selfish, not pure evil, they consider themselves > superior to humans and are pissed off that God made the Symphony > humanocentric. According to St. Augustine, in a piece of philosophy accepted by most mainstream Christian theology, good is "ordinate love" -- love in degree appropriate to the object -- and evil is a lack of good. One result of this is that there can BE no such thing as "pure evil," equal and opposite to goodness the way negative charge is opposite to positive charge. It's not that kind of opposition. Instead, evil is opposite good the way sickness is opposite to health, or brokenness to wholeness. IN demons, by putting self first instead of putting God first, are an entirely valid image of maximized evil according to Augustinian theology. Earl ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 16:05:01 -0400 From: David Edelstein Subject: IN> How do people play demons? >>>We find it a lot of FUN to play demons, actually. Killing, raping, corrupting, degrading, and just spreading evil everywhere can be a great way to work through those negative emotions you build up at the end of a week of dealing with life. Anyways, they're not real people getting killed, raped, corrupted, and degraded - they're just NPCs, and the GM has a thousand more where those came from.<<< Actually, the way most people play demons is by portraying them as more complex beings, not "pure evil." The dichotomy in In Nomine is selfless vs. selfish, not good vs. evil. If your demons are just amoral killing-perversity machines, playing them is not likely to be either interesting or challenging. If I met a group of players who thought it was fun to roleplay rape, degradation and similar things just for kicks, I would try to put as much distance between myself and that group of players as possible. - -David ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 17:31:59 -0400 (EDT) From: "Rev. Pee Kitty" Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? On Wed, 8 Sep 1999, David Edelstein wrote: > >>>We find it a lot of FUN to play demons, actually. Killing, raping, > corrupting, degrading, and just spreading evil everywhere can be a great > way to work through those negative emotions you build up at the end of a > week of dealing with life. Anyways, they're not real people getting > killed, raped, corrupted, and degraded - they're just NPCs, and the GM has > a thousand more where those came from.<<< > > Actually, the way most people play demons is by portraying them as more > complex beings, not "pure evil." The dichotomy in In Nomine is selfless vs. > selfish, not good vs. evil. If your demons are just amoral > killing-perversity machines, playing them is not likely to be either > interesting or challenging. No, it's really more for fun. We play demons more for fun - it's a less constrained session with a much looser plot than normal. The plot is usually something like "Go to Disneyworld and foster my Word as much as possible". Our angelic games, on the other hand, are where the real roleplaying comes out, and where the plots and adventures really turn deep and meaningful. It's just easier that way... with demons being so selfish, it can be hard to motivate a whole diverse group of the towards the conclusion of a typical planned-out 'adventure'; but if you just let 'em go under their auspices, they come out with some wild stuff. > If I met a group of players who thought it was fun to roleplay rape, > degradation and similar things just for kicks, I would try to put as much > distance between myself and that group of players as possible. Don't worry; we'd let you go after obtaining just a little blood for our dark, satanic rituals.... (yeah, right) Anyways, we think it's fun to roleplay rape, murder, and degradation, as demons. We also think it's fun to roleplay charity, love, compassion, and spiritual beauty, as angels. That's what roleplaying is about, n'est pas? Playing a side of yourself that you don't normally play in "real life"? We don't mind extremes at all; we're all mature, experienced gamers who are comfortable with ourselves... both the light parts and the dark parts. - -- Rev. Pee Kitty, of the order Malkavian-Dobbsian Meow! "I am the greatest man in the world; indeed I am SO great that I can afford great generosity: I encourage all others to adopt the DELUSION that they are as great as I. If they truly thought that they were themselves the greatest, they too would be as generous; and then we would all be able to HUMOR each other, in peace, for none would feel threatened by the now-harmless delusions of everyone else." -- Philo Drummond ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 17:53:54 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? At 16:46 -0400 9/8/99, Earl Wajenberg wrote: > IN demons, by putting self first instead >of putting God first, are an entirely valid image of maximized evil >according to Augustinian theology. Philosophically, that may be true, but I don't think this is what most people understand as Evil. Evil is baby-killing, rape, spitting on the flag, or whatever the person has been taught as being evil. Most people don't really think of Evil as a lack, but rather as a specific range of actions, and sometimes as a motivation (for other people, only, of course). Thus I tend to distinguish the two in IN -- most people think of selfish/selfless separately from good/evil. I suspect this is because people are generally selfish to some degree, but no one wants to think of themselves as actually evil. Which is one of the things that makes the game interesting. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 16:04:44 PDT From: "Janet Anderson" Subject: IN> Extremist statements I usually avoid these arguments, but I really have to comment that there is a considerable difference between saying "All humans have dark and undesirable impulses of some kind which they are continually striving to overcome" (a reasonable and true statement) and "All of us are repressed murders, rapists, torturers and child molesters, and anyone who claims differently is in denial" (a load of dingo's kidneys). Janet Anderson ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 19:21:11 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: [ADMIN: DEAD TOPIC] Re: IN> Extremist statements This doesn't have any IN content to it, and any replies to this topic are going to get me _really_ annoyed. Take it to private email. - --Beth, Djinn Princess of List Admin, in no mood to see this sort of IN-content-free discussion go any further. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 23:53:09 -0400 From: Douglas Muir Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? >If I met a group of players who thought it was fun to roleplay rape, >degradation and similar things just for kicks, I would try to put as much >distance between myself and that group of players as possible. Mmm, depends, Dave. If I met a group who *always* liked that, I would agree. But as an occasional change of pace... well, I have players who still remember a scenario called "The Very Best At Being Bad", which I ran in 1988(!). It was a one-shot, two-session scenario, in which the PCs were all various sorts of evil... a sadist, a megalomaniac, what have you. The players thoroughly enjoyed it, and I did too. Chacun a son gout. Doug M. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 02:02:42 EDT From: JadePsion@aol.com Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? In a message dated 9/8/99 3:45:08 PM Pacific Daylight Time, pkitty@IntNet.net writes: > It's just easier that way... with demons being so selfish, > it can be hard to motivate a whole diverse group of the towards the > conclusion of a typical planned-out 'adventure'; but if you just let 'em > go under their auspices, they come out with some wild stuff. Too true . The only demon game I've played (which was may first real _IN_ game) in we actually routed a section of freeway through a McDonald's drive-thru...Just for the...ahem..."hell of it." Had the GM laughing so hard, he couldn't continue for a while. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 02:11:11 -0700 From: "emmanuel francois" Subject: RE: IN> Malakim Chris wrote: >> 'By an infinite number of standards Hitler was evil - by all save the >> single standard that matters to a Malakite. Hitler strictly >> adhered to his >> own grotesque sense of morality.' He was utterly selfless - virtuous - in >> his devotion to his ideal. Alas, his ideal was totally sick. > This is one of the passages I have serious problems with the In Nomine >canon. It turns out the question "Did Hitler know he was evil?" is a fairly >hot one among historians studying the Third Reich. There's a recent >biography of Hitler (Explaining Hitler:The Search for the Origins of His >Evil by Ron Rosenbaum) which makes the argument that the top leadership of >the Third Reich *did* know they were evil. He points to a meeting where >three of the leaders (Hitler, Himmler, and Goring, I think) were talking in >front of a secretary taking internal notes -- not for release to the public, >but records for the archives. In the meeting, the three of them lie >extensively about the intentions and effects of the final solution. >Rosenbaum argues *if they thought they were virtuous* they wouldn't have >needed to lie for the archives, but instead by their actions they >acknowledged the course of action they had undertaken was so far beyond the >pale that no one, either then or in the future, would ever accept it as a >just act. Could you perhaps be taking things a little too seriously here? In Nomine is a game, a work of fiction. Hitler died and all the king's horses and all the king's men can't put all the pieces back together again. They've been trying for over 50 years, and they'll keep trying for centuries. No mortal can ever _really_ know the truth. This includes the talented and inspired mortals who write In Nomine. But in In Nomine, there are creatures that are beyond mortal. You want to know what Hitler was _really_ like? Ask a Malakite who met him. Look up the records of his dreams in Blandine's library. Look up his personal Book of Life in the Library of Yves. It's all there. Angels are given to know things that are beyond mortal grasp. Which poses a problem when mortals have to play the part of angels. If a PC looks such a question up, the GM must provide a definitive and accurate answer. But the GM is as mortal as the player and _can't_ know the real answer. So, she makes it up, based on what she thinks or what fits into the campaign, and that becomes the Truth of that campaign. Do you believe that the authors of In Nomine were _really_ implying that Paris is a city blessed by God and that there is a gateway to Heaven in Notre Dame de Paris, when they wrote it in the books? If they say that Hitler was selflessly devoted to his cause, then that's how he really was, in the In Nomine universe. Any records that might indicate otherwise must therefore (in the In Nomine universe) be false or misinterpreted. Maybe the record you speak of was planted by Servitors of Dark Humour to poke fun at historians. Mayber the author of the book you mention is a Soldier of Fate, trying to portray Hitler as truly, knowingly EVIL to make him more valuable as one of Kronos' beloved 'paragons of dark Fate,' rather than as an ordinary person who meant well, but who, through prejudice, self-delusion, and a series of all too human errors ended up destroying everything he touched, without ever quite realising at which point things started to go wrong. (Hell, they say, is paved with good intentions.) Personally, i think the second interpretation is far more tragic and more 'in tune' with the main themes of the In Nomine game itself, but.... The statement about Hitler surely could not have been meant to imply that Hitler was like that in real life (for on what absolute authority could they claim that?). It was simply meant to show readers how the Malakim judge mortals, by providing a very strong example that nearly everyone would be familiar with. - emmanuel ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 10:55:03 -0400 From: "Chris Bergstresser" Subject: RE: IN> How do people play demons? > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-in_nomine-l@lists.io.com > [mailto:owner-in_nomine-l@lists.io.com]On Behalf Of Douglas Muir > Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 1999 11:53 PM > To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com > Subject: Re: IN> How do people play demons? > > >If I met a group of players who thought it was fun to roleplay rape, > >degradation and similar things just for kicks, I would try to put as much > >distance between myself and that group of players as possible. > > Mmm, depends, Dave. If I met a group who *always* liked that, I would > agree. But as an occasional change of pace... well, I have players who > still remember a scenario called "The Very Best At Being Bad", which I ran > in 1988(!). It was a one-shot, two-session scenario, in which > the PCs were > all various sorts of evil... a sadist, a megalomaniac, what have you. The > players thoroughly enjoyed it, and I did too. I suppose, maybe as a one-shot. Personally, when I was setting up my latest game, I flat-out told everybody they were playing angels and that was that. There are some things I refuse to GM, and I can't in good conscience let them take characters who will act in way that I feel obligated to prevent. Angels have enough capacity for evil just trying to be good. - -- Chris ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 09 Sep 1999 12:34:53 -0400 From: John Karakash - Lucent ASCC Subject: IN> Disneyworld (was How do people play demons?) "Rev. Pee Kitty" wrote: > No, it's really more for fun. We play demons more for fun - it's a less > constrained session with a much looser plot than normal. The plot is > usually something like "Go to Disneyworld and foster my Word as much as > possible". Heh. Heh-heh. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! ;) Something that occurs to me is that DisneyWorld/Land have so MANY people going through them that there must be a significant celestial presence. In a bright campaign, Blandine, Christopher, and Marc at the very least. It's certainly big enough to support several tethers. - -- ___________________________________________________ / \ | John Karakash - Lucent Technologies/Bell Labs | | (919)388-2665(COOL) MIB2300 | | | | The power to tax involves the power to destroy. | | -Chief Justice Marshall | \___________________________________________________/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 13:43:28 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: RE: IN> Malakim At 2:11 AM -0700 9/9/99, emmanuel francois wrote: >Chris wrote: > >> This is one of the passages I have serious problems with the In Nomine >>canon. It turns out the question "Did Hitler know he was evil?" is a [...] It's actually one of the passages I am likely to alter slightly in any revised editions. In the beginning, I'm happily willing to assume that he didn't register as "evil" to passing Malakim. After things got rolling, they would have been _forbidden_ to tamper with humanity by offing such a public figure. They'd have had to content themselves with picking off the demons who flocked to the banner... if said demons didn't have too strong a Role to get at them without exposing themselves to mundanes. Which avoids some problems for GMs to deal with, and casts some light on the _non_intervention mandates, and keeps Seraphim of Fire from going after him whether he was honorable in his own mind or not. (Yves to Gabriel: "Child. Don't send them." Gabriel, to her Servitors, after a lot of ranting: "Human disease must yield to the human knife, touch it not, touch it not.") >Do you believe that the authors of In Nomine were _really_ implying that >Paris is a city blessed by God and that there is a gateway to Heaven in >Notre Dame de Paris, when they wrote it in the books? (Especially considering that the original IN was pure _satire_.) - --emccoy@nh.ultranet.com // arcangel@io.com In Nomine Line Editor GURPS, Roleplayers, In Nomine stuff; Art: http://www.io.com/~arcangel/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 14:55:16 -0400 From: "Chris Bergstresser" Subject: RE: IN> Malakim > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-in_nomine-l@lists.io.com > [mailto:owner-in_nomine-l@lists.io.com]On Behalf Of emmanuel francois > Sent: Thursday, September 09, 1999 5:11 AM > To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com > Subject: RE: IN> Malakim > > > Chris wrote: > > >> 'By an infinite number of standards Hitler was evil - by all save the > >> single standard that matters to a Malakite. Hitler strictly > >> adhered to his > >> own grotesque sense of morality.' He was utterly selfless - virtuous - > in > >> his devotion to his ideal. Alas, his ideal was totally sick. > > > This is one of the passages I have serious problems with the > In Nomine > >canon. > > The statement about Hitler surely could not have been meant to imply that > Hitler was like that in real life (for on what absolute authority could > they claim that?). It was simply meant to show readers how the Malakim > judge mortals, by providing a very strong example that nearly everyone > would be familiar with. Oh, I don't think I'm taking it too seriously. I don't think roleplaying games should take too strong a stand on morality in the real world -- after all, an RPG is designed to allow *me* to develop a particular world. I'll twiddle with the brightness and contrast on my own, thank you very much. In Nomine, being set in the modern day in a world whose history is ostensibly identical to our own (albeit with many unknown celestial causes behind events), makes parallels to recent events a particularly touchy subject. I didn't take the sentence to be a definition of the way things were *in the game* -- I took it as an example defining the Malakite's resonance in terms of a real world analog. I didn't like the real-world analog. I would be just as offended by a statement to the effect that Eleanor Roosevelt was a demon of Lust. I mean, maybe she was in your campaign, but that's a decision I wouldn't want to be made for me by the designers of the game. The question of whether Hitler knew he was evil actually strikes right to the heart of the modern challenge to morality, and it forms a basic underpinning of the In Nomine game world. For me, angels are the representatives of a single, universal morality (unfathomable though it may be to mortals and celestials) while demons remain advocates for individual relativism; the idea that each person determines what is ultimately right for themselves. Saying Hitler *was* virtuous tips the scale in a way I do not want my game to be tipped. - -- Chris ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Sep 1999 13:49:28 -0500 From: "Ben Glickler" Subject: IN> Rules Questions. I was running a session in which my angels were required to bring down the demonic heirarchy in Chicago. We ran into a few problems. 1. Can a Calabite use his resonance to tear an angel's vessel to pieces? The rules say he can only use it on another celestial while in celestial form. Does this mean he can only use it on their celestial form if they are both celestial, or does it mean *any* celestial, in *any* form, is immune unless the Calabite is also celestial? 2. Why is it so easy to possess someone? Whereas a normal fight between an angel and a demon may take several points of essence and lots of injuries, a crafty celestial can end a fight swiftly by spending a few points of essence on the song of Possession. Statistically, he only has to try twice. Seems bunk to me. 3. If you possess a celestial, they go to the marches. If they have two vessels, they can come back. What happens if you leave their body after they come back? Can they switch between them? What happens if they leave one of their bodies unoccupied for 15 minutes (ala the body bag rules)? 4. A Shedite is required to corrupt the mind. A celestial's vessel, when empty, is nothing. You can use the song of Possession to occupy an empty vessel. You can use your resonance (according to the Infernal Player's Guide and the Book of Songs) as a Shedite to shift the song of Possession into your own resonant power, thus using a song to take someone over and then keeping them according to your resonance rules. Since there's nothing to corrupt in an empty vessel, can you *keep* an angel's (or demon's) vessel forever? 5. A Mercurien's resonance lasts for a number of minutes. Can they glance at several people during that time and thus gain insight into all of their relationships, names, cultural origins, etc? 6. How violent is a Mercurien using a tranquilizer dart on a human? :-) Thanks. Ben ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #1324 ******************************** The material here is (C) 1999 Steve Jackson Games, Incorporated. All rights reserved.