From owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Thu Jul 20 16:08:37 2000 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 QAA11512 for ; Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:08:36 -0500 Received: (from majordom@localhost) by lists.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.1a) id QAA14811 for in_nomine-digest-outgoing; Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:05:18 -0500 Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:05:18 -0500 Message-Id: <200007202105.QAA14811@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 #1724 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, July 20 2000 Volume 01 : Number 1724 In this digest: Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors IN> Characterizing Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) IN> Malakim and Transformation (was a fun little thought) Re: IN> I know it's late, but! Trailer 1 - The Agony and the Ecstasy Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors Re: IN> I know it's late, but! Trailer 1 - The Agony and the Ecstasy Re: IN> Re: Grigori stuff (was Re: Deeply Heretical) Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Dead Superiors IN> Just got Sup 3. Re: IN> Dead Superiors Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) Re: IN> Re: Legion Re: IN> Thirty seconds over the Vale... IN> Flood Geology ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 13:59:02 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 11:40 -0600 7/20/00, ben wrote: >Put together a book of adventure seeds. This is done, sort of, in the >Superiors line, but most of the seeds seem geared towards the laughline >style of play. Either neutralize the seeds so anyone can use them or -- >better yet -- provide seeds for varying styles of play, and run with it. I don't know if SJ would buy it -- similar books have been proposed in the past for GURPS (which has much better chance of selling them than IN does), and he hasn't liked the idea enough to go with it. I think his reasoning is that a few seeds are good, but too many in one place would become tedious. In some sense, both L.Servitorum and YAH are books of adventure seeds; one is NPC-based, and the other is location-based. Of course, there's other stuff in there too, but they're as close as I've seen to a book of adventure seeds. (I think they're also among the lower-selling books in the line. Which is unfortunate, since I happen to like both of them.) - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 11:04:55 -0700 (PDT) From: sw@haven.eyrie.org Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors > See, Superiors I, I prolly would not buy if I were merely a player. It's > kind of a GM book, since the GM plays the Superiors. But "Liber Seraphim", > "The Complete Impudite", or "Everything You Never Wanted To Know About > Djinn" would get snatched up in a heartbeat. > > (Stick With Libers...) > > Maybe we could even include songs and artifacts and stuff in 'em. Extra > songs the choir/band tends to take. Optional resonance charts (or ways to > replace them entirely). Adventure seeds for that choir. Yes! Yes! Yes! _The Big Book of Temptations (or "We'll let you learn all about Lilim... but oh, how you'll *owe* us...")_ Aww yeah. I know *I'd* buy it. I mean, who wouldn't? - --JT ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:06:09 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors At 13:21 -0400 7/20/00, Whistling in the Dark wrote: >At 1:06 PM -0400 7/20/00, Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >>Whistling in the Dark wrote: >>Now, I suppose that one solution is to make different books for each type of game, but I don't think that's going to happen. > >Or divide an adventurebook into two. Printed with front covers on both sides, and with the demonic side inverted.... Too bad it wouldn't work. Hmmm... I wonder if there's any way to write a "one-sided" adventure so it's "reversible" -- either have two sets of NPCs, but doing the same plot (more or less), or fix it so the PCs can *replace* the NPCs in an adventure written for the Other Side (with the GM running what would normally be the PC track through the adventure). I'll have to think about this some more.... - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:14:54 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 11:46 -0600 7/20/00, ben wrote: >> full of brown, blue and green books, known affectionally as "The >> Complete Whatever Handbooks?" Splatbooks for players. Remember > >Hmmm. Would "The Complete Calabite" sell? A book dedicated to a single >choir/band? Aka "splatbooks" like WW does (and TSR was doing). Currently against SJ's policy, as best I understand it. The APG/IPG were about as close as things are likely to get to that, I think. And the Superiors books. (The "no splatbook" rule is one reason why there are 4 Superiors per book. No pagecount for pagecount's sake....) >See, Superiors I, I prolly would not buy if I were merely a player. It's >kind of a GM book, since the GM plays the Superiors. Yes and no -- for a player with a PC serving one of the Superiors in the book, they're very useful background. So I don't think they're really "GM-only" books. It is true, though, that players will probably only want ones for the Superiors they think they'll want to create characters serving. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:13:13 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 11:04 AM -0700 7/20/00, sw@haven.eyrie.org wrote: > >Aww yeah. > >I know *I'd* buy it. > >I mean, who wouldn't? > >--JT Jt? What makes you think you *need* it? - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 18:17:59 GMT From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >From: David Edelstein >Reply-To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 11:04:23 -0500 > >Jo Hart wrote: > > So I don't see that a successful game must have all those things. > > >Y'all should make a distinction between successful _games_ and >successful game _lines_. We meant game lines. Sure, a successful game only needs a main rulebook (but whether that counts as successful in terms of sales, I don't know.) jo ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 13:20:37 -0500 From: "Prodigal" Subject: Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors From: "Walter Milliken" > > Hmmm... I wonder if there's any way to write a "one-sided" adventure so it's > "reversible" -- either have two sets of NPCs, but doing the same plot (more > or less), or fix it so the PCs can *replace* the NPCs in an adventure written > for the Other Side (with the GM running what would normally be the PC track > through the adventure). I'll have to think about this some more.... The best way I can think of is to create an objective that both sides want. A friend of mine created his own system awhile back, and a lot of the adventures revolve around two warring factions which are after the same thing for their own reasons. Scenes would alternate between sides, with both sides occasionally coming into conflict with each other. I always loved playing that game, and not just because I wound up getting to play Michael once... *g* For In Nomine puposes, I'd include characters for both sides, with instructions on how the angels could be run as NPCs for a demonic game, and vice-versa. I'd also include a rundown on what each side was likely to achieve if they were being run that way. Another way of handling this would be joint Judgment/Game adventures, of course... ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 18:20:26 GMT From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >From: Walter Milliken > >And *that*'s the rub for adventures. SJGames' experience with adventure >books has been that they *don't* sell very well SJG have so far proven woefully inadequate at marketing and selling IN _because_ they keep trying to do it as if it were GURPS, Walter. "Hey, books of extra rules sell really well for GURPS! Let's do lots of books with extra rules for IN." And it doesn't work, does it? jo (2 rules good, 4 rules better?) ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 11:26:44 -0700 (PDT) From: sw@haven.eyrie.org Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors > At 11:04 AM -0700 7/20/00, sw@haven.eyrie.org wrote: > > > >Aww yeah. > > > >I know *I'd* buy it. > > > >I mean, who wouldn't? > > > >--JT > > Jt? > > What makes you think you *need* it? This is true. But I'd have to buy it, just on principle, if I ever saw it. I mean, maybe they'd finally give Andre all the space he wanted to wax poetic about the Lilim of Lust, and, well, 'nuff said, really. On the other hand, even if SJG never wanted to publish such a beastie, I bet it would make a groovy Net.Book. - --JT ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:30:23 -0400 From: Marc Bowden Subject: Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors - --On Thursday, July 20, 2000 1:21 PM -0400 Whistling in the Dark wrote: > At 1:06 PM -0400 7/20/00, Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >> Whistling in the Dark wrote: >> Now, I suppose that one solution is to make different books for >> each type of game, but I don't think that's going to happen. > > Or divide an adventurebook into two. > Sort of like those old two-in-one storybooks, each "book" read from the opposite end. I imagine the logistics of printing those would be insane, though. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:39:09 -0400 From: Marc Bowden Subject: Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) - --On Thursday, July 20, 2000 12:54 PM -0500 Prodigal wrote: > From: "Walter Milliken" >> >> Me, for one. (I'm afraid it's about the only kind I *can* write. > "Sahudese >> Fire Drill" in GURPS Fantasy Adventures, and a bunch of seeds in >> GURPS > IOU.) >> John M. Ford (who did some truly excellent Paranoia stuff), for >> another. > > Oh great, now I have a truly disturbing mental image of a Sahudese > gardener running around whacking people with shovels, screaming > "Only you! Only you!" > *dies laughing* Now I have an even WORSE image of a PARANOIA/In Nomine...no, not a crossover. More of a mid-air collision. Marc. Just Marc. Elohite Angel of Salvation ("Serve your Superior. Your Superior is your Friend.") ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 18:38:57 GMT From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >From: Walter Milliken >Reply-To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 13:59:02 -0400 > >At 11:40 -0600 7/20/00, ben wrote: > >Put together a book of adventure seeds. This is done, sort of, in the > >Superiors line, but most of the seeds seem geared towards the laughline > >style of play. Wouldn't it be cool to have a book with some (say 5) completely unrelated scenarios whose only common factor is that they are all mysteries/investigations .. PLUS a few pages to discuss the problems and issues of running that sort of game for IN and lots of advice for novice GMs... You could call it "The Mystery Plays". I'd even write up the Miranda scenario. jo ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:42:40 -0400 From: Marc Bowden Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors - --On Thursday, July 20, 2000 6:20 PM +0000 Jo Hart wrote: > > (2 rules good, 4 rules better?) > Only if you fledge Malakite. Marc. Just Marc. Elohite Angel of Salvation ("Oaths? Eh. I can take it or leave it.") ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 11:44:52 -0700 (PDT) From: Guy Royse Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors << See, Superiors I, I prolly would not buy if I were merely a player. It's kind of a GM book, since the GM plays the Superiors. But "Liber Seraphim", "The Complete Impudite", or "Everything You Never Wanted To Know About Djinn" would get snatched up in a heartbeat. >> Don't forget "Malakim for Dummies" and "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Calabim". Guy __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get Yahoo! Mail – Free email you can access from anywhere! http://mail.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:42:08 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 11:26 AM -0700 7/20/00, sw@haven.eyrie.org wrote: > >This is true. > >But I'd have to buy it, just on principle, if I ever saw it. I mean, >maybe they'd finally give Andre all the space he wanted to wax poetic >about the Lilim of Lust, and, well, 'nuff said, really. > >On the other hand, even if SJG never wanted to publish such a beastie, >I bet it would make a groovy Net.Book. I'm a big proponent of Net.Books. I think we should do lots of them. And more Iron Chef Challenges. Speaking of which, the frightening Woman's echoey announcement just called five minutes, Morgan -- how are your dishes coming? ("Today's ingredient... EVE!") - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:41:24 -0400 From: "Charles Phipps" Subject: IN> Characterizing Superiors >Okay. Thanks. >If you want to be canonical, celestials can't influence a soul's >ultimate destination. At best, the seraph ("seraphim" is plural) >could jostle souls out of a temporary condition of dream-shade-hood, >some to go to Heaven, some to Hell -- unless the seraph had >somehow pre-selected dreamshades that were Heaven-bound. Yes I want cannonical. :-) The Seraph was taking the righteous out of the Elysium fields section of Tarteus by the way (where Gladiator went after he killed the Emperor); the moral, just, and holy out of the Ethereal planes....though personally if he could have I believe he would have tried to save even the damned from Uriel's crusade. Just to sound perfectly bizzare in this case the shades were all ready for Heaven it was merely their devotion to the pagan gods of good that kept them from ascending. >I find it very unlikely that any Archangel, even Uriel, would >destroy human souls except for Undead and Hellsworn, and especially >if some of those souls might otherwise wind up in Heaven. >If Uriel was doing THAT, maybe THAT'S why he was summoned to the >Upper Heavens. Just maybe. Uriel was either the most righteous and faithful of Archangels in the history of the Heavens or completely insane in my campaign Serpiroth style (final fantasy 7-I play "One winged angel" every time I mention him in a game). In this case it's my opinion Uriel considered the Dreamshades to be no better than Hellsworn if not worse because because they served pagan enemies of God (who weren't even corruptions of the Almighty but something unrelated entirely).... Their devotion to the pagan gods tainted any righteousness they had in Uriel's view to the point soul death was the only method for their cleansing in Uriel's view. >That would have to be one enormously persuasive seraph to >convince Laurence. And I get the strong impression that ANY >Urielite would think Uriel was PERFECTLY in his rights to judge >what needed purifying (i.e. everything) and when (i.e. always). > >A high-ranking seraph of Destiny with the Divine Logic attunement >might be able to carry it off. If it were Yves himself, the thing >becomes far easier to believe in canon. Novalis might do, too, >and she's a lot more forthright. Perhaps I think I'll leave it slightly ineffable or say perhaps the fellow got a 1,1,1 on the matter. Though a seraph of Destiny with that attunement might work for it too. I doubt Novalis would be very good for the job. In any case it's a call. >Which means Laurance was dissonant, at least for a bit. As I recall, >Uriel had some very low number of notes of dissonance that he would >tolerate in his servants before destroying them. Maybe it was three. >If it was one, you either toss canon or have Laurence waiting for >execution. Just maybe. Another option is of course to say that Laurence lost his superior when God overuled Uriel in that instance and whatever dissonance or guilt he suffered was imaginary. It might actually disturb Uriel to no end indeed...just before he was called to the Higher Heavens. "Go...meditate on your actions..." (I keep imagining Uriel as this wild eyed guy in a jeweled robe around his adamentium armor) >Just out of curiosity, how do Archangelic wings differ from those >of regular angels, and what does the Host Commander's armor >look like? In my campaign I differentiate Michael and other angels by the size of their wings in this case Archangels have 4 wings and normal angels have only the normal 2. Angelic wing patterns I'm considering may also tell alot about an Angel's history (superiors, attunements, dissonance, age, even victories and times of great strife by broken feathers, styles, and even colors). The Host Commander's armor I'm fairly sure is a nearly indestructible suit of the stuff that sort of signifies one's rank in the host glowing with Celestial brightness it cannot be worn by any but the commander and demons are instantly destroyed (okay...weak ones) by attempting to wear it... (sort of a artifact for my campaign but more important for visual affects-I'm still working out the details). Eric Alfred Burns wrote: >You're tossing Canon already. It's explicit in Sup1 that Laurence has >*never* had so much as a single note of dissonance. >Not that it much matters, but I thought I would mention. Yeah I'm thinking about ways around that (see above) but I'm curious if the better story is actually in a momment of dissonance or not (Lancelot) or in the unquestioned virtue leading to rapture. I take it people like the story of Laurence and the servitors? - -Charlemagne ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:50:25 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 6:38 PM +0000 7/20/00, Jo Hart wrote: >Wouldn't it be cool to have a book with some (say 5) completely >unrelated scenarios whose only common factor is that they are all >mysteries/investigations .. PLUS a few pages to discuss the problems >and issues of running that sort of game for IN and lots of advice >for novice GMs... > >You could call it "The Mystery Plays". I'd even write up the Miranda scenario. > I'd buy it, speaking purely for myself. - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:07:51 EDT From: Samovar3@aol.com Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >> full of brown, blue and green books, known affectionally as "The >> Complete Whatever Handbooks?" Splatbooks for players. Remember >Hmmm. Would "The Complete Calabite" sell? A book dedicated to a single >choir/band? In a fashion, isn't this really what the Superiors books are? Yes, you can play a Seraph of Michael in incredibly different ways, but, in general, most end up in a similar way. Look at those covered in Superiors 1: Michael, Laurence, Dominic, and David. If you refer to Superiors 1 as "The Good Fighters Handbook," is it really that misleading? No more than nicknaming the Superior book that will cover Belial, Baal, Beleth, and Asmodeus "The Evil Fighters Handbook" I would think. To me, it seemed that SJG was following TSR's steps in producing products like that (I am hazy on the timeline of gaming products so Vampire Clanbooks may have come before, if so, my bad). I was a bit disappointed at the groupings (I would have preferred different Superiors together) but it made sense. Want to play a fighting-type angel? Pick up Superiors 1. Want to play a slick demon? Pick up Superiors 2. Haven't made the trek out to the gaming store to pick up Superiors 3 yet, but from the grouping, it seems like they all have some philosophical groupings. Sam Flanigan ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:13:46 EDT From: Samovar3@aol.com Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors Whistling in the Dark wrote: >>Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >>Now, I suppose that one solution is to make different books for each >>type of game, but I don't think that's going to happen. >Or divide an adventurebook into two. I did consider this, but I think that dividing the books would be a bad move. The question would come down to: Is $20 (around the typical price for SJG products) worth it for a product that I won't use half of? Now, if the other half that I would use is really, really good, then I would probably pick it up. However, if it's just okay, I'd probably pass. Add in mixed groups, and you may be dividing the book into three parts, so the bit that would get use would have to be outstanding before I'd consider picking it up. Sam Flanigan ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 14:14:38 -0500 From: David Edelstein Subject: Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) Walter Milliken wrote: > But comedy doesn't seem to be the main thrust of what people want to do > with In Nomine, so comic adventures need to be relatively rare. How do you know this? - -David ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:27:34 -0400 From: "Charles Phipps" Subject: IN> Malakim and Transformation (was a fun little thought) This is an odd question but if a Malakim started losing faith in his superior would he turn back into a Cherub, Seraphim, etc in sort of a reverse from what happened during the fall? (Assuming he somehow avoided his fellows killing him). After the War is over will the Malakim cease to exist? Also is it possible for a person to still be so fanatical that they do become Malakim or is this a one time Fall thing (and could it be repeated in Corporeal times with a sufficently weird enough event). Plus is it possible over time that other angels have undergone the transformation into other choirs by adopting some other aspect of the Symphony? (For instance the Menumine might have once been relievers who decided that they wanted to be different than the other choirs or a seraph who begins acting almost exactly like the heart of the Mercurians and indeed embraces their message more than his own choir?) Just a curious little thought there for my campaign seeds (Khalid or someone might probably need to take four oaths to begin the process...). - -Charlemagne ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:52:25 EDT From: MarkDEddy@aol.com Subject: Re: IN> I know it's late, but! Trailer 1 - The Agony and the Ecstasy In a message dated 7/20/00 9:57:32 AM, pisces_blue@yahoo.com writes: >The logo fades into view. > >In Nomine - The Agony and The Ecstasy > I'd just like to point out that this was really fun. Thank you. Mark ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:05:53 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 18:20 +0000 7/20/00, Jo Hart wrote: >>From: Walter Milliken >> >>And *that*'s the rub for adventures. SJGames' experience with adventure >>books has been that they *don't* sell very well > >SJG have so far proven woefully inadequate at marketing and selling IN _because_ they keep trying to do it as if it were GURPS, Walter. I don't think that's really the case -- in fact they tried a radical departure from how they handle GURPS (the "Cycle" concept), which did rather badly. Now, one can argue that the concept itself wasn't flawed, but the execution was, but the net result was "we tried to sell adventures combined with other stuff and it didn't sell well". (Not to mention all the people who complained about the very concept of how the Cycle books were structured.) And then the "core" books (closer to the GURPS line organization) sold better. What conclusion would *you* reach? >"Hey, books of extra rules sell really well for GURPS! Let's do lots of books with extra rules for IN." > >And it doesn't work, does it? Actually, it does. Books with additional rules expansions (*PGs) and *maybe* background material (Superiors) seem to sell better. That's exactly the experience they have with GURPS. It definitely *wasn't* how they started to structure the IN line. I'm sure you can argue that it sells better because SJGames is set up to sell things that way. But frankly, they haven't tried to sell IN much *any* way, since the initial launch, from what Andrew said here a while back. They tried a couple different organizational strategies, and are now doing what people asked for in the market survey a while back (the Superiors books). In fact, I don't recall if they asked about adventures in the survey, though I vaguely seem to think there was something there on them. They certainly weren't in the top 10 that I recall, anyway. They should produce things that people *don't* want as much? Yes, there probably should be some adventures. But I think they really would turn out to be a loss-leader. And you have to have offsetting profits (or think there are potential profits) elsewhere in the line to make that a viable strategy. As far as I can tell, adventures are only worthwhile (saleswise) when there's a *large* customer base, so the fact that only 10-20% (or whatever) of active line customers buy them still leaves them marginally profitable, or at least not too unprofitable. >(2 rules good, 4 rules better?) (1 adventure bad, 2 adventures worse; "we'll make it up in volume"...?) - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:08:57 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Re: In> Dead Superiors At 13:20 -0500 7/20/00, Prodigal wrote: >From: "Walter Milliken" >> >> Hmmm... I wonder if there's any way to write a "one-sided" adventure so >it's >> "reversible" -- either have two sets of NPCs, but doing the same plot >(more >> or less), or fix it so the PCs can *replace* the NPCs in an adventure >written >> for the Other Side (with the GM running what would normally be the PC >track >> through the adventure). I'll have to think about this some more.... > >The best way I can think of is to create an objective that both sides want. Except for the "McGuffin hunt" case, this is hard to do generically, since the angels and the demons have pretty much opposing goals, overall. It *is* possible to do it with specific Word groupings on each side, but that's restrictive in a different way. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:57:53 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> I know it's late, but! Trailer 1 - The Agony and the Ecstasy At 3:52 PM -0400 7/20/00, MarkDEddy@aol.com wrote: >In a message dated 7/20/00 9:57:32 AM, pisces_blue@yahoo.com writes: > > >In Nomine - The Agony and The Ecstasy >> >I'd just like to point out that this was really fun. Thank you. Agreed there. - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:10:13 -0400 From: "Krishnaswami, Neel" Subject: Re: IN> Re: Grigori stuff (was Re: Deeply Heretical) Earl Wajenberg wrote: > > Krishnaswami, Neel wrote: > > > This was the reason for the Flood in my game -- the offspring of > > humans and angels were monstrous giants, the nephilim, and they had > > been destroyed in the Flood. > > This is also a very traditional reason for the Flood. There > are old tales about the famine-producing appetites of the > nephilim, and the general idea is that they had destroyed or > corrupted almost the whole human race, necessitating the Flood. Yeah, that's the source of what I was working from. > > It was also the reason that Dominic would hunt down and obliterate > > with extreme prejudice any angel who was caught engaging in sex > > with humans > > Sex or procreation? Procreation was Dominic's own nightmare, but he objected to human-angel sex in general. His view was that the sacrament of marriage didn't exist for angels, so it was okay for angels to boff one another in whatever combinations made them happiest. (I was stealing from Paradise Lost here.) OTOH, this also meant it was unlawful for them to have sex with humans, because there was no mechanism for an angel and a human to marry -- Dominic had rather strict Catholic views about humans having sex outside of marriage. Funny, that. :) > > (Fortunately for Dominic, demon-human matings were sterile.) > > I thought angel-human matings were also sterile, unless the > angel was a Grigori or the Song of Fruition was used. This was a campaign-specific change. Angels in vessels were interfertile with humans, and demons weren't. > > The possibility that Eli was off producing a new generation of > > crossbreeds was the reason he was after him so relentlessly. > > Yeah, and it IS the kind of thing one can picture Eli doing. Eli: Relax, I know what I'm doing -- this time it's sure to work out great! Dom: Nnnnng.... - -- Neel Krishnaswami neelk@cswcasa.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:23:17 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 15:07 -0400 7/20/00, Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >>> full of brown, blue and green books, known affectionally as "The >>> Complete Whatever Handbooks?" Splatbooks for players. Remember > >>Hmmm. Would "The Complete Calabite" sell? A book dedicated to a single >>choir/band? > >In a fashion, isn't this really what the Superiors books are? Not really. Superiors 1 is probably closest to that, the others are at varying distances from covering a single archetype. They're certainly not intended that way. >To me, it seemed that SJG was following TSR's steps in producing products like that (I am hazy on the timeline of gaming products so Vampire Clanbooks may have come before, if so, my bad). Yes and no. They specifically *didn't* want to do "single subject" books, just for the sake of doing a million different books everyone had to buy. In fact, the very notion of doing Superiors books at all was something of a grass-roots thing from here on the list, not a plan from the upper levels of SJGames. > I was a bit disappointed at the groupings (I would have preferred different Superiors together) but it made sense. Well, Elizabeth spent a lot of time trying to break the Superiors up into groups that had *some* kind of coherency, partly so players who liked specific types of characters wouldn't have to buy 3 different books to get the Superiors they were interested in. And partly so there was *some* sort of flavor to the volumes other than "Encyclopedia of Archangels and Demon Princes, Volume X." I know the partitioning process wasn't easy, especially since she wanted to expand on the minor Superiors some, too. > but from the grouping, it seems like they all have some philosophical groupings. Yes, they're supposed to. Obviously everyone's favorite 3-4 Superiors can't be in a single volume, so the two obvious organizations are: a) alphabetical (boooring!) or b) some kind of common theme. And some of the themes are a bit of a reach... Superiors 4 is an example of that. It's a knapsack-packing problem with no really good answers, unfortunately. Elizabeth went through a half-dozen different organizational concepts, as I recall, and this was the one that seemed most coherent. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:34:36 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 18:38 +0000 7/20/00, Jo Hart wrote: >>From: Walter Milliken >>Reply-To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >>To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >>Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors >>Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 13:59:02 -0400 >> >>At 11:40 -0600 7/20/00, ben wrote: >> >Put together a book of adventure seeds. This is done, sort of, in the >> >Superiors line, but most of the seeds seem geared towards the laughline >> >style of play. > >Wouldn't it be cool to have a book with some (say 5) completely unrelated scenarios whose only common factor is that they are all mysteries/investigations .. PLUS a few pages to discuss the problems and issues of running that sort of game for IN and lots of advice for novice GMs... Personally, I think that would be great. Selling it to Alain and/or SJ might be difficult. (Not impossible, just difficult.) If GURPS IN and/or Superiors 3 is selling well, then they might seriously consider it. (And talk about copying strategies from the GURPS line.... Four adventures in one book is about the only format they've used for adventures. The additional material isn't something they've tried that I know of, though, and is a good idea.) One thing I'd like to see in more adventures is "What to do when things go wrong" sections. The other thing I'd like to see, and don't, generally, is non-linear plotting. That was something I worked on explicitly with "Sahudese Fire Drill," and I think it's a good idea in general. Too many adventures (other than some straight dungeon crawls) are written by frustrated novelists, and have mostly-linear plots. (Sound familiar, anyone...?) - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:35:40 EDT From: BillionSix@aol.com Subject: IN> Just got Sup 3. Hi all! Just bought Hope and Prophecy. Malakim of Faith must HATE the Habballah. Discuss. ;) Reverend Brian A. Rogers ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:41:16 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Dead Superiors At 15:13 -0400 7/20/00, Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >Whistling in the Dark wrote: > >>>Samovar3@aol.com wrote: >>>Now, I suppose that one solution is to make different books for each >>>type of game, but I don't think that's going to happen. > >>Or divide an adventurebook into two. > >I did consider this, but I think that dividing the books would be a bad move. I agree -- without some way to utilize the other half, it's a dubious buy for most people. > Is $20 (around the typical price for SJG products) This, by the way, is semi- cast in stone, for various marketing reasons. Basically, they won't produce anything under 128 pages, due to fixed aspects of production costs. (And really thin books, 64 pages and under, generally can't have flat spines with labels, and thus are resisted by retailers who want to be able to stick the books in a rack end-out, to conserve valuable shelf space.) And the costs of a 128-page book in the typical format drive the list price up to around $18-20, after the retailer and distributor get their cuts. I know SJ has been looking for creative ways around this, such as alternative formats, but I don't know of anything that's panned out yet. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:46:20 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Adventures in In Nomine (was Re: Dead Superiors) At 14:14 -0500 7/20/00, David Edelstein wrote: >Walter Milliken wrote: >> But comedy doesn't seem to be the main thrust of what people want to do >> with In Nomine, so comic adventures need to be relatively rare. > >How do you know this? Not from any formal survey, certainly, but comic campaigns (as opposed to occasional comic episodes) seem to be in a distinct minority on this list. Or are you saying that people might still buy a lot of comic adventures even though most people run "serious" campaigns. Personally, I suspect that the kinds of issues In Nomine raises (moral dilemmas and the like) tend to work best in a more serious campaign. Shall we take a formal poll? I think the results would be interesting, though I can't, at the moment, envision an appropriate set of categories to make data reduction on general campaign styles possible. Comic vs. Serious is fairly obvious. I suppose we could ask about brightness and contrast as well. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 15:53:58 -0500 From: Matt Trent Subject: Re: IN> Re: Legion Daedalus3D@aol.com wrote: > In a message dated 7/19/00 4:02:41 PM Eastern Daylight Time, > owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com writes: > > << Biblically Legion was the collective name of a bunch of demons who possesed > a man in Gallilee before they were driven out-not wanting to go back to the > pit-but that might have been because he didn't want to face Saminga >> > > Yeah, I had always woundered about that. Jesus casts out Legion into a herd > of swine in the Bible (somewhere around 15-30 A.D.) Maybe that was when > Legion was first experimenting with his powers. Then he just got stronger > and stronger until both sides had to take him out around 1000 A.D. Or perhaps it was when Legion was thrown into an entire heard that he began to guess at the possibilities and the realization of what had just happened caused him to loose control and the pigs killed themselves. He then spent the next thousand years trying to get it to happen at will and still have the control over the host needed to keep it from killing itself. Trent Ofanite of Dobut ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 16:57:42 EDT From: Samovar3@aol.com Subject: Re: IN> Thirty seconds over the Vale... Maurice, Very nice, very nice indeed. There's just one twist that I would personally add, if it actually happens. Since Michael and David are going to be personally involved in this (I believe your phrasing was "in the thick of things"), I might have them run into Beleth. And she crushes them. Soundly defeating both of them, if not destroying one or maybe even both. You see, Michael and David are visitors to the Ethereal Plane. They are very powerful and very skilled on it. But, Beleth lives there. She (with Blandine) discovered it. She shelters the Ethereals, learning their secrets. It's no contest between even the both of them and her. (Now, Blandine and her, that's a different story, but Blandine would be horrified and disgusted with what they did, so she may be too busy trying to cope with what's happened to come help them.) IMO, anyways. Sam Flanigan ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 17:03:37 -0500 From: Earl Wajenberg Subject: IN> Flood Geology We've spoken a fair bit about nephilim on the list lately, and that means indirect reference to the Flood, since the two are linked in the Bible. IN canon doesn't talk about the Flood, which leaves us free to make stuff up. Here's a suggestion: c. 90,000 BC, God conducts the Eden experiment on a paradisal (naturally) tropical island in what is now the Persian Gulf. Or maybe it was a sandy peninsula. This lets Eden be at the Biblical intersection of the Tigris, Euphrates, and mythical/lost Pishon and Gihon rivers. Adam and Eve are expelled and, if Eden is on a peninsula, the connection washes out soon thereafter, making an island. The descendants of Adam and Eve multiply, mixed in with Grigori blood. Time for the Flood. The Flood is a sudden rise in the Persian Gulf, washing away the sandy island that is the Adamites' world. Noah's Ark is the first boat ever and bears the eight humans and assorted animals into Mesopotamia proper. Once there, they find other human races -- Neanderthals and archaic Homo sapiens. Not to mention Grigori and their offspring. Amuse yourself with hybridizations. Around 40,000 BC, the Adamite strain has become dominant, culturally and spiritually if not genetically, and we have the "Great Leap Forward," with Cro-Magnon culture flourishing around the Mediterranean, nifty cave paintings and carvings, etc. Earl ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #1724 ******************************** The material here is (C) 2000 Steve Jackson Games, Incorporated. All rights reserved.