From owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Sat Jun 16 20:52:21 2001 Return-Path: Received: from lists.io.com (majordom@lists.io.com [199.170.88.15]) by pyramid.sjgames.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id UAA20294 for ; Sat, 16 Jun 2001 20:52:20 -0500 Received: (from majordom@localhost) by lists.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.1a) id UAA04333 for in_nomine-digest-outgoing; Sat, 16 Jun 2001 20:51:07 -0500 Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 20:51:07 -0500 Message-Id: <200106170151.UAA04333@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 #2265 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 Saturday, June 16 2001 Volume 01 : Number 2265 In this digest: IN> Re: Assassins Re: IN> Re: Assassins Re: IN> The Angel of Just Rewards IN> Mixed Group Scenario Re: IN> The Angel of Just Rewards IN> Iron Rev: Nipping One in the Bud ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 10:52:12 +1100 From: "james walker" Subject: IN> Re: Assassins > - --- Maurice Lane wrote: >> Assassins > > Bravo! One of your better ideas, Moe. And that's saying something. Mmmmmm......now, how would you about framing a Duke of Hell as one of the Assassins? The delightful thing is, a successful frame at the right time would allow the promotion of a REAL assassin to take his place.... James. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 15 Jun 2001 23:14:28 -0400 From: Mike Bruner Subject: Re: IN> Re: Assassins >>> Assassins >> >> Bravo! One of your better ideas, Moe. And that's saying something. > >Mmmmmm......now, how would you about framing a Duke of Hell as one of the >Assassins? >The delightful thing is, a successful frame at the right time would allow >the promotion of a REAL assassin to take his place.... Of course, the Demon Princes would suspect that possibility as well... Personally, I like the idea this is all just a figment of Hell's imagination; of COURSE they're going to assume someone has successfully plotted against them and planted someone close to the top; paranoia is the true essence of demonhood. Whether or not Heaven is capable of such a thing, they'd expect it's been done. Of course, for real fun and games, Lucifer might enjoy giving "confirmation" of some kind to the assassin rumors to watch the little ants scurry around frantically some more - perhaps with the unwitting assistance of a few convenient demon PCs? - -- Mike Bruner-- bruner@delaware.infi.net It takes all kinds of people to make a world, but did you ever think the percentages were wrong? ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 15 Jun 2001 20:07:22 -0700 From: "Phillip Des Jardins" Subject: Re: IN> The Angel of Just Rewards > For the truly selfless, yes. But it occurs to me that > his Word also encompasses just punishment. To people who > deserve that, he wouldn't be quite so nice. (Now back from enforced computer exile. Sorry.) Not really. That's a matter of human semantics. His Word simply covers those who Truly deserve a reward for their work. Actually, I was thinking about it, and I thought that maybe an Elohite would make more sense. What do you guys think? Phillip, Mercurian of Novalis The Happy Shiny Mercurian ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 02:00:33 -0400 From: "William J. Keith" Subject: IN> Mixed Group Scenario Just like the title says, this is about See/Saw, a mixed group of angels and demons. It's quite a bit too big for the list, so I've put it on my website at http://earl.of.sandwich.net/In_Nomine/SeeSaw.txt. Best suited for a low contrast campaign, mostly. Mainly, I just wanted to push the phrase "Heaven. Hell. Rock 'N' Roll." as far as I could. :^) William ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 07:03:52 From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> The Angel of Just Rewards >From: "Phillip Des Jardins" >Reply-To: in_nomine-l@lists.io.com >To: >Subject: Re: IN> The Angel of Just Rewards >Date: Fri, 15 Jun 2001 20:07:22 -0700 > > > For the truly selfless, yes. But it occurs to me that > > his Word also encompasses just punishment. To people who > > deserve that, he wouldn't be quite so nice. > >(Now back from enforced computer exile. Sorry.) > Now that's a punishment reserved for the truly wicked! ASMODEUS: And for those souls who wasted time online when they could have been aiding others, the punishment is an eternity without computer access! NYBBAS: Or television. You are the weakest link, Goodbye. jo _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2001 21:52:47 -0400 From: "Matthew Gerber" Subject: IN> Iron Rev: Nipping One in the Bud This Angelic seed is for beginning characters. It's set at high brightness, medium contrast, high silliness and low combat. The style of play is fairly open in parts, so it would likely be best for relatively experienced--or at least intelligent--role players. The County In a quiet, nameless county in the Midwest whose meadows are home to a decent contingent of minor Tethers to Flowers, a few of Novalis' Servitors have requested the assistance of a team from Destiny. Yves will, of course, put together a team with as much apparent sense and logic as useful; it will include at least *one* Servitor of Destiny, but should also include other Angels from widely variant Words, including at least one pairing of Words outright hostile to each other. If asked how he managed to get the Angels all assigned to the same problem, the Master who gives the group their initial briefing will just smile beatifically. The Master will send them to William, a Cherub of Flowers, who's Attuned to the subject of the call. It regards Ollie, a very promising elementary school student. It seems he's been having a great deal of trouble at school, far more so than usual (his usual is none) and William called for help, feeling there was Demonic influence in the wings. As ludicrous as the story sounds, it will become more believable quickly. Ollie has a Destiny of being a Nobel laureate scientist, solving at least one (and very possibly more) of the great questions of scientific thought. He has a Fate of helping to cripple the world's infrastructure by undermining communication networks. Recently, he's had minor infractions on the school's computer network be punished with *scathing* zeal. If Hell were trying to get started embittering him, it'd be a better than decent way. Ollie also has a few things going for him: he has a loving family environment, with parents who fully realize his potential and neither stifle him nor allow him to go without discipline. A few months back, they even bought him a particularly powerful new computer. If the group knows *anything* about Vapula, they'll hopefully coordinate this point with the appearance of Ollie's troubles. If they don't make this leap immediately, not to worry: at some point while investigating the school, they'll find out that the same company recently got the contract for the entire network. If they don't get the point *then*, you can either have William exposit somehow or spank 'em, depending on how merciful you feel like being. Upon initial investigation of OIlie's computer, it will appear to be a mostly ordinary all-in-one PC-compatible type--but with a peculiarly heavy base and heavy, oddly elliptical rubber pads on the bottom of that base to keep it from sliding around the table. *All* efforts to open the base will fail, and before before they get more than that, something should force them out of Ollie's room. If they decide to survey the room after this, then at the next nightfall, they'll see the computer stand up on sneakers that pop out of those pads, walk over to the phone jack, and plug itself in. If they decide to get hold of one of the computers and investigate it, they'll discover that it's very strange: it has a remarkable amount of kibble inside the base, is at least a Relic, and is very possibly alive. They'll probably find the sneakers hidden under the base, too. Under *no* circumstances will the computer "wake up", even if they destroy it. Once the sneakers have been removed, all efforts to replace them will fail. A call trace or sufficient analysis will show that the computer is dialing its place of manufacture, using some rather sophisticated Tec--equipment to keep itself from being found by anything less than, well, a determined group of Angels. If the PCs don't realize that they need to investigate the company at *this* point, feed their character sheets through a crosscut shredder and apply open flame to the confetti. Investigating the school, should they choose to, will also be fruitful: they'll find that reports of violations of network policy have gone up tenfold since the installation of the new network and that one of the assistant network administrators, at very least, seems to be *very* enthusiastic about punishing them. You'll hear more about him later. The Company Plantain Industries is a profitable company: a maker of computers that recently sprang up locally almost overnight. An investor simply moved into the sleepy community, built a factory and started turning out machines. Dozens of jobs have appeared as a result; the computers are, of course, wildly popular with the residents, both because they really are excellent equipment for the price and because of the pride the community's taking in the success of the new business. (The heavy base is advertised as part of a heat sink mechanism, incidentally, if the players think to investigate that far.) The business's records are clean as a whistle: everything checks out. The players will be able to tour the facilities at will if they desire: it won't be difficult to find out that everything that goes into the computers at this location is perfectly kosher, and the bases come pre-assembled from "somewhere in the East--they're one of those commodity products". *Careful* investigation will reveal some gaps in the background of the company's gregarious Chairman and CEO. The Characters William, the Cherub who got the PCs into this whole mess, is a powerful NPC with at least two Vessels: the standard-Cherub-issue stocky, powerfully built human; and a rather mangy orange cat that he uses when he needs to get around quietly (including close to Ollie). You can use him to keep things from being more than a new group of Angels can be reasonably expected to handle, if combat starts. Steven, the assistant network administrator from above, is a Habbalite of Fate, working to embitter and break an entire generation of young minds in the fair county. He's not a very good fighter, and he'll go down pretty easily if it comes to that--but he's also well known and well liked among the school *staff* (most of which aren't observant enough to realize what he's doing to the students), and he'll be missed sorely. Making things even more problematic, two of his assistants have become Hellsworn. John, the CEO of the company, is a gregarious, outgoing, relentlessly friendly man. His office (and it's easy to see him) is full of Geek Gear, especially Star Trek memorabilia; his head is full of sheer, sheer insanity. He's a Balseraph of Technology who's by now half convinced that he really does just love helping out this great community, and that besides, even if that wasn't it, it's all going according to plan anyway. Unlike Steven, he's a powerful Demon, at least twelve Forces or so with useful Songs, and a fight with him would be rather nasty. He is, of course, deluded. It is not, even remotely, going according to plan. The Conspiracy The plan was wonderful. John, Steven, and Bobbi had come up with it over some *very* stiff drinks. People liked computers. People used computers. So let's put bugs in all the computers! Have the computers track everything everybody did, and call in nightly to report. Simple. Brilliant. They could start small enough, and far enough from nowhere, that nobody would notice. *Nothing* could go wrong. Bobbi never told the other two that she was a Lilim of Dark Humor. She told her boss about what's happening in the county last week. He's still chuckling every few minutes, and she's off in parts unknown cuddling her shiny new Knighthood. The players won't find her in this seed. She took off immediately after getting things rolling far enough that John and Steven couldn't back out after realizing how *dumb* an idea it really was, just how many good things they'd done for the community in the process, and just how deep they were getting. So, like good little demons, they ignored the problems until they went insane. Steven has sunk deeper and deeper into his Habbalite delusions, and is hoping to keep his Prince from killing him by bringing in Ollie. John has simply gone bat-guano crazy. Sorting Things Out Getting things sorted out for Ollie will actually be relatively simple. In the end, they just have to get Steven off his case: this could be accomplished through bureaucratic maneuvering, blackmail, or some good old fashioned Vessel death. The conspiracy, of course, is more problematic: some of these computers have been shipped and a *lot* more are about to be. There are several things the PCs can do to deal with the situation. They can try to simply get the Malakim called in; this has the advantage of being the least difficult for them, but it will also cause a lot of upheaval in the community. Further, it will earn them the annoyance of the Angels (remember, Servitors of *Novalis*) who called them in in the first place. They can try to kill John, which will be less of a problem to the Flowery types (even if they twitch a bit), but will still cause problems in the community. It'll also be hard as Hell. They can try to blackmail John into disabling the Infernal circuitry inside the computers. They can even try to Redeem John--as unstable as he is, this isn't inconceivable. In the end, it's up to them. There are, of course, a thousand different creative and interesting ways they can succeed or fail. It would be particularly interesting if some of those computers managed... somehow... to "grow" single Celestial Forces. Hey, there's got to be something for them to deal with later. And besides, there's also got to be a *reason* Ollie would miss his so badly. "I think, therefore I am alive! Alive with life, and thought, and mind! Sweet consciousness, immortal soul--" Ahem. Anyway. It's all up to you and your players, of course. Enjoy. Matt ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #2265 ******************************** The material here is (C) 2001 Steve Jackson Games, Incorporated. All rights reserved.