From owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Sat Aug 22 22:54:46 1998 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 WAA28485 for ; Sat, 22 Aug 1998 22:54:46 -0500 Received: (from majordom@localhost) by lists.io.com (8.9.0/8.9.0) id WAA17248 for in_nomine-digest-outgoing; Sat, 22 Aug 1998 22:44:52 -0500 Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 22:44:52 -0500 Message-Id: <199808230344.WAA17248@lists.io.com> X-Authentication-Warning: lists.io.com: majordom set sender to owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com using -f From: owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com (in_nomine-digest) To: in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Subject: in_nomine-digest V1 #926 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, August 22 1998 Volume 01 : Number 926 In this digest: IN> How Big Is God...? Re: IN> A new way to compute Disturbance? Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? Re: IN> A new way to compute Disturbance? Re: IN> Little Girl Lost (plot seed) Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? Re: IN> How Big Is God...? IN>Test and rehi ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 20:52:30 -0400 From: Matthew Stein Subject: IN> How Big Is God...? This comes out of reading stuff on the IN web page as well as recent discussion. I've gotten to think - a bit - about what *is* God, in terms of In Nomine. I mean, Hell, we all know that he's YHWH, Jehovah, Jesus, Allah, etc, etc. But I was thinking - what if he was more? I think that is very close to cannon that God is the Symphony. The first few pages - Yves's story and the basic history - really suggest this strongly. Now, let's extend that a step further - say the Angel's are manifestations of God. I know that this sounds totally off the wall, but bear with me on this. God is the Symphony, yes. And when an Angel dies, his Forces return to the Symphony. Not only that, but Yves explains the beginning of Angels as "the complicated parts [of God] began moving of their own volition. Now we call them angels" (APG, p4). The real key to this is what God says in Genesis when Adam and Eve eat the apple; God states that "Now that the man has become like one of us." Okay, we must accept the notion that God has no equals (for the basis of IN, anyway; I don't feel like getting into an argument about real-life religion right now), so who else can the "we" be referring to? Not angels, since angels (even Archangels) are not equals with God. But, what if angels are parts of God, and those are the pieces of his personality shining through. An Angel is created out of the Symphony, right? So, Angels are part of the Symphony, and if the Symphony is God, then, via transitive properties, the Angels are part of God, he who was, is, and will be. Besides, why else would God move away? This makes some sense. While Lucifer might just be a Balseraph - and for that reason not want people to know his lack of power - God is probably suffering from a mental illness of types. Angels can hear the Divine, right? Yet if God's off chasing moonbeams, how is that possible? (Ditto for Demons, but I'll explain my theory on that in a moment.) Simply because Angels are part of God. Okay, so Demons, right? If they're part of God, why'd he let them Fall? Maybe it's an experiment in free will; you know, Lucifer screwed up the Eden experiment, so God tried again, this time with creatures that no one will mess around with. The problem is, the Demons hear a twisted Infernal version of the Divine, effectively cutting God off from a piece of Himself. That or it's just His twisted sense of humor. A joke that no one - Angel nor Demon - has caught yet. I really hope not. (The Angels as God ... this could explain, partially, why some Archangels are so completely one-sided. Words could be God's way of specializing a part of himself, much like our fingers versus our toes, and so he can make more Angels (compartmentalization is all well and good when fracturing your psyche).) Anyway. All comments would be much appreciated. Matt. (a/k/a Alain, Mercurian of Yves, Angel of Playing The Devil's Advocate. On Tuesdays. Or Thursdays, by appointment.) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 21:59:23 -0400 From: Neel Krishnaswami Subject: Re: IN> A new way to compute Disturbance? Walter Milliken wrote: > >I've been playing with ways to try to simplify disturbance, and finally >hit on the following: > > - Compute the amount of noise (the modifier) as the book states > - Roll against Perception + Noise - distance modifier > >...where the distance modifier uses the distance modifiers for resonance >CDs (but is applied to the target number here): > > +2 for touching the source > +1 if within 1 yard (or is it foot?) > +0 if between 1 and 10 yards > -1 if between 10-50 yards > -2 up to 100 yards, and an additional -1 for each 100 yards thereafter I will note that this system matches the behavior of Tariel in the Introduction much better; he was going around spending little piffs of Essence, which wouldn't have been heard at all under the current rules. However, I still don't like it. :) This rather dramatically changes the range at which disturbances can be heard; small disturbances can be heard /much/ farther away. A 3 Cel Force/6 Per character has a 6 target number to a hear a 2 point disturbance from 6 yards away. With your system, the same target would be at 100 yards. This is a radical change that would be hard to retrofit into an existing campaign without disrupting the expectations players have formed about how loud a given disturbance is. If you want a simple system that approximately matches up to what the main rulebook says, use the following rule: Any disturbance can be heard at a base range of the disturbance level squared in yards. So a 1 disturbance can be heard at 1 yard, and a 10 disturbance can be heard 100 yards away. [*] If you are within the base range, make a Perception roll to hear it. If you are outside the base range, you don't hear it. The GM should use dramatic license so that characters automatically hear really loud disturbances. [*] To really match the book, the range for each character should be the Celestial Forces times the base range, but the point of the change was to eliminate having to do a calculation for each character. - -- Neel Krishnaswami neelk@alum.mit.edu ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 21:57:54 -0400 (EDT) From: Pee Kitty Subject: Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? Much better. Much simpler. Easy to use. I like it. - -- Rev. Pee Kitty, of the order Malkavian-Dobbsian Meow! ::: Thinking about a Tampa Bay Devival in the future - email me! ::: Or go to http://www.cris.com/~pkitty (hell, go there anyways!) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 21:29:30 -0700 (PDT) From: Robert Knop Subject: Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? [Walter's Simplified Disturbance Rules (WSDR) omitted.] I like the WSDR, in that it's a simplified system that also "makes sense" game mechanics-wise, i.e. you're using a pre-existing "celestial range" table for the distances. What I don't like about it is that it does make small disturbances easier to hear at appreciable distances. It may be tempered by my biases based on the system in place, but it seems to me that you ought to have to be pretty close to a celestial before you hear it spend a small bit of Essence (for example). The WSDR as is makes it harder for a celestial to dissapear "into a crowd" by limiting it's use of supernormal powers. Now, it would probably have to cut them out altogether. - -Rob === Rob Knop === rknop@crl.com ==== http://www.wco.com/~rknop === Amiga PGP information at http://www.wco.com/~rknop/amiga_pgp Visit the Dramatic Exchange at http://www.dramex.org/ ================================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 01:43:55 -0400 From: "Matthew D. Gandy" Subject: Re: IN> A new way to compute Disturbance? I've done a few computations based on Walter's proposed modifications. They are below. In general, his fix makes disturbance mechanics easier--no more strange alchemical combinations of Perception, Celestial Forces and Disturbance Modifier. It does however put most disturbance detection possibilities into the middle distance, so that a level 1 disturbance (1 Essence spent) is easier to hear at a longer distance, and a Song of Thunder with a check digit of 6 (level 54 disturbance) doesn't go as far. Minimum Safe Distances for certain disturbances are now possible to calculate, though. My examples are based on three variables: level of disturbance, Perception and chance of success. For Perception, I used 3 variables: 12 (max PC stat), 6 (average) and 1 (lowest possible for a celestial). For chance of success, I used 12 (automatic except for Intervention), 7 (50%) and 1 (0%). I'll give ranges from highest to lowest for the various disturbances. Level 1 (1 Essence spent): Perception 12's range is 50 yards or less for automatic and becomes impossible outside 1100 yards. Yep, that's a 1 km range for a level 1 disturbance, with a midpoint (50% chance) at 500 yards. So much for vanishing into the crowd near a acute angel (pardon the pun). Perception 6 is more reasonable: no chance of auto success, with a max range of 500 yards and a midpoint of 10 yards. Perception 1 *still* has a chance (a very *small* chance) inside *50* yards! Level 10 (Killing a human): P12 goes from 900 to 2000 yards, midpoint is 1400 yards. P6 is 300-1400 yards, mid 800 yards. P1 is from 1 (!) to 900 yards, mid 300 yards. Level 20 and 30 (Appearance of Superiors in Corporeal and Celestial Forms) continues the trend, with maximum ranges from 1900-3000 yards for 20, and 2900-4000 yards for 30. Perception becomes a lot less important past the "killing a human" stage for either system, but yields similar results (although it does become easier for a perceptive celestial to hear things further away with Walter's system--this makes some sense). Level 54 was as high as I took it, but the results are more of the same: 5300-6400 yards to be safe, with auto success under 4200-5300 yards (!). One last note was checking for ranges where, barring Intervention, success was automatic *and* left an effective "skill" high enough (17) to ensure a check digit of 6 (spilling all of the potential beans about the nature of the disturbance). At the low end, it worked nicely--not even a P12 had a chance of noticing a level 1 with a +5 to the CD. When killing a human, P12 knows exactly what happened within 400 yards, and even your average celestials knows within a yard (which could lead to some interesting roleplaying...). Appearance of Superiors gets silly, though, with even a P1 knowing *exactly* what happened when within *300* yards. Walter's suggestion is a definite step in the right direction, but leaves something to be desired at the low end which would allow characters to be discreet in their disturbances (i.e. Essence expenditure) without a whole city knowing--large sporting events become dicey when a perceptive celestial has a greater than even chance of noticing that 1 Essence Song and its small disturbance within the confines of a stadium. (Of course, tracking it to its source is trickier, but it it's just a little louder, they're gonna get a bonus to their CD as well...) I think a few questions need to be asked about the disturbance mechanics. First, Walter, have you tried this new system in your game yet? If so, how successful was it? Secondly, and more generally, what is desired out of the mechanics? Automatic detection inside a certain range, based on the disturbance? The ability to go unnoticed to anyone outside 10 yards or so when dropping that 1 Essence? How far away should the Loud Stuff be heard? All across town? To the next town? The next state? What kinds of disturbances should be loudest, and why? As it stands, killing humans might need increasing as far as disturbance is concerned, if that is just a no-no for practical reasons in In Nomine (at least without some kind of masking effect in place first), and Superiors decreased (it makes it almost too hard for Superiors to pop up anywhere other than Tethers and conduct business. And what of Tethers? They're celestially noisy--how do they impact disturbance detection? Cause static if in the line of detection? Well, this suggestion of Walter's has raised a lot of questions--even outside the merits of his modification--that need some serious discussion. I'm curious to hear what others think, and what has worked in other campaigns. Sensing that the Can of Worms is now well and truly opened, Matthew D. "Demiurge" Gandy still looking for the face I had before the world was made ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 08:13:06 +0200 (DFT) From: Anders Gabrielsson Subject: Re: IN> Little Girl Lost (plot seed) On Fri, 21 Aug 1998, Walter Milliken wrote: > >> IIRC, vessel-killing a spirit no longer sends it to Heaven/Hell. > >> They now go to Limbo. (From APG/IPG, and should be in errata, but > >> may not be. *sigh*) Trauma, Limbo... Not a very nice thing to do to > >> a baby! > > > >Hm. A reliever isn't a spirit, is it? > > They fall into the class of celestial spirits, along with imps and > gremlins. It's in the back of the main book, I think. Ah, I was thinking spirit = Ethereal spirit. Anyway, in the IPG (p. 95) it says that a celestial spirit who's vessel is killed goes to Limbo, though I couldn't find such a reference in the APG, at least not in connection with Relievers. Anders Gabrielsson anders@stp.ling.uu.se The contents of this message belong to me and nobody else. So there! May you have the knowledge of a sage, and the wisdom of a child. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 10:03:29 -0400 From: Andrew Frades Subject: Re: IN> A new way to compute disturbance...? Walter Milliken wrote: > - Compute the amount of noise (the modifier) as the book states > > - Roll against Perception + Noise - distance modifier > > ...where the distance modifier uses the distance modifiers for resonance > CDs (but is applied to the target number here): > > +2 for touching the source > +1 if within 1 yard (or is it foot?) > +0 if between 1 and 10 yards > -1 if between 10-50 yards > -2 up to 100 yards, and an additional -1 for each 100 yards thereafter That's fairly similar to the hodgepodge system I have been using IMC. The only addition that I would make is to use the range modifier as a check digit modifier as well since for many disturbances that annoying check digit of six shows up with most any angelic character. IMC I had been using a flat -1 per doubling of the distance with a +2 if close enough to touch. (i.e. even odds to one yard, -1 to 2, -2 to 4, -3 to 8). I think I like your way better as using my method the REALLY big disturbances can noy longer be heard around the world. Peace, Andrew ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 14:36:46 -0400 (EDT) From: Casca Subject: Re: IN> How Big Is God...? On Fri, 21 Aug 1998, Matthew Stein wrote: > Angels as God ... this could explain, partially, why some > Archangels are so completely one-sided. Words could be God's way > of specializing a part of himself, much like our fingers versus > our toes, and so he can make more Angels (compartmentalization is > all well and good when fracturing your psyche).) I came up with something very close to this for my game. I theorized that angels, collectively, make up the Holy Spirit -- a concept that, 2000 years after its creation, is still poorly defined. As near as I can tell, the HS is the nearly undetectable presence of God in us and around us, and generally motivates to do what is right (conscience, among other things). I think this fits the definition of IN angels quite nicely. - -- Casca, Seraph of Archives (bertishg@db.erau.edu) "...I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above Him were seraphs, each with six wings: with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying...At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook, and the temple was filled with smoke." -- Isaiah 6:2,4 ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1998 20:38:44 -0700 (PDT) From: Kim Foster Subject: IN>Test and rehi Hi, back on the list after some time. I know violence doesn't solve all problems... But it sure feels good! Felicia:DS3:Vampire Savior ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #926 ******************************* The material here is (C) 1997 Steve Jackson Games, Incorporated. All rights reserved.