From owner-in_nomine-digest@lists.io.com Fri Jun 9 00:43:52 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 AAA03451 for ; Fri, 9 Jun 2000 00:43:51 -0500 Received: (from majordom@localhost) by lists.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.1a) id AAA15878 for in_nomine-digest-outgoing; Fri, 9 Jun 2000 00:39:25 -0500 Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 00:39:25 -0500 Message-Id: <200006090539.AAA15878@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 #1667 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 Friday, June 9 2000 Volume 01 : Number 1667 In this digest: Re: IN> Rules question: Habbalite backlash Re: IN> The Angelic Bible Re: IN> City Regions Re: IN> City Regions Re: IN> New Web Site Announcement Re: IN> The Final Frontier Re: IN> Welcome to Fat Charlie's! Re: IN> New Web Site Announcement IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> City Regions Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> The Final Frontier Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Re: IN> The old Eli Re: IN> The old Eli IN> Re: in_nomine-digest V1 #1666 IN> Knotty Choir question ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 09:57:25 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: Re: IN> Rules question: Habbalite backlash At 3:45 PM -0500 6/7/00, Kris Overstreet wrote: >At 04:22 PM 6/7/00 -0400, you wrote: >>The Habalite takes the Song of Possession at a reasonably high level. If >>backlash occurs, the Habbalite uses the Song to take over someone nearby, >>and acts out the backlash in that person's body. The possessed victim ends >>up getting blamed for any bizarre behavior... > >No. >IMC, even with a check of 6, it takes an instant for the Habbie to make the >decision to do this, during which the Habbie -is- suppressing the backlash; >therefore, Dissonance. This makes sense to me -- though I might allow, depending on emotion, the Habbie to do the possession _whjile_ under the influence. would expand more but wigglebaby all over my lap - --Beth, catching up as she can, typing with a baby (iolanthe) in her lap. But now with a computer desk! Vapitalizatoin and spelling still difficult, typing w/ 1 hand (and often a wigglebaby in the other). ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 10:25:22 -0500 From: Earl Wajenberg Subject: Re: IN> The Angelic Bible Charles Phipps wrote: > Thanks to Earl Wajenberg for his ideas on the Angelic Bible. I'm > incorporating them definatley with all the missing letters from the > Apostles, highletting what was inspired and what was note, and > basically making my Seraphim's life a whole lot easier I'm glad you liked my suggestions. He's a seraph, by the way, not a seraphim. If you make up any parts of your angelic-insider books, I recommend you avoid using gamey terms like Essence and Forces (or, of course, points), even though these are things characters are aware of, in the game. It would just disrupt the Biblical feel, I think. You might also want to use generic "angel" whenever possible instead of referring to specific choirs. > Revelations (Teacher's Edition): There are 66 Chapters to > Revelations and not 22 in this version of the Bible. Okay. Be aware that the division into chapters and verses took place long after the books were written, though. Earl ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 10:43:38 -0400 From: neelk@cswcasa.com Subject: Re: IN> City Regions Erich S. Arendall wrote: > > I'm having a tough time here. I'm working on a write-up of > IN:Houston, but have run into some real problems when it comes to > separating the city into regions. So far the only two instances of > regioned cities that I've seen have been Austin (in Revelations I) > and Las Angeles (in Revelations IV). Anybody here ever division a > city out, and any good tips/rules of thumb to keep in mind? Sure. The basic trick is to break the city down into regions corresponding to the significant distinct locales the players will get involved in. Think in terms of what you need the places for. PCs will either pass through an area, or spend time in specific places within an area. If they are just passing through, you only need a couple of sentences of description. If they are spending a lot of time in an area, then you need the general description, plus descriptions of the specific places the PCs spend time in. I'll use Cambridge and Boston as an example. Let's suppose that I'm running an In Nomine game where the PCs play Vapulan demons masquerading as grad students at MIT. Then I'd want to break the city down so that the places where the PCs spend a lot of time would have a lot of distinct locales: I'd break MIT into Kendall Square, the Media Lab, LCS, the AI lab, the Infinite Corridor, and the Student Center. All of these places are distinct places, In contrast, Beacon Hill would be Beacon Hill, with undifferentiated boutiques, expensive houses, and the state house as a one-line piece of scenery. If the PCs were instead spending a lot of time trying to manipulate state officials, though, then I would break Beacon Hill into a lot more explicit locales, and MIT would become a one-sentence description ("You pass by MIT as you go up Mass Ave into Cambridge -- hopefully their nuclear reactor isn't as badly maintained as the buildings.") - -- Neel Krishnaswami neelk@cswcasa.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 11:00:10 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> City Regions At 10:43 AM -0400 6/8/00, neelk@cswcasa.com wrote: > >I'll use Cambridge and Boston as an example. > >Let's suppose that I'm running an In Nomine game where the PCs play >Vapulan demons masquerading as grad students at MIT. Then I'd want to >break the city down so that the places where the PCs spend a lot of >time would have a lot of distinct locales: I'd break MIT into Kendall >Square, the Media Lab, LCS, the AI lab, the Infinite Corridor, and the >Student Center. All of these places are distinct places, In contrast, >Beacon Hill would be Beacon Hill, with undifferentiated boutiques, >expensive houses, and the state house as a one-line piece of scenery. > >If the PCs were instead spending a lot of time trying to manipulate >state officials, though, then I would break Beacon Hill into a lot >more explicit locales, and MIT would become a one-sentence description >("You pass by MIT as you go up Mass Ave into Cambridge -- hopefully >their nuclear reactor isn't as badly maintained as the buildings.") All very true. However, my own take's slightly different. What I did was figure out where the major players had their strongholds (by Tether). That gave me five fast 'regions' of the city and their control. (Jean-Cambridge; Marc-Quincy Marketplace; Haagenti-North End; Lilith-Waterfront/Lexington & Concord; Michael-Charlestown.) Then, I figured out what 'between the cracks' places existed. (Copley Square-Yves, Gabriel, Dominic; Park Street-Mammon; Bay State Road-Andrealphus and so on.) It ends up like a series of safe havens for demons and angels, with a lot of No Man's Land in between. - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 08:17:36 -0700 (PDT) From: Maurice Lane Subject: Re: IN> New Web Site Announcement Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 07:18:30 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: IN> New Web Site Announcement >After having a rather poor In Nomine site, which >itself has endured a long history of not being >updated and some too-ambitious projects that never >went anywhere, I am *infinitely* happy to announce >something that doesn't suck has taken its place.The >new site is at: Just checked it out. Some good stuff there: I particularly liked your variant of Belial*. Morgan (FAW) *Doing Heretical Superiors is addictive as hell, don't you think? :) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Photos -- now, 100 FREE prints! http://photos.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 11:37:45 -0400 From: John Karakash Subject: Re: IN> The Final Frontier Charles Phipps wrote: > > "Like, let there be light man." > -Eli > > and it was good. > > 1:) The Sun > > Lucifer's greatest creation-the Morning star which united the Celestial > world with the Symphony and gives them all their essence every morning. I believe, astrologically, the 'morning star' refers to Venus. Note that the sun appears in the sky throughout the day, and not just during the morning. =) Venus, IIRC, is brightest and most visible near dawn... and dusk. Something to do with it being closer to the sun than the Earth. If I had to pick a single Superior to have made the Sun, it'd be Eli. Mind you, I think it was a group effort. ;) - -- +============================================= + John Karakash - geek, writer, cook + Code mangler for EMC CLARiiON + mib2300 +============================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 11:43:46 -0400 From: John Karakash Subject: Re: IN> Welcome to Fat Charlie's! Very nice! I especially like this line: "I'd seen him come over the top of the bar like an avalanche in an apron." - -- +============================================= + John Karakash - geek, writer, cook + Code mangler for EMC CLARiiON + mib2300 +============================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 15:47:17 GMT From: "Erich S. Arendall" Subject: Re: IN> New Web Site Announcement > >After having a rather poor In Nomine site, which > >itself has endured a long history of not being > >updated and some too-ambitious projects that never > >went anywhere, I am *infinitely* happy to announce > >something that doesn't suck has taken its place.The > >new site is at: > Good stuff, that. Although, I'm a bit suprized that Saminga doesn't see Jordi's new word as a threat to his position. :) Still, you're site's definitely worth the book-marking, and the linking! - -Erich S. Arendall "Shadow Sprite" Demon of Critical Failures at the Worst Possible Time for Players and the Best Time for GMs, Impudite of Kronos (transferring to Asmodeus) - ------------------------- Touched by an Impudite http://www.impudite.com Go Directly to the Blog http://www.impudite.com/abt-blog.asp ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 12:51:28 EDT From: AngelPatriel@netscape.net Subject: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Hey, Newbie GM here, still haven't run a game yet. My question: I've been explaining to my players how their angels will have to show some discretion on Earth, to avoid disturbing the Symphony. They've been pretty understanding about this, but it got me thinking, why not disturb the symphony? Oh, I know it's bad form and all, but humans don't notice, and the implication I seem to get is that a bunch of Malakim will be likely to show up, spoiling for a fight with something unholy. I once thought that angels might be nervous to disturb the Symphony in case it attracted angel-hunting demons, but that only seems to happen in Los Angeles. It seems to me that the worse that might happen (other than being scolded by your Superior) is that a Malakite might not show up, and might make a snap judgement that your angel character is a demon and attack. Of course, if the Malakite decides to wade in using Numinous Corpus Songs, such as horns and claws, there's bound to be a case of mistaken identity on both sides. Am I off-base in this? I haven't had a chance to really really digest the rules the way you guys and gals have. My big fear is that I'll have the player characters facing a tough situation, and my GM expectation (plot) is that they'll do something subtle, then one of them says "Hey, let's just kill the henchman of the Calabite. Or let's kill two! It'll broadcast a pretty big disturbance, and I bet it'll attract some Malakim who'll proceed to do some @$$-pounding! We'll just clear out until after the dust settles." Pat - -- - ---------- Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Webmail account today at http://home.netscape.com/webmail/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 12:51:28 EDT From: AngelPatriel@netscape.net Subject: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences Hey, Newbie GM here, still haven't run a game yet. My question: I've been explaining to my players how their angels will have to show some discretion on Earth, to avoid disturbing the Symphony. They've been pretty understanding about this, but it got me thinking, why not disturb the symphony? Oh, I know it's bad form and all, but humans don't notice, and the implication I seem to get is that a bunch of Malakim will be likely to show up, spoiling for a fight with something unholy. I once thought that angels might be nervous to disturb the Symphony in case it attracted angel-hunting demons, but that only seems to happen in Los Angeles. It seems to me that the worse that might happen (other than being scolded by your Superior) is that a Malakite might not show up, and might make a snap judgement that your angel character is a demon and attack. Of course, if the Malakite decides to wade in using Numinous Corpus Songs, such as horns and claws, there's bound to be a case of mistaken identity on both sides. Am I off-base in this? I haven't had a chance to really really digest the rules the way you guys and gals have. My big fear is that I'll have the player characters facing a tough situation, and my GM expectation (plot) is that they'll do something subtle, then one of them says "Hey, let's just kill the henchman of the Calabite. Or let's kill two! It'll broadcast a pretty big disturbance, and I bet it'll attract some Malakim who'll proceed to do some @$$-pounding! We'll just clear out until after the dust settles." Pat - -- - ---------- Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Webmail account today at http://home.netscape.com/webmail/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 13:58:49 EDT From: AngelPatriel@netscape.net Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences in_nomine-l@lists.io.com wrote: > > Hey, Newbie GM here, still haven't run a game yet. > Ooops. I have a bad boolean in the following sentence... > It seems to me that the worse that might happen (other than being scolded by your Superior) is that a Malakite might not show up, and might make a snap judgement that your angel character is a demon and attack. It should say that a Malakite might show up, not that a Malakite might not show up. Although that would then be bad if a bunch of demons did show up, looking for you... Sorry if it caused any confusion. Patman - -- - ---------- Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Webmail account today at http://home.netscape.com/webmail/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 14:40:30 -0400 From: Elizabeth McCoy Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences At 12:51 PM -0400 6/8/00, AngelPatriel@netscape.net wrote: >My question: I've been explaining to my players how their angels will have >to show some discretion on Earth, to avoid disturbing the Symphony. They've >been pretty understanding about this, but it got me thinking, why not >disturb the symphony? There are many reasons. #1: Their Superiors rarely approve of it. (Jean is typically uncaring of disturbance -- where there's LIghtning, there's thunder -- but sometimes even he will demand quiet.) Among other reasons (like #2 and #3), it draws attention that there is _something_ going on in the area, and Superiors rarely like having their plans hinted at. "Gee, I wonder why there's a running battle going on over there. Let's go see. Oh, my, a stronghold of the Opposition is being defended! Mmmm, let's spy some more until we can attack without warning, having sussed out all their defenses!" Or even "Hm, looks like some of Baal's/Michael's people have an interest in this old broken down house. I wonder why?" #2: God and Lucifer don't like it. Nuff said. (This is more inferred in God's case, IIRC.) #3: DIsturbance disrupts Tether-formation! This is another reason why Superiors don't like it. Here they've had someone being very quiet and watching this potential Tether to their Word -- and a bunch of rowdy PCs come along and jangle things to heck and gone. #4: Disturbance can attract _unwelcome_ attention. You might get a Malakite, you might get a Calabite, you might get a triad or a Gamester, you might get Laurence who is in the vicinity for some reason, you might get _Asmodeus_ who is in the vicinity to check up on his people in the area, you might get Lucifer showing up to see what the noise is about... You might just get the Demon of Brothels who would like to charm everyone into a nice little orgy and then swipe their Essence. (Not to mention setting the stage for use of some of the special Distinction powers he has...) You might get a Djinn who just shows up and attunes to a PC or a PC's jacket or a PC's car and then follows them around until he knows their every move and can send in the crack team of demons with all the PCs' weaknesses targeted. There are probably other reasons, which I am not recalling at the moment. There are also disturbance=damage and disturbance=dissonance optional rules in the _Game Master's Guide_. - --emccoy@nh.ultranet.com // arcangel@io.com In Nomine Line Editor GURPS, Roleplayers, In Nomine stuff; Art: http://www.io.com/~arcangel/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 14:25:40 -0400 From: Whistling in the Dark Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences At 12:51 PM -0400 6/8/00, AngelPatriel@netscape.net wrote: >Hey, Newbie GM here, still haven't run a game yet. > >My question: I've been explaining to my players how their angels >will have to show some discretion on Earth, to avoid disturbing the >Symphony. They've been pretty understanding about this, but it got >me thinking, why not disturb the symphony? Oh, I know it's bad form >and all, but humans don't notice, and the implication I seem to get >is that a bunch of Malakim will be likely to show up, spoiling for a >fight with something unholy. On the Angelic side, it's quite simple. God has decreed subtlety. Disturbance indicates a lack of subtlety, and a reliance on big powers and destruction of the Corporeal by the Celestial. Which means that even if the Demons are outmatched, and therefore Angels aren't worried about making noise, too much regular Disturbance will bring Judgement Triads down on the PCs, investigating Heresy and disobedience to the Will of God. On the Demonic side, it's even simpler. Disturbance means the Angels can *find* you. And Angels tend to be tougher than Demons. The more noise you make, the bigger the death warrant. Plus, every jangle of the Symphony is that much more infernal power the Angels know is being brought to bear, and sooner or later that means the Angels will say "the Heaven with it" and escalate the War from Cold to Hot (or so the Demons fear). The Demons don't want Hot War before they *know* they're ready. (Or more to the point, the Princes don't.) So, the Demons will send the Game even as the Angels send Judgement, muddying everything. It's bad. >It seems to me that the worse that might happen (other than being >scolded by your Superior) is that a Malakite might not show up, and >might make a snap judgement that your angel character is a demon and >attack. For over-disturbance without dissonance, for an Angel, the worst that might happen is the Angel will be ripped off the Surface of Earth and buried in the depths of Heaven for the next six centuries, doing work that reinforces the need for quiet. One does not contest the Will of God lightly. For a Demon, the worst thing that might happen involves *really* sharp, barbed hooks and a Habbalite, if you're *lucky.* >My big fear is that I'll have the player characters facing a tough >situation, and my GM expectation (plot) is that they'll do something >subtle, then one of them says "Hey, let's just kill the henchman of >the Calabite. Or let's kill two! It'll broadcast a pretty big >disturbance, and I bet it'll attract some Malakim who'll proceed to >do some @$$-pounding! We'll just clear out until after the dust >settles." Follow it up with some nasty Triads, and they'll get the hint pretty fast. And indiscriminant killing of humans, even Hellsworn, had *better* have the sanction of your Superior or some pretty extenuating circumstances. (Note that "they opened fire on us" is often extenuating enough. But don't lie. Triads have Seraphim.) - -- Eric Alfred Burns - Habbalite of Belaboring the Point ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 12:52:22 -0600 From: "ben" Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences In my games, disturbance is avoided because it tends to attract the demons. My players seldom operate on their own turf, so they are always careful to keep quiet in areas that aren't there own. And all it takes is a few angels showing up with search warrants issued from Dominic to give them the hint if there aren't demons around to spank them. Of course, do whatever. When the explosions start to level city block after city block and half a dozen demons on motorcycles are racing after the characters, nobody really cares about disturbances anymore, except that maybe it'll let the demons track you... Most people play quieter games, I've gathered. Ben ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 11:58:13 PDT From: "Jo Hart" Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences As a GM, I'd advise you not to sweat the small stuff, disturbance-wise. If an angel has a good reason to use a Song or take celestial form (ie. killing a demon), then the chances are that they won't get into any trouble with their own side. I don't think it's necessary to lay down the law on players so hard that they never dare do anything. As long as players know that there's a constant risk that they'll be spotted and investigated by demons or a triad of Judgment, it should keep them away from the really heavy disturbance. I'd always make sure some NPC comes to investigate someone summoning a Superior, and let the PCs find out what other NPCs are doing by following trails of disturbance too -- hopefully they'll figure that if it works for them, it would work for the NPCs. If you want to keep the Song use low, then keep them low on Essence, and have their senior angels on Earth warn them against disturbance -- if your setting is closely contested between angels and demons (ie. the front line), that would be a good reason. jo ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 15:14:04 EDT From: AngelPatriel@netscape.net Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences in_nomine-l@lists.io.com wrote: > Thanks everyone for the great responses. Certainly, I'll respect the need for Symphonic harmony, and will try to get my players to respect it as well. After all, I want to have them play angels, not superheroes. If I can carry the conversation a bit further... > #4: Disturbance can attract _unwelcome_ attention. I agree, but what happens then? Assuming the disturbing party are in their vessels, the watchdogs who show up won't know who's an angel or demon, who's a celestial and who's human, or who caused the disturbance (I seem to remember that the nature of the disturbance (Song, Essence burning, human killing) might be able to be detected, but not the individual behind the disturbance. A bunch of celestials may show up, in little groups, and eyeball one another, one triad not knowing if the group that just showed up were some other angels in the area who came by to investigate, or Demons of the Game sent to crack heads. And who's going to be the first to tip their hand? And it could lead to a bunch of embarrasing moments. Mightiel, : You there! Are you a demon? Captain of the Delware Demons' Football team: You bet! (Swish) Ooooow! (Thud, bleed bleed bleed) Mightiel : Yowch. That was loud. I also think a bunch of celestials materializing will be pretty noisy, which sounds like fighting fire with fire. Ultimately, I'll do what GMs always do, which is not worry about it too much, and use it when it serves the plot. Patman - -- - ---------- Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Webmail account today at http://home.netscape.com/webmail/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 16:16:57 -0500 From: "Tafka J." Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences At 12:51 PM -0400 06/08/00, AngelPatriel@netscape.net wrote: > Hey, Newbie GM here, still haven't run a game yet. You'll get the hang of it. Trust me. };;;> > [Why do Angels have to worry abous Disturbing the Symphony?] 1) Celestial interferance disrupts Tether formation (In the Liber Castellorum; recommended if you deal with Tethers a lot). 2) Judgment & the Game frown upon it: You're supposed to be SUBTLE, and not make a lot of noise that could alert the other side of your plans. Sometimes this is counterproductive to your plans, since the other side can just as easily unravel them now that they know your side is involved. For Servitors of Hell, it's a lot worse, since you can have fellow _Demons_ disrupting your best laid plans; naturally serving their own selfish agenda. 3) Some humans _are_ aware, and can just as easily ruin your day. Imagine that you're an Angel, who has just made some sort of Symphonic noise. This alerts the Local Witch Finder Sergeant (with the requisite Thunder Gun), that you are a Witch. He procedes to banish you from this realm of existance. (Why yes, I've just finished reading _Good Omens_, why do you ask?) That's my excuses, and I'm sticking with 'em! Be seeing you, - - Tafka J. = tafkaj@thrifty.net # Balseraph of Fate, Marquis of Delusions of Grandeur ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 19:30:07 -0500 From: "Kiara S. Legner" Subject: Re: IN> City Regions >'m having a tough time here. I'm working on a write-up of IN:Houston, but have run into some real problems when it comes to separating the city into regions. So far the only two instances of regioned cities that I've seen have been Austin (in Revelations I) and Las Angeles (in Revelations IV). Anybody here ever division a city out, and any good tips/rules of thumb to keep in mind? >I have some ideas on what I want to do, but I've got this niggling feeling that I'm making too many divisions in the city. When I did Chicago, I based it on existing neighborhoods. Austin was done based on existing "neighborhoods" as well - or at least regions that are actually referred to by the folks who live there. I'd assume LA was done the same way - I've never lived there, so I don't know LA at all. Houston would be difficult, I think - from what I remember of the zoning laws, there wasn't much remotely resembling the type of neighborhood regions that make Austin work or which I used for Chicago. Just my 2 cents... Ki ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 19:54:48 -0500 From: "Kiara S. Legner" Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences >After all, I want to have them play angels, not superheroes. If I can carry the conversation a bit further... I've dropped triads on 'em, dropped big nasty demons on 'em, and had Superiors hit them over the head with 2x4's. All of those work. I just don't care for them. I'm *still* not happy with my solution to the disturbance issue. I'm down to one IN campaign at the moment, and one of the big issues I need to resolve before I start the next one is how I'm going to handle this next... > And who's going to be the first to tip their hand? >And it could lead to a bunch of embarrasing moments. Well, I have to admit, they get pretty funny at times... >I also think a bunch of celestials materializing will be pretty noisy, which sounds like fighting fire with fire. It *is* noisy. But a group of trench-coated Malakim and Cherubs dropping off a nearby rooftop is a lot of fun, too... >Ultimately, I'll do what GMs always do, which is not worry about it too much, and use it when it serves the plot. I've almost come to the conclusion that, although I would like to run a 'quieter' game than I do, it's just not going to work with my gaming group in a manner that doesn't require me to drop big bricks on their heads more often than I enjoy doing. Since I GM because I enjoy it, I'm now debating between dropping canon on this issue and not worrying about noise (my PC's stay low enough on essence as it is that it's not a case of overpowered, just noisy) or implementing a variant of the "disturbance = negatives to your resonance rolls" situation. I won't end up making a decision until I get closer to finishing up my next campaign for this group and decide what kind of flavor I want for it. Ki - ---------- Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Webmail account today at http://home.netscape.com/webmail/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 22:39:31 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> The Final Frontier At 11:37 -0400 6/8/00, John Karakash wrote: > I believe, astrologically, the 'morning star' refers to >Venus. Note that the sun appears in the sky throughout the day, >and not just during the morning. =) Venus, IIRC, is brightest >and most visible near dawn... and dusk. Something to do with it >being closer to the sun than the Earth. Venus becomes brightest in Earth's sky when it's relatively close to the sun, from Earth's viewpoint -- this has to do with the fact that it's relatively close to the Earth at maximum brightness. And it never gets very far away from the Sun in the sky. Historically, Venus has sometimes been named two different objects, the "evening star" and the "morning star". I'm not sure whether the civilizations that did this really understood that it was one object at different times, and just liked having multiple names, or just didn't care. I think the Romans were one of these, but I don't recall the Latin names, offhand. > If I had to pick a single Superior to have made the Sun, >it'd be Eli. Mind you, I think it was a group effort. ;) I actually like Garbiel better. Eli's just *too* easy an answer for any question that starts "Who created...". I really don't think he should be made responsible for everything corporeal. Saturn, now, looks like something Eli might have done. Totally, impressively, beautiful, and highly impractical. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 22:56:09 -0400 From: Walter Milliken Subject: Re: IN> Disturbance, and It's Disturbing Consequences At 15:14 -0400 6/8/00, AngelPatriel@netscape.net wrote: >> #4: Disturbance can attract _unwelcome_ attention. > >I agree, but what happens then? Assuming the disturbing party are in their vessels, the watchdogs who show up won't know who's an angel or demon, who's a celestial and who's human, or who caused the disturbance (I seem to remember that the nature of the disturbance (Song, Essence burning, human killing) might be able to be detected, but not the individual behind the disturbance. Well, there's the disturbance option in the main book that Elizabeth calls "sticky disturbance" -- listening to the echoes can let you track down the agent of the noise, if you do it fairly quickly. (Main book, p. 55, 2nd paragraph under "Echoes".) Basically, the GM can use this when it suits. In my own campaign, I decided this as a "campaign option" -- there is no "sticky" disturbance in my game. But I have a player group that (mostly) tries to be quiet. Both PCs and NPCs try to find an out-of-the-way place *way* out of town if they need to make a lot of disturbance. (This also makes sense if you want to avoid a lot of embarassing collateral damage to the corporeal scenery that would raise questions with the human authorities.) Maybe this explains crop circles and the like.... The main reason I chose this option is that it makes it a little too easy for the PCs to track down the enemy, if *all* disturbance is "sticky", and I don't care to be inconsistent as a GM -- I'm not comfortable with bits of the game world that vary at the GM's convenience. (At least, those things that depend on the physics -- or metaphysics -- of the universe, and not PC or NPC choices.) > A bunch of celestials may show up, in little groups, and eyeball one another, one triad not knowing if the group that just showed up were some other angels in the area who came by to investigate, or Demons of the Game sent to crack heads. And who's going to be the first to tip their hand? But when this happens a bunch of times, and you keep running into the *same* people. Well, they're clearly aware that something's going on... and if they're not *your* people, then they should probably be investigated further. As a GM, I consider this a feature. Similar things happen in corporeal investigations -- I seem to recall hearing this being used as a technique to spot some types of arsonists, who tend to hang around to watch the fires they set. >I also think a bunch of celestials materializing will be pretty noisy, which sounds like fighting fire with fire. That assumes they "materialize", rather than being called in via corporeal transport. Which can be pretty noisy in its own way, given the canon about celestials liking motorcycles.... >Ultimately, I'll do what GMs always do, which is not worry about it too much, and use it when it serves the plot. And you can point to the main book material on echoes, if the players gripe. - ---Walter ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2000 20:24:07 -0700 From: Ryan Elias Subject: Re: IN> The old Eli Walter Milliken wrote: > I actually like Garbiel better. Eli's just *too* easy an answer for any > question that starts "Who created...". I really don't think he should > be made responsible for everything corporeal. Saturn, now, looks like > something Eli might have done. Totally, impressively, beautiful, and > highly impractical. This is something I've wondered, on and off, for a while. Was Eli always the flaky, slightly comical nice guy he currently appears to be? Or did he use to be a stern serious Archangel, given to deep ponderings on the nature of creation and such? Did he have distinctions and a hierarchy and everything, which were simply abandoned when he left on his little jaunt? (in the 1950's, if I recall correctly) (actually, on occaision I think that he used to be a Jesus-type, charismatic and likable, but also pretty serious about his job) This will almost certainly become clear in his Superiors writeup, but opinions are always good. Cheers, Ryan "When humanity finally conquers space, it'll be the corporations who move in and take over. The Sony Galaxy. The IBM cluster. Planet Starbucks." -Fight Club ------------------------------ Date: 8 Jun 2000 20:38:05 -0700 From: Casca Subject: Re: IN> The old Eli On Thu, 08 June 2000, Ryan Elias wrote: > This is something I've wondered, on and off, for a while. Was Eli always > the flaky, slightly comical nice guy he currently appears to be? Or did > he use to be a stern serious Archangel, given to deep ponderings on the > nature of creation and such? Did he have distinctions and a hierarchy > and everything, which were simply abandoned when he left on his little > jaunt? (in the 1950's, if I recall correctly) > > (actually, on occaision I think that he used to be a Jesus-type, > charismatic and likable, but also pretty serious about his job) I've flat-out stated in my Endgame writeup (first chapter out! Please comment!) that Eli is the angelic equivilent to Jesus. One can then reverse-deduce the notion that he didn't have Distinctions because "Angel or Archangel, all are equal in the sight of God." I'll go into greater detail on this when I write up "New Jerusalem and Creation Faith". - -- Casca "...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 _______________________________________________________ Are you a Techie? Get Your Free Tech Email Address Now! Many to choose from! Visit http://www.TechEmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 20:47:33 -0700 (PDT) From: Maurice Lane Subject: IN> Re: in_nomine-digest V1 #1666 Date: 7 Jun 2000 18:55:30 -0700From: Casca Subject: IN> Endgame: The Beginning of the End >....And Christ Eli walked among the wretches of Shal->Mari, and none dared oppose Him, for the Princes knew >how He had vanquished Nybbas and were scared >shitless. >-- Gorach’s Tale Concise, that. :) >[Astute readers will see the conncetion between this >and the post I made several months ago regarding the >Eli-Nybbas conflict. If you did not get this post, or >deleted it, please contact me and I'll email it to >you. If enough folks ask, I'll re-post it.] Interesting take, there. I'm curious about Dom and Mike's reaction in your campaign, though: has the revelation that Dominic was planning to put a personification of God on trial for heresy made him less rigid, more rigid or did he just wig out? And does Mikey now do "manuevers" in Gehenna, or has he been slapped down for his interactions with Baal? Morgan (FAW) Kyriotate of Destiny Petitioner for the Word of Missing Fun, Dead Enemies* *Or do they tell stories in Hell on how Nybbas will come back to retake his birthright on a future Day Of The Sweeps? ;) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Photos -- now, 100 FREE prints! http://photos.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Jun 2000 22:38:59 -0700 (PDT) From: Maurice Lane Subject: IN> Knotty Choir question I've got a kinda odd one, here. I'm working a Servitor of Janus that just recently got his Word: unfortunately, the Word was Heresy. Janus likes the way that heretical thinking can shake up a person's viewpoints, whether or not they agree with the heresy. Of course, people can get hurt by this, but that's precisely _why_ a Word-bound would be needed in the first place: to minimize the damage and promote the positive aspects. Naturally, the current holder of the Infernal version would disapprove, especially since the Words in this case are really, really similar. Janus isn't too concerned about this, as the next step in this experiment is to remove said demon. That's not the problem. The problem is that I'm trying to determine the best Choir for this poor schmuck ... I mean, angel. A Seraph would be right out, as Janus wants to push heresy as a force for change: from his POV, whether or not the new version is noticeably truer or not is not that important. Using a Kyriotate would make the spreading of heresy much faster, but the dissonance would pile up really fast: that's also a problem with Mercurians (as both Choirs aren't supposed to let humans suffer by their actions). Elohim would probably have the most problems with dealing with the whole conflicting Word issue, while Cherubim would run the risk of focusing on one particular heresy. Bright Lilim might be able to handle the problem, but there just aren't enough of them to make a suitable candidate plausable. That leaves using a Malakite (who are, as we all know, inFallible*), and frankly, they just don't seem to be the right type for this kind of Word. Any suggestions? Or is there just no way to fit this Word among the Host? :) Morgan (FAW) *Pardon the pun. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Photos -- now, 100 FREE prints! http://photos.yahoo.com ------------------------------ End of in_nomine-digest V1 #1667 ******************************** The material here is (C) 2000 Steve Jackson Games, Incorporated. All rights reserved.