The Gaming Den

Pedestrian. Driving a car,

But when you're driving a car, you aren't a pedestrian.

FrankTrollman wrote:It is important to note that normal humans often have dice pools of 4 dice or less on tasks they do frequently. So when a supernatural critter throws down on a task with 12 dice or more that really is an incredible thing to watch. Such characters can literally phone in a TV quality performance and the like. Storytellers should not become jaded and allow success inflation to cheapen the actions of characters with super human dice pools. Characters who can lift and throw motorcycles genuinely can expect to casually kick in locked doors. The fact that success is practically automatic for these tasks should not be resisted, but rather embraced as a fact that is itself impressive and magical.

Best part of all of that.

FrankTrollman wrote:

	Hits:	Asomeness
	0:	Not Awesome. Trying shoes, climbing stairs.
	1:	Completely Pedestrian. Driving a car,
	2:	Professional
	3:	Hard.
	4:	Extreme.
	5:	Crazy Extreme.
	6:	Super Human.

It is important to note that normal humans often have dice pools of 4 dice or less on tasks they do frequently. So when a supernatural critter throws down on a task with 12 dice or more that really is an incredible thing to watch. Such characters can literally phone in a TV quality performance and the like. Storytellers should not become jaded and allow success inflation to cheapen the actions of characters with super human dice pools. Characters who can lift and throw motorcycles genuinely can expect to casually kick in locked doors. The fact that success is practically automatic for these tasks should not be resisted, but rather embraced as a fact that is itself impressive and magical.

Sweet - that pretty much takes care of how exactly people make or become Prometheans, Witches and Children of Ether too.
Building an Android and scanning a brain into it, developing a super-serum, or performing the Khaibit ritual becomes a 6-hit "Superhuman"-level skill check (probably one of an appropriate Medicine/Electronics/Occult + Logic/Intuition) - and our iconic Luminary scientists and magicians are the ones who had enough Edge, talent, skill, and luck in the right areas to succeed on that check when they made it.


Some ideas for technical skill specializations:

Electronics: Circuitry, Software, Hacking
These should be fairly apparent. I separated Hacking out from the obvious two domains because I don't see skills in software engineering correlating much more strongly with exploiting a machine's vulnerabilities than they do with tinkering with the machine's guts.

Rigging: Clockwork, Fluids, Structures
Clockwork is gears, pulleys, and so on; Fluids covers hydraulics, pneumatics, and piping; Structures covers structural engineering and building houses.

Research: Archives, Library, Network
A bit iffy on this one. Archives covers looking through logs, business documents, or other chronological dumps. Library is looking through topic-organized piles of books and similar academic domains. Network Research covers things like internet searches and similar types of datamining.

Three dice can make a task 10x faster. How easy is it to get three dice? I'm assuming tough since thats also what separates each awesome level.

Vnonymous wrote:Making them an established part of the law of the land ensures that the masquerade also has to include police officers and anyone who gets involved with the legal system.

I first read that as meaning that the masquerade needs to have its own police that just exists to police the masquerade. It'd be just like NCIS.

Disciplines

Disciplines come in Physical and Sorcery types. Physical Disciplines are mystically expanded abilities (which can be mental, physical, or social), while Sorceries represent magical knowledge that allows the character to do new things. The distinction is pretty subtle, but basically Sorceries can be learned, taught, and detected, while a Physical Discipline “just happens.” Sorcerous Disciplines are divided into Astral, Infernal, and Orphic Sorceries. They are in some manner connected to one or another otherworld, and their use can be detected and countered based on that connection.

Disciplines are fairly broad and often times represent many different paths to power that are grouped together game mechanically because that's playable. Nevertheless, to represent the different approaches that magic responds to; every discipline with a dicepool to activate presents two different Skills that they can be activated with.

Discipline Levels: There are three levels of discipline: Basic, Advanced, and Elder. A character must have at least one Basic ability in a discipline before they can learn an Advanced ability of that discipline. A character must have at least one Advanced ability in a discipline before they can learn an Elder ability of that discipline. Abilities within a discipline are otherwise unordered. A character can learn any Basic ability and then learn another Basic ability or learn any Advanced ability. Standard characters begin play with only Basic and Advanced abilities in their Disciplines. A Devotion is a special Advanced ability that belongs to two different Disciplines and requires that a character have at least one Basic ability from both in order to be learned.

Physical Disciplines

Auspex
“You see what you want to see. You hear what you want to hear.”

Auspex is the power to have unusual and enhanced senses. A character with Auspex can perceive what others cannot. A character with Auspex gains a +2 bonus on Perception tests. This bonus increases to +4 if they have Advanced Auspex, and +6 if they have Elder Auspex.

Basic Disciplines

• Supernatural Senses A character with supernatural senses can enhance their perceptions well beyond human norms. Vision can become telescopic or even function in total darkness. Hearing can become acute enough to hear heart beats. Smell can become powerful enough to track at a brisk walk. And so on. Bringing one's senses into the realm of magical basassery also makes one vulnerable to intense sensory input. Bright lights can blind, strong smells can overpower, and loud noises can deafen. While a sense is enhanced, the threshold to resist overstimulation is increased by 2. Activating or deactivating Supernatural Senses is a Free Action.
• Aura Perception A character using Aura perception can bleed themselves into other worlds and see and interact with the things that are there. This extends them only into the Shallows, and they are still in the material world. Activating or deactivating Aura Perception is a Simple Action.
• Sensory Damper A character with sensory damper is protected from harmful stimuli such as glare, pepper spray, and loud noises. They are able to dial down their sensations to the point of unobtrusiveness. This can be effectively instantaneous in the case of bright flashes, and highly selective in the case of filtering out noise while listening to a conversation across the room. Such a character can stay conscious regardless of wound level (ignoring pain sufficient to knock them out), but it does not affect wound penalties at all.

Advanced Disciplines

• Spirit's touch The Spirit's ouch allows a character to view past events by touching and concentrating upon items or people that were involved in those events. The event in question must be described (although that description may well be entirely conversational such as “What happened here?” in the case of a brutal crime scene, the context makes that description sufficient), and must have taken place within the last month. Dicepool for Spirit's Touch is Logic + Research or Intuition + Empathy. Using Spirit's Touch requires one power point, and the expected amount of time is one minute. Seeing farther back into time can be done by increasing the expected amount of time by one step and increasing the cost by 1 power point for each time increment the viewing window is increased.
• Telepathy A character with Telepathy can communicate mentally with people within line of sight. Voluntary telepathic messages can also be sent and received between people the character knows the name of and who they have touched (regardless of line of sight) so long as they are within a number of kilometers equal to the character's Potency. The contents of an unwilling mind can be read, but only with physical contact and difficulty. Telepathy is always on, but mind reading is a Resisted Extended Action. Mind reading uses either Willpower + Intimidation or Intuition + Empathy.

Elder Disciplines

• Divination Divination allows a character to ask questions about reality and the future and get actual (if often vague and cryptic) answers. Using Divination takes an hour and costs one Edge. The Dicepool is either Logic + Research or Charisma + Bureaucracy.
• Twilight Projection Activating Twilight Projection sends a character and everything they are carrying into the shallows of an other world of their choice (Limbo, Maya, or Mictlan). The character can also return to the material world using this ability, but only from the point they last entered the other world. Crossing either way requires a Complex Action and a Power Point.

Celerity
There she goes again.

Celerity is the power to move with the astonishing speed of the supernatural. Celerity must be consciously activated at a cost of 1 Power point, and its effects last for one scene. Distinct from other disciplines, the effects of Celerity are cumulative. The discipline as a whole is activated or not during a scene, and may be activated as a Reflexive Action while rolling initiative. When activated, the character gains a +2 bonus to Initiative tests. With Advanced Celerity this bonus increases to +4, and with Elder Celerity this bonus increases to +8. During the initiative phase, a character with Celerity may choose to reduce the speed that will move at to a more normal velocity. The degree of speed utilized cannot be changed again until next initiative phase. In general, character whose Celerity more than doubles their speed in any dimension would constitute a masquerade breach.

Basic Disciplines

• Quickness While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn.
• Nimble Feet While Celerity is active, the character is able to walk and run at stupendous speeds. The character's personal movement rate is quadrupled. If the character has Advanced Celerity, the speed increase is itself increased to six times. If the character has Elder Celerity the movement increase is eight times. In addition, the character ignores penalties for acting while moving over difficult surfaces (although she may be slowed down by them as normal).

Advanced Disciplines

• Alacrity While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn. This is cumulative with Quickness (for a total of 2 extra IPs if both are known).
• Quicken Sight While Celerity is active, the character may perceive and derive meaning from fast moving objects. She may follow a specific card in a shuffled deck, read a sign on a fast moving train, or gauge the trajectories of bullets in flight. She gains a +4 bonus to Defense Rolls, and suffers no penalties from dodging more than one attack during an Initiative Pass. If she has Elder Celerity, the bonus increases to 6 dice.

Elder Disciplines

• Blur While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn. This is cumulative with Alacrity and Quickness (for a total of 3 extra IPs if all are known).
• Rapid Thought While Celerity is active, the character is able to consider their situation and their surroundings carefully as if they had little or no time pressures. All penalties for splitting one's attentions between two or more activities (such as wielding two pistols or picking a lock while dangling from a rope) are canceled. The character ignores all penalties for a “rushed job.” And finally, the character always wins initiative against enemies, and must roll only if another character also has Rapid Thought.

Dominate
“Look me in the eyes and tell me that again.”

Dominate is the power to impress one's Will directly upon another. Dominate requires eye contact to function, although only cursorily. A character who is closing their eyes or wearing mirror shades cannot be Dominated. A character who is actively attempting to avoid seeing a potential dominator's eyes may be able to do so, depending upon the actions of the dominating character. Activating Dominate is generally an opposed test with the target defending with Willpower. When a character is compelled to do something which is against their nature (generally including following suicidal orders), they may spend an action dithering. They at this point lose an entire round of actions as they have their internal struggle, making an additional resistance check to attempt to shake off the effects. Most uses of Dominate require instructions to be given to the victim in a manner that they can comprehend. Usually this requires verbal orders to be given in a language they understand; but sign language, written directions, and even silent telepathic commands can suffice.
Basic Disciplines

• Command The character gives an instantaneous verbal command, which the victim will follow to the best of their ability. The action itself must be essentially instantaneous, using up no more than a single complex action. If it is of an open ended nature such as “lie down,” then the victim will perform it for one complex action worth and then they are free to do as they please and wonder why they did that. Using Command is a Complex action, and requires a successful opposed test using either Willpower + Intimidation or Logic + Persuasion against Willpower test.
• Mesmerism The character can hypnotize a victim, allowing them to give extended commands that will be obeyed. Commands must be stressed and repeated, with each major instruction taking approximately a minute to convey. During the period of hypnotism, the victim stands there like an obviously hypnotized drone, but behaves seemingly normally when they go off to carry out their instructions. Any sudden sensory stimulation (such as a nearby gunshot or someone shaking the victim) during the Mesmerism breaks the spell. Using Mesmerism is an opposed, extended test pitting the character's Logic + Persuasion or Willpower + Intimidation against the target's Willpower. The expected time to bring someone under Mesmerism so that instructions can begin is one minute.
• Suggestion The character can offer a suggestion that the victim will then immediately themselves suggest as if it were their own idea. Whether this idea is followed up upon or discarded as “a bad idea” depends entirely upon how they feel about the idea once they've said it. The immediate victim does not remember being fed the suggestion in the first place, but the scene may look odd to onlookers. Using a Suggestion is a Simple Action and requires an opposed Logic + Tactics or Willpower + Expression vs. Willpower test.

Advanced Disciplines

• Forgetful Mind The Forgetful Mind allows the character to erase or alter the memories of a victim. A single use of Forgetful Mind can alter about 5 minutes of memory, but net hits increase the time frame. Using Forgetful Mind is a Complex action, and requires a successful opposed Willpower + Expression or Logic + Artisan against Willpower test. A Luminary who is presented with proof that their memories are incorrect may spend an Edge to remember. Extras just have to resolve those discrepancies somehow.
• Conditioning Using extended mind controlling techniques, a victim's will is broken and they are transformed into a servant of the character's. Breaking someone's mind in this manner is an extended task that has an expected time frame of 1 day per point of the victim's Willpower, with a dicepool of Willpower + Intimidation or Logic + Tactics. Conditioning is Hard and has a threshold of 3. Conditioning supernatural creatures with higher Potencies than the dominator is even more difficult, and the difference is added to the threshold in that case. Once a victim has been thralled, they follow all orders their new master gives them as if they had been imparted with the force of a successful Mesmerism. At the time of conditioning, the character may choose to alter the nature and demeanor of their victim (this is often done to make the giving of orders that would be against the original nature easier to do. Using Conditioning requires an Edge, and it fails if the process is interrupted long enough that it is not continued between when the sun rises or sets and the next time it sets or rises.

Elder Disciplines

• Possession Using Possession, the character can transfer their mind and spirit into the body of another. While the character is possessing a victim, their original body is inert and vulnerable, but they have full control of the other's body. They use the victim's Strength and Agility, but their own Social, Mental, and Special attributes as well as their own skills. They may use their own disciplines in the body of another, and cannot activate any of the victim's disciplines (but these disciplines do not necessarily turn off in the case of powers with ongoing effects). Activating Possession is a Complex action, and requires a successful opposed Willpower + Empathy or Logic + Persuasion against Willpower test. The character returns to their own body as soon as the sun rises or sets, the body they are in is knocked unconscious, their Possession power is suppressed by any means, or they spend a Complex Action to return to their own body.
• Mob Mastery A character with Mob Mastery may affect a number of characters with their Domination powers simultaneously. The character's dicepool is reduced by 1 for every doubling of the number of victims.

Fortitude
Endure. And in enduring, grow strong.
Fortitude is the power to resist destruction. Some powers of Fortitude are continuously in operation, while others must be activated with power points. What makes Fortitude special is that it does not require the active choice to activate it. A character may activate their Fortitude powers passively while unconscious, or in some cases even while dead. A character with Fortitude is generally resilient even when their powers are not being activated, gaining a bonus on physical Resistance rolls of +2 dice. If they have Advanced Fortitude this bonus increases to +4, and if they have Elder Fortitude it increases to +6.

Basic Disciplines

• Patience of the Mountains The character does not need to eat, drink, or breathe. They persist night after night as the mountains and valleys do. Never aging, never changing. Such a character can hold any position no matter how awkward without cramping or moving. This ability is continuous.
• Revive the Flesh The character can heal their wounds by drawing upon their magical power. By spending a Power point, the character's wounds suture themselves, restoring their body to its original condition without mark or scar. Each power point heals one box of Lethal or two boxes of Nonlethal damage. Wounds healed in this manner are gone in one round. Any wounds short of death can be healed in this manner. Aggravated damage is harder to heal, and takes two Power points and an hour per box.

Advanced Disciplines

• Restoration Death is no longer an insurmountable obstacle. While the character is dead, they may spend 2 Power points plus an additional Power point per point of Potency they possess and four hours to reduce the amount of damage on themselves to one less than Lethal. If the character lacks the Power points to use this discipline, they may yet get a chance if the vast majority of their body is placed together and invested with sufficient Power by others.
• Indomitability Wounds do not hamper the character. This discipline is continuously active. The character suffers no wound penalties and does not go unconscious from injury before they die.

Elder Disciplines

• Endless Persistence By spending an Edge, the character becomes literally invulnerable for a brief period of time. For one round per Potency, the character ignores all damage, whether aggravated or not. This discipline can be activated reactively when damage would be sustained.
• Skin of Night This passive discipline converts all aggravated damage to normal damage.

Hey Frank, how easy is it in aWoD to get multiple initiative passes? Is it pretty much the domain of Celerity folks exclusively, or do you just strap an electrode to your spine and call it good? For example, how many initiative passes would you expect on:

- a normal human
- a generic mook
- a formidable opponent
- a typical PC

Also, it was my experience in Shadowrun that if you don't have enough initiative passes, you die. Painfully. Will that still be the case, and if so, how do you balance the people who don't have Celerity?

FrankTrollman wrote:Celerity
There she goes again.

Celerity is the power to move with the astonishing speed of the supernatural. Celerity must be consciously activated at a cost of 1 Power point, and its effects last for one scene. Distinct from other disciplines, the effects of Celerity are cumulative. The discipline as a whole is activated or not during a scene, and may be activated as a Reflexive Action while rolling initiative. When activated, the character gains a +2 bonus to Initiative tests. With IntermediateAdvanced Celerity this bonus increases to +4, and with AdvancedElder Celerity this bonus increases to +8. During the initiative phase, a character with Celerity may choose to reduce the speed that will move at to a more normal velocity. The degree of speed utilized cannot be changed again until next initiative phase. In general, character whose Celerity more than doubles their speed in any dimension would constitute a masquerade breach.

Basic Disciplines

• Quickness While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn.
• Nimble Feet While Celerity is active, the character is able to walk and run at stupendous speeds. The character's personal movement rate is quadrupled. If the character has IntermediateAdvanced Celerity, the speed increase is itself increased to six times. If the character has AdvancedElder Celerity the movement increase is eight times. In addition, the character ignores penalties for acting while moving over difficult surfaces (although she may be slowed down by them as normal).

Advanced Disciplines

• Alacrity While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn. This is cumulative with Quickness (for a total of 2 extra IPs if both are known).
• Quicken Sight While Celerity is active, the character may perceive and derive meaning from fast moving objects. She may follow a specific card in a shuffled deck, read a sign on a fast moving train, or gauge the trajectories of bullets in flight. She gains a +4 bonus to Defense Rolls, and suffers no penalties from dodging more than one attack during an Initiative Pass. If she has AdvancedElder Celerity, the bonus increases to 6 dice.

Elder Disciplines

• Blur While Celerity is active, the character gains an extra initiative pass during any confrontation turn. This is cumulative with Alacrity and Quickness (for a total of 3 extra IPs if all are known).
• Rapid Thought While Celerity is active, the character is able to consider their situation and their surroundings carefully as if they had little or no time pressures. All penalties for splitting one's attentions between two or more activities (such as wielding two pistols or picking a lock while dangling from a rope) are canceled. The character ignores all penalties for a “rushed job.” And finally, the character always wins initiative against enemies, and must roll only if another character also has Rapid Thought.

Terminology wordfiltered.

How are 'immediate' powers with point cost balanced for golems and the like? I mean, there's not really any cost for a golem using twilight projection. It spends the one power point (which it can most certainly spare), and then gets it right back -- or does the point stay lost until it returns to the normal world?

Other than that, looks totally rad.

Judging__Eagle wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote:It is important to note that normal humans often have dice pools of 4 dice or less on tasks they do frequently. So when a supernatural critter throws down on a task with 12 dice or more that really is an incredible thing to watch. Such characters can literally phone in a TV quality performance and the like. Storytellers should not become jaded and allow success inflation to cheapen the actions of characters with super human dice pools. Characters who can lift and throw motorcycles genuinely can expect to casually kick in locked doors. The fact that success is practically automatic for these tasks should not be resisted, but rather embraced as a fact that is itself impressive and magical.

Best part of all of that.

I wholeheartedly agree. Reminds me of the ST of my werewolf game last night complaining about werewolves having "the easy button" with the umbra and their gifts... If you don't want players having "the easy button" for tasks such as infiltration, then run another god damned system.

Heath Robinson wrote:
Terminology wordfiltered.

Thanks. Fixed and added Dominate and Fortitude.

Gelare wrote:Hey Frank, how easy is it in aWoD to get multiple initiative passes? Is it pretty much the domain of Celerity folks exclusively, or do you just strap an electrode to your spine and call it good?

Pretty much just the Celerity folks.

The idea is that magic and guns are really deadly, and if you don't have Edge for plot armor you can pretty much fuck off and accept death. You're a dude in a horror movie and you're going to get cut open the first time a werewolf decides to do this to you.

Catharz wrote: How are 'immediate' powers with point cost balanced for golems and the like?

Right now, the Immediate powers are balanced against the fact that the burst powers like Vigor suck for the Continuous characters. I'm not sure that's workable, and I might cut it down to three power schedules (Ritual, Feeding, Lunar).

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:

Catharz wrote: How are 'immediate' powers with point cost balanced for golems and the like?

Right now, the Immediate powers are balanced against the fact that the burst powers like Vigor suck for the Continuous characters. I'm not sure that's workable, and I might cut it down to three power schedules (Ritual, Feeding, Lunar).

That's a pretty ironic balance point considering that the burst powers are most iconic for continuous schedule characters. Dropping continuous characters would be the easiest route, but that would be a shame. Would it be too heavy handed to simply restrict characters on continuous schedules from taking immediate powers?

For the Dominate Discipline, can you use Mob Mastery with Possession? If so, is the die pool reduction applied to all checks made while possessing; so you'll have a constant -3 to all checks if you possess eight people at once?

FrankTrollman wrote: ] Patience of the Mountains The character does not need to eat, drink, or breathe. They persist night after night as the mountains and valleys do. Never aging, never changing. Such a character can hold any position no matter how awkward without cramping or moving. This ability is continuous.

As written, this means that Vampires don't need to drink blood to sustain their unlives. Is this intentional?

Skin of Night This passive discipline converts all aggravated damage to normal damage.

How does aggravated damage work in AWoD

Narcissus, I think that means food.

Vampires have a [Feeding] power Schedule. So they have to feed on their special substance to refill their Power Pool. Actual food isn't needed by them. Unlike most of the other creatures which don't have this power.

I'm assuming that Aggravated damage takes twice as long to repair, at the very least.

FrankTrollman wrote:Pretty much just the Celerity folks.

The idea is that magic and guns are really deadly, and if you don't have Edge for plot armor you can pretty much fuck off and accept death. You're a dude in a horror movie and you're going to get cut open the first time a werewolf decides to do this to you.

Wouldn't this apply to supernaturals too though? Withstanding someone with 4 turns worth of actions seems like it would be tough even for another supernatural with elder disciplines. Won't this just devolve into celerity wins combat?

FrankTrollman wrote:Right now, the Immediate powers are balanced against the fact that the burst powers like Vigor suck for the Continuous characters. I'm not sure that's workable, and I might cut it down to three power schedules (Ritual, Feeding, Lunar).

So, which schedule would Prometheans use? My vote would be for whatever most closely maps to being the secret friend of children and similar activities.

Robots and Frankensteins probably want to get zapped with electricity for a while (probably ritual, maybe feed). Golems probably just meditate or pray to YHWH (ritual).

Draco_Argentum wrote:Wouldn't this apply to supernaturals too though? Withstanding someone with 4 turns worth of actions seems like it would be tough even for another supernatural with elder disciplines. Won't this just devolve into celerity wins combat?

Unless Elder powers are really easy to get (which... they could be, for all I know) you're actually looking at 3 total turns worth of actions; Blur is an Elder power and supernaturals can't get it right out of the box. That's still a pretty big deal combat-wise, true, but I wanted to put that out there.

The thing is, if it takes three turns of actions to down someone, you could take them down with four otherwise-equivalent guys with no extra initiative passes (they aren't guaranteed initiative, since that's a completely different Elder power). The idea is that enough normals with guns and bombs could take out a supernatural in combat; the same is true of "combat-focused supernaturals" versus "not-combat-focused supernaturals". So if you have to take down a superfast ancient Bagheera Berzerker, you can use your social powers to convince a group of initiate vampires to come with you and go kill it.

The question then is: Is it okay for Quickness/Alacrity/Blur to be the most powerful first choice for combat specialists?

From what I'm looking at, none of the disciplines are terribly focused on combat except Celerity. It's not that Quickness/Alacrity/Blur is the most powerful choice for combat specialists, it's almost the only choice right now. I say almost because Fortitude gives a bonus to soak in the mastery, without requiring a discipline selection per se.

I'm presuming that at the very least Potence, Walk of Flame, and Lure of Destruction will have some combat-applicable powers (looking at the list of disciplines). Giant Size, Body Weaponry, Hand of Flame, and Fire Starter, for example. The War Form Devotion as well.

FrankTrollman wrote:Physical Disciplines are mystically expanded abilities (which can be mental, physical, or social)

This suggests to me that "Physical Disciplines" may not be the best choice of name, unless you're inheriting the terminology from previous WoD games. Innate? Trait? Natural?


Regarding Celerity, it seems important to know how many IPs you get without it. It's a lot more powerful if everyone starts with 1 than if everyone starts with 3.

The way the preface is written, it sounds like Elder disciplines have more prerequisites than Basic disciplines, but the same cost--that is, if you currently have Quickness and Alacrity, then Blur and Nimble Feet are both supposed to be valid next choices.

There are three levels of discipline: Basic, Advanced, and Elder. A character must have at least one Basic ability in a discipline before they can learn an Advanced ability of that discipline. A character must have at least one Advanced ability in a discipline before they can learn an Elder ability of that discipline. Abilities within a discipline are otherwise unordered. A character can learn any Basic ability and then learn another Basic ability or learn any Advanced ability.

If that's true, then Elder disciplines probably don't want to be significantly better than Basic disciplines, just rarer. And the fact that Quickness, Alacrity, and Blur all do exactly the same thing tends to support that idea.

If Elder disciplines are supposed to be hard to get, then more information may be required.

Judging__Eagle wrote:Narcissus, I think that means food.

Vampires have a [Feeding] power Schedule. So they have to feed on their special substance to refill their Power Pool. Actual food isn't needed by them. Unlike most of the other creatures which don't have this power.

In WoD and most source material, vamps need to drink blood every so often or starve. If, in AWoD, they only need blood to use their powers, blood-drinking becomes some that vampires might or might not actually do.

Basically what I'm saying is that we should put a broad, forgiving power point cost on this discipline, (like 1 per night) so that vamps who don't drink blood (or zombies who don't eat brains) suffer penalties.

I'm assuming that Aggravated damage takes twice as long to repair, at the very least.

Ah, thanks for clearing that up.

World of Darkness vampires do not ever starve. They lose a blood trait (that is, a Power Point) every night to wake up, and if they don't have one they just stay asleep until someone gets some blood into them.

And yeah, considering how nasty of a posse you can put together with Conditioning (Advanced Dominate) or Blood Bondage (Basic Path of Blood) I'm really having a hard time caring about some Bagheera with Elder Celerity going hamster style on people with 4 actions to their one. Yes, they can butcher people effectively, but Khaibit can make zombies. Celerity warriors might not be good enough at merely taking four actions to a normal character's one at the high end.

-Username17

Celerity really should be a part of the default suite for combat monsters anyway. Most horror monsters are supposed to leap out of the shadows, butcher people with shocking speed and brutality and disappear before you can react or comprehend.

Also, Elder Fortitude gives temporary invulnerability which lets you win a 1 on 1 with a celerity monster (though he can probably escape and come back later).

Insofar as I see a problem with celerity, it's that enemies with Celerity are potentially too lethal to PCs. if you put 4 PCs (1-2 with some celerity) up against an elder weretiger with 4 IPs, sure they can win, but one PC probably gets redmisted in round one. Having zombie minions doesn't help, and having Fortitude doesn't help unless everyone has it.

This isn't really a problem, it just means we need good combat mechanics or disciplines for bodyguarding vulnerable PCs, a large gulf between "down" and "dead" for Luminaries, or easy resurrection.