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Some notes.
Don't forget all Obenebration levels, save Arms of Ahriman, invoke Courage rolls in observers and targets; and, in the case of Shadow Play and Shroud, mortals and animals always must roll that check (as opposed to Black Metamorphosis and witnessing the transformation into Tenebrous Form). In my latest VtM game in which I played a Lasombra, I explained it to the ST as akin to being waterboarded, except in this case it's being waterboarded by living shadow trying to tear one's very life essence from their body. In fact, with a Lasombra I played in an earlier chronicle (different ST) who was the proprietor of a PMC, his "elite" fire team of ghouls regularly performed live fire and CQC exercises whilst having a Shroud dropped on them.
Arms are by RAW incapable of fine motor control. They're frenetic appendages in constant motion unless grasping and constricting something. Tearing a door off its hinges, for example, unquestionably doable; opening one, closing one, and/or holding it open, that's more of an ask and open to ST interpretation. I've always read the write-up for Arms of Ahriman to simply mean "tentacle whip" attacks, however silly it may be to prevent them, are off-limits for some reason. To deal damage, they must first win the grapple check, and on subsequent actions use the "damage an opponent" action if they maintain the grapple. It kind of balances out Arms a bit, at least, since it takes a turn to start doing damage with them and the opponent gets at least one turn to try to break the grapple before Shadow Hentai Fun Time begins.
That said, my latest Lasombra was Angelis Ater, and in lieu of fucking with weirdo and broken bloodline shit, I simply took ECD (Obfuscate) to analog it. Until I got Tenebrous Form, Shadow Play got dropped in just about every scene, except for dialog scenes involving other PC's. Considering exposure to bright light or spotlights was a key factor in piercing Obfuscate levels 1 and 2 mundanely, being able to dampen nearby light came in handy more than once. I also took Nightshades in lieu of Black Metamorphosis, and traded in a big-ass boon for instruction in Melpominee; the other players laughed until they realized they'd never seen my character in person after about a third of the way through the chronicle -- they'd been talking to a Nightshade to which I was throwing my voice the entire time, and was so accustomed to my use of Shadow Play they never questioned it, while I was safely out of harm's way in Tenebrous Form and using Unseen Presence.
Had that game gone on long enough for my character to have developed Cloak the Gathering, I had many potential uses of Obtenebration and Obfuscate combined planned. Masking fellow PC's to all look the same while dropping several Nightshades of the same appearance to confound and distract opponents; Mask opponents to look like allies, and vice versa, and start dropping Nightshades of the people Masked; Vanishing allies and dropping Nightshades to make it look as if they'd reappeared; stuff like that, generally-speaking.
Don't forget all Obenebration levels, save Arms of Ahriman, invoke Courage rolls in observers and targets; and, in the case of Shadow Play and Shroud, mortals and animals always must roll that check (as opposed to Black Metamorphosis and witnessing the transformation into Tenebrous Form). In my latest VtM game in which I played a Lasombra, I explained it to the ST as akin to being waterboarded, except in this case it's being waterboarded by living shadow trying to tear one's very life essence from their body. In fact, with a Lasombra I played in an earlier chronicle (different ST) who was the proprietor of a PMC, his "elite" fire team of ghouls regularly performed live fire and CQC exercises whilst having a Shroud dropped on them.
Arms are by RAW incapable of fine motor control. They're frenetic appendages in constant motion unless grasping and constricting something. Tearing a door off its hinges, for example, unquestionably doable; opening one, closing one, and/or holding it open, that's more of an ask and open to ST interpretation. I've always read the write-up for Arms of Ahriman to simply mean "tentacle whip" attacks, however silly it may be to prevent them, are off-limits for some reason. To deal damage, they must first win the grapple check, and on subsequent actions use the "damage an opponent" action if they maintain the grapple. It kind of balances out Arms a bit, at least, since it takes a turn to start doing damage with them and the opponent gets at least one turn to try to break the grapple before Shadow Hentai Fun Time begins.
That said, my latest Lasombra was Angelis Ater, and in lieu of fucking with weirdo and broken bloodline shit, I simply took ECD (Obfuscate) to analog it. Until I got Tenebrous Form, Shadow Play got dropped in just about every scene, except for dialog scenes involving other PC's. Considering exposure to bright light or spotlights was a key factor in piercing Obfuscate levels 1 and 2 mundanely, being able to dampen nearby light came in handy more than once. I also took Nightshades in lieu of Black Metamorphosis, and traded in a big-ass boon for instruction in Melpominee; the other players laughed until they realized they'd never seen my character in person after about a third of the way through the chronicle -- they'd been talking to a Nightshade to which I was throwing my voice the entire time, and was so accustomed to my use of Shadow Play they never questioned it, while I was safely out of harm's way in Tenebrous Form and using Unseen Presence.
Had that game gone on long enough for my character to have developed Cloak the Gathering, I had many potential uses of Obtenebration and Obfuscate combined planned. Masking fellow PC's to all look the same while dropping several Nightshades of the same appearance to confound and distract opponents; Mask opponents to look like allies, and vice versa, and start dropping Nightshades of the people Masked; Vanishing allies and dropping Nightshades to make it look as if they'd reappeared; stuff like that, generally-speaking.
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