[V5] The Sabbat thread

[Taggie]

Ghouled horses work amazingly for cavalry and poorly as their own monster. I didn't mention Bears because, well, they're a staple and it's rather easy to forget about them, and we're largely discussing history for the modern context of Sabbat going wild. Bears are common, and though you might go 'OH SHIT' if you found one strutting around the inner city, they're common enough in north america (supposedly where most Sabbat reside) that it wouldn't be terribly groundbreaking for a Bear to appear in the suburbs. A Hippo, on the otherhand, is going to come from a zoo, or perhaps a cocaine king's private garden. There's just a massive wow factor from having a hippo run about. You'll make international news. And so the Cam need to be really considerate about how they handle it.

Bears + flesh craft armor and enlarged claws and fangs= better than Vozhd for way cheaper.

[Taggie]

Yep. These should be the Nexus Crawlers of vampiredom.

Maybe not that powerful (that's Cathedral of Flesh level terror) but much more dangerous than they are now.

[MyWifeIsScary]

I have it so that Tzmisce can inflict lesser versions of Horrid form on others, but because you're essentially canibalizing vitals to put muscles into overdrive At +1,+1,+1 the Ghoul is stable, though a mortal might die of complications given a good amount of time. At +2,+2,+2, A Ghoul will die -soon-, while a mortal just can't take that kind of stress on their body. Vampires can be Horrid formed (You need direct access to their heart to do this) but they heal it each night, and it requires willpower to bestow it. Through this method Tzmisce could be more competitive with Lupines in times of yore, while also keeping things relevant for modern nights. Also got it so a fleshcrafter with Bloodform can use it to have dead creations melt away into blood upon death, to keep the silence of the blood (among other things)

But alas, this isn't canon.
A ritual to make Fomori would work pretty well. The spider-changers can do it, and the Tzmisce do have a fair few wizards among them.

The biggest problem I have with Vozhd is structural. Like, If you could turn the people you're using to mush and rebuild them all as one solidly constructed animal, it'd be fine. If Vozhd were meant to be somewhat inteligent and could fire guns, it'd be ok, but Bozhd as they are are too stupid for that, and they're a design disaster because really you can't build good arms from entire humans and using humans arms is just going to be weak.

I feel as a psycho Tzmisce I'd have better things to do.

[MyWifeIsScary]

Bears + flesh craft armor and enlarged claws and fangs= better than Vozhd for way cheaper.

The mechanics for flesh-crafted armour are... eh... not good. That and I don't imagine it actually working that well to just re-allocate bone and tissue like that. You'd be better off sewing a few kevlar vests together for the bear. Maybe add a few spikes coming out of the vests. A Ghouled bear is extremely dangerous. Not enough to challenge a Garou, but certainly enough to kill a few neonates that haven't had the time to prepare.

[Taggie]

The mechanics for flesh-crafted armour are... eh... not good. That and I don't imagine it actually working that well to just re-allocate bone and tissue like that. You'd be better off sewing a few kevlar vests together for the bear. Maybe add a few spikes coming out of the vests. A Ghouled bear is extremely dangerous. Not enough to challenge a Garou, but certainly enough to kill a few neonates that haven't had the time to prepare.

fair point,

[CTPhipps]

I wonder what would be the best way to incorporate the Sabbat back into the larger 5th Edition metaplot? They could easily roll back things but I'd like to see how they handle things too.

[CajunKhan]

It's such a mess what they did to the Sabbat. They clearly hoped we'd be content with just Cammies vs Anarchs and not mind that they summarily disposed of the Sabbat in a manner that is virtually impossible to undo in a remotely clean manner. It's such a mess that I'm just ignoring it. The Sabbat never left their cities in my personal universe. The absurd mass exodus of an entire sect just never happened. Blech.

[CTPhipps]

It's such a mess what they did to the Sabbat. They clearly hoped we'd be content with just Cammies vs Anarchs and not mind that they summarily disposed of the Sabbat in a manner that is virtually impossible to undo in a remotely clean manner. It's such a mess that I'm just ignoring it. The Sabbat never left their cities in my personal universe. The absurd mass exodus of an entire sect just never happened. Blech.

I feel like that's a dramatic overstatement. The Sabbat weren't wiped out but went on Crusade where they wiped out hundreds of Elders and Methuselahs.

I think the Sabbat returning is obviously going to happen and maybe they should have never abandoned some cities but I think there's a lot of potential for what they may have found in the Middle East:

* Ancient knowledge
* Artifacts of the First and Second City
* Reincarnated Leaders of The Ancients
* New Bloodlines
* New Sorcery
* New Allies and territory in Africa as well as the Middle to Far East

There's no reason the Gehenna Crusade has to be a wash for them.

[Taggie]

I feel like that's a dramatic overstatement. The Sabbat weren't wiped out but went on Crusade where they wiped out hundreds of Elders and Methuselahs.

I think the Sabbat returning is obviously going to happen and maybe they should have never abandoned some cities but I think there's a lot of potential for what they may have found in the Middle East:

* Ancient knowledge
* Artifacts of the First and Second City
* Reincarnated Leaders of The Ancients
* New Bloodlines
* New Sorcery
* New Allies and territory in Africa as well as the Middle to Far East

There's no reason the Gehenna Crusade has to be a wash for them.

Maybe, but even that much victory is the sum of various roll backs, and 'we didn't mean its'. It certainly started this edition as them having run off to die off screen. About the only way to bring them back is basically the biggest crusade ever, shock and awe of the bloated packs hitting the Anarchs as hard as they can (because the anarchs are the main territorial power now, with the Cam doing inconnu lite impressions, and the anarchs have a lot of deserters the Sabbat are going to loath with unholy passion) then, when they have territory, they can go after the Cam, it may be interesting to have them strike in places that aren't expecting them...like Europe, or Russia, continue the theme of eating the elders by hitting the largest concentrations that are left of the really ancient, or grabbing the space Baba Yaga left denuded of strength and unity. (If that still happened)

[CTPhipps]

Maybe, but even that much victory is the sum of various roll backs, and 'we didn't mean its'. It certainly started this edition as them having run off to die off screen. About the only way to bring them back is basically the biggest crusade ever, shock and awe of the bloated packs hitting the Anarchs as hard as they can (because the anarchs are the main territorial power now, with the Cam doing inconnu lite impressions, and the anarchs have a lot of deserters the Sabbat are going to loath with unholy passion) then, when they have territory, they can go after the Cam, it may be interesting to have them strike in places that aren't expecting them...like Europe, or Russia, continue the theme of eating the elders by hitting the largest concentrations that are left of the really ancient, or grabbing the space Baba Yaga left denuded of strength and unity. (If that still happened)

I point out that this is not what happened. The Sabbat were confirmed to be annihilating the Camarilla and WINNING the Gehenna War in The Camarilla book.

It was only Chicago by Night which implied the Lasombra considered it too much.

[archderd]

i don't see anything they could do with the sabbath except gut them and make them ostensibly a skeleton crew of the old sabbath that relies on guerrilla tactics to target the few elders that remained behind.
that or pull a "it was all cammy propaganda and this is what's really going on" (whit how the meta plot has been going i wouldn't even mind it)

[Black Fox]

I decided to look up the stats in Ghouls Fatal Addiction to see the comparison. It's interesting as to what stats are used in the book.

The Vozhd has 8 Str + Potence 6, and Stamina 6 + Fort 4. It also has 19 Health levels.

Compare to the stats they use for Ghouled Animals. They don't have Bears, but they include Gorillas, Lions, and Wolves. They stats they use are

Gorillas and Lions have Str 4 + Potence 1 and Stamina 4. The Wolf has Str 2 + Potence 1and Stamina 3. They also get 1 point of either Celerity or Fortitude. They have between 7-9 Health Levels.

These animal stats are fairly consistent in the early WoD/Storyteller system. In books like Werewolf's Ways of the Wolf, they give wolves 2 Strength and Bears 4 Strength. (Vampire Revised boosted some of these stats - it shows wolves having 3 Strength, Bears 5 strength, and big cats 4 or 5.)

This is what the book writers were comparing Vozhd too. There's obviously no doubt which is better in this comparison - the Vozhd wins hands down. Even assuming you add additional features to the animals via Vicissitude, I think the Vozhd would dominate.

However, I think what people are doing is not comparing the vozhd to the "official" ghoul animal stats, but the stats they would give the animals. Because the animal stats in Ghouls: Fatal Addiction appear clearly wrong to me. Gorillas are anywhere from 4-10 times stronger than a human, so a stat like Strength 4 for them is just ridiculous. Even Olympic level powerlifters aren't stronger than a gorilla. Gorillas probably have a Str between 8-10 in WoD/Storyteller system rules. Furthermore, the stats for lions and the other animals are too low. I think most people would give wolves far better strength stats. Certain parts of a human's anatomy can be stronger than the equivalent part of a wolf's, but in combat we'd probably want to use the wolf's bite strength versus that of a human's arms. I think wolf strength stats would likely be between 4-6, at least for combat purposes.

Either the game writers didn't understand these animals, or they deliberately decided to downplay them in order to provide a more cinematic experience for players when encountering these animals so they have a realistic chance of overcoming them like we'd see in an action movie as opposed to real life. The second is defensible design choice as long as it's explained that is what you are doing.

I think we need to take the initial comparison between Vozhd and ghouled animals seriously, not the particular stat itself. Since we'd likely want to boost the ghouled animal stats, we should do the same for the Vozhd.

So if your ghouled Gorilla goes from Str 4 + Potence 1 to Str 10 and Potence 1, the Vozhd should go to Str 14 + Potence 6, perhaps even more. Instead of simply adding 6 extra dice of Strength, maybe you feel doubling it is what the relationship should be, so you give it Str 20.

I don't think their Stamina and Health Levels are too off, but a slight boost there could probably be justified.

We should also keep in mind that players often choose to do optimal builds which almost always breaks the game as the rules were never intended to use all these exploits together. STs tend to do the same in order to create a challenge for those PCs. But in a serious setting, it's unlikely the characters would ever have these exploits, and therefore the Vozhd as written would be terrifying. If your chronicle does have PCs that have optimal builds, you likely have to recreate the Vozhd in the same way.

If you do that, I think the Vozhd becomes the thing everyone thinks it should be based on the description. You just have to factor in the original design criteria and why that doesn't actually apply, versus just repeating the original stats outside of that context.

[CTPhipps]

i don't see anything they could do with the sabbath except gut them and make them ostensibly a skeleton crew of the old sabbath that relies on guerrilla tactics to target the few elders that remained behind.
that or pull a "it was all cammy propaganda and this is what's really going on" (whit how the meta plot has been going i wouldn't even mind it)

Why is that? I'm curious.

[archderd]

Why is that? I'm curious.

i'm assuming you mean why i would preffere the rewrite. simply because the meta plot as it stand is just not good and the it was all propaganda route gives them a chance to go back to older plotpoints and just have another go at it. not necessarily retconning stuff but give a better explanation

[Banu_Saulot]

I don't think anybody who's gone to the Gehenna Crusade is coming back, and if so they are going to be loonier that Anatoly after eating Octavio. They are really selling that some weird (perhaps lovecraftian) shit is going on there, so people just coming back hands full would depreciate it, I think. Although the idea of, like in real crusades and the whole troupes it spawned, there could be some new myths and mysteries talked about, like miracles, artifacts, sightings, even some Cthulhu-level madness.
But, this is what the Sword of Caine was waiting for, "the time is not nigh, it is now" for the Sabbat. I imagine only the more faithless, coward, paranoid, suspecting and freedom loving packs would stick to the old territories, or maybe the most monstrous packs too. The rest, as I see, is up and gone to fight the Matusaleah and Antediluvians for good, and only after that, with the power they get (in their hopes) would they triumphally return and take over the world and never again hide their vampire nature. Which probably is far from what is going to happen, if we find out.

I also thought that, well, even if it hasn't been stated nothing about the Wan Kuei, if someone made a decision they could be considered hunted down or drawn to the whole Crusade (for some mysterious you don't know Dirty Secrets reason) just to wipe them out too. But I wouldn't like that, but would certainly throw some gunpowder in the kerosene tar splashed dumpster fire that is happening in the regions of the Crusade. We never saw much of Wan Kuei Sabbat interaction, but I imagine they funking hate it each others guts. But I imagine that won't be addressed either.

In the end, I think the Sabbat remnants won't be a city dominating sect. They will let the Camarilla and Anarchs roll in their former territories, and either move to the now less defended ones, or even wait out holed in until the new occupants feel comfortable, and eat them up. Sticking to the old boogeyman sect, that sometimes appear or act giving creepy sightings, marks, murders and some such.