[Contagion fan] Your Outbreaks

[wyrdhamster]

We have now few examples of various Contagions, now it times to prepare your own. Or modifying official ones.

As I have my Viking Era Werewolf game, with pack of Norse coming to Constantinople after Dragon Idigam that come from 'Greece' to their lands to discover how to kill it, I wanted them to uncover that it was Contagion that awoken and driven out Idigam from Byzantium.

Now, it's year 800 in chronicle, so it's 'just' after last of outbreaks from Plague of Justinian / Black Death. ( First was in 541, last sickens en masses was seen in 750 year. ) Also, Idigam did not awoken with two hundred previous years of plague, so why did it need suddenly now?

This are main solutions to using new Contagion in game:

1. Using canonical Plague of Justinian Contagion from Chapter 3 of Contagion Chronicle.

From my reading, it's about all death and (zombie) resurrection, over and over again, and weird spatial dimensional drifts. Not sounding as something to awoken Idigam - especially, as Plague is assumed too die out till year 800 then.

2. Doing my own new Contagion, as new threat the Sworn in place are not ready to face. Maybe something that Spirits ( or other Ephemera ) are spreading?

I was thinking about mixing it somehow with Iconoclasm movement in Empire - i.e. refusing the cult of icons and sacred statues - as it's very much touching Spirits and Essence generation - so logically it could awoken Idigam.

3. Modifying official materials - like maybe using Gyro of Kyoto.

I still did not read setting of Kyoto, but Gyro were announced as being related to Father Wolf, so it could work as awakening Idigam, probably. Yet, from spoilers till now, they do not seem much hard on Spirit side of problem.

What do you think? Do you have ideas for your own new strains of Contagion?

[2ptTakrill]

“The time would be easy to know, for then mankind would have become as the Great Old Ones; free and wild and beyond good and evil, with laws and morals thrown aside and all men shouting and killing and reveling in joy. Then the liberated Old Ones would teach them new ways to shout and kill and revel and enjoy themselves, and all the earth would flame with a holocaust of ecstasy and freedom.” —H.P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu

I didn't back the Contagion Chronicles so I don't really know how the whole thing works yet, but I did recently break down and buy 'Berlin The Wicked City' to use as a possible Contagion setting and the quote above (which is included in the book) is my idea for a Contagion. An accelerating decent into destructive madness centered in Europe that includes everything from the Armenian Massacre to WWI and will ultimately culminate in the total conflagration of WWII (only worse) if the heroes don't head it off.

[CTPhipps]

So I return to the idea of Iconoclasm and Werewolf, returning to my game. Watching werewolf media, I think that my players need clear Prey to hunt the Contagion – werewolves stories are about hunting, in the end – and hunting the Iconclasm Contagion itself would be to nebulous as enemy. I think about Prey that would reflecting the spread of the Iconclasm in Constantinopole – leading to at least stop of the large stop of spreading in city, or as the ‘disease sample’ to devise the Cure. Maybe some sick and mutated Spirit Lord as Prey? What do you think?

Don't crosspost. Let alone to three different threads.

Take a warning.

[wyrdhamster]

So I return to the idea of Iconoclasm and Werewolf, returning to my game. Watching werewolf media, I think that my players need clear Prey to hunt the Contagion – werewolves stories are about hunting, in the end – and hunting the Iconclasm Contagion itself would be to nebulous as enemy. I think about Prey that would reflecting the spread of the Iconclasm in Constantinopole – leading to at least stop of the large stop of spreading in city, or as the ‘disease sample’ to devise the Cure. Maybe some sick and mutated Spirit Lord as Prey? What do you think?

[wyrdhamster]

After playing few sessions with my Vikings Werewolf players, I remade in my Iconclasm Contagion the Infected (2) stage to better reflect crisis management with making the sculptures or paintings of the afflicted to sustain they lives.

Contagion Carrier (Persistent)

1. Contagion-Touched – Social penalty -1 to express oneself / Social penalty -1 as people subconsciously omit Touched in conversation.
2. Infected (1) – Loss of 1 Manifestation per day. When loss of last one – treated here as Twilight Form - next stage. / Loss of reflection in water, mirrors and similar.
3. Infected (2) – Loss of 1 extra Essence per day. Cannot use Numina and Influences as ephemeral entity lacks the bodily cohesion to interact with other beings in Twilight. ( From lack of Twilight Form. ) A ghost who suffers this fate drifts through Twilight unable to be seen or touched even by other Twilight ghosts, alone and helpless to affect the world in any way, even only the world of ghosts. Spirit is locked in Twilight and cannot move to Shadow Realm on it’s own. When loss of last one Essence point – next stage. If being has physical representation and at least 3 other material beings worship the representation – Essence lost is stopped for 24 hours. / Loss of shadow on any light source.
4. Infected (3) – Loss of 1 Corpus point per day. Uratha are checking entering Basu-Im each night because of Essence hunger. Begotten has 0 Satiety. When loss of last Corpus box – final stage. / People do not notice you unless you make physical contact ( transmitting Contagion then ).
5. Disappearance – Final outcome, you cease to exist.

I start to think what can be final cure - not the crisis management - that could solve this pandemics? Any ideas you have?

[Korogra]

I’ve read the players guide, I like Horrorspawn. Beast itself just happens to be my least favorite game line for myriad reasons. I do read it from time to time whenever the masochistic urge to do so hits me.

[wyrdhamster]

The Beast one was completely unknown to me,

If you commit to read Beast - remember to read also Beast Player's Guide, if corebook is not griping. BPG is explaining a much better concepts than core, and expands giving new Families and Hungers, for example.

[Korogra]

The Beast one was completely unknown to me, and I must of skimmed over that part in Dark Eras 2. I’ll have to look at that.

[wyrdhamster]

Korogra, it seems a very similar idea to Beasts as Fears of Sickness - and a bit like Refrain from 1001 Nightmares in Dark Eras 2. Maybe look on those for inspirations?

[Korogra]

While it may be in bad form, COVID-19 has given me some inspiration for a Strain Of The Contagion that uses the fear of a pandemic to reshape diseases into deadlier forms, while also subtly forcing a paradigm shift among humanity that discourages close contact with or compassion towards other humans out of a fear ( logical or irrational) of being infected by some sort of nebulous plague- to increasingly fearful and intolerant degrees- almost as if humanity invokes Disquiet in the presence of itself.

[wyrdhamster]

Updated my Contagion of Being infection stages, with clarifying what happens to Ephemeral Entities when contacted with epidemic...

Contagion Carrier (Persistent)

1. Contagion-Touched – Social penalty -1 to express oneself / Social penalty -1 as people subconsciously omit Touched in conversation.
2. Infected (1) – Loss of 1 Manifestation per day. When loss of last one – treated here as Twilight Form - next stage. / Loss of reflection in water, mirrors and similar.
3. Infected (2) – Loss of 1 extra Essence per day. Cannot use Numina and Influences as ephemeral entity lacks the bodily cohesion to interact with other beings in Twilight. ( From lack of Twilight Form. ) A ghost who suffers this fate drifts through Twilight unable to be seen or touched even by other Twilight ghosts, alone and helpless to affect the world in any way, even only the world of ghosts. Spirit is locked in Twilight and cannot move to Shadow Realm on it’s own. When loss of last one Essence point – next stage. / Loss of shadow on any light source.
4. Infected (3) – Loss of 1 Corpus point per day. Uratha are checking entering Basu-Im each night because of Essence hunger. Begotten has 0 Satiety. When loss of last Corpus box – final stage. / People do not notice you unless you make physical contact ( transmitting Contagion then ).
5. Disappearance – Final outcome, you cease to exist.

[wyrdhamster]

Symptoms
(...)
Stages of Contagion are describing firstly effects on Ephemeral Beings, then after ‘/’ for the humans and physical monsters. Beasts of Dark Mother, Bound Sin-Eaters and Uratha werewolves are in worst situation because of this Plague – they response they were are both Ephemeral and physical beings, at once. On Stage 2 they lose Essence/Plasm/Satiety and their shadow. And on Stage 3 they lose Corpus ( Health in reality ) and lose contact with outside world.

Contagion Carrier (Persistent)

1. Contagion-Touched – Social penalty -1 to express oneself / Social penalty -1 as people subconsciously omit Touched in conversation.
2. Infected (1) – Blocking of 1 Manifestation per day. When loss of last one – next stage. / Loss of reflection in water, mirrors and similar.
3. Infected (2) – Loss of 1 Essence per day. When loss of last one – next stage. / Loss of shadow on any light source.
4. Infected (3) – Loss of 1 Corpus point per day. Uratha are checking entering Basu-Im each night because of Essence hunger. Begotten has 0 Satiety. When loss of Corpus box – final stage. / People do not notice you unless you make physical contact ( transmitting Contagion then ).
5. Disappearance – Final outcome, you cease to exist.

Consequences of Contagion
Ephemeral Beings:

• Loss of Manifestations – Slow disappearance of Twilight Form, Reaching, Fetter and Posses or Claim makes ephemerals not possible to affect humans – so now healing, blessings and overwatching of spiritual entities of humanity. More deadly accidents, weaker tools, and first and foremost – no influence of ghosts and spirits on the mortals. People are becoming more and more agnostic in their worships.
• Loss of Essence ( and a like ) – Weaker spirits ( and other ephemerals ) are easier prey for their enemies. Predatory spirits are more violent, weakened by Contagion spirits and ghosts looks for the way to jump over to the Flesh World and collect Essence directly. Spiritual landscapes madness. Hungry Werewolves without Essence and Beasts Satiety going down implies rampaging Uratha and Horrors in physical bodies on Flesh World. Mortals become more dull and detached from their emotions.
• Ephemerals cease to exist – Like in Loss of Essence, but much more direct. Spirit World and Primordial Dream is turn upside-down with gaps in ecology. Underworld is much more ‘hungry’ as ghosts-slaves of it are disappearing. All the realms are starting to ‘steal’ mortals in place of their native ephemerals, to fill the roosters.

Okay, revisioning my Inconclasm Contagion idea. Reading more rules on Contagion, I see character simply goes from Infected (1) to Infected (2) and then Infected (3) simply by passing times of chapters without cure ( number of Stage +1 ). However, how character goes from Contagion-Touched to Infected (1) Condition? There is a way for stoping the Contagion ( avoid contact with source ), but there are not the rules for when character goes from Touched to Infected, finally.

Other idea I have - I thinking about adding extra rule for Infected (1) stage for werewolves - where Ephemerals are losing Manifestations, Uratha would get extra Kuruth Triggers. But this seems to imbalance them against other hard hit supernaturals by Contagion - Beasts and Bound/Sin-Eaters - as those groups would not have something this hard on this stage. Also, deciding extra Kuruth Triggers could be a problem on itself - Do infected Uratha get's new Kuruth Trigger set, with Passive, Common and Specific forms? Only one of them? If only one,which should character get? Maybe it's a too much a hurdle to get werewolves even worst than rest of afflicted monsters...

[wyrdhamster]

Drafting Iconclasm Outbreak with framework from Contagion Chronicles Storytelling Chapter. Now Ephemerals part…

Symptoms

Outbreak Core: It starts with your secondary traces of being. People start to miss you in conversation. You lose reflection, then your shadow. Then people omit you in life. And, finally, you simply cease to exist.

Contagion started with Ephemeral Beings ( spirits, ghosts, goetia, angels, etc. ), worshiped as sacred items and anchored to those images. Spirits and ghosts started to lose Manifestations, then their Essence – then their Corpus, being erased from reality. As the Contagion spread, even non-infected individuals lose they reflections – like the mirrors and water resists to show anyone living in them. ( Non-infected undead like vampires and sin-eaters are still shown. ) And finally whole glory of Empire is forgotten and lost.

Stages of Contagion are describing firstly effects on Ephemeral Beings, then after ‘/’ for the humans and physical monsters. Beasts of Dark Mother, Bound Sin-Eaters and Uratha werewolves are in worst situation because of this Plague – they response they were are both Ephemeral and physical beings, at once. On Stage 2 they lose Essence/Plasm/Satiety and their shadow. And on Stage 3 they lose Corpus ( Health in reality ) and lose contact with outside world.

Contagion Carrier (Persistent)

1. Contagion-Touched – Social penalty -1 to express oneself / Social penalty -1 as people subconsciously omit Touched in conversation.
2. Infected (1) – Blocking of 1 Manifestation per day. When loss of last one – next stage. / Loss of reflection in water, mirrors and similar.
3. Infected (2) – Loss of 1 extra Essence per day. Cannot use Numina and Influences as ephemeral entity lacks the bodily cohesion to interact with other beings in Twilight. ( From lack of Twilight Form. ) A ghost who suffers this fate drifts through Twilight unable to be seen or touched even by other Twilight ghosts, alone and helpless to affect the world in any way, even only the world of ghosts. Spirit is locked in Twilight and cannot move to Shadow Realm on it’s own. When loss of last one Essence point – next stage. If being has physical representation and at least 3 other material beings worship the representation – Essence lost is stopped for 24 hours. / Loss of shadow on any light source.
4. Infected (3) – Loss of 1 Corpus point per day. Uratha are checking entering Basu-Im each night because of Essence hunger. Begotten has 0 Satiety. When loss of Corpus box – final stage. / People do not notice you unless you make physical contact ( transmitting Contagion then ).
5. Disappearance – Final outcome, you cease to exist.

Consequences of Contagion
Ephemeral Beings:

• Loss of Manifestations – Slow disappearance of Twilight Form, Reaching, Fetter and Posses or Claim makes ephemerals not possible to affect humans – so no healing, blessings and overwatching of spiritual entities of humanity. More deadly accidents, weaker tools, and first and foremost – no influence of ghosts and spirits on the mortals. People are becoming more and more agnostic in their worships.
• Loss of Essence ( and a like ) – Weaker spirits ( and other ephemerals ) are easier prey for their enemies. Predatory spirits are more violent, weakened by Contagion spirits and ghosts looks for the way to jump over to the Flesh World and collect Essence directly. Spiritual landscapes madness. Hungry Werewolves without Essence and Beasts Satiety going down implies rampaging Uratha and Horrors in physical bodies on Flesh World. Mortals become more dull and detached from their emotions.
• Ephemerals cease to exist – Like in Loss of Essence, but much more direct. Spirit World and Primordial Dream is turn upside-down with gaps in ecology. Underworld is much more ‘hungry’ as ghosts-slaves of it are disappearing. All the realms are starting to ‘steal’ mortals in place of their native ephemerals, to fill the roosters.

EDIT: I revision Infected (3) rules to accommodate Uratha and Beasts in Contagion Carrier section, given the 'worship image' damage control option.

[FallenEco]

I've gathered a lot of homebrew and 'fixes' over the years, not for use in most games (those kind of thing tend to shine best in a vacuum imo) but they work really well as infected.

For example, the ST Vault recently got a new product called Kinslayers. Generally speaking, I would not run this in a normal Beast game, unless it was an all Hero game. But as a infection, a place where those who are Devoured become these 'Heroes' and the true Heroes are slowly changing into this new breed as the Contagion spreads...
Well, that works well.

Basically any hack or variant can become a potential new form of the Infected, if not outright intruders like the Arisen in Edinburgh.

Edit: I have also considered sporting over 1st edition variations of splats as another option.

[Mad_Maudlin]

I have an idea for a Contagion of Progress, for a city that's perversely enamored of its glorious history and utterly incapable of dealing with its present problems (*coughcoughStLouiscough*). The Contagious start dreaming of the good old days, to the point they live parallel lives at night, and then just don't wake up....so some enterprising angel has started ripping holes in the timeline and bringing random stuff forward to compensate. The Ship of Theseus would be scandalized.