Beast's Appreciation Thread

[Dusksage]

You know, I was actually giving some thought to writing one about the game after postin last on here. Would that be something people would be interested in?

[ajf115]

You know, I was actually giving some thought to writing one about the game after postin last on here. Would that be something people would be interested in?

I would be, for one. I've been meaning to start a Beast chronicle for a while now, but I'm not really sure where to start.

[Second Chances]

You know, I was actually giving some thought to writing one about the game after postin last on here. Would that be something people would be interested in?

Actual Play posts are always a welcome thing. Especially for the lines that not everyone has run a game in yet.

[Cinder]

I'd sure appreciate it. Actual Plays are indeed always good

Edit: While we're at it, I made a complete Brood around that History teacher, essentially my Ready-Made characters. Somebody would like to see them?

[Dusksage]

Well, in that case I'll definitely make one. Thank you all for the support.

The Chronicle in question was a subversion of the classic camp horror story, and it went down as probably my finest hour as a ST. I'll get to work on the Actual Play tonight.

[SunlessNick]

Cinder: As the one who wrote around here about that 'History teacher who is really a serpent of ruin in a desert of broken civilizations', I'm glad that idea had an effect on you. It's my best Beast character, means a lot you appreciated him.

I'd like to hear more about him.

[b]Yossarian:[b] I think Lair is the coolest power stat in any CofD (or WoD) game ever. And I like that you play the *villain*, and the conflict of what your character does with that.

I love Lairs, and that they're part of the character's spiritual makeup - having a world in your heart is at least as evocative as the monster itself. (I've occasionally thought about making a minor splat that's a human with a Chamber as a soul rather than a Horror). I love for that for all its outre protagonists and families of monsters, the game lends itself just as well to a life within the mortal sphere - that most of the behaviours that feed the Hunger are ordinary human actions makes it a vehicle for exploring how threads of hunger, evil, and abuse can lace into everyday life. And yet I love the outre at the same time, and the whole feel of the Primordial Dream. I love the heartbreaking nature of Heroes - that they should be something glorious, but time, noise, nature, and story have conspired to make twisted what should be admirable. (Though if I put Melanie in a scenario, I confess it would be with the opportunity to get her out of her predicament). And same as Cinder said, it resonates with my mental health issues.

[21C Hermit]

Surely I must not be the only one to love Beast in both of its incarnations, both pre-revision and revised?

Oh, and...

I've occasionally thought about making a minor splat that's a human with a Chamber as a soul rather than a Horror

Pray, tell us more

[ArchonAres]

I've been running a particularly crossover heavy Beast for a few months now PbP. The things all my players love seem to be (in no particular order): Building a Horror, Building your Lair, and the Crossover shenanigans.

I particularly enjoy the Crossover shenanigans myself.

[Cinder]

I'd like to hear more about him..

Well, if that's the case, for starters there's this thread, which is basically a story where he's an important character. I use their Brood and the setting I created around them both as testing ground for ideas and as a setting for CoD fiction. That story is the first one, more are planned. Then again, I should probably write them as Ready-Made Characters and share them. More practical and fair, gonna do that too.

[nalak42]

As far as Beast goes honestly this really struck me as the first World of Darkness game (It wasn't Chronicles yet) that one interested me and two actually had a chance of getting some of my friends to play without completely failing to play the spirit of the game.

First was just the potential of being so many things. I mean yeah there's basically all of mythology to draw on, but at the same time it doesn't have to be old it could be new or abstract or really have no deeper metaphysical logic than spiders are creepy. You could legitimately create that has no idea what their Horror actually looks like because there's nothing in the lair that would enable to Beast to see what it's Horror looks like.

The second is just the options in play. As I explained to one player you could actually play a character who's big goal is to make someone paranoid via harmless pranks. Yes there's nothing stopping an eshmaki predator from sneaking into someone's house and tattooing the person in their sleep with a warning about when the hunt will begin, but there's something glorious about the option existing to feed by bypassing a security system and shaving the person's head while they sleep before putting bullion cubes in the shower head.

[Second Chances]

I'd just like to put it out there that I appreciate all of the art we've seen from Conquering Heroes already. Dark Mother be damned, that book is going to horrifyingly beautiful.

[Daigotsu Max]

I love Beast. It's the Chronicles of Darkness game which finally dethroned Promethean as my favorite. It's such an elegant solution to allow a mish-mash of monsters in a contemporary setting. I've been running it with a mostly new group and we've had a ball with it. I love the design of the power systems and the sliding scale of hungers, and the ability to draw on Lairs to reshape the environment. I loved the absence of a morality trait - don't get me wrong, I love seeing one in other games, but it makes Beast monsters who are unusually at peace with their inner nature, and gives players a lot of leeway in their interpretations.

I love Beast and will purchase every single book that comes out for it without waiting. That player guide will make my day when it comes out.

[HelmsDerp]

Beast is hands down my favorite CoD game. In a line devoted to personal horror, this is the book that hit me like a punch in the gut because it was so relevant to my struggles and fears. The Horror and the Hunger are incredibly apt metaphors for intrusive thoughts and sadistic impulses, and Beast became a major tool for examining them from the moment I started reading the first draft. I made characters that represented what I was afraid of becoming, monsters who wallowed in their monstrosity. I made characters who fought tooth and nail to be something more, something better. And later I made characters who found community with other supernats and ways to feed their hunger without destroying lives. Beast did for me exactly what these games are supposed to do; it provided a safe outlet to grapple with some tremendously difficult personal issues.

[ArcaneArts]

I like it as a game of empathy.

No, I'm serious. Being a Beast is an invite to empathy. Disregard the few ways you become more powerful by pursuing the hauntings of monsters-Beast's focus on family means that they are likely to find their fellows and just try and help them for no other reason than it feels right, and as they do pursue power through their Kinship, it requires understanding them not only as monsters or archetypes, but also as people. Beasts strip organizations and politics away and reminds everyone that they are basically the same, that they are more alike than not, and as a rule tend toward rough-bringing-people-together sort of answers. I've talked before about how I feel like everyone needs at least two friends, one who knows exactly what you're going through and one who doesn't but is willing to commiserate all the same, and Beasts inherently are that second one for monsters.

It's not like empathy stops there. Lots of people rag on the "Teaching Through Fear" thing, and while it is inherently monstrous, in this case it is done by monsters who are going to be monstrous one way or another, so the idea that this collection of monsters has decided to take their imperatives and turn it to good is pretty damn cool to me. What's more is that I've always perceived this aspects of Beasts as being a both parties win sort of thing when done right, because while the Beast might get to feed on the moment of shock, they can also use this as a centerpiece to than show how a person is stronger, smarter, faster, wiser, and kinder than they might know. Beasts are adversity, and when they carefully apply themselves to people as they feed, they can help people realize their better aspects, to build them up in the ways that matter versus the ways that don't.

On a negative-but-fun side, Beast's aren't all sunshine and roses, and they actually aren't inclined to make people better. I do like that they are essentially bad people who may or may not be trying to do good things. Empathetic as they might be, Beasts by dint of their disposition mean they are the sort of people who make being monstrous cool and acceptable. These are people who can bind themselves to Strix as well as Kindred, to True Fae as well as changelings, and while not every Beast would, this blanket default of acceptance despite the depth is grimly fascinating and even kind of funny, and it speaks to a deeply skewed perspective.

This push and pull between brutally monstrous and wonderfully kind, the desire to eat someone mixed with the desire to help someone, in this right sort of context* is pretty damn cool and makes for a lot of interesting characters that promise a lot of personality, and stories with a-typical approaches. It's just really fun, and more importantly, it's resonant. I've said it before and I'll say it again-while I would never willingingly be a supernatural, if I had to be one, I'd be a Beast. It's a life I can get behind, even in light of the "warts".

*I bring up context, because I do not like the Lancea Et Sanctum despite them being very similar in tone, and a lot of that has to do with the massive differences in framing devices around them versus Beasts.

[SunlessNick]

Pray, tell us more

Thankyou, but there isn't much more. "Occasionally thought about" was meant literally. I'd probably make them a kind of dream shaman, able to lucidly dream into their Chamber and from there into the dreams of others (theoretically into the Primordial Dream as well, but that would be far more dangerous than most are willing to attempt; and theoretically into the Bright Dream as well, but most of them wouldn't know it exists in the first place). Anything trying to possess them would end up lost in the Chamber.