The astral ideal of monsters and its relation to hunters

[FallenEco]

It was merely suggested, never confirmed. And the text only mentions Heracles by name. Achilles was just another 'hero' trained by the mythological Cheiron.
Mind you, nothing stops Slashers from being Heroes.

[LostLight]

Thanks. My personal theory is that Jack the Ripper was the first known Slasher (except for maybe the random mention of one in the Scandinavian witch hunter era in Dark Eras 2), but that could change once I read H:tV 2e.

Like, in the Slasher book I think that Nimrod from the bible was stated potentially being the "first Slasher", with him being "great hunter before God" means he hunted people. Sure, it is only a legend, but the book did lead to the concept that slashers are not a modern phenomena, but something very, very old. If you are interested in very old slashers, keep an eye open for the next few days, as my next STV title may be fitting for your interests (shameless promotion :P)

As for Kinship as such- as other people have stated, slashers are Kin, because they are monsters. The fact that they are also human does not contradict it. And for hunters, there is that nice little fiction there in the Beast's core book where some Beast enters into what sounds like one of Cheiron's facilities, and while she despise them as the Dark Mother whispering in her ear that they ARE family, just like any other monster.

Of course, it could refer to the Director Board- but I always wondered on the possibility of a certain hunter becoming into a Kin by stuffing enough monster parts into them. Plus, Cheiron's mythological role as the one to "train heroes" makes that connection between Beasts and that conspiracy feel very.. natural, let's say.

[Guest]

LostLight thank you 😊. Post or send me a link to your new STV title and I’ll defo check it out.

[Jacob]

Re: The original question in the first post. I would point out that the sidebar regarding Family Ties doesn't specifically disqualify anything that's Fundamentally Human from gaining the Family Ties Condition. It really only says "supernatural creature" and since human characters can have supernatural Merits and things like minor templates exist, I'd say that a great deal of wiggle room exists for troupes to decide one way or the other locally as their games need. IMO, the Fundamentally Human can have the Family Ties Condition. The only things that I'd say are explicitly ruled out are other Beasts (which is weird if you think about it) and anything for which "Kinship Does Not Apply," e.g., Demons, Angels, and the like.

[Primordial newcomer]

Re: The original question in the first post. I would point out that the sidebar regarding Family Ties doesn't specifically disqualify anything that's Fundamentally Human from gaining the Family Ties Condition. It really only says "supernatural creature" and since human characters can have supernatural Merits and things like minor templates exist, I'd say that a great deal of wiggle room exists for troupes to decide one way or the other locally as their games need. IMO, the Fundamentally Human can have the Family Ties Condition. The only things that I'd say are explicitly ruled out are other Beasts (which is weird if you think about it) and anything for which "Kinship Does Not Apply," e.g., Demons, Angels, and the like.

Minor templates have made me wonder too actually. Perhaps Proximi could be Kin too

And regarding Kinship with Beasts, I always thought that was weird too. I wonder if shared chambers from the players guide was to rectify that. At least, I think it would make sense if Beasts didnt have Kinship with fellow beasts because of how their Lairs interact and such. Either way, yeah it is kinda weird but that's the only justification I can think of

[ArcaneArts]

Beast the Primordial's sense of Kinship as dervied from the sympathetic connections it's built from depends on the differentiation from humanity in some metaphysical format-an person who is ideologically a monster isn't going to get connected. Unless Hitler's darkness flipped a switch to his humanity and was a Slasher the whole time, Hitler's not in the family.

The only things that bear something supernatural to themselves that are not subject to Kinship are anything related to the God-Machine of this direct universe (jury's out how some of the resultants of the some of the strains of Contagion play on it, but for now I'm lingering on Kinship being more fun in those scenarios than not) and a not-textual point made by David Brookshaw where-in technically the Abyss and it's entities shouldn't count either, which is neither here nor there.

(I think he has a point, but it's undermined by the text.)

So literally the answer to Is It Kin is "Is it a plain jane vanilla human? Is it caused by G-M? If no to both, then it's Kin."

[Primordial newcomer]

Beast the Primordial's sense of Kinship as dervied from the sympathetic connections it's built from depends on the differentiation from humanity in some metaphysical format-an person who is ideologically a monster isn't going to get connected. Unless Hitler's darkness flipped a switch to his humanity and was a Slasher the whole time, Hitler's not in the family.

The only things that bear something supernatural to themselves that are not subject to Kinship are anything related to the God-Machine of this direct universe (jury's out how some of the resultants of the some of the strains of Contagion play on it, but for now I'm lingering on Kinship being more fun in those scenarios than not) and a not-textual point made by David Brookshaw where-in technically the Abyss and it's entities shouldn't count either, which is neither here nor there.

(I think he has a point, but it's undermined by the text.)

So literally the answer to Is It Kin is "Is it a plain jane vanilla human? Is it caused by G-M? If no to both, then it's Kin."

Despite being a beast fan, I am actually pretty uneducated on the Astral as a whole. So just because a human could be SEEN as a monster by the mass unconcious, it wouldnt be a powerful enough metaphysical change without something more tangibly monstrous about the person?

Also, I do think it's kinda weird the Abyss would never be Kin. They do have an astral reflection in the old man and the hut after all. Then again, I would like more on Kinship regarding monsters that arent the playable ones.

[ArcaneArts]

Despite being a beast fan, I am actually pretty uneducated on the Astral as a whole. So just because a human could be SEEN as a monster by the mass unconcious, it wouldnt be a powerful enough metaphysical change without something more tangibly monstrous about the person?

Also, I do think it's kinda weird the Abyss would never be Kin. They do have an astral reflection in the old man and the hut after all. Then again, I would like more on Kinship regarding monsters that arent the playable ones.

There's lot of wibblyness, and one of the places where a lot of actual work actually does have to be done with Beast is it's perspective on the Astral, and how that might affect all other portrayals of the Astral going forward.

But in the same way that a singer can get on stage and inspire a lot of emotion spirits to be as near a walking wellspring as you can get and still not be a monster because there's no spiritual connectivity, a person who is a terrible human being to the degree still isn't going to connect until there's a supernatural vector*.

What's likely to happen, though, from the Primordial/Astral point of view is that if a strong enough conception of humanity is at work, it might bleed spaces enough that the Astral idea of this person can then Possess or Claim that person, and then you have, well, a monster.

*Now it must be noted that this deals with Beast as it is written now. I don't think Kinship as it exists is a good vector for discussing the relationship with humanity(not that it has to be, by itself), which is kind of important because being a Beast, a person with a World-Goetia-Incubated-Into-a-Humanity-Goetia, is not just a person but a symbol that applies to a certain amount of mass people-age. I've talked about this as the angle of Beast I want to see developed the most, since it has a lot of possibly really cool expressions(THe "Lore" trait from before ties into this) and helps to develop some of the individualist vs communalist and empathetic/trangressive/guidance themes of Beast, but putting it simply: I think there's room for a Human Kinship powerset that is seperate and distinct from Monstrous Kinship, that in particular keys off of Hunger and Family.

Beasts not as a person but as a people is the edge of crazy I really want to play with into a sharpened set of teeth.

[Primordial newcomer]

There's lot of wibblyness, and one of the places where a lot of actual work actually does have to be done with Beast is it's perspective on the Astral, and how that might affect all other portrayals of the Astral going forward.

But in the same way that a singer can get on stage and inspire a lot of emotion spirits to be as near a walking wellspring as you can get and still not be a monster because there's no spiritual connectivity, a person who is a terrible human being to the degree still isn't going to connect until there's a supernatural vector*.

What's likely to happen, though, from the Primordial/Astral point of view is that if a strong enough conception of humanity is at work, it might bleed spaces enough that the Astral idea of this person can then Possess or Claim that person, and then you have, well, a monster.

*Now it must be noted that this deals with Beast as it is written now. I don't think Kinship as it exists is a good vector for discussing the relationship with humanity(not that it has to be, by itself), which is kind of important because being a Beast, a person with a World-Goetia-Incubated-Into-a-Humanity-Goetia, is not just a person but a symbol that applies to a certain amount of mass people-age. I've talked about this as the angle of Beast I want to see developed the most, since it has a lot of possibly really cool expressions(THe "Lore" trait from before ties into this) and helps to develop some of the individualist vs communalist and empathetic/trangressive/guidance themes of Beast, but putting it simply: I think there's room for a Human Kinship powerset that is seperate and distinct from Monstrous Kinship, that in particular keys off of Hunger and Family.

Beasts not as a person but as a people is the edge of crazy I really want to play with into a sharpened set of teeth.

Gotta say I agree with all this. I do think I know all I need to know about Beast as individuals (dont get me wrong, more is good, but they have a good amount) and I would love to see their relationship with the Astral more beyond the creation of Lairs. And their very unique relationship with humanity too. While flawed, many Beasts ARE trying to be at least a little benevolent in their Feedings eith Lessons, and humanity DOES tend to pick up on stuff whether the Beast meant for it or not (I've said this before, but my favorite view from without is the mummy one about beasts just desperately looking for a purpose in life. To see another view from without that contradicts this one would be cool). Admittedly the only thing I want to see further explored with Beasts as individuals is their relationship with Horrors, specifically Legendary Horrors and the fact that some can actually talk. I wonder what beasts who believe they and their horrors are one and the same think when they have a disagreement

I'll admit, I believe this thread is done, but I do have one question for you Arcane. If given the chance to expand upon Beast the Primordial (I sure fucking hope you do), how do you plan to approach the theme of "no neat little boxes"? To me that theme is almost as important as Family in Beast, being the Lynchpin to the relationship of beasts and heroes and the overall feeling of just BEING a beast. Basically my overall question is how you would maintain that thematic since it also applies to the more concrete supernatural parts of beasts beyond just that of morality

[Satchel]

Also, I do think it's kinda weird the Abyss would never be Kin. They do have an astral reflection in the old man and the hut after all.

The Old Man is an Aeon. The other things to which that label is applied include, at their base, the beings who preside over categories describing almost everything in existence.

Those beings also personal relationships have been compared to squabbling siblings, and, at last count, include multiple beings whose whose presented names have been shared by the Dark Mother, who is herself occasionally theorized to be an Aeon.

The Dark Mother herself is the subject of some notional high-level branch-family drama by the fact that some of the Insatiable claim a usurpation was done to their Progenitor; here note the fact that one thing occasionally encountered in the Astral is beings claiming to be former Aeons, and that sufficiently dramatic changes in the psychic landscape of reality tend to alter the forms the Aeons prefer to take.

On the other end of things, the admonition of the Nemean in The Unmurdered Man bears remembering re: the Abyss and Abyssal beings: do not confuse the baby with its caul. The Abyss is an inconstant "place" where mundane natural laws shift at whim and everything-and-its-opposite may be found, filled with every awful human passion and alien urge that exists in the bridge between the sacred and the mundane; Abyssal beings are consistent entities who exist despite their impossibility and do so by being in the Abyss, a place reached through profane and horrific means and imposing some fundamental wrongness on its denizens (which includes several products of divine mishap) as a mark of their errors.

Much like the God-Machine and its angels (albeit in a different fashion), the Abyss is apart. Its denizens' agenda is the unmaking of the reality they exist on the Outside of, and the corruption of existing life and matter to their ends does not dissolve the barrier put between them and would-be Kin by an entity of such incomprehensible scale that it may as well not exist. No Ravager can quite approach the Ruin of cosmic-scale nihilism; no Gorgon can truly appreciate the soul-deep disgust that sustains a Paradoxical reality.

The Dark Mother's line splits on the family world-tree relatively far up the chain, but there are things her lineage doesn't truck with, and it's not even terribly difficult to pick out the throughline: she's a creature of human fears — animal fears, more broadly, primordial fears if you want to be as all-encompassing as possible, but the important thing about the Dark Mother is that she is not a cosmic horror monster. She might, as much as Luna or any Aeon you care to name, have an eye on the big picture, but the thing that she is is not in the business of making reality Not Matter.

Her Children may truck with the particulars of learning and teaching lessons, which may or may not occasionally include some variant of "[thing] is pointless" or "[facet] is unpredictable," but Mama Nightmare's place in the fiction has generally been to put forward some variant of You Have To Pay Attention. You Have To Care. You Have To Be Present. Either side of the conversation she's facilitating can do what they like with what they get out of that interaction, but experiences are being had and internalized from it, and as a creature of a certain stripe of Mystery she seems only too pleased to see people… y'know, Living With Fear.

At least, that's my 2AM take on it.

[Primordial newcomer]

The Old Man is an Aeon. The other things to which that label is applied include, at their base, the beings who preside over categories describing almost everything in existence.

Those beings also personal relationships have been compared to squabbling siblings, and, at last count, include multiple beings whose whose presented names have been shared by the Dark Mother, who is herself occasionally theorized to be an Aeon.

The Dark Mother herself is the subject of some notional high-level branch-family drama by the fact that some of the Insatiable claim a usurpation was done to their Progenitor; here note the fact that one thing occasionally encountered in the Astral is beings claiming to be former Aeons, and that sufficiently dramatic changes in the psychic landscape of reality tend to alter the forms the Aeons prefer to take.

On the other end of things, the admonition of the Nemean in The Unmurdered Man bears remembering re: the Abyss and Abyssal beings: do not confuse the baby with its caul. The Abyss is an inconstant "place" where mundane natural laws shift at whim and everything-and-its-opposite may be found, filled with every awful human passion and alien urge that exists in the bridge between the sacred and the mundane; Abyssal beings are consistent entities who exist despite their impossibility and do so by being in the Abyss, a place reached through profane and horrific means and imposing some fundamental wrongness on its denizens (which includes several products of divine mishap) as a mark of their errors.

Much like the God-Machine and its angels (albeit in a different fashion), the Abyss is apart. Its denizens' agenda is the unmaking of the reality they exist on the Outside of, and the corruption of existing life and matter to their ends does not dissolve the barrier put between them and would-be Kin by an entity of such incomprehensible scale that it may as well not exist. No Ravager can quite approach the Ruin of cosmic-scale nihilism; no Gorgon can truly appreciate the soul-deep disgust that sustains a Paradoxical reality.

The Dark Mother's line splits on the family world-tree relatively far up the chain, but there are things her lineage doesn't truck with, and it's not even terribly difficult to pick out the throughline: she's a creature of human fears — animal fears, more broadly, primordial fears if you want to be as all-encompassing as possible, but the important thing about the Dark Mother is that she is not a cosmic horror monster. She might, as much as Luna or any Aeon you care to name, have an eye on the big picture, but the thing that she is is not in the business of making reality Not Matter.

Her Children may truck with the particulars of learning and teaching lessons, which may or may not occasionally include some variant of "[thing] is pointless" or "[facet] is unpredictable," but Mama Nightmare's place in the fiction has generally been to put forward some variant of You Have To Pay Attention. You Have To Care. You Have To Be Present. Either side of the conversation she's facilitating can do what they like with what they get out of that interaction, but experiences are being had and internalized from it, and as a creature of a certain stripe of Mystery she seems only too pleased to see people… y'know, Living With Fear.

At least, that's my 2AM take on it.

Well your take on it was a very good read. I had no idea Aeons may possibly change and usurped by new ones, and until now have not though the Abyss and its lack of connection to the Dark Mother as similar to the God Machine and the Dark Mother.

I think you make a good point that even when it comes to fear, the Abyss brings about such a cosmic, eldritch fear that it just cant be like that of the human fears the Dark Mother lives to bring about. So, in short, thank you for the explanation. I really appreciate it

[FallenEco]

Look, anything that can qualify as a sleepwalker in M:tAw terms is Kin and it can include other things too.
My earlier comment that hunters that are perceived as monsters by other hunters might count has more to do with the themes and mechanics of Vigil than a strict reading of Beast.
Heck, I've had some games where stigmatics and VASCU hunters don't count because of the God-Machine. Teleinformics isn't even officially connected to the G-M! YMMV applies a lot with crossovers. I am okay with that, especially in Beast. Family is a personal matter after all.

Furthermore, Building the Legend and the Beast Player's Guide do go into more detail on the Astral. I would like more, but there is enough there to subtly mind control an area or group by messing around with it's astral reflection/realm, dig up information, fight the literal embodiment of oppression and many more adventures. It is all there already.

[Tessie]

Another point about the Abyss and the Old Man is that they're reflected in the wrong part of the Astral. If monsters are Kin because they're reflected in the nightmares of Humanity, then anything not reflected in the Bright/Primordial Dreams (aka the Temenos) wouldn't register as Kin because only those parts of the Astral represents Humanity.

[LostLight]

I think that the main reason that hunters were stated to not be Kin is because they are generally being Endowed with their abilities (hence the name). If something supernatural about you can be taken away, it is not truly yours, and you are still foundmentially human. On the other hand, if your Endowment can not be "taken back", it does belong to you and is a part of you, hence you arwe a monster. Note that from Hunter's point of view, in 2e, we have what could be called a "reverse Kinship", where we have a definition for what does not counts as a "monster" (that is, Endowments and Supernatural merits, which are a part of being a human). Agai, cases such as the Lucifuge makes things murkier, which is exactly what they should be doing, so that's no problem.

On the other hand, we should remember that Inoue Akio is the Apex of Tokyo- and I am preety sure that in order to be an Apex, you need to be a monster, while IIRC Inoue is basically a human (maybe a ghoul, I remember it was mentioned, but I can't find a reference for it in V:tR2e), even though that again, with the Hototogisu's ability to steal things from monsters, I won't be surprised if he somehow "stole" his position, maybe as a part of the "dream quest" mentioned in Beast.

EDIT- also, in 2e, some of the Endowment processes seems to be "less reversible", making those huntes more likely to be counted as Kin- excluding the option of those Endowments being some form of Supernatural Merits, which again should not turn someone into a Kin as they are foundmentially a part of the mortal existence.

[Tessie]

Supernatural Merits absolutely makes you Kin. Psychics and mediums (both represented as Supernatural Merits) are Kin on the same level as mages, slashers and ghosts.
If I had just read the description of Kinship and not the HtV crossover text I would've naturally assumed that Thaumatechnology and other imbued supernatural Endowments (aka no magic items anyone could learn to activate) would be enough to make a hunter Kin, because they're now "fundamentally human but still wield supernatural power".
I find the two texts somewhat conflicting. I assume that either most Endowments doesn't count because they change the hunter; they just add something on top; or that hunters are subject to a stricter definition to preserve themes or something. Considering the "he who hunts monsters" trope the former is probably intentended.