Demon Storyteller's Guide

[Xenesis]

The Blog Post is up! - it's a few comments plus the "How to use this book" section.

I think this all sounds pretty exciting.

Chapter 1, I think is going to be really, really important and seems to have a focus on the long game/end game while being stuff you can use right now.

[Satchel]

children of a killer god tho

[Pants O Doom]

Oh thank goodness, a more in depth explanation of Ciphers. That has always been my hang-up about storytelling Demon.

[atamajakki]

Biblical shard and crossover remain the most important bits. Cannot fucking wait.

[BigDamnHero]

Biblical shard and crossover remain the most important bits. Cannot fucking wait.

Eh, I'm more interested in the cyberpunk setting meself. But holy shit, crossover. Very excited about that.

children of a killer god tho

I know, right? Just the sound of Parameters is awesome. I can't even begin to guess what's up with them, but they're related to Exiles. I love Exiles.

[MrParaduo]

Do you guys know if they'll tackle making demons more... demonic? Right now they honestly feel kinda like they're just magical robots from the future. With accents of demonhood. I mean, I'm all for (bio)machinery that's possessed by the Inferno, but again, I'm still feeling jarred, especially since the terminology sort of demystifies the subject material. It's just off putting to me, that's all. :/

[BigDamnHero]

Do you guys know if they'll tackle making demons more... demonic? Right now they honestly feel kinda like they're just magical robots from the future. With accents of demonhood. I mean, I'm all for (bio)machinery that's possessed by the Inferno, but again, I'm still feeling jarred, especially since the terminology sort of demystifies the subject material. It's just off putting to me, that's all. :/

I think they're about as demonic as can be aside from the trappings, but you may want to check out the Demon Translation Guide if you want things to not have the matrix aesthetic going on.

Alternatively, you could just make a Demon Form that looks like a human with red or purple skin and bat wings and horns. And who has a cult of satanists, whom (s)he wows with her divine power.

Ultimately, you'll find that a lot of us here really resent people dismissing the Unchained as "magical robots". I won't pretend like your complaint should be dismissed, but note that a lot of us are really tired of hearing what we consider a baseless criticism of the game.

[MrParaduo]

I think they're about as demonic as can be aside from the trappings, but you may want to check out the Demon Translation Guide if you want things to not have the matrix aesthetic going on.

Alternatively, you could just make a Demon Form that looks like a human with red or purple skin and bat wings and horns. And who has a cult of satanists, whom (s)he wows with her divine power.

Ultimately, you'll find that a lot of us here really resent people dismissing the Unchained as "magical robots". I won't pretend like your complaint should be dismissed, but note that a lot of us are really tired of hearing what we consider a baseless criticism of the game.

I get that. I do, but listen: when you think of a splat dedicated to demons, you want a splat that delves into the quandaries of what it means to BE a demon. I don't care what they look like. I don't care if they're tied to a religion or not. Why couldn't it be like Changeling where there's a sense of many truths and deviations? This doesn't feel spiritual or even interconnected with some cosmic mystery, it just feels like someone wanted to play cyberpunk at the office, then shoe horned magic in at the last minute.

I don't mean to sound like a hard ass. It's just, the subject of demonology has always fascinated me. I've written a book (and currently writing another) where the main characters are in fact demons, and how questions related to whether or not they have souls, partial souls, and what that means in relation to morality and free will, are all based on the fact that demons are not constructs of deities, nor servants of some dark overlord--but emanations of the human psyche made manifest by people's hopes, fears, and struggle to maintain sanity in the face of adversity.

And yeah, I got the translation guide. I still have to spend hours and hours converting terminology to sound appropriate to the topic. Problem is: that won't help people already familiar with the old terms, since they'll be confused by it, and need a reference sheet just to play. How fun is that, I ask you?

Please don't take this personally. This is just a subject really near and dear to my heart, and I just can't help but feel defeated by all this.

[Satchel]

I don't care what they look like. I don't care if they're tied to a religion or not.

Your own repeated banging on about the aesthetics and terminology is at odds with this claim.

Why couldn't it be like Changeling where there's a sense of many truths and deviations?

You're going to have to explain this one, because Demon has so far managed to provide a decent wealth of examples and general descriptions of how the laws of its given slice of the World of Darkness metaphysics are obscure and riddled with hidden exceptions and presided over by beings that aren't intent on sharing whether they do and don't do things as a matter of intent or circumstance.

My focused reread of Changeling is only partway done, but that line's managed several similar statements even just in the initial run of books. Promethean has an entire book dedicated to the "strange aberrations exist all over the place and no one can say for sure why they happen," Mage has the concept as a perennial background element, and Beast approaches that same jib from a slightly different angle. Half the content of Night Horrors is based around the idea of spooky weird shit.

To repeat the eternal refrain of the argument this is founded on, clarify your terms.

This doesn't feel spiritual or even interconnected with some cosmic mystery, it just feels like someone wanted to play cyberpunk at the office, then shoe horned magic in at the last minute.

I don't mean to sound like a hard ass.

Then don't. The mouse and keyboard and forum interface do not move on their own and you have the capacity to edit for tone.

[BigDamnHero]

I guess I just don't see how Descent doesn't provide those things. Questions about stuff like Cover, how each demon pursues hell and the Cipher's place in that, and the nature of the soul.

Not to mention there are thousands of words about what it means to be a demon, and a fallen angel to boot. And how that messes you up, suddenly being cut off from that safety, that certainty.

They don't put on airs with each other, sure, but that stuff's for the cultists anyway.

Could you PM me the specifics of demonology that you're referring to that Descent doesn't address? This discussion had played out on these threads enough I think.

[Xenesis]

I don't mean to sound like a hard ass. It's just, the subject of demonology has always fascinated me. I've written a book (and currently writing another) where the main characters are in fact demons, and how questions related to whether or not they have souls, partial souls, and what that means in relation to morality and free will, are all based on the fact that demons are not constructs of deities, nor servants of some dark overlord--but emanations of the human psyche made manifest by people's hopes, fears, and struggle to maintain sanity in the face of adversity.

I don't think you're going to find that very particular flavour of demonology in this game, to be honest. It's certainly not what "Demon the Descent" promises in its elevator pitch (to steal MachineIV's lexicon). Descent has a pretty solid identity built around espionage, rebellion and revolution. It also has very strong ideas about having a discussion about freedom, control and personal identity.

Why couldn't it be like Changeling where there's a sense of many truths and deviations?

Reading the core even an individual agenda can't even agree on any fundamental truth regarding what it means to be one of the Unchained, what the God Machine is, whether falling is even something that was designed to happen, whether exiles and demons are really the same thing, or whether they genuinely fell/have free will in the first place.

(Besides, I will echo: the Translation guide is fantastic and it's really not that much work to use. Honest.)

[MrParaduo]

Satchel, listen to me. I already stated that these "demons" are basically arcane automatons sent my a sentient machine from a different moment in time to accomplish esoteric missions--deactivated during downtime--unless they malfunction and become independent. Sure, it's symbolic and means stuff, but a demon it is not. You could do the exact same thing with Promethean Unfleshed.

And sure, the game's solidly built mechanic-wise. But again, that doesn't matter when it's all about hammy super-science. We already had material to work off of from Inferno and even Mage the Awakening. We could've had different X-splats based on origins, eg. daemons from the Astral, Immundi from the Shadow, Larvals from the Underworld and so forth. Instead we scrapped that for a chance at playing the Matrix meets Bladerunner.

Don't mince words with me here. These aren't demons. They're closer to golems than they are the entities from the Lower Mysteries of Abaddon.

And even if you still wanted them in the game, maybe as possessed bits of technology, you could have had them be a wedge inside the splat. Instead, it turns into the centerpiece, making it as cold and sterile as the metal cogs they came from.

[Satchel]

I already stated that these "demons" are basically arcane automatons sent my a sentient machine from a different moment in time to accomplish esoteric missions--deactivated during downtime--unless they malfunction and become independent.

Absent the specific aspect of being agents of a "sentient machine," that's essentially the typical theological view of angels you're describing.

Sure, it's symbolic and means stuff, but a demon it is not.

Your terms: define them.

You could do the exact same thing with Promethean Unfleshed.

If one were to completely discard the meaning of those terms and ignore all the associated mechanics and metaphysics behind the Created and overlook the way the various strange and terrifying angels of the Divine Fire completely fail to fit into this notion that a newborn protohuman with a leaky protosoul made of the fundamental force of change is a suitable substitute for an immortal executor of divine will who has accumulated enough memory and personality to become a metaphysically separate existence just because both might be made of metal, yes.

We already had material to work off of from Inferno and even Mage the Awakening. We could've had different X-splats based on origins, eg. daemons from the Astral, Immundi from the Shadow, Larvals from the Underworld and so forth.

Inferno already had a full book and the way that subline's divisions work are based in the ephemeral beings rules and easily rendered moot through basic "character" progression, to say nothing of how this fails to address the recurring problem of "what do they do that is worth building a game around?"

These aren't demons. They're closer to golems than they are the entities from the Lower Mysteries of Abaddon.

They would have to be, seeing as "the Lower Mysteries of Abaddon" are not a thing so much as you stringing together a geographical umbrella-term for part of the Underworld with a more esoteric name for the Inferno.

And even if you still wanted these possessed bits of technology, you could have had them be a wedge inside the splat. Instead, it turns into the centerpiece, turning it cold and gray as the metal cogs they came from.

Pardon me if I find this viewpoint to be diminutive and blatantly biased.

[MrParaduo]

Abaddon isn't an umbrella term, Satch, it's described in Imperial Mysteries as a plane beneath the Underworld. But judging by your use of words, you don't think highly of my argument, regardless. And I HAVE explained what a demon is: they're emanations of the human psyche made manifest by people's hopes, fears, and struggle to maintain sanity in the face of adversity.

[YeOfLittleFaith]

So Inferno Whisperers? ._.

There's sort of an entire book already written about the sort of Demons you seem to want, but by no means does that invalidate the Unchained as a different sort of demon in concept. I personally find them some of the most interesting demons ever written.