[2E Fan] Choir of Hashmallim

[wyrdhamster]

Note: Original 1E version comes from Summoners book.

This is Legacy update done by one of my players - I helped him with redaction and sticking to 2E rules but all the heavy lifting is on to him. So then, we enter Legacy update...

Choir of Hashmallim

Origins

Parentage: Obrimos or Adamantine Arrow
Appearance & Background: In Summoners, page 188 and 189.

Doctrine

Prerequisites: Prime 2, Occult 2
Initiation: Having to deal with an Intruder manifested because of own or another's Paradox and win the fight or at least contain the danger for a week.
Organization: In Summoners, page 189.
Nickname: Dominions
Theory: The Void is an invasive, corrupting force of otherworldly chaos which constantly seeks its way into the Fallen World, and sometimes it has help from those foolish enough or mad enough to want its presence. The Dominions' sacred mission is to prevent the corruption by battling the Intruders and their twisted cults by the holy power of Aether as they see it.

Magic

Ruling Arcanum: Prime
Yantras: Casting in a holy place (+1, +2 when actually protecting it from Abyssal danger), Drawing and focusing on an enochian rune by gesture (+1, takes one turn of concentration), Being purified by a religious rite of penance (+1)
Oblations: In Summoners, page 189 and 190.


Attainments

First: See the Void, hear the Void
Prerequisites: Initiation
The Dominion can see the Void and its denizens for what they really are, piercing through their veils more easily than other Willworkers. This acts as an automatic Pierce Deception spell when the Dominion has an active Mage Sight and the Abyssal untruths are present, giving the user Potency equal to his Prime dots.
Optional: Forces 1
By spending 1 point of Mana the Dominion can use his will to try and Tune-In to Abyssal distortion, being able to detect the approximate direction of the Abyssal presence.

Second: Aetherial Cleansing
Prerequisites: Prime 2, Occult 3
Whenever within sensory range of the use of any Numen or Influence by an Abyssal Being, the Dominion may attempt to protect the Fallen World from the unholy taint of the Void by countering the power as a reflexive action, requiring a Gnosis + Prime roll (this acts as an anti-Abyss version of Universal Counterspell attainment).
By spending 1 point of Mana, this power can be used to try and Dispel the Abyssal-created effect after it has been cast. Obviously, this cannot reverse the effects imposed by the Paradox.
Optional: Forces 2
The Dominion can use his connection with Aether to literally walk through fire and not get burned – gaining Environmental Shield spell effect with its Duration equal to Mage's Forces dots.

Third: Aetherial Avatar
Prerequisites: Forces 3, Prime 3, Occult 3 with Specialization in Abyss
Calling down the very fire of magic from the Aether, the Dominion gives it shape within his soul and channels it, outward, into the Fallen World, in the form of an avenging angel. This Aetherial avatar is formed of Supernal Mana and adorned with fire; beautiful and terrifying, all at once. This acts like an instant version of Summon Supernal Being. The mage spends a point of Mana and summons the avatar, which remains within the Fallen World for a number of turns equal to his Prime dots.
The avatar's Rank is equal to Dominion's value of Prime dots / 2 (round up) + 1, giving Rank 3 or 4 depending on the Mage's experience.
The avatar is affected by spells just like a being normally summoned from the Aether. While the entity acts in the mage's best interests — according to the unyielding standards of the Golden Key — to oppose the Void, it is not under his direct control, unless he uses other magic to compel its obedience. Others attempting to control the avatar with magic suffer a dice-pool penalty equal to the Dominion's Prime dots.
By spending a point of the Dominion's Mana as an instant action (irrespective of the per turn Mana spends allowed by the mage's Gnosis), the Aetherial avatar may create effects identical to the spells Celestial Fire or Controlled Dispellation, rolling Power + Finesse. If the Dominion is an Adept of Prime, the damage dealt by the avatar's fire may be lethal.
While the Aetherial avatar is present, Willworker may instead shunt any damage dealt to him by an Acamoth, Gulmoth or other Abyssal spirit to the avatar.
The Dominion's Aetherial avatar may only be called down once per scene.

Fourth: Aetherial Exaltation
Prerequisites: Forces 4, Prime 4, Occult 4
The Dominion can further empower her Aetherial avatar. Enhanced by still greater boons of the Watchtower of the Golden Key, the entity becomes a genuine terror to the creatures of the Void. After summoning her Aetherial avatar, the Dominion spends another point of Mana as an instant action. The Mage may add the number of the following effects to her avatar (these abilities may only be selected once for a given summoning, unless otherwise noted) equal to her Prime dots:
- One of the avatar's Attributes may now be increased by the Mage's Prime dots. This effect may be selected three times, once for each of the avatar's Attributes.
- The avatar gains bonus points of Health equal to two times the Dominion's dots in Prime.
- The avatar may remain within the Fallen World for a number of additional turns equal to the lesser of the Dominion's dots in Forces or Prime.
- When attacked by an Abyssal spirit, the avatar is considered to have an armor rating equal to the lesser of the Dominion's dots in Forces or Prime.
- The avatar gains the Harrow Numen.
Optional: by spending yet another point of Mana, the Dominion may add one extra effect, regardless of the above bonuses distribution: the empowered aetherial avatar spreads the aura of fear in Abyssal creatures, causing them to suffer -1 penalty to all actions when the avatar is present in sensory range.

Fifth: The Ultimate Exorcism
Prerequisites: Prime 5, Occult 4
During their long war with the Abyss, the Dominions mastered the raw magical energy of Aether, perfecting Celestial Fire into Holy Fire, used only agains beings of the Void, but quick and deadly. The Mage causes his Prime dots of aggravated damage to one Abyssal being in sensory range.
Optional: Forces 5
Mage can cause harm not to the Abyssal being itself, but to those who worship or help it. This acts like Thunderbolt spell, causing Forces dots value of lethal damage to one target in sensory range.

So, any thoughts or comments?

[MovingMind]

I've been trying to convert my own version of the Choir for a while, but was never satisfied with what i made; especially the summoning part... i like what you/your player did;

That said; my comments:
Third attainment requires Forces 3, but does nothing with it. None of the stats for the Avatar are based on Forces. I feel it's like a 'Tax'... Maybe set the duration to Forces + Prime rounds?

I would also base the rank calculation on the lowest of Forces and Prime, because of how powerful the Supernal entities get at Rank 4 (rote action on mundane actions), so you only get that when you are a second degree master.

I'm assuming that the Stat calculation for the avatar is done the same way as in the original version.
Does it follow all the rules for supernal beings? What arcana does it have?
Also

Fourth attainment; i get the same 'Tax' feeling, in the same way, only a bit worse. Almost everything is based on Prime, and the only thing that is based on forces is a the 'Lowest of' part, so it just makes it harder to improve the Avatar.
Number of effects is based on prime, stat increase on prime, health on 2x prime, while armor and duration are based on lowest of Forces and Prime, which could be looked at as a "disadvantage".

I'd base the number of Effects based on the Lowest of Forces and Prime (because this is a force multiplier and SHOULD be harder to improve). It's not a big loss, at this point you have forces 4 and prime 4, minimum.
I'd base health on Forces + Prime.
You could also add an option to increase the Avatar's arcana (if it applies).
I think the stat increase is way too powerful: Assume the old stat calculation for the Avatar summoned; You probably have '3's across the board. As soon as you get the fourth attainment, you get 7s across the board... a massive jump.
I'm of three minds on this; but i think the best option is this:
Add Forces to one of the Avatar's Stats
Add Prime to one of the Avatar's Stats.
Each of these options can be taken once.

Or, alternatively Divide the Lowest of Forces/Prime between all of the Avatar's stats (option may be taken multiple times).

Finally, you can keep the option from the original version to use the highest attribute, rather than the lower one...

The 5th Attainment i'm also a bit dubious about; firstly both sides of the attainment do the same thing; and secondly... i don't think the power level is correct.
The Prime part: since it is not an Aimed spell, it should be withstood... and that means that it's effectiveness is drastically reduced due to the fixed potency that attainments have.
I think the same applies to the Forces part; but the damage can also be Aggravated at this point too...

Easiest fix is to make the spells Aimed, to avoid the Withstood potency reduction.

What i came up with in my attempt at the legacy is this:
Prime 5: Something along the lines of Ephemeral shield (but worded like "wards and signs" to be more 'Prime') from Spirit, again limited to Abyssal beings, with reach being used for the effect to affect physical attack, use advanced scale and advanced duration.
Forces 5: Eradicate energy, limited to Abyssal beings. Withstood by Rank, but is actually an "instant death" effect... has a bit of creative interpretation of 'Living things', but i think it's appropriate.


Phew... that took long to write

[Mrmdubois]

Three things, 1) I agree with MovingMind on his notes.

2) When you're building a legacy you should probably give the heads up that you're using your houserules.

3) Where are your notes for how Reach is spent on the various attainments? Also, factors for the effects? Where are the actual rules your building from that aren't just randomly slapped on numbers?

[MovingMind]

These are my ideas for the first attainment... not sure which to pick, or how to sum them up together into a final product; and i don't have enough experience to judge the opacity mechanic.

The Dominion's peripheral mage sight is also triggered by passive abyssal phenomena.
When scrutinizing such Abyssal phenomena, the Dominion's sight burns through the Deceptions of the Abyss, reducing the penalty to scrutiny attempts by the number of dots in Forces.
The deceptions of mere mortals pale in comparison to the deceptions of the Abyss, as an instant action, the Dominion may produce an effect identical to Prime 1 Pierce Deception.

I considered a couple of different things for the scrutiny part.
Outright reducing the Opacity takes the fun out of things...
Automatic successes ... makes things just too easy
... and various other permutations that pretty much have the same effect. At the end of it i settled for the reduced penalty... same amount of work as any other mage, no automatic successes but a much better toolkit.

Some more thoughts on the third and fourth attainment:
We don't have guidelines as to how the Legacy rules interact with attainments, so this pretty much falls entirely under the "Strange attainments" part of the rules.

The stats for the Avatar as summoned by the third attainment are pretty much fixed.
Summoning as an instant action for a short time, with these stats. Pretty much 'hard coded' (i'm a programmer...).

The fourth attainment, once achieved changes the 'hard coded' stats as per the rules indicated. Using the 4th attainment again requires a Scene of communion with the Aether, and allows the choices made to be changed. It still has an enormous amount of flexibility, but not something that can be used on the fly.

Another concern i have is with the Arcana the Avatar would get if it follows the rules for a supernal being. Summoning a rank 3-4 entity as an instant action is would require 20-25 successes, and a lot of risky rolling, but something like that can literally work wonders with 4 dots in an arcanum and unlimited reach. Summoning such a thing instantly and without rolling is enormous.

Removing the Avatar's access to Arcana seems harsh though.

Maybe as part of the 4th attainment allow one of the options to be "Add an arcanum dot"?

[Mrmdubois]

I wouldn't allow the entity to exceed Rank 2 in the same way that familiars can't. Letting the entity have arcana is fine, but a rank 5 being with unlimited Reach raises the question of why the Mage ever bothers to use his own magic anymore.

I'd also consider making the 3rd attainment a sped up version of the regular Supernal Summoning rules allowing it to happen as an Instant Action instead of an Extended one, and granting a wider range of the "choir" to be summoned. I'd limit to the entity still needing to be summoned into a circle that protects it from the Fallen, but since you can set the circle up as an Instant Action it means you can summon it around Abyssal targets and have them duke it out in a cage match. Then the Forces 3 optional attainment could be used to lay an Environmental Tilt on an area so that the Supernal Entity can be summoned regardless of whether or not it usually resonates with the Aether. This also has the effect of making the Forces attainment useful by itself even if you don't summon the entity.

For the 4th attainment I'd consider removing the circle restriction, the Mage's power now directly protects the entity from the Fallen. Come up with an additional perk.

In my opinion the Choir of Hashmallim is best served by breaking down the regular rules about summoning rather than just beefing up one creature.

[MovingMind]

My thoughts did go a little in that direction...

I though about using automatic successes on summoning (which is probably too powerful...), or maybe compressing a number of regular summoning rolls into an instant action.
Another effect that could be used is supernal beings returning to the supernal if within a certain range of the mage.


Here's my take on the fifth attainment:
Ultimate Exorcism

Prerequisites: Prime 5, Occult 4
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
The dominion enforces supernal truth from the aether, weakening all abyssal being’s grip on reality.
Numina, Manifestations, Influences and physical attacks of abyssal beings within the area covered by this attainment trigger a clash of wills.
(2 Dots effect based on Ephemeral shield. Reach is spent for Instant activation, Changing primary factor to Area, Advanced scale and Advanced duration).
The attainment lasts a week (-4 penalty on advanced duration), and covers the area of a small neighborhood (Primary factor scale, 5 steps).
Optional: Forces 5
The Dominion’s can bring down the might of the Aether to purify the fallen world. This attainments works as per Eradicate energy, limited to be used on Abyssal beings. It is withstood by the Abyssal's Rank.

[wyrdhamster]

Third attainment requires Forces 3, but does nothing with it. None of the stats for the Avatar are based on Forces. I feel it's like a 'Tax'... Maybe set the duration to Forces + Prime rounds?

Summoning Avatar IS based on Forces – when you look on Summoning rules from corebook it’s highlighting that Supernal Being use one Ruling Arcanum and second other. In this example Choir Avatar is Prime being based on Forces, contrary to others, like Prime being based on Life or on Time.

I would also base the rank calculation on the lowest of Forces and Prime, because of how powerful the Supernal entities get at Rank 4 (rote action on mundane actions), so you only get that when you are a second degree master.

I could agree on this one.

I'm assuming that the Stat calculation for the avatar is done the same way as in the original version. Does it follow all the rules for supernal beings? What arcana does it have?

Stat calculations work on base of Supernal Summoning rules and Ephemeral Entities from 2E corebook.

Fourth attainment; i get the same 'Tax' feeling, in the same way, only a bit worse. Almost everything is based on Prime, and the only thing that is based on forces is a the 'Lowest of' part, so it just makes it harder to improve the Avatar.
Number of effects is based on prime, stat increase on prime, health on 2x prime, while armor and duration are based on lowest of Forces and Prime, which could be looked at as a "disadvantage".

Was not sure here on this in first place – if you have idea on Forces Optional power, I’m all ears.

The Prime part: since it is not an Aimed spell, it should be withstood... and that means that it's effectiveness is drastically reduced due to the fixed potency that attainments have.
I think the same applies to the Forces part; but the damage can also be Aggravated at this point too...

Easiest fix is to make the spells Aimed, to avoid the Withstood potency reduction.

Will talk on this with my player.

[wyrdhamster]

2) When you're building a legacy you should probably give the heads up that you're using your houserules.

3) Where are your notes for how Reach is spent on the various attainments? Also, factors for the effects? Where are the actual rules your building from that aren't just randomly slapped on numbers?

They are not any house rules used on this Legacy – we only let to use Supernal Summoning as Instant Action, as it is Summoners Legacy, so it’s logical change to make. That’s all.

The Dominion's peripheral mage sight is also triggered by passive abyssal phenomena.
When scrutinizing such Abyssal phenomena, the Dominion's sight burns through the Deceptions of the Abyss, reducing the penalty to scrutiny attempts by the number of dots in Forces.
The deceptions of mere mortals pale in comparison to the deceptions of the Abyss, as an instant action, the Dominion may produce an effect identical to Prime 1 Pierce Deception.

Would stick to the Prime on Pierce Deception – also, Prime is Ruling Arcanum of Legacy, Forces is Optional.

Some more thoughts on the third and fourth attainment:
We don't have guidelines as to how the Legacy rules interact with attainments, so this pretty much falls entirely under the "Strange attainments" part of the rules.

And it’s exactly what we do here – there are nothing against it, it made topic specifically about it. Summoners book also break the rules on Supernal Summoning in 1E letting Choir members to summon avatars in Instant Action, so we do this here.

The stats for the Avatar as summoned by the third attainment are pretty much fixed.
Summoning as an instant action for a short time, with these stats. Pretty much 'hard coded' (i'm a programmer...).

‘Hard coding’ for Attainments usage on the same Arcanum levels, not on general changes, from time to time. On Prime 3 Legacy Attainments do one thing with 3 successes. One Prime 4 it does it with 4 successes. Same policy works here. Avatar is evolving a bit with character.

Another concern i have is with the Arcana the Avatar would get if it follows the rules for a supernal being. Summoning a rank 3-4 entity as an instant action is would require 20-25 successes, and a lot of risky rolling, but something like that can literally work wonders with 4 dots in an arcanum and unlimited reach. Summoning such a thing instantly and without rolling is enormous.

Was thinking about Arcanum=successes needed in particular category.

Another Maybe as part of the 4th attainment allow one of the options to be "Add an arcanum dot"?

Can be think more on it.

[Mrmdubois]

I thought you were using your version of legacy building that has free Instant activation for attainments and trying to build each attainment to use powers that correspond with dots 1-5 of the arcana used to build them. Am I mistaken, if so sorry about that?

[wyrdhamster]

MovingMind , what do you mean about Celestial Fire and Withstand? It's direct damage spell, there is no Withstand on it.

[MovingMind]

... I was under the impression that casting at Sensory range added a Withstand to the spell if it did not have one... but perhaps i was just confusing that with the 1e rules, where you could cast at the target pattern directly, but had to subtract a resistance attribute from your dice pool.

However i can't find the rule in the 2E book. That makes direct damage attainments significantly more powerful :O

[Mrmdubois]

Yes it does.