User Profile

[Dataweaver]

To me, the line that makes me think “hopeless setting” is “past the point of no return”: the Traditions and Technocracy are so far gone in their respective corruption that there's no saving them. The Nephandi aren't just winning; they've already won — it's just that the final steps to ultimate destruction haven't yet finished playing out. The world has already crossed a line from which there's no coming back, and the end result is going to be the same no matter what. That's about as bleak and hopeless as things get.

There's a difference between “the Traditions and Technocracy have...

[Dataweaver]

A good case could be made that Conditioning is coupled with Banality, and that the sorts of activities that would reduce someone's Banality would also have a tendency to undo Conditioning; and vice versa. It's not a perfect parallel; but I think it ought to be close enough.

On a separate note: if you buy the Revised Convention Book metaplot, the VEs have up on the notion of abandoning the Technocracy back when the Avatar Storm hit: you don't abandon your brothers in arms (the rest of the Technocracy) in their time of need. If you're not using Threat Null in your game, that's a different...

[Dataweaver]

So: They Came From Beneath the Sea is almost out now: backer previews have been released. It has been cited as the game that made the Trinity devs take a step back from producing a 50s era. Still, I find myself wondering about how the two games might be brought together.

Back in its 1e days, one of the devs for Adventure! was pushing the notion that Daredevils aren't some sort of “empowered human”; that Dramatic Editing and Heroic Knacks were metagaming constructs that represented genre conventions rather than in-setting phenomena. For better or worse, Trinity Continuum has gone...

[Dataweaver]

I also use something along the lines of the Gnosis paradigm (where the power stat represents a deep understanding of the mysteries of the world); but I call it Enlightenment, and present it as an alternative to Arete rather than a replacement for it. They're are tangible differences between a mage with Enlightenment and a make with Arete: those with Enlightenment don't get to Work Without Tools or Surpass their Instruments, but get to select Instruments that they master at the same rate that mages with Arete choose to surpass them; a mastered Instrument is just like a surpassed Instrument except...

[Dataweaver]

And teaching them what it was and how to use it.

[Dataweaver]

Looking forward to it.

[Dataweaver]

I was referring to Prometheus in the context of the debate between Athena and Hephaestus and the origins of technology.

[Dataweaver]

(Prometheus)

[Dataweaver]

Obviously, sympathetic bonds aren't some new innovation that the Axios devised. But let's be honest: when the typical Mage player thinks of Space, he tends to think of Scrying and Teleportation first, along with other spells that are ultimately about altering or transcending distance; and of Sympathetic bonds primarily as a way to facilitate that.

The Axios puts the emphasis the other way around. Yes, Scrying is useful; and the Axios won't deny that. But to the Axios, the real value of a Sympathetic connection isn't that it transcends distance; it's that it contains meaning. It's...

[Dataweaver]

Actually, TC:Ab not only lets you leverage Q-Tech into nova-tech; it also lets you convert nova-tech into core-tech. With enough time and effort, you can go from “only I can use it” to “only I can make it; but anyone can use it” to “anyone can make or use it”. Iron Man armor to mass-produced VARGs.

[Dataweaver]

Most of this post is going to be somewhat rambling; I'm still thinking things through here.

That's why I referenced the Advocate aspect of the Path for that part: it's not about bargaining; it's about making a case. Granted, it's still easier to envision this as making a case before a judge of some sort; but from the karmic angle, there's another way to consider it:

Merit isn't a singular value that resides in an act alone; it reverberates through the web of Sympathetic connections that ties everything together. A skilled Advocate can try to account for this; but there's...

[Dataweaver]

In my World of Darkness, the Technocratic Focus is dominant; but the Technocracy itself is another matter: it's in the middle of a Civil War after Control attempted a purge. The so-called Technephandi might be behind it, or the purge may have been initiated to root out the Technephandi, or the cause of the purge may have had nothing to do with the Nephandi; no one knows for sure. But whoever was behind the purge miscalculated, and now a new Order of Reason is fighting the Union.

Another thing I've changed in my World of Darkness is that the Syndicate's Special Projects Department...

[Dataweaver]

For a Necrokinesis Aptitude, I'd focus more on the “psychic residue” angle, and generally say that ghosts don't exist — but that Astral Forms do, and that the Aptitude is as much about Astral Projection as it is about psychic residue. That could even be two of its Modes. Not sure what the third would be, though. Possession, maybe?

That said, I'm hoping that Mesmerists won't use the Aptitudes and Modes system; I'm hoping they get something more akin to Adventure!'s Psychic Knacks.

[Dataweaver]

I'm not necessarily saying that there are “gods of judgment” (though the Axios Entities of Fate might come close; more on that once I've had a chance to digest your Supernal Entities suggestions); but there might be — and Seers in particular would be inclined to believe that there are, and that the Exarchs are the judges of merit.

The alternative is that the “judgment of merit” is an impersonal force, sort of like the notion of karma. If there's a consciousness behind it, no one knows for sure what it is. There are theories; but nothing conclusive....

[Dataweaver]

I'm not sure that a Hulk or Spiderman would be possible in the TC main sequence without an N-Day event in the recent past. Pre-N-Day Eruptions, sure; but “bitten by a radioactive spider” sounds more like a trigger for an Eruption that's already been made possible by an N-Day event in the recent past, and “exposed to radiation from a Gamma bomb” sounds like an N-Day event in and of itself — or it would be, if not for the Doyens' containment field.

Also, I'm pretty sure that there's been at least something of an effort to distinguish between what the Æon era calls Aberrants and what...

[Dataweaver]

TC pp.90–91:

Advanced Science is technology that leapfrogs over modern-day capabilities and lands step beyond tomorrow. It's mundane, but devices and gadgets of this caliber would be 10 or more years away if left to non-Talent scientists.

Devices that fall under Inspired Science can only be built and created by Inspired minds, but can be used by anyone. … while Inspired Science can also improve upon existing tech, devices created at this level often enhance a Talent's pre-existing abilities or mimic the effects of Gifts.

So no; Inspired Science is not just advanced mundane tech. You...

[Dataweaver]

Yeah; Equivalent Exchange is something that even Fullmetal Alchemist ultimately rejected: by the end of the story, the Elric brothers had hit upon “a new principle” that involved investing and the whole being greater than the sum of its parts.

Though maybe that's another part of what distinguishes the Seers from the other Axios: the Seers do tend to think in terms of zero-sum games, whereas the Pentacles have more of a “growing the pie” philosophy. That would be why the Seers are so willing to lock the doors behind them.

On the subject of Risk and Reward: definitely...

[Dataweaver]

The same way that Ægis is essentially looking to be “Scion, but Science!-based”, I could see Argent being “They Came From Beneath the Sea, but with superheroes”. (Well, Scion is also modern-day while Ægis is ancient Greece; but then again, They Came From Beneath the Sea's monsters are all aquatic in nature, and Argent's monsters would likely be a bit more diverse than that. So the comparison may still be apt.)

[Dataweaver]

With the “The Bigger They Are” Gift in TC:Ab (assuming it survives to publication in something resembling its current form), a Talent has a much improved chance of holding his own against a Nova. Plus, Talents have access to Dramatic Editing; Novas, with a rare handful of limited exceptions, don't.

I don't have much fear that Talents will be unduly sidelined in TC:Ab. After all, we need our Batman and Green Arrow types.

[Dataweaver]

As I read it, the setting in question was supposed to be inspired by Marvel comics, but wasn't supposed to be as potent as Marvel. That said, I refer you to my own initial reaction to it.