Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

The troll vignette:

 

I'm thinking it thru, but don't have any useful expansive thoughts on the matter. It's going to force me to deal with faerie concepts, and I have very shallow knowledge in that area.

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

I've backburnered the Troll scenario for what may turn out to be mere hours. Right now I'm putting together an equipment 'prefab' using much of the equipment already used by the Pregens and NPCs. That will make it a darn sight easier to create new characters as well as maintain a consistency among equipment. No doubt you will want to tweak many of the items once you see them all together. And perhaps add a few to fill some gaps. I will add a few obvious ones myself (flash light, cell phone, etc.).

 

A Daemonologist cult vignette sounds great, definitely iconic. Perhaps they are protecting a human born son of a demon prince. Verity Blake (names meaning 'true dark') bears an unborn child and 'signs' are appearing that lead the investigators to discover the cult. They might well believe that the signs are due solely to the cult's use of and affiliation with demons and completely miss the relevance of the pregnancy of Verity Blake.

 

Edit: And I am encountering all sorts of bugs with Hero Designer while trying to compile an equipment list. I may have to sit through reading 60 pages of documentation just to get this software to work without disintegrating every time I try to add more than 8 pieces of equipment to the equipment tab. ARGH.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

I've backburnered the Troll scenario for what may turn out to be mere hours. Right now I'm putting together an equipment 'prefab' using much of the equipment already used by the Pregens and NPCs. That will make it a darn sight easier to create new characters as well as maintain a consistency among equipment. No doubt you will want to tweak many of the items once you see them all together. And perhaps add a few to fill some gaps. I will add a few obvious ones myself (flash light, cell phone, etc.).

This would be awesome. I took an early stab at this on the Gear page but haven't kept it up to date.

 

Donaldson has a flashlight i think. I don't bother writing up cell phones and other such ubiquitous things; in fact I wouldn't have bothered to write up a flashlight for Donaldson myself. The main advantage to his having paid points for it is that he'll pretty much _always_ have a flashlight whether its convenient to the GM or not, while other characters might have one as serves the needs and convenience of the the plot.

A Daemonologist cult vignette sounds great, definitely iconic. Perhaps they are protecting a human born son of a demon prince. Verity Blake (names meaning 'true dark') bears an unborn child and 'signs' are appearing that lead the investigators to discover the cult. They might well believe that the signs are due solely to the cult's use of and affiliation with demons and completely miss the relevance of the pregnancy of Verity Blake.

Hmm...yes. That works nicely.

 

In the interests of the Law of Character Conservation I'm considering having the main baddy be a Warlock, mixing Daemonology, Invocation, and a little Alchemy. I've got a great pic already, and I think I'm going to repurpose the name "Tudor Brezak". This guy is going to be realy bad ass, and the scenario is going to be for a solid team of mid-powerlevel experienced Hunters or a duo of high powered Hunters.

 

It's also a great opportunity to introduce Doctor Allosious Jones, the Elminsterish dude mentioned in several of the iconics backstories. This shindig would be going down at a power level he'd be aware of.

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Equipment list sent by Email. It is contains pretty much all equipment so far found on the pregenerated characters that might want to be used by players and GMs. It does 'not' include 'special' items like potions made by alchemists, silver bullets and the like.

 

Edit: By the way, Jimmy Hunt is not listed in the 'NPC' section.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Equipment list sent by Email. It is contains pretty much all equipment so far found on the pregenerated characters that might want to be used by players and GMs. It does 'not' include 'special' items like potions made by alchemists' date=' silver bullets and the like.[/quote']

 

Cool; I'll check it out this evening.

 

Edit: By the way, Jimmy Hunt is not listed in the 'NPC' section.

Added to the todo list, thanks!

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

The troll is done (sent by Email). At least my part in it is. KS no doubt will be able to improve upon it.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Gear updated, with prefab linked at top.

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Gear updated' date=' with prefab linked at top.[/quote']

Gear updated, but prefab link up top not working. ;-)

[5lippers]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Hi Both,

 

I’m happy to see if I can come up with an interesting vignette featuring Banshees, the Morrigan and possibly Hugo Glamour. In the spirit of La Rose’s flag about the Feb adventure challenge, it may also end up being about a love lost (or soon to be lost) and a shared connection with the dead…

 

5.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Hi Both,

 

I’m happy to see if I can come up with an interesting vignette featuring Banshees, the Morrigan and possibly Hugo Glamour. In the spirit of La Rose’s flag about the Feb adventure challenge, it may also end up being about a love lost (or soon to be lost) and a shared connection with the dead…

 

5.

 

Go for it!

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

The Birth of Venus Malefica

 

Dramatis Personae

 

Tudor Brezak; powerful Warlock / Infernalist. Daemonology, Invocation, some practical / useful Alchemy. Has two (2) Bound Daemons, a Slayer and a Possessor named Baraerazil and Aurhabazu; a Summon for Pacting Daemons, 4d6 Invocation, a few Daemonic Gifts and Innate Abilities. Very very very dangerous. UN records suggest that Tudor has been around for at least three hundred years.

 

Verity Blake; moderately powerful Witch apprentice of Tudor. Deluded by him into thinking she will gain great power by giving birth to a cambion (child of a human and a Daemon). She is really part of an elaborate sacrifice and will not survive the delivery. She had a Hermetic background before coming under Tudor's influence. Hermetic, Daemonology, 1d6 Invocation.

 

 

Michael Blaine; Experienced Monster Hunter; Occultist Pusher / Illusionist; per example entry, 13- Ego Roll and +2 w/ Ego Rolls; Possessed by Aurhabazu after a failed Exorcism.

 

 

Cult of the Red Hand: a fairly numerous satanic cult which Tudor either founded a couple of hundred years ago or took over; which is unclear. Regardless or which, per UN analysis he has been the "hidden master" of the cult for many decades. Most members are mere initiates and have 1d6 of Invocation or a weak Bound Daemon (such as an imp or two) or a minor Summon for Pacting, or maybe a Gift or two; (these are 25 - 50 point characters). A handful of highly placed members are more powerful, ranging up to experienced Hunter levels, but none are anywhere near as powerful as Tudor himself.

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

I am looking forward to seeing where "The Birth of Venus Malefica" goes.

 

A question, slightly unrelated. Can a possessor demon 'add' abilities to the character it has possessed? I am dabbling with the idea of a hunter (biker babe professional) that walked into something alone that they were ill equipped to handle and got possessed. Now 'they' are are in need of exorcism, but first they have to be stopped, preferably without killing the possessee, and they are seriously dangerous.

 

Edit: And look what I found. Someone just released the movie 'Zombie Apocalypse' and did us the favor of making it with roughly the level of awesome incompetence we would expect from Zackary Hak. http://www.zombieapocalypsemovie.com/ No bus though, and no 'awesome babes'. Zackary's wold probably therefor actually be better than this. Scary thought that.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Presumably Possessors can add abilities to their host via UBO, and they also keep their own mental powers.

 

With that in mind, I might reenvision Michael Blaine to be more physical so I can demonstrate the difference.

 

 

And I don't think I'll be renting a copy of Zombie Apocalypse

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

I just re-watched the pilot for the TV series 'Supernatural', which is obviously one of the most relevant modern media anologs to this setting, and it got me wondering a few things, things that might well be good to address before too much work is done on creating 'monsters'.

 

There are in this series a number of things which hunters can do to counter the supernatural, without themselves having supernatural powers. This TV show references for instance using salt to create barriers which many supernatural creatures will not pass, using rock salt loads in shotguns to disrupt 'desolid' entities. They reference certain symbols having protective properties, burning the 'remains of the original bodies' of ghosts in order to banish them, etc..

 

Would it be prudent to perhaps define a number of such things that hunters might know as part of their 'Supernatural World' KS? Such vulnerabilities might be written into monster descriptions rather than taken as powers by hunters.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

I just re-watched the pilot for the TV series 'Supernatural', which is obviously one of the most relevant modern media anologs to this setting, and it got me wondering a few things, things that might well be good to address before too much work is done on creating 'monsters'.

 

There are in this series a number of things which hunters can do to counter the supernatural, without themselves having supernatural powers. This TV show references for instance using salt to create barriers which many supernatural creatures will not pass, using rock salt loads in shotguns to disrupt 'desolid' entities. They reference certain symbols having protective properties, burning the 'remains of the original bodies' of ghosts in order to banish them, etc..

 

Would it be prudent to perhaps define a number of such things that hunters might know as part of their 'Supernatural World' KS? Such vulnerabilities might be written into monster descriptions rather than taken as powers by hunters.

 

Yes, for the most part such things would be built into the monsters themselves, and exploited by knowledgeable Hunters. Like Vampires vulnerability to sunlight and aversion to Faith, and Werewolves silver "allergy".

 

The protective symbols bit is a little different. And its weird that it comes up just now. You might recall that I had originally defined a type of Magi as "Warding", which was going to be a simplified rebuild of my Runecrafting system oriented around protective wards / glyphs / symbols.

 

However, I got to thinking about it and I wasn't entirely convinced that it belonged under Magi considering the direction they went as we developed it. I was considering the general power of symbols, and the possibility that the symbols themselves were the source of power rather than the person that drew them. Anyway, I couldnt come to a clear decision, so I commented the entire section out a couple of days ago until I can come up with the "right answer".

 

Maybe what I should have done is broach the subject for discussion instead

 

Im certainly willing to entertain the idea of this, but I don't have the time to do the research and come up with a list of "symbols of power" or do the graphics for them by myself. I think it would be extremely cool however if we all chipped in and found ancient symbols used in real history and assigned effects to them, and figured out an "equipment" cost or some equivalent way of hooking them into our resource management system to prevent abuse.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Rough cut of Michael Blaise, no bg or complications, is up. I'll do the possessor Daemon next, and then pin it all down.

 

Unfortunately the Senior VP in charge of my project is in town this week, and I'm going to be tied up in meetings, lunches, and happy hours, which will impinge on my free time; I'm expecting some late hours. So, if I seem uncommunicative the next few days rest assured its not by choice. But keep the good stuff coming; the backlog will be worked thru over time.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Gear updated' date=' but prefab link up top not working. ;-)[/quote']

 

should be fixed; I moved the wrong hdp into the folder

 

 

Also, Jimmy Hunt is wired up on the NPC's page, and his HDC is linked up properly.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Added a new Key Note that I've been meaning to splice in..."NOT EVERYTHING HAS A SUPERNATURAL ANGLE"

 

Added a line item to the Abilities page; KS: Crypto-History

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

For comment, dissection and improvement upon:

 

Symbols: Religious - Serves as a conduit and magnifier for the faith of the person using the symbol. It will have no effect for someone without faith. The symbol used must be of the faith of the person using it. This does not require that a person be a 'believer' in terms of the character 'origin', rather simply that the person be of the requisite faith. It can serve as a repulsive barrier for some creatures (like vampires) either total or requiring an ego check to pass (reflected as a complication taken by the creature). It will also serve as an ego boost to the person possessing the symbol (+1 to +3) depending upon the degree of faith.

 

Symbols: Magical - (pentagram being the most common, but others can have effect). Repeated use of certain symbols in ritual magic have lent the symbols themselves a degree of universal power. They are not overwhelming in their effect but have a boosting effect upon whatever they are being used. This serves generally as a 5 point cosmic power pool with no conscious control (the GM decides what effect if any the symbol has). The effect can boost existing effects or have some other defensive quality. The effect is never offensive. This effect only works on people who are magically aware. They have to either know magic exists or otherwise 'believe' it to exist (so someone practicing the 'Wiccan' religion who does not know of the 'real' supernatural world, would still gain the effect of a pentagram). The size of the effect is to some degree dependent upon the manner in, and intent with which it is used. So someone who casually tattoos a small pentagram on their arm will likely not have the same level of effect as another who wears a gold pentagram around their neck visible to all.

 

Many religions are doctrinally antithetical to magic and the effects of their religious symbols will not stack with the effect of magical symbols.

 

Hermetic Circle - A circle drawn upon the ground containing a full pentagram the points of which adjoin the circle, often containing other symbols. If drawn by someone without magical training, this will have no greater effect than a standard pentagram. If drawn however by someone with magical training (at least ten real points spent on either magic powers or magic knowledge skills, 'KS: Supernatural World' does not count) will function in two ways, it will serve as a ten point cosmic power pool that can boost the effect of a caster's magic if cast within the circle. It can be used either to boost an existing effect or create an entirely independent effect. The effect is under the control of the person who drew the circle (again, requiring that they be an appropriately magic using character). A hermetic circle also functions as would a salt barrier to any creature that would be affected by such a barrier.

 

 

Resistant: Salt - Usable by all if they know to use it. Easily disrupted by disturbing the salt through non direct means. Creates an ego check for creatures to pass of either strong or total (written into the creature description as a complication). Requires an adequate quantity, a small amount will not suffice. A box of kitchen salt might be enough to block a doorway and window. It would not stop then however stop a creature from coming through the wall.

 

Rock salt used as shotgun loads will have a disruptive effect on most desolid entities and creatures that find salt resistive will also take damage from rock salt as if they were standard shotgun loads.

 

 

Conductive: copper-gold - Conductive metal must form a full loop around the protected area. The conductive metal must be exposed and not covered with insulating material. Typically used by hermeticists and other magically astute persons. The conductivity of the metal barrier can be used to reinforce the magics of the user. It functions identically to a salt barrier except that it can only be made to function by a person with appropriate magic power. This requires no actual investment of magical 'pool' points, it is a bonus to their special effects. The caster must spend time 'energizing' the protection of the metal (several minutes). The protection will fade over time if it is abandoned by the caster.

 

 

Subject to passive resistance, strong (15 points) or total (20 points). Strong means the creature can pass with an ego roll at negative five. Total means the creature cannot pass and must find some other way either around the barrier, or a means to disrupt the barrier.

 

Edit: And I am just now thinking that maybe the effect of a hermetic circle aught to be limited to those who possess a full ten active points in magic knowledge skills, period. Simply having magic powers alone is not enough. You have to know a lot about magic, and therefor magic symbology to make it work. This in effect 'pays' for the effect by rewarding the character who 'blew' ten points on knowledge skills that otherwise probably wouldn't get their fair share of play.

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Unfortunately the Senior VP in charge of my project is in town this week, and I'm going to be tied up in meetings, lunches, and happy hours, which will impinge on my free time; I'm expecting some late hours. So, if I seem uncommunicative the next few days rest assured its not by choice. But keep the good stuff coming; the backlog will be worked thru over time.

Have you looked at my 'Troll' yet? :-)

[Panpiper]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Rough cut of Michael Blaise, no bg or complications, is up. I'll do the possessor Daemon next, and then pin it all down.

Great picture for Michael Blaise! :-)

 

This guy is seriously scary. He can pretty much one shot kill anyone he so much as sees (line of sight, mental, invisible, 3D6-1 KA!!!). Combat luck sure won't count because they'll never see it coming. With him possessed, I would be shitting bricks. May I suggest maybe making his 'slayer' ability an EB effect? That will still do a 'crippling' damage to most characters (most do not buy up their ED) and two shots will still kill.

 

Might I suggest giving him the complication of causing him to use his 'stormcaller' power unconsciously when under extreme stress? It suits the trope.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Great picture for Michael Blaise! :-)

 

This guy is seriously scary. He can pretty much one shot kill anyone he so much as sees (line of sight, mental, invisible, 3D6-1 KA!!!). Combat luck sure won't count because they'll never see it coming. With him possessed, I would be shitting bricks. May I suggest maybe making his 'slayer' ability an EB effect? That will still do a 'crippling' damage to most characters (most do not buy up their ED) and two shots will still kill.

 

I think I'd rather translate it into a Drain vs Body or something along those lines instead. I don't want to dillute the "SLAYER" label. Its a 140 AP ability intended to kill; I want it to be brickshit inducing. Besides, once you see Tudor Brezek you'll think Blaise is a wuss.

 

Venus Malefica is slotted to be a very tough upper end adventure, demonstrating the deep end of the pool. Not something to throw starting characters into. Starting characters should probably just die or worse, unless a whole bunch of them were working together (like 8 or more), and even then casualties would be expected.

 

Might I suggest giving him the complication of causing him to use his 'stormcaller' power unconsciously when under extreme stress? It suits the trope.

 

Cool idea!

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

Have you looked at my 'Troll' yet? :-)

 

Would you believe...

 

Actually, I perused it but have not looked at it in depth yet. Its been a crazy week

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

For comment, dissection and improvement upon:

Awesome opening. I cant go line by line right now (wolfing lunch btwn meetings), but its definitely on the right track. Will go into depth asap.

 

Edit: And I am just now thinking that maybe the effect of a hermetic circle aught to be limited to those who possess a full ten active points in magic knowledge skills, period. Simply having magic powers alone is not enough. You have to know a lot about magic, and therefor magic symbology to make it work. This in effect 'pays' for the effect by rewarding the character who 'blew' ten points on knowledge skills that otherwise probably wouldn't get their fair share of play.

 

Probably an 11- of Hermetic Lore Skill would cover Hermetic Circles. 11- Daemon Lore would cover Pentagrams / Summoning Circles. I'm sure we can figure out a Nomen Lore, Necromantist Lore and Alchemical Lore equivalents.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Urban Fantasy Setting: Here There Be Monsters

 

A rough version of Tudor Brezak sans bg is up.