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World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate
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@Jennkryst Yeah, I’m aware of the mechanics of DA:M. It’s the big draw for me. I know it kinda works in the meta that every Tradition was eventually forced to conceive of magic through a Hermetic lens, but I like the other Traditions having their own ideas, and I like the magic system in general being a little more narrative in nature.
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@GF said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
I know it kinda works in the meta that every Tradition was eventually forced to conceive of magic through a Hermetic lens
Eh, not… really? I mean, OOCly, sure, because real world science helps explain IC stuff. But each tradition does view it through their own paradigms and junk. This is why different traditions might have a rote for a spell that other traditions don’t (though in oWoD, a Rote is just a -1 on the difficulty of the spell, if memory serves? THEN AGAIN, you can also ‘aim’ your spell with a skill roll, and the whole idea of getting rid of a focus with each Arete raise means you are learning that traditions and paradigms are all an illusion, all that matters is knowledge and will, and oh god, how did we end up discussing mechanics?!?)
AHEM.
But yeah, totally pick up that geas, give you a reason to go meditate under a waterfall while naked or whatever.
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@Jennkryst said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
Eh, not… really? I mean, OOCly, sure, because real world science helps explain IC stuff. But each tradition does view it through their own paradigms and junk.
Their paradigms are mechanically indistinguishable from a Hermetic one, using Hermetic concepts like Spheres and Arete but with a different shirt, like the difference between Mario and Luigi. I think that acting as if Hermetic isn’t the magical default is bad game design; I think the fancy term for it is ludonarrative dissonance.
DA:M doesn’t make a new magic system for each Fellowship, but it does enough to make me feel better about them.
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@GF I believe the idea that they didn’t bathe that often in the dark ages only applies to certain locations and is something of a myth overall. IIRC bath houses were a thing exported by the Romans to much of Europe.
Then again, it’s WoD, so of course it’s nastier and darker than reality.
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If you’re a Mage and not using magic to shower you’re doing it wrong.
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@shit-piss-love said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
If you’re a Mage and not using magic to shower you’re doing it wrong.
THIS, also. Because also remember, the reason that the Technocracy exists and invented SCIENCE was because the other wiz-nerds built mage towers and flaunted their majikz over people.
… or something like that.
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The Technocracy were the only actual heroes of oWoD.
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@shit-piss-love Ohh, I’m now fascinated by that hot take. Tell me more.
I don't know what I'm doing. Poke at Seven Nations sevennations.aresmush.com port 2021
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@WhiteRaven said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
Tall, dark-haired and in charge has been my type ever since.
️ Step
On
Me -
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@Testament said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
@shit-piss-love Ohh, I’m now fascinated by that hot take. Tell me more.
The Technocracy’s position is that reality should be dictated by the unconscious consent of mortals. Everything else is a Reality Deviant seeking to exert nonconsensual force in the pursuit of their urges and/or agendas. Are their methods, uh, suspect? Maaaaaaaaybe.
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Eh, Technocrats and Traditionalists are about equally prone to fascism. I reckon the Disparates would be just as bad if they had the numbers and/or organization to be.
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@GF Yeah it can be awkward if you’re not used to it, trying to take the MtA game mechanics that are all written Hermetic-first, and try to play an Etherite or anything else with them.
But it can be done. It just takes more work than just being able to talk about ranks of Ars Stuckupica
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@shit-piss-love
The Technocratic Union, in their higher ideals, are building a world built on comprehensible and predictable rules where the laws of the universe and the ability to effect it is the same for everyone, not the result of having special magic powers, and where the things that go bump in the night get shut the fuck down.
It was introduced back in the Guide to the Technocracy as more of a justification for why the forces of The Man are stomping on human faces forever, but it has been taken more or less straightforwardly in a lot of later material.I will also say that, these days, the fact that Mage: the Ascension has the heroic psychic surgeons, homeopaths, and crystal energists trying to overcome the paradigm of the evil germ theorists makes me feel… less enthused about the game’s presentation.
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That’s actually the most reasonable breakdown of The Technocracy I’ve heard in a long time.
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@insomniac said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
I will also say that, these days, the fact that Mage: the Ascension has the heroic psychic surgeons, homeopaths, and crystal energists trying to overcome the paradigm of the evil germ theorists makes me feel… less enthused about the game’s presentation.
To be fair, presenting that conflict as good versus evil was much more a 1E thing, but it is still one of the weirder and occasionally uncomfortable aspects of the game, making the whole “my opinion is just as valid as your knowledge” shit we’re all dealing with as a society very literal. Like, I know people IRL who would be miserable to play with because they would be a liiiiiitle too into it.
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Yeah to be clear my tongue is firmly in cheek here. Nothing in oWoD should be taken remotely seriously. I just really like the against-the-grain generous interpretations of the Technocracy. Some of the most fun characters I’ve seen were like NWO agents with complicated social philosophies, It-X researchers trying to solve food insecurity, or Void Engineers trying to equalize the access to Technology across socio-economic lines.
edit: My personal favorite Technocracy trope is “did you think we want to just mirror mundane society hierarchical models? fuck that, those always end up with the wrong people in charge. we’re concerned with making the system actually work for everyone.”
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@shit-piss-love said in World of Darkness: The Weird Little Monster We Love and Hate:
The Technocracy’s position is that reality should be dictated by the unconscious consent of mortals. Everything else is a Reality Deviant seeking to exert nonconsensual force in the pursuit of their urges and/or agendas. Are their methods, uh, suspect? Maaaaaaaaybe.
It’s not even that reality SHOULD be dictated by mortal belief… reality IS dictated by mortal belief - which is partly why when you surround yourself with a cult of mortals who BELIEVE in your magic/paradigm, you get a bonus. (See also: Demon the Fallen, souls being made of Godstuff/mortals being used to fuel powers with FAITH)
So if you get enough mortals to believe that the Earth is an oblate spheroid… reality conforms to that belief. But local reality can be overwritten, so if you then take a bunch of flat earthers to Antarctica, they might just walk up and find the edge… just like your cult makes your rituals work better.
This is also why planes crash sometimes. People were tricked into thinking there was a loophole in physics that lets multi-ton vehicles fly through the air, and enough people believe it is safe, and so it is. But every now and again… they don’t.
And we can keep going with examples, but that covers it pretty well.
Reality Deviants are Deviant from the norms that the technocracy want… but also are Deviant in that 100% of humanity could believe that vampires are fake, yet vampires will continue to exist despite this.
The Technocracy is totally cool with Drones (or Fomori that are easily disguised as Drones, see: Special Projects Division) so long as they further the ‘science is real, nothing else is’ paradigm. They are totally cool with fetishes and charms and talismans, so long as they use SCIENCE.
But also the why of it all is because as mentioned, Reality Deviants tend to like… want to control mortals; part of the Dark Ages being so dark was because Supernaturals operated in the open (more or less, there was still secrecy, but this is pre-masquerade days). So now we have to convince mortals that vampires are fake. So even though this won’t affect vampires existing, it means that humans are less likely to like… actively help them. Or worse, stop believing in SCIENCE/start believing in mystic bullshit again.
This, uh… got a lot more wordy than I anticipated.
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What I mean is, that hasn’t really been an against-the-grain portrayal of the Technocracy since the first edition of the game or arguably late second. There are POV chapters in the convention books that explicitly state that’s what a lot of people sign up for, and they retconned the history pretty early on to be that basically the entire reason the Technocracy was formed in the first place was as opposition to these strange weirdos wielding their power at the expense of the average mortal. The “good” Technocrats might run into Nephandic corruption at the top and/or rank-and-file (or at the very least plenty of people who are just extremely self-serving and interested in preserving the status quo), but I never walked away from the more recent editions and especially M20 feeling like the former were particularly all that rare. It isn’t (necessarily) the Technocracy’s intentions that can make them suspect, it’s their methods. That’s just my take tho.
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I’m not familiar with any of the oWoD stuff that’s come out since the nWoD stuff dropped. I was actually cruising around DriveThruRPG last night and noticed that there’s a new line of stuff coming out now that is a continuation of the original setting? Like it reconciles the Avatar Storm stuff? I’m not sure how interested I am in running or playing that but I’m curious how they are approaching it.
Personally, I love the nWoD (I guess it’s maybe called Chronicles now?) stuff for running generic Spooky Modern with most of the lore filed off.
