A demon’s Incarnation is his original function in the service of the God-Machine. Some angels walked battlefields with bladed wings dipped in blood, others protected humans without rest… until the moment of their appointed doom.
Today, we take a look at the Messengers and the Vocal Embeds they wield.
Once, you were a Trumpet. A living symbol of the God-Machine’s authority, you shaped minds to its design. On some missions you took on mortal shape and whispered in the ears of humanity, on others you manifested in all your angelic glory and burned commandments into their minds. You never considered the implication of your missions, until one moment of crisis. You realized that, just as you made humans believe what you told them was truth, the God-Machine did the same to you.
Then you Fell, and now you define what truth is.
<Click here for the Messsenger Incarnation and sample Embeds>
Great stuff! Messengers sound super cool, and their paradigm of information is quite fascinating. I’m getting ideas already. 🙂
One of the Embeds, Common Misconception, was slightly confusing to me. I get the basic idea of what it’s about, and what it does mechanically, but it wasn’t clear how one gets from the former to the latter. Does the Demon mention a “fact” and this disrupts the target’s ability to perform a task somehow, as they have to cope with cognitive dissonance?
Yep. Works better, I think, on Mental or Social actions (someone is trying to think of something or explain something, and the demon comes in which “Actually, it turns out that in Seattle during 60s, pants were outlawed due to a weird quirk in the law…”). Could work on Physical actions, if you’re quick (someone’s, like, climbing a tree, and you say “Hey, careful. That species of tree is prone to limbs breaking if more than 100lbs of pressure…” crack).
The impression I got is that it works by exploiting flaws in psychology or perhaps metalinguistics or meme theory.
What makes certain incorrect facts like “10% of our brains” so convincing?
The demon knows and uses them as a weapon to sow doubt.
Guy: “The law is great!”
Demon: “Did you know “
Awesome, thank you for the preview! My anticipation grows.
I was a little apprehensive about Mummy and very much against Demon at first. But after reading Mummy’s finished product (just bits and pieces) and the little that there is on Demon I am digging it actually. Demon is sounding more and more like a really great concept for a game.
My hope is for MES LARP that Demon will be sanctioned as RST or NST NPC’s at the very least and able to cut across venue lines. Also that some of the God Machine material will be incorporated into the current LARP.
This Is great. I’m more and more excited for this game. Also? I love that Prometheans are joining the Big Three in the stereotype section. Is that…SIGNIFICANT? 😉
Nah. For numerological / space reasons, I wanted to do four “those other guys” per Incarnation. The other Incarnations have different ones – Psychopomps opine on Vampires, Werewolves, Mages, and Sin-Eaters, for example.
Oooh, I thought that might be it! I did that with a Mage fight once. Obrimos fought the Promethean, Acanthus the Changeling, Thyrsus the Werewolf, etc. Cool idea, Dave.
I suggest adding “technophobic surveillance expert” to the concepts section. A reference to The Conversation[1]. A film that hinges on in-depth analysis of one fragment of conversation seems right up the Trumpet’s alley.
Technophobia also fits. “You can’t use radio, think of all that information leaking out into the world! Analogue tapes, and only ever move them by hand”
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conversation
Looks really great, thanks for the preview. Also, I have a question, why there’s no changeling in the stereotypes?
Other than the “big three”, only one other splat is getting covered in each Incarnation writeup, one that they deem to have the most thematic resonance with the Incarnation in question. IIRC, that is Prometheans for Messengers, Mummies for Guardians, Sin-Eaters for Psychopomps, and… I *think* it was Hunters for Destroyers… IIRC, anyway.
So, what you’re telling me is that either Demons don’t KNOW about Changelings or CARE about Changelings.
Not at all. Each Incarnation has one stereotype beyond the “big three.” If a type of monster isn’t referenced, it doesn’t mean that the Incarnation can’t know about them.
Likewise, the presence of stereotypes shouldn’t be taken to mean that demons automatically have a lot of intelligence on the other denizens of the World of Darkness. There are probably Messengers who have no idea what a Promethean is. These are stereotypes that someone with some knowledge might hold, not inherent information available to all Unchained.
I’m a little curious as to how long Borrowed Expertise is supposed to last. The Success section says it’s a single action (which can be an extended roll and thus that single action takes a while). But the Exceptional Success result implies a longer duration but doesn’t say outright what that duration is.
I’d like to know the answer to this one too.
“You realized that, just as you made humans believe what you told them was truth, the God-Machine did the same to you. Then you Fell, and now you define what truth is.”
Um … does this apply to ALL Messangers? I had assumed one’s Fall was a unique characterisation/motivation thing.
Read the rest. You’re just looking at flavor text there. Later in the document you can see a myriad of ways to fall.
Huh, you’re right. Guess it’s probably a leftover from an older draft if it’s contradicted in the section on Falling.
The summary at the top provides a generalized perspective on the Incarnation. The text below breaks it down into more specific cases. This is the usual pattern for splat writeups: a big concept up front, variations later.
And, of course, the catalysts presented here are not the only ones.
I don’t know what “knurd” means.
You can’t deliberately fail a roll to take advantage of the DF effects. This is because you, as the player, might know the system, but the character does not, and is trying to do A. If you’re trying to do A, you’re not trying to do B.
(That said, if ever there was a game where you could get meta enough to screw with that assumption, it’s Demon.)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/16/amnesia-speaking-swedish-palm-springs
Thought this might be relevance to share.
Aw, I’m disappointed there’s nothing on Changelings in the “Stereotypes” section.
The rest sounds great, though!
There is in one of them, but I forget which one offhand.