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Chaosium Digest Volume 12 Number 06
Chaosium Digest Volume 12, Number 6
Date: Sunday, December 10, 1995
Number: 1 of 1
Contents:
What Makes a Good Bad-Guy? (Ian Young) NEPHILIM
Editor's Note:
Included this week in the Digest is an essay on Nephilim that was
originally presented over on the Nephilim ML.
Shannon
NEW (FRENCH) RELEASES:
As usual, French Chaosium info is courtesy of Frederic Moll
(100350.1766@compuserve.com). I have very little info on
Chaosium-licensed products in countries besides the US, and so welcome
information on these areas from all Digest subscribers.
* Nephilim - _Le Livre Noir_ (Multisim) is a new supplement for the
Multisim Nephilim that provides information on Selinim magic. It
should be available within the week.
* Pendragon - _Au dela du Mur_ (Oriflam, 144 francs, ISBN
#2-906897-65-5) is the French translation of _Beyond the Wall_. It
is nearly identical to the original, except that rivers are missing
from the map, and the PC sheet is missing from the book. This brings
the French edition of Pendragon nearly up to date with the American
edition; the only supplements not yet translated are _Pagan Shores_
and the announced _Land of Giants_.
Forthcoming French releases include _Le Roi Arthur_ (Multisim), a
supplement on King Arthur for Nephilim, and _the Elric! GM Screen_
(Oriflam).
(FRENCH) MAGAZINE SIGHTINGS:
* Credo! - A short test of the French edition of Credo!, which was
released by Multisim a few months ago, Casus Belli #90
* Nephilim - A review of the entire French Nephilim line, including a
few notes on the American edition, Casus Belli #90
BOOKS TO LOOK FOR:
In picking up December's Locus magazine, I discovered a huge array of
books of interest to this Digest, that will be released in the next
year. For that reason, I've created this new feature, which will
occasionally list forthcoming books related to Chaosium's RPG games.
One Caveat: I have no idea what some of these books are, but the title
or author lead me to believe that they might be related to the game
I've noted.
* Call of Cthulhu - _The Dunwich Cycle_ (Cthulhu Cycle #8), edited by
Robert M. Price, pub. by Chaosium, DEC95; _Disciples of Cthulhu_
(Cthulhu Cycle #9?, reprint of the 1976 collection with small mods),
edited by Paul Berglund, pub. by Chaosium, JAN96; _HP Lovecraft_
(reprint of the 1976 biography), HC, by L Sprague de Camp, pub. by
Barnes & Noble, JAN96; _The Mask of Cthulhu_ (reprint of the 1962
collection), by August Derleth, pub. by Carroll & Graf, APR96; _The
New Lovecraft Circle_, edited by Robert M. Price, pub. by Fedogan &
Bremer, APR96; _The Averoigne Chronicles_, by Clark Ashton Smith,
pub. by Donald M. Grant, MAY96; _The Trail of Cthulhu_ (reprint of
the 1962 collection), by August Derleth, pub. by Carroll & Graf,
JUN96
* Elric! - _The Eternal Champion #6: The Roads Between The Worlds_, by
Michael Moorcock, pub. by White Wolf, AUG96
* Nephilim - _X-Files: Goblin/Whirlwind_, OM TP, by Charles L. Grant,
pub. by BOMC/QPBC, DEC95; _The X-Files #4_, pub. by Harperprism,
MAY96
* Pendragon - _Merlin's Harp_, HC, by Anne Elliot Crompton, pub. by
Donald I. Fine, DEC95; _The Skystone_ (a new historical Arthur
novel), HC, by Jack Whyte, pub. by Forge, DEC95
* Ringworld - _The Ringworld Throne_, HC, by Larry Niven, pub. by
Ballantine Del Rey, AUG96
NEW ELECTRONIC RESOURCES:
Updated NecroPress Archives
ftp://ftp.csua.berkeley.edu/pub/cthulhu/necropress/
A few weeks ago, some new catalogs were added to the Necronomicon
Press archives maintained on ftp.csua.berkeley.edu. They list many new
products of interest to CoC enthusiasts.
--------------------
From: Brilliant Mistake <idyoung@az.com>
Subject: What Makes a Good Bad-Guy?
System: Nephilim
What Makes a Good Bad-Guy?
------------------------------------------------------------
So you're preparing to run the first scenario in your new Nephilim
campaign, and you're trying to devise a suitable threat for your
magic-wielding friends. Do you toss them into a hot-bed of Knights
Templar, all armed with Ka-vision and Orichalka bullets and elixirs
hanging from their utility belts? Well, in a word, no. In comparison,
this would be akin to starting off a Call of Cthulhu campaign by
having the players run into dread Cthulhu himself right off the bat.
Certainly, the Templars are a pervasive force with which to contend,
but their magical resources are strikingly rare commodoties, not to be
squandered on the first supernatural threat to cross their paths.
Furthermore, the Templars can't be everywhere and know everything.
So, you have to ask yourself, how can I make someone a real (and above
all, believable) threat to the Nephilim? To do this, you have to
remember that the real threat to the Nephilim does not come in the
form of magical firepower. The real threat stems from the following:
numerical advantage; organisation; intelligence; and ruthlessness.
NUMBERS
Think about the manpower available to the secret society you wish to
consider. Remember that humans outnumber the Nephilim by an
outstanding advantage. While the secret societies will constitute only
a minute fraction of the overall population, they will still outnumber
the Nephilim by far. On the basis of numbers alone, humans will often
be able to out-maneuver Nephilim. The larger the group and the denser
their population, the more likely it is that they will be able to
identify and track down an intruder in their midst. This is perhaps
the most ready advantage that humans have over the Nephilim.
ORGANIZATION
Anticipate how organized your bad-guys are, for this is one of their
most effective weapons. The supplement on secret socieites identifies
three forms of organisation: the cell; the pyramid; and the lodge.
The cell is the most isolated form of organisation, with very small
groups of operatives working independantly of other cells in their
secret society, and only a single member of each cell has contact with
the cell higher up in the chain of command. The benefits to this
organization are rapid reaction time within a particular cell,
immediate accountability among a very small group, and a tendency for
greater loyalty among the cell. The drawbacks for this organization
are small manpower, slow reaction time between cells, and a tendency
for mistrust between cells.
The pyramid possesses the most established network of organization.
Each member of the group is accountable to a superior within the
group, culminating in a single person or group leading the entire
organization within a readily identified hierarchy. The pyramid
benefits from a unified purpose, co-ordinated action, ease of direct
communication, and the ability to support large scale manpower. It
does, however, suffer from the inertia of co-ordinating large groups
of people, and an inflexibility in altering plans once set in motion.
The lodge is a sort of middle ground between the cell and the pyramid,
where cell-like groups are created for a specific purpose, and
organized on a larger scale in a hierarchy with other similar cell
units. The lodge offers the manageability of smaller units of
membership, with the grander purpose of large-scale organization. The
benefits and flaws of such an organization will depend upon the
specific situation (i.e. the make-up of the membership, the scale of
organization, the goals of the lodge, etc) and will typically be a mix
of those involved in both the cell and the pyramid.
The real purpose of organization is to achieve a specefic goal. When
you are designing a scenario, try to anticipate how easily you want
your bad-guys to organize themselves, and how easily they can achieve
their goals. A group of Nephilim facing a cell-group of Black Star
initiates will have to contend with, at best, two or three people with
very individualized goals and high magical competency, presenting a
very concentrated source of conflict. When facing a group like the
Knights Templar, the Nephilim are dealing with a diffuse organization
of dozens, perhaps hundreds, of members, at the ready with a unified
purpose and rigid hierarchy of orders, but typically of a lower order
of power than the Black Star. Each scenario presents a unique form of
threat. Be sure that you know how your players may utilize gaps or
breakdowns in their foes' organization to their advantage, and how
secret societies may best utilize their own strengths in their pursuit
of the Nephilim.
INTELLIGENCE
Almost by definition, secret societies have to be clever. Somehow they
have to keep up on the latest developments in the world of politics
and the occult, staying one step ahead of the general populace, or
they won't remain secret for very long; and if they don't remain
secret, they are likely to have an un-surprisingly brief life-span.
Secret societies can't gather such information without intelligence,
cleverness, planning, conniving, and just plain foresight. A very
important consideration for the gamemaster is to decide just how much
a given conspiracy actually knows, and how they managed to gather such
information. If the gamemaster has a good idea of what a secret
society knows, then she is forearmed to deal with the impromptu
innovations of the players.
First, what do they know? The answer to this question will depend upon
the nature of the secret society at hand. Returning to the comparison
of the Black Star with the Knights Templar, we can see a profound
difference. The Black Star is a society dedicated to the annihilation
of the Nephilim through magical means. As such, they are privy to a
vast wealth of magical knowledge, but their organization is limited in
both scope and scale. Temporal politics have seldom been the interest
of the Black Star, nor has the latest technological development, so
they aren't likely to have the most comprehensive grasp of information
outside the sphere of the occult. The Templars, on the other hand,
have taken a constant, active interest in the politics of mankind, and
as such, they keep a finger on the pulse of current events as a matter
of course. Certainly, the Templars possess great magical might as
well, but being a more diverse organization, they are far less likely
to be the innovators of such matters and possess less knowledge of
magic than specialised conspiracies. The gamemaster needs to decide,
on a case-by-case basis, how specialised or generalised the sphere of
knowledge of each secret society is, and then decide specifically what
the contents of that sphere of knowledge is likely to be.
The next question is, how do they know it? There are two basic sources
for gathering information: public record and espionage. Gathering
information from the public record takes any of a number of obvious
forms, while espionage can be broken down into three forms of
activity: coercion; intrusion; and the mole. Coercion is the most
blatant form of espionage, where a knowledgeable target is compelled
to divulge information under threat of harm to person or property
(whether to the person, family, friends, etc.), or blackmail, then
subsequently compelled to secrecy through similar threats, or possibly
even killed outright. Intrusion is the stuff of classic spy novels and
movies: a specialised agent is inserted into an organization's
stronghold to retrieve sensitive documents, or to plant monitoring
devices that will allow the later gathering of information at leisure.
In recent years, this form of spying has taken on far more subtle hues
with the advent of computer hacking. The mole is possibly the most
common form of spying, where an agent is secretly planted within an
organization and given the task of recording and relaying
consequential information that happens to come their way. The mole is
quiet and un-obtrusive in order to avoid detection and promote a long
career of information gathering, but on certain occasions, a mole
might be "activated" to perform a much more active and high-profile
role in the spying echelon.
So, the gamemaster should put some forethought into how a secret
society in question has found out what they know. All of them have
access to the public record, and so will devote a certain amount of
their resources to scouring the media and public files for anything of
interest or value. However, how much access to strong-arm techniques,
or technological finesse, or planting moles will a secret society
have? Will a secret society be philosophically dis-inclined to use a
particular form of espionage? Is certain information available through
one form of gathering, but not another? Bear in mind that secret
societies don't know everything, and they don't have access to all
information (regardless of what they would LIKE you to believe).
Sometimes an ignorant Templar is even more fun, and more dangerous,
than one who has a comprehensive grasp of the entire situation, by
virtue of his mis-understandings. Above all, unless you have a
specific purpose in mind for creating a bungling secret society
operative, remember to play your bad-guys smart. They didn't become
the threat they are by being, or hiring, incompetent boobs. Try to
have your bad-guys out-think your players, but be certain to limit the
extent of their available knowledge realistically.
RUTHLESSNESS
One of my favorite lines from the recent movie "The Usual Suspects",
was when one character was describing the semi-mythical criminal
mastermind, Kaisar Soze: "You see... what these guys realized was that
to have power, you didn't need guns. You didn't need money. What you
needed was the will to do whatever the other guy won't." That sums up
the definition of ruthlessness very neatly. Ask yourself, what is a
secret society willing to do in order to achieve their goals? To what
length will they pursue their mission? To what extent will they
utilize the resources available at their command? Likewise, ask
yourself to what extent you, as a gamemaster, are willing to create a
truly deadly threat to your Nephilim group; after all, a group of dead
Nephilim is hardly any fun to play. Again, the answers to these
questions will depend upon the nature of the cospiracy in question.
Using the Black Star and the Templars as an example, we are likely to
find that both organizations are similarly ruthless and willing to go
to virtually any length to succeed in their goals. In contrast, groups
like the Rosicrucians are devoted to more peaceful (or perhaps simply
less destructive) pursuits, and far less likely to go on a
destructive, killing rampage in order to win out in the end.
THE USE OF MAGICAL RESOURCES
Perhaps this is a good place to discuss the use of magical resources
such as elixirs, homunculi and Orichalka. First off, bear in mind that
these are rare resources for any secret society. They aren't going to
be dusted off and put to test in the field unless your group of
Nephilim have proven themselves to be such a serious threat that they
truly warrant this kind of response. Few, if indeed any, of the secret
societies are so very wealthy in terms of magic that they can afford
to utilize these resources as a first line of defense, or offense for
that matter. No standard-issue Orichalka-bullet clips and Orichalka
survival knives or armor, nor Orichalka wiring in their laptops; no
bandolieras rattling with dozens of elixirs; and no Ka-awakening as a
standard indoctrination practice. Strive to keep the magic from
becoming so common-place as to be no surprise when your players
encounter it. First off, your secret societies shouldn't have to rely
upon magic to be a threat. Secondly, when your players see magic being
fielded against them, it should be at the climax of an adventure, and
they should be keenly aware that they are in far more danger than they
have yet faced.
The old adage of "less is more" seems to apply well here. Making magic
common-place, to have every adversary running about with an arsenal of
magic at his disposal reduces the situation to the absurd, where a
tempermental five-year-old swinging an Orichalka teddy bear is as much
a threat to a Nephilim as a Templar with an Orichalka sword. Bear in
mind the ritual nature of magic as well, and try to avoid trivialising
magic by incorporating it into common-place or throw-away items like
bullets, or survival knives, or wiring for computers. If a secret
society is going to invest so much of their resources into creating an
object of magical power, it should be an object of importance, of
recognition, of value, even of reverence. Magic should be a source of
awe in your game, particularly for humans, who can not directly
produce or manipulate it themselves. The moment you can imagine the
members of your secret society not batting an eyelash at an elixir, or
a homunculus, or an Orichalka weapon, you know that something
important is missing.
IN SUMMARY
In summary, work to make your bad-guys realistic adversaries.
Anticipate how they think, how much they can know and how they know
it; figure out how they protect themselves and their strategies and
tactics for attacking; be aware of what resources and manpower they
have available in any given scenario; remember to start with the more
common and less powerful threat first, then build up to rarer and more
dangerous threats as the campaign progresses. Above all, make your
human adversaries... and allies... believeable, and powers to be
contended with, within the means of their resources.
--------------------
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