Nightbane Personal Canon

For the discussion of Nightbane™ and its supplements.

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Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by blackwingedheaven »

So Nightbane is a great setting, I'm pretty sure we can all agree on that. But there are definitely parts of it that are unpolished and rough, or even outright bad. "The NSB really stands for Nightlords Society of Blood!" is a lurid bit of nonsense that doesn't contribute anything to the setting and actually makes it seem goofier, so I never use it.

My question is this then: What in Nightbane do you change when you run the setting? (Or what would you change if you've never gotten to run it?)

First of all, I call them "Nightspawn" instead of "Nightbane." It just sounds better.

Besides the NSB thing, I don't use the Nocturnes as written. In my campaign, they're an old Nightspawn faction dedicated to exploring the Nightspawn condition and becoming transhuman monsters. They eschew human morality in favor of building their own ideals and beliefs. Their faction is composed mostly of older Nightspawn, but any once-human supernatural creature can join them if they have something to contribute, so they allow in vampires and wampyrs as well. Also, I tend to call wampyrs "dhampirs" instead to avoid confusion, and my vampires are more traditional instead of Palladium's "rain hurts us" vamps.

So what's your personal canon?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

blackwingedheaven wrote:I call them "Nightspawn" instead of "Nightbane."
-spawn is a good suffix for the race. -bane is a good suffix for the good -spawn who fight the Squires/Princes/Princesses/Lords.

We need another suffix for the dumb ones who follow the Lords who will ultimately sell them out and kill them then. Nightdupes?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by MurderCityDisciple »

blackwingedheaven wrote:So Nightbane is a great setting, I'm pretty sure we can all agree on that. But there are definitely parts of it that are unpolished and rough, or even outright bad. "The NSB really stands for Nightlords Society of Blood!" is a lurid bit of nonsense that doesn't contribute anything to the setting and actually makes it seem goofier, so I never use it.

My question is this then: What in Nightbane do you change when you run the setting? (Or what would you change if you've never gotten to run it?)

First of all, I call them "Nightspawn" instead of "Nightbane." It just sounds better.

Besides the NSB thing, I don't use the Nocturnes as written. In my campaign, they're an old Nightspawn faction dedicated to exploring the Nightspawn condition and becoming transhuman monsters. They eschew human morality in favor of building their own ideals and beliefs. Their faction is composed mostly of older Nightspawn, but any once-human supernatural creature can join them if they have something to contribute, so they allow in vampires and wampyrs as well. Also, I tend to call wampyrs "dhampirs" instead to avoid confusion, and my vampires are more traditional instead of Palladium's "rain hurts us" vamps.

So what's your personal canon?


I also changed my vampires a bit...more biological than supernatural, though still supernatural. Using the rules from Rifter #49 makes them a hell of a lot more interesting and unique.

The one ideal I try to run with as far as my game is each different creature/race(?) has it's own unique biological drive. The Nightlords have their drives, vamps, Spawn/Bane have theirs. It's supernatural Darwinism at it's best. I run my NPC's with this in mind.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Nekira Sudacne »

I'll bite, what's a bane's biological drive?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

To change shapes? To dump their dark liquids into the Mirrorwall? To get their Club Freak on?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by drewkitty ~..~ »

From reading the OP, The question asked is "How have you changed things from canon?"

For me NB are the wraths of the formless ones, Foundling (Which are mistaken in today's society as orphans.) and follow the canon in the books.

And NightSpawn is a race, that ignores all stupid Rifts Munchkin pandering text in the RDC and other places.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

blackwingedheaven wrote:"The NSB really stands for Nightlords Society of Blood!" is a lurid bit of nonsense
Is this in the newest book? Don't recall from the first 5.

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:NB are the wraths of the formless ones, Foundling (Which are mistaken in today's society as orphans.) and follow the canon in the books.
Wraths? Wraiths? Not sure what this means. I think when the books calls them orphans they mean in the sense of not having any known human parents and being perceived by human society in this way.

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:NightSpawn is a race, that ignores all stupid Rifts Munchkin pandering text in the RDC and other places.
Not sure I understand what is Munchkin-pandering about the DC change to being an antibody to supernatural evil. I agree it conflicts with the NB books and is pretty lame by comparison to the rich origins, but what makes it munchkiny?

Is any race or class really munchkin, or is this an outlook of a player which can apply to any class?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by drewkitty ~..~ »

Tor wrote:
drewkitty ~..~ wrote:NB are the wraths of the formless ones, Foundling (Which are mistaken in today's society as orphans.) and follow the canon in the books.
Wraths? Wraiths? Not sure what this means. I think when the books calls them orphans they mean in the sense of not having any known human parents and being perceived by human society in this way.

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:NightSpawn is a race, that ignores all stupid Rifts Munchkin pandering text in the RDC and other places.
Not sure I understand what is Munchkin-pandering about the DC change to being an antibody to supernatural evil. I agree it conflicts with the NB books and is pretty lame by comparison to the rich origins, but what makes it munchkiny?

Is any race or class really munchkin, or is this an outlook of a player which can apply to any class?

This topic is about our game differ from strict canon. So Duh I'm going to post things that aren't strictly canon. :roll:
---------
Wraiths of the formless ones. This is taken from posts from C.J. Carella about the concepts behind his writing.

Foundlings: children found somewhere w/o parents. In a modern society where kids just found w/o parents and none coming forward to claim them would be considered Jane/John Doe orphans.

NB...being foundlings, are children (manifesting as babies to Toddlers) that are found "somewhere" and put into orphanages. Then they are adopted or not depending on fate.
----

As in there are perfectly non-munchkin Rifts conversions from NB/NS in their main book and NB:BTS. KS just have to pander to rifts munchkins in RDC.
As in based in the fact that the Facade is not Supernatural 1) the facade is not MDC 2) the facade does not bio-regen. 3) the facade does not read as SN.

Note: I used the term munchkin correctly.
Last edited by drewkitty ~..~ on Sun Dec 29, 2013 11:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by eliakon »

The largest change I did was to alter how Shadow Warlocks work.
At each level (including first) I let them select a talent, one incantation spell of their level, AND one shadow spell (LoB, shadow slide, any others in the campain). They can only take a spell from levels 1-5 untill they are level 6, then its their level or lower.
I also allow races/classes that gain magic/psionics/talents/whatever intuitivly at level up to save that. So you dont have to pick as soon as you reach level 2 or what have you, instead you can pick when you have 'a great need' eg, when you want to do something that you dont have the power to do. THEN you pick/manifest the ability to do what you want. I have found personaly this works well. People tend to have selections not of 'the most kewl powerz' but of things they need/use.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:Wraiths of the formless ones. This is taken from posts from C.J. Carella about the concepts behind his writing.
So like their ghosts, after they die? Like a reincarnation?

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:Foundlings: children found somewhere w/o parents. In a modern society where kids just found w/o parents and none coming forward to claim them would be considered Jane/John Doe orphans.

NB...being foundlings, are children (manifesting as babies to Toddlers) that are found "somewhere" and put into orphanages. Then they are adopted or not depending on fate.
Thanks that explains it. So foundlings are a form of orphan (parentless person) with absentia living parents... do we have a term for orphans with dead ones? Or who never had parents (like many gods)?

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:there are perfectly non-munchkin Rifts conversions from NB/NS in their main book and NB:BTS
Assuming this means the vampires... not sure about BTS tho.

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:KS just have to pander to rifts munchkins in RDC. As in based in the fact that the Facade is not Supernatural 1) the facade is not MDC 2) the facade does not bio-regen. 3) the facade does not read as SN.
One might call that power creep rather than munchkin. We've had big MDC things from the get-go in Rifts (Dragons) so the tendency of more and more races to be MDC is moreso just the MDC creep than munchkin.

drewkitty ~..~ wrote:I used the term munchkin correctly.
Perhaps it's become broader over time? Really thought it was just player-based. To me, being a munchkin is like being a troll, in that it's entirely about one's intentions and beliefs moreso than behaviour or choice.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

Well, Banes have always been MDC in RIfts. Whatshername was a nightbane in that one world book,(federation of magic?).
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by drewkitty ~..~ »

Sir_Spirit wrote:Well, Banes have always been MDC in RIfts. Whatshername was a nightbane in that one world book,(federation of magic?).

Correction, NB have always been MDC while in their morphus when in rifts.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

I don't recall there being a Nightbane in Federation of Magic. If there were any present in one of the Rifts World Books it must be one I don't own yet...
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Jedrious »

Tor wrote:I don't recall there being a Nightbane in Federation of Magic. If there were any present in one of the Rifts World Books it must be one I don't own yet...

There's one in Juicer Uprising
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Guy_LeDouche »

Jedrious wrote:
Tor wrote:I don't recall there being a Nightbane in Federation of Magic. If there were any present in one of the Rifts World Books it must be one I don't own yet...

There's one in Juicer Uprising



There are? In either? :eek:
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Jedrious »

Guy_LeDouche wrote:
Jedrious wrote:
Tor wrote:I don't recall there being a Nightbane in Federation of Magic. If there were any present in one of the Rifts World Books it must be one I don't own yet...

There's one in Juicer Uprising



There are? In either? :eek:

Yolanda, one of the leaders of the Magickal Guild is a Lvl 15 NB Sorcerer, pg 108 of JU
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Prince Cherico »

I always add heros unlimited aspects to the game.
Banes are tougher then most but a skilled super can handle themselves just fine.
Svartalf- if Cherico were a character created in a point game system, he'd have all his scores in geeky skills and his youtube and weird net stuff schticks all paid through a a Terminal Bad Luck (with more nasty GM intervention) disadvantage, and probably an Uncouth (can not have social skills) disad as well...
In an RPG with deadly situations that character would have had to be replaced a dozen times over[
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

Jedrious wrote:Yolanda, one of the leaders of the Magickal Guild is a Lvl 15 NB Sorcerer, pg 108 of JU
Gotta love Carella's own-work-referencing easter eggs. They help tie the Megaverse together.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

Tor wrote:
Jedrious wrote:Yolanda, one of the leaders of the Magickal Guild is a Lvl 15 NB Sorcerer, pg 108 of JU
Gotta love Carella's own-work-referencing easter eggs. They help tie the Megaverse together.

Right, I meant Yolanda from Juicer Uprising.
She's rumored to predate the Coming of the Rifts and have a tiger Morphus IIRC.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Alrik Vas »

Uh...isn't it proper to have the facade be totally normal, even in Rifts?

Regardless, I don't change much. Aside make morphus' way cooler looking at all times instead of randomly silly as hell, more like I let people decide what it should look like, with me giving some input based on their character design.

Also, vampires are much cooler and make slightly more sense.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

blackwingedheaven wrote:So Nightbane is a great setting, I'm pretty sure we can all agree on that. But there are definitely parts of it that are unpolished and rough, or even outright bad. "The NSB really stands for Nightlords Society of Blood!" is a lurid bit of nonsense that doesn't contribute anything to the setting and actually makes it seem goofier, so I never use it.


Hmm, I always assumed that was just a bit of black humor among the Nightlords/their minions, rather than a serious title.

My question is this then: What in Nightbane do you change when you run the setting? (Or what would you change if you've never gotten to run it?)


I like the idea that Shadows of Light was written from the perspective of the Nocturnes, I also focus on the Nocturnes being mostly undead, or blood dolls.

Besides the NSB thing, I don't use the Nocturnes as written
.
Me either...
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

Sir_Spirit wrote:Yolanda's rumored to predate the Coming of the Rifts and have a tiger Morphus IIRC.
Interesting, I don't remember that, will
Doesn't specify a tiger, just a thorny feline. I missed that part, was adjacent on pg 109 *marks up his book some more*

It's not so much rumour as she claims to have been around when the Cataclysm hit. I don't want to call her a liar as I'm hoping this catgirl might be some other things besides thorny.

Sir_Spirit wrote:I like the idea that Shadows of Light was written from the perspective of the Nocturnes
Which parts? You mean like that weird background stuff about Moloch and Lilith which seems to contradict their backgrounds from Nightlands a bit? I like that.

Sir_Spirit wrote:I also focus on the Nocturnes being mostly undead, or blood dolls.
Does blood dolls mean people whose only purpose is to stand around and look pretty and get fed on?

I dunno... why couldn't they also have humans and Nightbane in their group? Obviously the leadership is vampire-centered (secondaries and wampyres) but while they might be biased (no worse than Guardians, probably better, I'm guessing) but excluding humans and banes who wanted to work with you would be foolish.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

IRL, Blood dolls were like, Anne rice fans who all wanted hot dudes to suck on their necks?
No offense to any, I assume they are more varied now.
But basically they are people IRL who are willing to let "vampires" feed off them, negating the need for "vampires" to steal/kill their victims if they don't want to.
In the game, they can be humans and even mystics/spellusers/etc.
Having a few appropriately themed nightbanes also makes sense, but if the Nocturnes have too many it just makes the resistance less special(the resistance is where Nigthbane go, unless they want to hide out with the UR).
The nocturnes is where undead blooddrinkers and goths and wannabes go. Sure, you can have this random person end up wherever, but too much mixing kills the idea of factions altogether. This is more from a story telling perspective than a realistic/practical one. But if you are going to have different factions instead of one single antiNightlords group, the I say use them. play up differences etc....

I change the Lightbringers the most, the Bringers of Light have several front religions and philanthropy groups, in addition to having heavily recruiting mages, whom they use to infiltrate most magical brotherhoods/groups.
The nocturnes also have a liaison from the Bringers of Light, who is always a guardian, and who always just happens to stumble upon every Nocturne cell the moment the cell is founded. The liaisons are ALWAYS very polite and friendly. If they happen to stumble upon a vamp feeding on an unwilling victim, that vamp just happens to immediately die, but that's no cause for rudeness or preemptive judgment of the others. Of course, any cell stupid enough to attack the liaison just happens to be wiped out by the Bringers of Light within a single night of such foolishness, so that's generally not done.


As to the bits of the book written by the NOcturnes, I'm mostly referring to the faction parts. They view the seekers as paranoid and hard to find, the Lightbringers as antivampire extremist self righteous ********. Etc...
Last edited by Sir_Spirit on Fri Dec 13, 2013 9:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

Rappanui wrote:Most bane's personal Cannon usually involves a Desert Eagle or a 90mm Sniper rifle.. :)

I don't know why you would attach a desert eagle to a cannon but whatever floats your boat. :D
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Incriptus »

As awkward as it sounds I play down the "NightSpawn" aspect of the game, and emphasize the Human aspect.

As such I'm currently playing with an idea that scales back the success of the dark day. I simply have this bad feeling that the Nightlords have already won. I'm thinking of twisting things so that while the ba'al are in the government, they're not already the president. Perhaps the NSB will be working side by side with the FBI, NSA, DEA instead of absorbing and disbanding them.

Actually as I think about I may want to run Beyond the Supernatural, with a bit of Dark Day thrown in ... Hell, I might want to pretend that I'm running BtS before throwing the players for a loop and having dark day happen.

Sorry turns out I'm just talking to myself at this point...
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

I like to add Nightbane acts to supers games. Having the Alphabet Plot be (apparrantly ?) stopped, but the NSB created in response. They haven't absorbed, replaced every other LEO org yet. They've basically taken the place of the DHS, though the DEO, ATF, Federal Protection Service are gone/absorbed completely. The secret service is withered down to protecting the President and POTUS family members. The FBI is barely holding on but is getting nibbled around the edges(the ATF used to be their's)
The Lightbringers are replaced by the mysterious Bringers of Light, who've infiltrated most mystic brotherhoods and kept the Cults of Night too weak to actually pull off Dark Day.
The Plot was going to supposedly use a drug call Noctutrol, which is grown in the Middle East. So the Alphabet Plot can replace 9/11.
Etc...
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Rallan »

I'd be willing to bet that I'm not the only one who routinely ignores all the Nemesis stuff from TtGD. It's an interesting spin on things, but it massively changes the tone of the whole setting and personally I think it could only work well if you built your entire campaign around the concept.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by DevastationBob »

Tor wrote:
blackwingedheaven wrote:I call them "Nightspawn" instead of "Nightbane."
-spawn is a good suffix for the race. -bane is a good suffix for the good -spawn who fight the Squires/Princes/Princesses/Lords.

We need another suffix for the dumb ones who follow the Lords who will ultimately sell them out and kill them then. Nightdupes?


Nightfinks?
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by drewkitty ~..~ »

Rallan wrote:I'd be willing to bet that I'm not the only one who routinely ignores all the Nemesis stuff from TtGD. It's an interesting spin on things, but it massively changes the tone of the whole setting and personally I think it could only work well if you built your entire campaign around the concept.

yep, you are not the only one. :D
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

Sir_Spirit wrote:basically they are people IRL who are willing to let "vampires" feed off them, negating the need for "vampires" to steal/kill their victims if they don't want to.
This reminds me, didn't Felicia Hardy do something like this for Morbius in the 90s Spider-Man series after she got the Black Cat syrum that enhanced her healing factor?

Sir_Spirit wrote: if the Nocturnes have too many it just makes the resistance less special(the resistance is where Nigthbane go, unless they want to hide out with the UR). The nocturnes is where undead blooddrinkers and goths and wannabes go. Sure, you can have this random person end up wherever, but too much mixing kills the idea of factions altogether.
We could look at the inherent prejudices to figure what factions could be attracted to non-Resistance. With the introduction of Club Freak in Between the Shadows, and how many of their clubs discriminate against Kens/Barbies, and how much influence Club Freak has over the resistance, it could be that the Barbie/Ken outcasts get pushed away to join either Lightbringers/Nocturnes depending on their tastes. That and general personal attitudes towards them.

Resistance has more Nightbane-supreme aims and closer ties to the Underground Railroad, they get all the new recruits. Nocturnes/Lightbringers lack that networking and so wouldn't get as many raws, but might get Resistance/Warlord rejects who disagree with policy or focus.

The moderate Lightbringers you use sound boring. Sure, a lot of them might be like that, but there are all the lighter-than-thou Nutjobs too or else it sucks.

Incriptus wrote:I'm currently playing with an idea that scales back the success of the dark day. I simply have this bad feeling that the Nightlords have already won. I'm thinking of twisting things so that while the ba'al are in the government, they're not already the president. Perhaps the NSB will be working side by side with the FBI, NSA, DEA instead of absorbing and disbanding them.

Sir_Spirit wrote:I like to add Nightbane acts to supers games. Having the Alphabet Plot be (apparrantly ?) stopped, but the NSB created in response. They haven't absorbed, replaced every other LEO org yet.

These sound cool, kind of what Beyond the Supernatural or Chaos Earth was to Rifts?

Rallan wrote:I'd be willing to bet that I'm not the only one who routinely ignores all the Nemesis stuff from TtGD. It's an interesting spin on things, but it massively changes the tone of the whole setting and personally I think it could only work well if you built your entire campaign around the concept.

The Nemesis concept works fine so long as you go by the less extreme "only occasional major figures have them and they could be anyone" type text and not the contradictory "everyone has one" text found alongside it.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by GlitterKnight »

I haven't gotten a chance to run a game yet, but my personal canon drops a lot of the "extra" supernatural races that were in the sourcebooks and the Rifters. No lycanthropes, no Athanatos. Drop the whole Dreamstream and most of the Astral stuff. The Astral exists, and I might tie in some Astral Lords and the silverships of the Guardians (if I ever get around to deciding what they really are...).

I like to keep the canon more strictly to the world put forth in the core rulebook, with the emphasis put strongly on the Nightbane, the Night Lords, and humanity. These are the important elements, and factions that don't reflect those elements most strongly are minimized. As part of the Megaverse, I guess I'd keep vampires as is, in. Partly because they're a core setting component, and I love the Vampire Intelligences. I really need a good backstory for the Guardians, who I've always liked, but kind of felt need to be directed. The mysterious background thing is fine, but as the GM, I don't even know what their deal is so I'm never sure of what do with them. I don't want them just as default "good guys"; Nightbane has always been about the weird fighting the wicked, to me. Nightbane, sorcerers, psychics, Spook Squad soldiers; the last, least hope for mankind standing as the thin grey line between the Night Lords and eternal domination of the Earth.

I'm generally ok with all kinds of options for human characters; magic OCCs and PCCs are all cool with me. Bringing in mystic martial artists is cool too, and artifact wielders are fine. I allow for diverse expressions of human magic and psionics. But I don't like other supernatural races intruding on the setting. The whole gimmick with the Nightbane is a race of beings with unique forms and abilities. Every monster that ever existed should be a Nightbane in his Morphus; dragons, demons, gods, werewolves, vampires, zombies, golems. Any story with a grain of truth has a Nightbane behind the curtain. A vampire-like Nightbane and an actual vampire step on each other's toes; I guess one can be a "fake" vampire and the other a "real" vampire, but it erodes the sense of the Nightbane as the "monsters" of the setting. They should be the "monsters" from humanity's stories, when in reality, they are the guardians who keep the Night Lords at bay.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

I liekthe idea that there are real vampires, but the Nightlords chased them away on darkday. So they are rare, and the ones PC's will encounter are likely to be loners who have to keep a low profile.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by AmberImmortal »

I have difficulty with the athanatos and shadows of light in general. About half of it is just crap with contrived plot and canon and the other half is good but, needs constant editing. I drop ALL the ridiculous p.c.c's in SoL and the vaash ( they simply make no sense). I also ignore the whole reaper/mircala thing entirely.

I use most of the NSG but, ignore certain contradictory statements made by it. Such as the stuff about the FBI and other alphabet soup organizations. Honestly I do a lot of tweaking and changing to the whole series and never even think of using any of the characters or settings in any of the books. I prefer to make it all up myself. I also change names a lot. Particularly of the classes and such.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Tor »

AmberImmortal wrote:I have difficulty with the athanatos and shadows of light in general. About half of it is just crap with contrived plot and canon
I really don't understand the adjective 'contrived' as an insult. As if writing could ever be anything other than a forced conscious choice and not some 'natural' thing. It's a meaningless criticism. If there's a problem with canon or plot, specific criticisms can be made, not elitist hollow buzzterms.

GlitterKnight wrote:Every monster that ever existed should be a Nightbane in his Morphus; dragons, demons, gods, werewolves, vampires, zombies, golems. Any story with a grain of truth has a Nightbane behind the curtain. A vampire-like Nightbane and an actual vampire step on each other's toes; I guess one can be a "fake" vampire and the other a "real" vampire, but it erodes the sense of the Nightbane as the "monsters" of the setting. They should be the "monsters" from humanity's stories, when in reality, they are the guardians who keep the Night Lords at bay.

I recall in Rifts Main Book that the dragon hatchling writeup initially went on about how all the ancient gods could've been dragons. Then in less than a half decade later, screw that, Pantheons.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Niji »

The Nemsis concept was quite enthraling and very "through the looking glass" kind of feel.

What is the darker and more sinister counter part to an already heinous villain?

I add a lot of HU, BTS, NS and some minor rifts stuff(flavor/occs/other).
To flesh out some details and add more thematic light to villainous intentions.

I have yet to find a way to incorporate the Dreamstream despite it being the most interesting thing to come from palladium books. Seems to big for it to be anything other than the major plot.

Often nightbane earth is the Pre-Rifts earth and the real cause of the events was the (attempted?)destruction of the night lords. BETTER TO START OVER THAN TO BE RULED. Type background theme/plot. Which helps explain the Nightlords absence in Rifts.

A bunch of nukes really couldn't release that much raw power... (Attempt) killing a few hundred alien intelligences enmass via chain reaction though and dimensional shuntering mixed in... Humina Humina!

Makes a good Segway into my overly detailed Rifts and AU campaigns >.> depending on how the players go.


I am not a killer GM and to boot I have the worse rolls imaginable to the point of statistically improbably(every session!) so that's of great help to the players when I roll a 1 on having a night lord dodge and actually dodge then INTO their attacks >.>

The dice really make for crazy fun plot churning gremlins!

Getting bad rolls as GM(or a player!) is very entertaining in the Thriller/Horror sense in nightbane more than any other setting(except call of Cthulhu!).

So to sum up, I like any creative person deviate heavily from the book canon, the canon is a GREAT jumping off point and brainstorming machine, but if you are GMing and following the cannon as is... You are just doing it wrong/lack the time and creative "energy" to be a sucessful GM.

Asking/reading about other's canon is not ideal, as it stifles your own creativity IF what you read doesn't inspire you!


Also:
Nightmooks

And I assumed this threat was about the Personal Cannon Morphus trait xD
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Nytemare Rhosyn »

in my personal cannon the nightlords only took over part of the world on dark day an secret organizations are fighting back to keep their homes safe. Texas rejoined mexico an is under nightlord control same for south america, half of Russia is under control other half is free. china completely controlled. japan is free, usa is at war with its self in the shadows. Canada was protected by an athusa that woke up to be a guardian.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Nytemare Rhosyn »

but biggest change i added was fact that 30% to 40% of the world now knows theres things that go bump in the night. an monsters exist. The party i run with are part of diff organizations all forced to work togther. fight the evil monsters save the good ones an ask em for help.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Borast »

Vampires are the biggest thing I change... Showers and rain no longer hurt them is the biggest change.

If you want to use a real world "European" vampire, sunlight merely paralyses them, crossroads confuse them, they all have a compulsion (one was known to return at night to make/repair shoes in his shop after his first death), those born on a certain day can order them to perform a deed, can not enter a place without an invitation (implied or expressly made - which means that they can enter any "public" space, like a bar/hotel/etc).

I also have made damaged weapons hazardous to their user...I had a group that LOVED it, since they saw a handful of bandits and others vapourised when the e-clip released ALL if it's energy in an explosion...until one of the PCs did it with his Firebreather and a full e-clip. :oops:

I cross-pollinate... My Rifts setting also has a small number of transplanted RDF.
I use the burst rules for all modern weapons, including lasers and plasma weapons. ;) (Some of my groups go through e-clips like a drunk on a bender.)

I refuse to use the 2nd edition Ancient Master from HU. (And it has nothing to do with the 1st edition AM - and a minor psychic to boot - I have living in Lazlo...)
CHI and PPE are NOT the same thing.

I have blast damage effect ALL parts of an object in the blast radius (the above noted group had a GB that lost it's hands, and therefor could not fire it'd boom gun, to a medium missile explosion.)

I *ignore* listed ranges for some weapons on space ships and such...an anti-planet/anti-city weapon with a TEN mile (in atmosphere) range!!! If humans can live on it, the atmosphere is more than 100 MILES thick! :eek:

Off the top of my head, that's the biggest canon ignores on my list. :mrgreen:
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by Sir_Spirit »

Tor wrote:The moderate Lightbringers you use sound boring. Sure, a lot of them might be like that, but there are all the lighter-than-thou Nutjobs too or else it sucks.


Naah, I keep them in eh background and so that they are more Mage the Awakening style org standing behind the orgs that stand behind the orgs that controlling the front organisation.

They aren't boring, you just have to use them right. WhIch admittedly can be tricky. But "holier-than-thou" types are IMO simple"default" guys that most people use because they don't get how to be moral and interesting(I"m trying to be not insulting, but I do look down on people who keep resorting to that sort to thing.). Same thing happens to angels all the time. In my setting they have a set of Precepts for the BoL that includes a regular purging of the holier-than-thou types. However, if you want them, this actually give you a reason to have the arrogant ones show up as "outcasts" of the BoL who join the PC's or PC's groups.
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Re: Nightbane Personal Canon

Unread post by The Beast »

blackwingedheaven wrote:So Nightbane is a great setting, I'm pretty sure we can all agree on that. But there are definitely parts of it that are unpolished and rough, or even outright bad. "The NSB really stands for Nightlords Society of Blood!" is a lurid bit of nonsense that doesn't contribute anything to the setting and actually makes it seem goofier, so I never use it.


:nh: Man was I hoping you were making that up.

It's crap like that that leads me to believe that Kevin is the Lucas of the RPG industry...
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