A hypothetical WoD crossover

[Grinner]

With a couple of notable exceptions, White Wolf's designers tend to be strict about disallowing supernatural crossbreeding. Even the low magic practitioners from Second Sight lose all of their Thaumaturgy merits if they ever become a vampire or something.

This has got me thinking "What if they could crossbreed?". What if Sin Eaters could learn low magic? What if vampires could cut deals with spirits for Gifts? What if normal humans could take on Contracts?

Naturally, there would be limitations. Each character would have a karma meter for every outlook in addition to their primary one. Their primary meter would be the measure of their sanity, but the efficacy of learned abilities would rely upon the relevant meter. If a mortal wanted to be a master of werewolf lore, he'd have to begin improving his Harmony score, perhaps to the detriment of his other meters.

Also worth considering is the nature of their abilities. A werewolf may not be able to pay for using vampire Disciplines using Essence, and the Coils of the Dragon would probably be useless to him. Usage of "non-native" abilities would be entirely dependent on the nature of the ability itself. A Sin Eater might be able to swing a Gift, but anything requiring Glamour is far out his reach. That, of course, could change with certain considerations being made.

Food for thought. :smallsmile:

[CarpeGuitarrem]

They tried it.

It was called Samuel Haight, and I know him only through rumor.

[comicshorse]

They tried it.

It was called Samuel Haight, and I know him only through rumor.

'Shudders' :smalleek:

[Mephisto]

I'm pretty sure you can keep Thaumaturgy merits or at least cash them in for more XP towards thematically related powers.

For learning out-of-type powers, there are a few systems in Mirrors. One is pretty similar to Proximus blessings from Mage: you learn a power as though it was a Merit with a dot rank one higher than actual, you only use the appropriate Attribute + Skill for dice pool, and you suffer a few points of bashing damage with each use. So one could learn The Forgetful Mind (Dominate 3) at the cost of a 4-dot merit, but would only roll Wits + Persuasion - Resolve, and wouldn't get the 1-dot and 2-dot powers as a Vampire with Dominate 3 would. I rather like this idea, but I think a little bashing damage isn't enough of a cost for abilities that would normally use some "fuel", so maybe have powers with a cost also cost Willpower or lethal health. This would make Contracts more useful, since they all have Catches to get around the cost.

The other system is sorta Call of Cthulhu-lite and meant only for mortals. Characters have a Reason stat. Learning powers lowers Reason, and using them causes Insanity (or Stress or whatever, I forget what it's called) to build up, and having Insanity exceed a threshold also reduces Reason. This system I'm sorta meh about.

[hiryuu]

There's also the Dark Hero template, which is pretty cool and I want to see expanded a little more, with a supernatural power source (maybe Conviction?) added in.

I have thought about trying this once, but I actually kind of like each supernatural being forced into a theme, since I prefer magic that reacts in accordance with your character type and metaphysics (I love the hell out of Classic Deadlands for this very reason).

You may want to look out for horrible combinations of pain, such as Werewolves learning physical Vampire Disciplines, Mages grabbing Promethean powers (or other powers that let them do what they do cheaper), or anyone at all grabbing Sin-Eater powers, otherwise, look at the Hunter: the Vigil books and consider letting people buy the generic monster powers out of there. You'd end up with a sort of dark superheroes setting that's likely really awesome.

[Mewtarthio]

There's also the Dark Hero template, which is pretty cool and I want to see expanded a little more, with a supernatural power source (Conviction?) added in.

The Dark Hero powerstat is Arete. Conviction is something else entirely (also from Mirrors, a sort of pseudo-powerstat for mortals that enhances Willpower).

I kind of wonder just how extreme you can make the Dark Hero. Particularly if you let them take Merit-Based Spells and Spell Masteries.

[hiryuu]

The Dark Hero powerstat is Arete. Conviction is something else entirely (also from Mirrors, a sort of pseudo-powerstat for mortals that enhances Willpower).

I kind of wonder just how extreme you can make the Dark Hero. Particularly if you let them take Merit-Based Spells and Spell Masteries.

Yes, I am aware that the power stat is Arete, I had it open right then. I was talking about adding a form of power source, the juice, to use other than Willpower and threw "Conviction" out there as an idea for what to name it. You know, Vampire: Potency, Vitae. Sin-Eater: Psyche, Plasm. Dark hero? Arete, Conviction maybe.

You could probably have the "clan" form of the splat be one of the five Jungian archetypes, Trickster, Senex, Hero, Mother, Child. Or something else. There's a lot of material, but I really want to steal Talecrafting from Changelings, you know? Riding the wave of your myth as you perceive it, knowing where the hooks are and following them to their source.

[CN the Logos]

One especially silly consequence of the "no template-mixing EVAR" rule is the Immortals errata stating that Eternals (immortals whose lives are tied to objects, e.g. Koschei, Dorian Grey, Voldemort) can't know any other sort of magic. Apparently they missed the memo that Koschei the Deathless, ur-example of this sort of being in mythology, was known as a powerful wizard in addition to being unkillable. One also wonders how a mortal with no supernatural abilities is meant to tie their soul to an object in the first place, but whatever.

I think splat-mixing could be okay on a case by case basis, depending on what sort of chronicle the ST wants to run. Probably not between the major splats, that'd be silly, but maybe allow each major splat to mix with one of a certain number of compatible minor splats. For example, I've had an idea for a Dhampir Sin-Eater (killed by vampires after failing to cover his tracks while vampire-hunting). Wolf-blooded wouldn't make sense with the Werewolf major template (it'd be "overwritten" by becoming a full werewolf), but a werewolf who used Hermetic ritual magic or a Purified who learned about the Shadow through his wolf-blood might be interesting and probably wouldn't be overpowered. And I personally think that the Eternals, Blood-Bathers, Reapers, and probably Body Thieves should be merits allowing any sort of character not already immortal through supernatural means (i.e. vampires and Prometheans) to become immortal, rather than templates.


The Dark Hero powerstat is Arete. Conviction is something else entirely (also from Mirrors, a sort of pseudo-powerstat for mortals that enhances Willpower).

I kind of wonder just how extreme you can make the Dark Hero. Particularly if you let them take Merit-Based Spells and Spell Masteries.

Well, they obviously can't keep up with the guys who get to edit history like cosmic wiki vandals, but if you're looking for power in combat, the Hero can get pretty silly without even needing magic.

For example, say one of your heroic skills is Firearms (not even a really munchkiny choice, "guy who has legendary skill with ranged weapons" is an archetype dating back to Greek myth at least, not to mention all the gunslinger characters that have been written since actual firearms became decent enough to be considered reliable weapons). Take Powerful Success and Rapidity twice. Congratulations, there are not enough doves in the world for John Woo to do justice to your fight scenes (although they will be short fight scenes, given that that ends up working out to about nine lethal damage on each of your three heavy pistol attacks). God help your enemies if you acquire a rifle. And we haven't even taken bonuses from other sources into account yet. Give this guy Combat Marksmanship and you are officially playing as Roland Deschain.

Also, the template is just called "Hero." "Dark Hero" is just the section header, so we see that it is dark and totally not a superhero template. Everywhere else in that section they just say "hero(es)."


Yes, I am aware that the power stat is Arete, I had it open right then. I was talking about adding a form of power source, the juice, to use other than Willpower and threw "Conviction" out there as an idea for what to name it. You know, Vampire: Potency, Vitae. Sin-Eater: Psyche, Plasm. Dark hero? Arete, Conviction maybe.

You could probably have the "clan" form of the splat be one of the five Jungian archetypes, Trickster, Senex, Hero, Mother, Child. Or something else. There's a lot of material, but I really want to steal Talecrafting from Changelings, you know? Riding the wave of your myth as you perceive it, knowing where the hooks are and following them to their source.

I've considered the idea of doing a hero/demigod/nephilim fansplat using either the Hero or the Purified as a base to expand from. Unfortunately, basing a fansplat on a preexisting official book limits the audience of people who can use it to people who have the original splatbook. It's a shame, because the Hero template has a lot of potential, but I don't know that enough people own Mirrors for there to be interest in an expansion for it. At the same time, it seems like a waste to start from scratch when the base for the splat is already there. :smallsigh:

Since mythological heroes tended to have some sort of divine ancestry, I was thinking of dividing the splat based on the source of their powers; qashmal, demon, spirit, entity of Primordial Chaos/the Abyss, and vampire/Chthonic entity were my initial ideas. I like your idea too though. Honestly, "fairy tales" aside, talecrafting seems more appropriate for beings that inspired legends and were worshiped as gods.