Hunter; the Reckoning question

[Yael]

I have seen what happens when an imbued do obtain its abilities, and she has conviction to avoid losing herself before supernatural creatures, but what happens when a willingly hunter just leaves its cause and becomes something else? Like, a hunter becoming a Skindancer? Do the hunters take cards? Is something like a red list (from the Camarilla) for hunters? Halperino??

[JeenLeen]

To my knowledge (which is having read the core Hunter book and a couple splatbooks, as well as a lot of other oWoD), there are no mechanics set out for it. I think the only exception is that there are some mechanics/fluff-that-impacts-things about hunters becoming thralls for demons. I'm not clear on the details, but I think it turns out really bad for the hunter and incredibly good for the demon.


what happens when a willingly hunter just leaves its cause and becomes something else?
If they just quit, I think they could try to live a mundane life. It might be hard, due to the supernatural (?) 'emotional' pull their Virtues have on them, but doable.


Like, a hunter becoming a Skindancer?
Edit/Addition: I don't think there's an official rule (though I could be wrong); I could see changing into a skindancer making you lose or corrupting your Edges, since you are becoming what you should hunt, but I would see that as the GM's call. I would imagine for all but Visionaries that the idea would be innately repulsive due to their Creed, though.

If I were in a game and a Hunter wanted to do something like become a Skindancer, I would say the ritual to become one fails due to how the Imbuing changed the Hunter, for the same reasons a werewolf cannot Awaken as a mage.
From my understanding of the metaphysics of the soul in oWoD (which are second-hand, and probably contradicted within the lore as oWoD tends to do), there are multiple parts of the soul. Becoming/being one supernatural generally means one has dominance (like the Beast in vampires, or the Avatar in mages) or that you are missing some aspect of your soul (most undead are missing a few.) I'm not sure how becoming a Hunter would change the soul, but it is reasonable that it makes it impossible to be another supernatural at the same time. Since the ritual to be a Skindancer (if I recall correctly) turns you into a werewolf, I can see it failing.
However, maybe not, since you are a 'fake' one; that'll be the GM's call. And stuff like being thralls or ghouls could still give power. You could probably also learn... whatever mortal magic (not what mages use, but what anyone can learn; sorcery?) is.

If other hunters ran into such a hunter (Skindancer, thrall, ghoul, sorcerer, etc.), though, I reckon they would try to kill (or perhaps rehabilitate, depending on Creed) them.


Do the hunters take cards? Is something like a red list (from the Camarilla) for hunters? Halperino??
Not sure what 'cards' or 'Halperino' is, so no answer to that.

If the hunter was active on Hunter.net, I could see a notification about their change getting put on it, assuming they knew other hunters also on Hunter.net. That could lead to a group of hunters actively hunting for them. But I don't think there's any real solid organization of hunters that would have something like the Red List. There are small groups of them (the core book lists a few), so I could see a bounty being placed on such a hunter.

[SaurOps]

What's stopping you from joining the other side as a monster is that the Messengers' touch prevents you from becoming a vampire, ghoul, ghost, etc., even if you don't spend Conviction and have none left. Kinfolk and other family of heritage-based monsters can't become Imbued in the first place (see Moonstruck), so any Imbued inherently lacks the means to use Rite of Sacred Rebirth, if they could even find a tutor for Rituals in the first place. The chosen don't get converted to anything; they just die, or nothing happens, depending on the method in question.

There's only one exception to this, and that's becoming host to a demon on par with the Earthbound. It requires very, very high Virtues to host one and not get the host body to burn out. It also requires the Imbued to acquiesce to the possession.

For Imbued that have contact with Hunter-net, there's a watchlist of known compromised hunters that's vaguely like the Red List, but since this takes a lot of crowdsourcing to accomplish and Hnet is rather short on members, it doesn't happen very often.

[Anonymouswizard]

The basic rule is that hunters can't become a supernatural, which includes ghouls, cainites, skindancers, awakened, and probably sorcerers, whereas normal Garou and Changelings cannot become hunters.

In theory a specially developed Thaumaturgy ritual could allow a Imbued to be embraced, but we are at this point on a separate level from kinfolk rights, and the Tremere know that most things don't bring their powers over, so there's very little interest and it probably isn't possible, I'd let them roll their highest virtue to resist.
I subscribe to the idea that a cainite's soul is twisted into their beast at embrace, and that's why they destroy most powers.

I see Imbued as essentially being what you get when you force avatar to awaken, and so any change will shatter the (now very angry and defensive) avatar.

Oh, and demons can posses them because they require a soulless body, so the Imbued isn't there anymore.

[SaurOps]

The basic rule is that hunters can't become a supernatural, which includes ghouls, cainites, skindancers, awakened, and probably sorcerers, whereas normal Garou and Changelings cannot become hunters.

In theory a specially developed Thaumaturgy ritual could allow a Imbued to be embraced, but we are at this point on a separate level from kinfolk rights, and the Tremere know that most things don't bring their powers over, so there's very little interest and it probably isn't possible, I'd let them roll their highest virtue to resist.
I subscribe to the idea that a cainite's soul is twisted into their beast at embrace, and that's why they destroy most powers.


De ja Abomination, all over again. (^VVVVVVV^)



I see Imbued as essentially being what you get when you force avatar to awaken, and so any change will shatter the (now very angry and defensive) avatar.

Oh, and demons can posses them because they require a soulless body, so the Imbued isn't there anymore.

Though, to be clear, Avatars are a thing in Mage only, and no other game really subscribes to the idea that all humans have one just waiting to be woken up. Hunter in particular has much more to do with KotE's ways, as the Imbued were tapped by the Scarlet Queen and Ebon Dragon as an alternative to the fallen Wan Xian.

[Anonymouswizard]

Though, to be clear, Avatars are a thing in Mage only, and no other game really subscribes to the idea that all humans have one just waiting to be woken up. Hunter in particular has much more to do with KotE's ways, as the Imbued were tapped by the Scarlet Queen and Ebon Dragon as an alternative to the fallen Wan Xian.

Just to clarify, I know this, but I'm trying to piece together a coherent cosmology and set of metaphysics, and I decided that avatars from MtAs was how I'd describe it, and that the Scarlet Queen and Ebon Dragon have learnt to do something to dormant avatars. I probably shouldn't have brought it up.

[JeenLeen]

The basic rule is that hunters can't become a supernatural, which includes ghouls, cainites, skindancers, awakened, and probably sorcerers, whereas normal Garou and Changelings cannot become hunters.

In theory a specially developed Thaumaturgy ritual could allow a Imbued to be embraced

Which book states that Hunters cannot be Embraced and become Kindred?

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I haven't heard this before. I would think that a Hunter could be killed and Embraced. They wouldn't have any Hunter powers anymore, of course. But this sounds more like how for some fera they die (like corax) or almost always die (like garou, others becoming Abominations) if Embraced.

[Kyuu Himura]

Core Book, I think, it does state explicitely that an Imbued can't be bound by blood like a Ghoul, it would make sense that the Messengers would also protect the Hunter from other, more invasive forms of corruption.

[SaurOps]

Which book states that Hunters cannot be Embraced and become Kindred?

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I haven't heard this before. I would think that a Hunter could be killed and Embraced. They wouldn't have any Hunter powers anymore, of course. But this sounds more like how for some fera they die (like corax) or almost always die (like garou, others becoming Abominations) if Embraced.

Visionary deals with the after-effects of Fyodor's cold experiment, where he gets a vampire to try to Embrace one of the chosen and it simply just doesn't hold. Moonstruck deals with the Kinfolk issue, so I'd imagine that any given crossover "can I play a hybrid?" questions get shot down in their respective enemy books (I only have Moonstruck) or possibly in a Storyteller resource.

[JeenLeen]

Core Book, I think, it does state explicitely that an Imbued can't be bound by blood like a Ghoul, it would make sense that the Messengers would also protect the Hunter from other, more invasive forms of corruption.

I always took that to mean that a Hunter could activate (perhaps even unconsciously) their Conviction 'shield' while ghouled, and that would counteract the ghouling. I think I read somewhere about vampires at least thinking they had hunters as ghouls, but suddenly the hunter would attack. I guess it is unclear whether they were just pretending to be ghouls or if they really were ghouls and then broke free.
From... I forget his name, but the narrator for some parts of the main book who is now in a wheelchair (Bookworm?)... I think I recall he drank blood from a vampire friend, and it seemed like it did give him inordinate affection and perhaps some strength. But I could be remembering wrong or just misinterpreted the text.


Visionary deals with the after-effects of Fyodor's cold experiment, where he gets a vampire to try to Embrace one of the chosen and it simply just doesn't hold. Moonstruck deals with the Kinfolk issue, so I'd imagine that any given crossover "can I play a hybrid?" questions get shot down in their respective enemy books (I only have Moonstruck) or possibly in a Storyteller resource.

Cool. That's neat to know.