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eric-the-bmo · 2 months

Text

Blood and Silicon ep16 recap: Past Sins

[Summary: Leo informs the coterie of Percy's stay in the Territory, leading to an impromptu visit despite Blake's current sensory issues. We learn about the Week of Nightmares, a tour ensues, and a face Pauline recognizes introduces himself...] @sanguineasylum @kentuckycaverats @zwoelffarben

Dec 14, 2021.

Blake wakes up and everything is too loud and too much. He texts Leo asking him if he's free, piquing the Malkavian's curiosity by saying he wants to investigate Kyra's base (since she's dead, they can poke around), and they plan to meet up to drive there.

Leo had woken up and stared at the ceiling for a few minutes before leaving his apartment, finally replying to the text Cynthia had sent him earlier- he states he had figured it would best to use an alias when introducing himself to Yen, hence why he said his name was Michael.

Leo meets Blake at their normal spot- he notices Blake winces when the car door closes, and the music is turned down unusually low. The Malk asks if he's okay, and Blake says he's got a hangover- Leo, from experience, knows that's bullshit.

---

(Meanwhile, Percy wakes up in the bathtub of a motel room- he had chosen to sleep there, as there's no windows and no risk of getting burnt by the sun. He gets up, and lets out a world-weary sigh as he thinks about how far he's fallen.)

---

Blake and Leo head to Kyra's old place- an abandoned church- and go down into the side alley to break into the place through the windows. They enter, and Blake spots a tripwire- he notifies Leo about it, which is great because this man can't see shit without his phone flashlight. The tripwire is connected to a rope that leads upstairs to the tower of the church, almost like it wasn't tied to a trap but acted more of an alarm.

After disarming it, Blake and Leo begin to explore. The place is abandoned, of course, full of dust, and some of the stained-glass windows are boarded up. There are apple cores a few days old scattered about. A bible is on the lectern.

Blake slowly begins to head upstairs, while Leo approaches the lectern; he uses Sense the Unseen, first, to try and determine if it's safe to touch and open. It seems fine, so he opens it up to the bookmark— Matthew 12 1-37.

And then Leo's phone suddenly rings— Blake winces and glares at him as the Malkavian scrambles to answer it, with his ringtone set to the intro of a popular dnd podcast.

["Hello?" "Mr. Leo," says Percival. "I hope I'm not catching you at a bad time."]

Percy says he can call back later (he wishes to have a tour of the territory), and Leo says they can meet in an hour. He writes it down in his notebook as a reminder Blake wants to know what the fuck was that, you said you weren't busy, and Leo is all "...Okay so we might have someone staying at our territory." He explains Harrison had called him about the man they had met earlier-

["That guy? He's staying at our t-" Blake pauses, and puts a hand over his mouth.] He asks if Leo told Pauline about this- he didn't- and Blake looks pissed. He tells Leo to call Harrison and find out where Harrison is staying. It takes a moment for Harrison to answer- probably because this man keeps his phone in his desk drawer- and the Baron says to simply call Percy, and in the future only call this line for emergencies. Leo eventually finds out Percy is staying at a place called Dayspring Motel, some ways south of town. Blake begins to walk out of the church- Leo follows him, picking up on the fact Blake is going to head over right now, and he tries to convince him to chill out and wait the hour like he had promised Percival; Blake almost considers it before saying he's not mad, just disappointed, and continues to walk out the building- he's hurt by fact Leo didn't tell him. (Before Blake leaves through the window, he sets something discreet/hidden by the window; if he comes back later and sees it's disturbed, it's a sign someone else came in here.)

Blake texts Pauline: [Blake: Kid just informed me that we have a new guest on our lot. Going to give him a warm welcome. Could you make time tonight from your busy schedule? Pauline: Good evening, Mr. Moore. That sounds concerning. Yes - would you be able to give me a ride? Blake: Be there in 15. Pauline: Understood.]

It's a tense ride. Pauline enters, asking if they could tell her what happened. Blake looks at Leo to answer, and the fledgeling goes "Once again, I fucked up." He explains the gist, and Pauline frowns.

["Perhaps Harrison should've neglected to inform us himself."]

Blake lets Pauline know the kindred now staying on their territory is the one Leo had distracted the earlier night- and was the one Harrison had a meeting with earlier, and Pauline guesses Harrison wishes to keep a better eye on them. Leo admits he knows as much as they do about Percival, however he did overhear the Venture seems to be searching for something of his own volition. Blake comments that hopefully he won't stay long- this whole thing confirms his belief that no matter what Harrison says, their territory was never really theirs.

Leo calls Percy like "hey uh there's been a change of plans is it okay if we meet earlier?", and once that's over he puts his head in his hands (It's really similar to the shinji pose meme ngl). This man would rather be in torpor.

Pauline questions wtf they're even doing- first it was a Tremere, now this, and we don't even know this man's clan.

---

The trio finally arrives, and Percy is waiting outside. He's wearing a light blue buttoned shirt and a newscap. There's a simple silver ring on his right hand, and he has a gun hidden inside his grey suede coat.

There's a bit of a miscommunication error, as Percy was expecting to be given a tour first, but upon hearing they just want to get to know him first before taking him there he's like "yeah that's fair," and leads them to his motel room (room 212) so they can speak. Percy closes the door behind him and apologizes for the state of his affairs- it's temporary living. He gestures for them to sit- Blake doesn't- and asks what they'd like to talk about. Blake answers they'd like to know more about him. Percy says he's an open book.

He tells the trio his clan upon Pauline's questioning, and he looks vaguely disgusted as he says he's a Ventrue. Blake comments it explains why he's got a suit and asks why he's here.

["First," Percy begins, "May I turn a question towards you? It adds context, I assure you." "It's an open forum. Go ahead."

"July 1999- What do you recall of it?"]

Blake's eyes go dark, and he quietly says he knows more than he'd like to. Percy fiddles with his ring as he explains that in July of 1999, during the Week of Nightmares, he was closer to the Ravnos Antediluvian than he would've liked, and was knocked into torpor. Due to this he's curious about it all now that he's awake again, and wishes to look into Noddism- and he confirms his meeting with Harrison was partially about that, though it was mainly an introductory one.

Leo has some questions, but then Blake comments that it sounds like Percy won't be staying very long, since it seems he needs to collect some more knowledge- Percy says it really all depends on how much information his leads have to give him, and so there's no way to say how long he'll stay. Blake then asks why Harrison chose to put Percy on their territory, specifically.

["Mr. Leo's sire- he believes that he can help me out with my own research."

Blake nods. Ah- there it is. He turns to Leo. "How does that make you feel?"

Leo's gone entirely quiet. His hands have found each other to hold.]

Percy asks if he's alright- the Malkavian's hands unclasp, and he says he wasn't expecting his sire to be mentioned. Percy asks if Blake is done with his questions, and the thing is Percy's been very formal this whole time, so Blake asks him to drop the Mr when referring to him. Percy nods. Anyway Blake's all "so if you have any questions or want to do anything with the territory, please refer to us-" and gestures towards himself and Pauline. Blake is trying to come up with plans on how to extort Percival for money, and suggests the man pay rent- Percy says he can offer protection services, but sure he can pay too. There's discussion of a job hunt for Percy, and Blake hands the Venture his and Pauline's numbers.

Percy says he was promised a tour of the territory- Pauline reminds them all that Leo's got questions- and Blake says he can give Percy a ride. ["It's a quaint little spot," He tells him. "It's got a nice sports bar- They can make a mean margarita." "...Are you still capable of partaking?"]

The group eventually leaves the hotel and begins to head towards the territory; Leo starts his questions by asking what a Ravnos is, presuming it must be one of the clans.

Percy runs down the gist of Ravnos- they're wanderers, really- and Blake chimes in that they're good storytellers but bad company. Percy agrees and says the Ravnos he knew said the same thing. Leo scribbles down what he learns, and Blake adds that Ravnos could make people see illusions- which doesn't seem scary in theory, he mutters, but it's terrifying when cranked up to 11. Leo pauses, and takes note of the illusions.

Leo lets Percy know he's aware of what an Antediluvian is, and the Venture explains the Week of Nightmares; how the Ravnos Antediluvian woke up and decided to cannibalize its childer. He explains there were many things during that week: headaches, visions no one seemed to remember, etc.

Blake says that's not what he heard, and as Percy asks Blake what stories he's heard about the Week (mortals who had the sun in their hands, a disease running through the Ravnos, how something woke up, etc), Leo's eyes glaze over as he mentally goes somewhere else for a moment. Blake implies he's skeptical of the Antediluvians' existence, how something of such great power could just rise up and die like that- and Percy doesn't seem to be a big fan of this :-/ Leo blinks back to hear the tail-end of this.

Pauline asks Percy he views Harrison- it turns out Percival feels the Baron is further from humanity than those in this group, and though he respects the Baron he doesn't feel any particular positive emotion about him. Pauline and Blake secretly approves of this- Leo, however, is blood bound to Harrison, so he frowns at this comment.

Leo then brings up in the form of a question that Percy mentioned his sire? The Ventrue confirms this- he's a scholar that could help him learn more about Noddism, though Percy's heard he might not be among the living anymore. ["Well, to say he's not amongst the living will always be accurate, but- He's not amongst us anymore. Do you happen to know if he's still alive?"] Leo doesn't know what Noddism means- he assumes it's a vampiric thing, like everything else he's learned about- and he also winces. Percy takes note of that reaction, though he's unable to pin down why Leo did that.

Blake makes a joke(?) from the driver's seat about Percy applying for jobs to pay rent as they arrive at the Territory.

---

The trio gives Percy a tour of the territory; Pauline and Blake give a general warning to him about the church and its priest. Speaking of the church- as we get closer to it, we see a crowd of people exiting the building; service has just ended. Someone seems to recognize Pauline and starts to walk towards the coterie- and as always, Pauline's expression is indiscernible (But she knows who this is). As the man crosses the sidewalk towards the coterie, we all use Blush of Life to look human- and as all of my dice rolls thus far tonight, Leo fails and gains a point of hunger.

The figure gets closer- he's a priest.

Leo is suddenly filled with a sense of panic as his headache spikes; everything in him is screaming with the knowledge that the man walking towards them is a threat. It overrides his brain and he shouts, running away. It gets the attention of some of the crowd members. Pauline takes this as her cue to leave, and follows him.

[The priest furrows his brow in concern as Leo runs off. "Hello," he begins, "I was here to speak to one in your group, but... Is the boy alright?" "...He ain't the religious type."]

The priest says that's interesting, since he had seen the woman who went after him during his service a few nights ago, and hoping to introduce himself. Blake offers to pass on his intro, and so the priest holds out his hands and introduces himself as Father William. Blake introduces himself as Robin- Percy looks away from the Father, yet still introduces himself.

Father William hopes they can get Pauline to return to one of his services again- Blake comments she's busy a lot, and upon William's next question he tells the priest she works at a night club. The Father makes a comment about how even light can be found in darkness- she had some interest in God, seeing as how she showed up for a service. He then asks if the others will eventually attend; they politely decline.

----

Meanwhile, Leo turns the corner, running just a bit further. He's connecting the dots, and comes to the general conclusion that religion is Very Bad for vampires- especially priests.

Pauline finally catches up to Leo, saying that he can't just run off like that, and advises that they head back to the group. He explains that he felt the priest was dangerous- she agrees, but again you can't just run off! She asks if the priest had done anything to him, and he says it wasn't an external thing that had caused him to flee; it was more of a brain thing.

["...Leo, are you quite alright?" He pauses, and gives a small laugh, putting his head in his hands. "Oh, when have I ever?"]

---

Blake texts Pauline if she found Leo, and they agree to head elsewhere- on that doesn't have a lot of people- and meet up there, so that Leo isn't stressed out by a potential crowd. Percy asks if Leo was okay, and Blake says he's not sure, but this isn't the first time he did something like this, so it might be something he can't control. Percy nods. Blake comments they should continue the tour after they meet back up- he does a little dramatic bow as he goes "After you :-)" He continues to give a bit of the tour, pointing out the bar, the art museum, etc. (At one point Blake goes into a store and comes out with a job application, handing it to Percy for "just in case." Percy takes some glasses out of his pocket (he doesnt need them) and looks it over, commenting on Blake's dedication to the job joke.)

The Malkavians arrive, and Pauline asks what happens when she was gone- the two fill her in about Father William, and Blake says it was risky to visit without telling the coterie (Leo says nothing to avoid being hypocritical, but gives her a bit of a side-eye). Pauline admits she went to a service but didn't think it was worthy to mention; she apologizes, and mentions she probably won't go to another service.

["FYI," Blake adds. "I didn't explode when I shook the priest's hand. Just so you know."] The original trio briefly wonders if Father William is the guy Harrison had warned them about when they first received the territory- Blake finally asks why Leo ran off, and the Malk once-again gives the rundown that the Father is dangerous. Pauline suggests maybe she should keep on the down-low for a bit, implying she might not visit the territory a lot.

["Maybe you should take the clippers to your hair again," Blake says. Pauline lights a cigarette. "...Perhaps you're right."]

----

Notes/Commentary:

Finally, another night has gone,,, /lh

Leo's been a vampire for 90 days! 🎉

The other player and I began to go wild in the chat over how Blake seems to have unintentionally unlocked Heightened Senses!

[in regards to Blake and Leo texting] "Please know that Leo would not put the discord eyes emoji, but just know it's there in spirit" amazing quote from Past Bmo, thank you

Leo types So Sketchy btw.

We all began to focus on the apple cores tbh. wtf is up with that we're So gonna check those out later

I can't help but wonder if the verses that Bible was open to has any lore significance? Foreshadowing, perhaps?? Or am I reading too into that?

If anyone's curious, Leo's ringtone is specifically the intro to TAZ:Balance ⭐

NOOO NOT THE DISSAPOINTED LINE THAT DADS USE-

Love how some of my only notes for this session was "Leo fucks up. Shinji pose," everything this man's been through has been his own goddamn fault

my boy is so stupid

Love Pauline sm. "hey guys what the fuck are we even doing at this point" The ST plays her So Well

Percy's player had a whole written dialogue prepared for describing his outift and every time he does something like this I'm blown away. So cool,,, decided to describe his outfit there bc of it

Shoutout to the moment the ST and I decided to spontaneously sing that one pina colada song

It's so funny that Leo doesn't know some of the clans and YET he knows what Antediluvians are. (Wonderful job telling your childe information there, J... /sar)

Hey yall. The Week of Nightmares caused headaches and weird visions. Ik Leo is a Malk so visions are normal for them, but... Have we considered some weird Antediluvian shit is going on with him?

Blake's player: Man I miss Pauline :-( ST: Dude she is RIGHT THERE-

I roll to see what Noddism is/if Leo recognizes that. Nothing. I roll 5 other dice for some reason bc the ST told me to- also nothing. /lh

//sobbing the dice HATE ME- (i've declared a Gehenna War upon the dice gods btw)

FATHER WILLIAM-

"Leo's going to run to... an alleyway." "An alleyway?!" "Yeah because nothing bad has ever happened to him in an alleyway" /silly

Leo realizes for the second time in his life that god sucks, more at 11-

Love how Percy contributed to the bit by pulling out reading glasses. Sir you don't need those

This was the first session I recorded hooray! Hence why there's so much more quote bits yayy

Anyway. im very tired gn yall

#eric finally speaks #blood and silicon #vtm chronicle #vtm #leo west #jeremiah

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themarginalthinker · 6 months

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OK I'm pretty sure this has already been asked, but I haven't read far enough into the book to see if it's been explained, so I hope you don't mind the ask!

Are there specific clans of vampires in VTM? Or different breeds?

*slowly spins around so you can see the absolutely MANIACAL, UNHINGED grin on my face*

OHHHHHH BABY, HERE WE FUCKIN GOOOOOOOO

So, Vampire: The Masquerade is a ttrpg system first released in the 90s about vampires, part of a larger overworld called The World of Darkness, or just commonly called the 'WoD' - this, as well as vampires, includes werewolves, changeleings (faeries), Mages (magic people), demons, as well as other creatures, all of which have their own games under this system, but the one that I play (and the only one I'm interested in playing tbh bc the it's the oldest, most popular and best developed of the games) us Vampire: The Masquerade.

SO Thw World of Darkness is a grittier, slightly more grim-dark version of our reality. People are a bit less kinder, the shadows are a bit darker. And in those shadows, lurk vampires.

Now, in the official canon lore of the WoD, vampires are all descended from Caine - yes, that Caine. The Bible dude. As punishment for his transgression again God, God cursed him to shun the sun and forever walk the Earth. Being lonely, Caine sired three 'childer', three vampires, who then also sired more, who became the 13 Antedeluvians ('those who survived the flood') and THOSE 13 became the founders of the 13 Clans of Vampire.

The Masquerade: The one rule almost all vampires everywhere follow. The Masquerade is the deception of vampire existence to humankind, and maintaining it is paramount to everything you do AS a vampire. Humans must never, ever, ever know.

Each Clan has their own unique powers, and like. Vibe to them. (As they are the types of vampire you can choose to play in your games.)

When you are Embraced (turned into a vampire), you become the Clan you were Embrace by, ie, a Nosferatu will make another Nosferatu, a Gangrel a Gangrel. So yes, it IS a breed of vampire.

The Clans are as follows (to the best of my description lol):

Ventrue: The powerful lords of vampires, bluebloods, they desire power and to dominate others. They're behind CEOs and polititians, controlling a lot of the vampire political landscape. Their Thing is that they can only drink specific kinds of blood, a blood restriction, say, only the blood of blue eyed men, or something. you can choose what that restriction is with your character. (also this is Berd's least favorite, and I'll go into detail why further down)

Toreador: The Clan of the Rose, ie, the pretty ones. Toreador are the cultural influencers of the vampire world, and while not exclusive to, they ARE incredibly dug into the arts. Typically associated with fashion as they want to keep up with and make the latest trends in the world. Their powers are...literally being so fucking pretty. A siren-like ability, which goes just as much for the men, too.

Brujah: The Clan of the rebels! The Brujah are a clan of rabble-rouses who hate the system and want to see the world into a utopia of humans and vampires, but getting there is gonna be a chore. The Brujah's deal is that they're punks, and that means supernatural anger to go with it. They rage. Hard.

Malkavian: The Clan of the Moon, they get literal visions and whispers of the Beyond, information from outside of what any person can pick up on the street. They're literally a clan of mad oracles, driven to their derangement by the vampiric blood. A Malk's particular way of receiving this information can range from perceiving the reporter on tv telling them so, to getting flashes of visions from reading a newspaper.

Gangrel: A Clan where you kinda wanted to play a werewolf, but also a vampire. Gangrel lean into the beastial side of vampire lore, being able to best control and even transform into animals. I don't have a lot to say about Gangrel, they're a pretty straightforward clan as far as things go.

Nosferatu: The Clan of the Hidden. As the name implies, the curse of vampirism affects them by twisting their bodies into hideous forms they cannot undo or reverse with any kind of magic. Named so bc a lot of them end up looking like Max Schreck's Count Orloc. Most Nosferatu cannot participate in the wider world because of their looks endangering vampirekind, so they form large networks below cities, occupying old sewer and tram systems, forming 'Warrens'. Their Thing is that they possess very powerful invisibility powers, and have set up large subinternet networks, making them master spies and information farmers. The Nosferatu know everything about everything...as long a you're willing to trade a secret for a secret. (This is my favorite clan, if you can't tell :>)

Tremere: Nobody likes Tremere. Ok, that's not true, bad me. But they are...standouts in the vampire world (ask me about their lore, it's...wild). Tremere are blood mages, using Thaumaturgy (blood magic) to do dark rituals and keep their magic knowledge in the clan. They're essentially your 'casting class' in the game.

Ok, so, that's not even half of them, as you can count, but this is getting long, and these are all the 'major' clans that most people tend to play. I will be passing off this post to @berd-alert to tell you about the other smaller but JUST as interesting clans, but here is also a short overview of the world the WoD vampires exist in:

The clans all belong to larger political 'factions'. (Again, ask me more about the lore if you want a more in-depth explantion). These factions are based on ideologies of how vampires should interact with the human world

The Camarilla: what's considered 'mainstream' vampire, or 'Kindred' society. Every city will have an Elysium, where the Prince (can be a person of any gender, that's just the title) will preside over their court, being whatever vampires claim allegence with the Camarilla in that particular city, or, 'domain.' The Cam rule their worlds with very firm rules about interacting with humans, or 'kine'. You're expected to follow these rules and receive protection and order....or face severe and swift consequences should you put a toe out of line and someone hears about it.

The Anarchs: pretty much what it says on the box. The Anarchs oppose the Camarilla and their deadly rules, the only one they want to follow being 'don't break the Masquerade'. Full of the young, the boisterous, the new, hot blood eager to destroy the old system and build something new.

The Sabbat: these vampires say hang the rules all together, fuck the Masquerade, humans are prey or playthings, and vampires being stronger and immortal should rule the world. pretty much, if you want to play a vampire who loves blood and destruction, ie an evil player game (bc those are always fun heheh) this is the faction for you.

WOOF, OK, I THINK THAT'S ABOUT IT. Again, if you have specific questions, just ask me or Berd bc they're just as deep into this as I am, and knows lots of cool, intricate lore. But that's about it for right now! I highly reccomed looking up some youtube videos about this, as there is a TON of supplementary and educational videos out there for it! And also a video game, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, which is from 2004 and an INCREDIBLE cult-classic, to match the Lost Boys in terms of iconic vampire media.

Love you Cherry!!!

#vtm #vampire the masquerade #answered asks

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pompadourpink · 10 months

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Bonjour maman! I'm almost 23, ace, and for about the last 2 months now I've had my first real crush (on a new friend I made about 6 months ago). I'm trying to set up a get-together with just the 2 of us because I've finally worked up the nerve that I want to tell him how I feel, but this is complicated by the facts that he's very recently started hanging out again with the ex who dumped him in February, that he probably thinks I'm a lesbian, and that we're both super awkward and bad at communicating or texting back. I've never dealt with this before and it feels super freaky and stressful. Do you have any words of hope or advice? Merci <3

Hello dear,

Given all those little problems that you already have, I would personally try to fix what could go wrong before making my move. If a man I thought was gay sat me down to announce he had a crush on me, I cannot imagine having a reaction he would be happy about. Not that I would necessarily reject him, but outside of being very surprised, I would have to take time to think, because his presumed sexuality made him off-limits so I would have never thought about him this way. And then I would have to figure out if I like him or not, I would be afraid of him getting pushy, and overall it would probably make me feel too awkward to want to try.

So here's your homework: why does he think you're a lesbian and how can you casually correct him? What makes you a bad communicator and what can you do to improve? What do you call awkward and how can you work on it? Think of what you would want your ideal partner to do and do it.

That being said (and this is where big sister turns into mum), I also want to encourage you to sit down with your thoughts and think about this. You are trying to go after someone who:

is already enamoured with another person,

got your sexuality wrong (after six! months! of friendship! how does he know nothing about you?) which in this context is important because sex is important to a lot of people and like I said in the other post, being ace should be mentioned quite soon: if someone isn't interested in that type of relationship, not only they will remove themselves from the situation, but they will be mad that you mislead them and you will be crushed because you thought something was happening,

and finally seems to be so uncomfortable socially that you have to do the work alone - if you had any evidence that he likes you too, I'm guessing you would have said so. The relationship hasn't started and I'm already seeing a pattern where, if this was to happen, you would have to carry the whole thing on your back, be the one requesting dates and arranging plans and making everything happen.

So I'm inviting you to wonder why you still want to pursue him, why you think this is a good idea. You can look at the malks tag and look for romantic requests: a lot of girls get crushes on random guys who don't seem to want them and are still ready to take the stars out of the sky for them. Why? Why don't you think you deserve someone who is willing and eager to work for you too? Why are you trying to sentence yourself to a mediocre relationship with someone who already doesn't want to be there? Do you realise that you deserve to be happy too and that your existence isn't dedicated to making yourself smaller and shaping yourself to fit men's expectations?

I understand this is a bit rough and being lonely sucks donkey but I dated a man like this ten years ago and it's the one relationship I regret because of what it says about my confidence at the time. Looking bad, I cannot name a single good thing about him. He wasn't filled with red flags at first, he was just in the grey zone, but I was so desperate for love that I actively pursued him. He felt it, mistreated me, called me names, pushed me away physically when I tried to be affectionate, and revealed when I finally dumped him (after just a few weeks) that he didn't want to be with me but didn't want to be mean and reject me. If I hadn't decided to give up on him, for all I know I would be like that bride who went viral a few months ago for claiming that her husband's horrible vows were just a joke. That is the danger of being lonely: if you put people on a pedestal for just existing, you will be lower than them.

Look for someone who gets excited when they think of you, who gets amused when you start rambling about your interests, who *wants* to text you and plan a date this weekend, who randomly gets you a candle because you like them, who makes you feel appreciated. Not someone who seems to be there because they saw light under the door and figured it would be nice to be cared for while they look for who they really want. Effort is what makes the world go round.

Please, please, please, put yourself first.

Much love,

Mum

#ask #malks

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malkavian-suggest · 4 years

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I’m a Tremere and I still can’t tell you why Gangrels are like that. Some of them are pretty nice though. -Sascha Strauss

Tremere be like: I’m a tremere

#malkavian #tremere #vtmb #not a suggestion #hhhhhhh #madness #actually i decided it is a suggestion #mad malks know why #vtm

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poisoned-peppermint · 2 years

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Eating tile and making head cannons

!Dsmp incorrect quotes!

~~~

Tubbo: Lmao i wonder what'll happen if i light this thing on fire

Tubbo: *lights thing on fire*

*the thing is on fire*

Tubbo: incredible

~~~

Foolish: Did I hit a nerve, bitch boy?

~~~

Ranboo: My favorite game is Chest. Love the little horses.

~~~

Ponk: don’t care didn’t ask plus this hole you put me in wasn’t deep enough and I’m climbing out right now

~~~

Ant: A fistfight can be romantic. If you’re fucking gay

~~~

Bad: *turns on lamp for reading*

Skeppy: You might as well call me that lamp~

Bad: why…

Skeppy: Because you turn me on.

Bad: *slams book shut

~~~

Ranboo: What are you doing?

Tommy:*squiggling in ranboo’s arms* hiding

Ranboo:..........Do you mean hugging?

Tommy: *pauses* did I stutter.

Tommy: This is my safe place.

Tommy: Now shut up and put your arms around me!

~~~

Tommy: I’m so full of love. And anger. Like a lava lamp.

~~~

Bad: I’m full of rage and dangoruslly stupid but god is holding me back by the scruff of my neck like a kitten

~~~

Bad: You expect me to act like a normal human being? I’m wearing a turtleneck!

~~~

Skeppy: *stubs toe* Fuck!!

Bad: *stops drinking coffee* put a dollar in the swear jar *resumes drinking coffee*

Skeppy: *takes random can out of the trash* judging by what you did last night, you need to put a dollar in the sin tin.

Bad: *chokes*

~~~

Skeppy: You want the last muffin?

Bad: yea

Skeppy: You want the last muffin?

Bad: yes

Skeppy: You want the last muffin?

Bad: yes!!

Skeppy: Will you go an a date with me

Bad: YES!!

Bad: waaait…

~~~

5up: Get down from there!

Fundy: *up in a tree* No Way!!

5up: I’m going to call the police.

Fundy: Go ahead, I’ll fight them!

5up: I have cookies.

Fundy: *gets down and grabs cookies* I totally would’ve fought them.

5up: I know you would

~~~

Bad: You know, Skeppy, I like you much better with my glasses off.

Skeppy: You put your glasses back on and face the facts!!!

~~~

Tommy: In this essay I won’t

Tommy: Fuck you for comming to my ted talk!

~~~

Tubbo: Goodnight to my Husband fuck the rest of ya’ll

~~~

Gumi to Skeppy: Hey girlboss you malewife is looking especially gnc today.

~~~

Wilbur: U r cute all the time

Quackity: Even when I tell you I want to punch you

Wilbur: Yes

~~~

Skeppy: If my husband thinks he can just bat his cute lil eyes at me and get whatever he wants, he’s absolutely right.

~~~

Bad: I’m a goth girl on the inside. on the outside? A father figure.

~~~

Bad: how do you tell a guy politely you want to push him against a wall and make out with him?

~~~

Skeppy: Ugh I’m so mad I’m going to go home and touch my husband’s tits so I won't be mad.

~~~

*Fighting*

Skeppy: Bite me!

Bad: Where?

Skeppy *tiny gasp*

~~~

Bad: Not wearing glasses any more. I’ve seen enough

~~~

Eret: *takes a long swig from the flask he was carrying in her purse*

Barkeep: Ma’am no outside drinks are permitted

Eret, hoarsely: This is flour

~~~

Eret: Might fuck around and let nature reclaim me.

Bad: Does this mean you’re going feral or just lying in the dirt for a while?

Eret: Yeah.

~~~

Skeppy: Malk?

Bad: Milk.

Skeppy: molk?

Bad: MILK.

Skeppy:......Melk?

Bad: MILK! M I L K

Skeppy: Milk

Bad: MALK- oh I see what you did there.

~~~

*laying in bed together*

Bad: I need you to promise that you'll hold my hand whenever I’m scared.

Skeppy: Yeah ok.

Bad: *starts holding Skeppy’s hand*

Skeppy: *looks around confused* What are you scared of?

Bad: I’m scared if I let go of your hand you’ll disappear.

Skeppy: *Forgets how to breath*

~~~

Skeppy: Hey Techno.

Techno: *punches Skeppy in the stomach*

Skeppy: What the fuck?!!

Techno: You are one of my very best friends. And I cannot stand by and watch you throw away your life like this. You're too young....YOU'RE TOO BEAUTIFUL!

Skeppy: What the fuck are you talking about?!

Techno: I'm talking about the baby that's growing inside of your belly right now.

Antfrost: See ya! *leaves*

Skeppy: I'm not pregnant!!!!!

Techno: Well, not after that punch you're not. I've been taking muay thai classes.

Skeppy: I was never pregnant, Techno!

Techno: Are... you sure?

Skeppy: Yes I'm fucking sure!!!!

Puffy: I'm sorry, but why the fuck is everybody yelling over here?

Techno: Oh, I found this positive pregnancy test and—

Puffy: *punches Skeppy in the stomach*

Skeppy: AW, MOTHERFU--

~~~

Ya’ll better see this I made it for you

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paragonrobits · 2 years

Text

Malkavians, some post game thoughts for VTMB

@macrocondy3point0 (since you showed some interest in me writing this up!)

In more positive news, I recently beat Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines as a Malkavian, and this was a big deal in several ways, not the least being that the Malkavian's playthrough style of sneaking, stealth and gunplay is as far away as you can get from my usual playstyle in this game, which usually involved being a combat-focused smash monster with diplomancer skills.

To explain, perhaps for those not used to the specifics of how this works, here's the specifics: in Bloodlines, you play as the Fledgeling, the recently sired vampire whose sire was killed as a result of fierce politicking between the rival vampire factions of the Camarilla (the leading power and authority in vampire society, though with a very unsafe position in the areas the game takes place in) and the rebellious Anarch faction, who until recently were the primary power. You can choose to play as one of several clans, and each one has broadly the same skills, with a notable exception: each vampire clan gets three unique Disciplines of vampire powers (supernatural abilities, which vary hugely from clan to clan), a clan weakness and a clan strength, and these can all create very different gameplay experiences. I play with a particular variant called Clan Quest Mod (which mainly offers much of an experience of the game as it was intended, reusing dummied out content, but also trying to make the gameplay more similar in some ways to the tabletop game it was based on, and most signficantly, reworks the power to heal faster and temporary enhance physical abilities into new Disciplines common to all clans), but to my knowledge, its close enough to normal gameplay that i could probably compare notes with friends and not lose any experience.

So, thus we come to Clan Malkavian.

They're rather notorious in player experience, for a lot of reasons. In the lore, all Malkavians are afflicted with madness once they are turned; the exact reason varies a lot, whether its the collective insight and minds of the entire clan being forced into your brain until something breaks, a curse of madness carried on the blood, and so on. Needless to say, this IS 90s era White Wolf we're talking about; its not a stretch to say it wasn't handled particularly gracefully, even at the best of times. The Malkavians are further infamous for players interpreting 'madness' as 'wacky comedy times' and played their characters as doing weird and goofy things for no reason, a playstyle that came to be known as Fishmalks after a famous illustration of a malkavian with a big fish for... some reason. (In other words, Fishmalks are players who have their Malks smack people with fish just for giggles.) The player character Malkavian leans strongly towards this; their dialogue is bizarre and comedically poetic, with wildly changing register and poetic phrasing so dense that most people they speak to don't understand what they're saying, and neither does the Malkavian. (I got the impression that they were speaking through a heavy filter.) However, the Malkavian possesses insight and oracular powers, and this is the main reason why it is considered vital to play this clan on your SECOND playthrough!

You see, the Malkavian might be hard to understand (to the point where a lot of the stuff they say makes very little sense unless you've laready played the game, and have a rough idea of what certain lines will result in) but they KNOW things, even if they don't understand the full implications involved. Multiple times in dialogue, the Malkavian will flat out state future events, but wrapped up in so much dense metaphor that even they have no idea what it actually means. Therefore, playing them as a second playthrough is ideal since there's a lot they spoil, or at least that only makes sense if you understand that context. Which is also true in-game; the smartest characters are the ones who understand that Malkavians have tremendous insight, and its a very bad idea to just dismiss what they say; this can be seen in characters freaking out when you know their name before even speaking to them, referencing past events in their lives you have no way of knowing, or making oblique references to the true plans underpinning the game.

Now, for how the Malkavian actually plays, and this is where my usual gameplay style required some rethinking.

I usually play this game as Gangrel, or Brujah; two clans whose powers are very much geared towards direct combat, either by being extremely touch and getting powerful area-attack skills along with a progressively more deadly transformation, or being super fast, super strong and debuffing everyone around you. I combine this with a high focus in Rhetoric and Charisma, so i can persuade people. (Also high levels of Appearance and Seduction because sometimes I just wanna play as a pretty vampire and that's it.) I usually level up Bloodbuff, the Disipline for physical stat boosts, as well; this allows me to pass most lockpicking challenges, which a big part of the game is locked behind, without having to invest too much in the relevant abilities.

However, doing this as a Malkavian is a very tricky prospect. Firstly, the Clan's innate penalty, at least in the version I play, is a malus to Persuasion; they automatically have two points subtracted from Persuasion feat, capping it at 8 out of 10. This isn't so bad; I've never actually encountered a check that requires that level of Persuasion. This is more of an early game problem, as leveling Persuasion initially gives you no rewards; only after you get 3 points in total do you start increasing it, and then its the bare minimum. As a result, Persuasion is a bit of a experience sink as a Malkavian. you CAN still do it, but it takes way more points that could be better spent elsewhere.

(Their clan bonus, an automatic extra point to the Inspection feat, is a bit pointless, especially with some of their powers vastly superceding it, but it is still useful early game.)

Then this brings us to the Malkavians powers. Like any clan, they can be played any way without suffering for it; if you want, you can make them a gun-toting commando, super sneaky, or a melee expert, though most of these DO suffer for the fact that their unique powers don't exactly make them more efficient at it. This is where we come to their greatest assets with their Disciplines.

The first is the most obviously useful: Obfuscate. This makes them straight up invisible. Initially they can only do this while standing still, but with the second level they can do so while crouching (at the cost of automatically losing invisibility if they touch someone or an object); fully leveled, Obfuscate will allow you to run around invisible, doing stealth kills without breaking stealth, and makes stealth missions LUDICROUSLY easy; some missions that i constantly had to reload over and over to get past specific sections were done here in under five minutes. Additionally, while vampire characters CAN see right through it, this is actually pretty rare, and most of the time it only comes up in places where you're supposed to fight anyway.

Second is Auspex. This was a surprising one. I've heard that Auspex in-game is embarrassingly low-powered compared to its tabletop counterpart, where they START with inhumanly strong senses, to a kind of psychometry, aura reading, and THEN telepathy and astral projection. Here, Auspex just allows you to see auras (indicating if something is hostile, and whether they are human or not), as well as giving you an increase to Wits and Perception. This sounds weak... but its not, as I worked out. You see, this ALSO improves the feats tied to those stats: Hacking and Defense for Wits, and Ranged and Inspection for Perception. The increase can be pretty sizable, especially if you go to the effort of leveling those stats to begin with. The Wits buff allows you to hack pretty much any computer in the game with ease (in a game where hacking, as well as lockpicking, can be TREMENDOUSLY important!), as well as increasing the Defense feat, which governs taking less damage. Given that Malks have no real defensive powers besides MAYBE using bloodbuff to increase Stamina, which gives better damage resistance, and its far less impressive than what other characters can potentially do. Conversely, the buff to Perception can easily increase Inspection to extremely high levels, highlighting anything important in the area, but the Ranged Combat feat increase will allow you to increase the damage of all firearms, so you can potentially one-shot a zombie with an ordinary pistol so hard it EXPLODES INTO BLOOD CHUNKS FOR NO REASON.

The aura ability is also useful; while it doesn't help much in combat, it DOES help with situational awareness and keeping tabs on people around you, which is very helpful in stealth. Its not necessary, but it is highly useful, especially determining what's a vampire and what isn't, for refueling on blood in a dangerous situation. All in all, I was genuinely shocked at how absurdly useful Auspex was in a practical situation, to the point that its become one of my favorite Disciplines in the entire game. Stealth became downright TRIVIAL with a combo of Auspex to spy on enemies and make it through any hackables, and Obfuscate to hide from sight!

Then we get to the signature power of the Malkavians; Dementation, or the power to influence minds by pouring the madness inherent to Malkavians into them. It's one of several disciplines in the game that gives you a specific technique, one per level, and they are a lot more useful than they might sound, and in the version i use, they range from a powerful and free to use power that freezes enemies in place long enough to get at least one free attack in or buy you some time or distract enemies, a fairly minor buff to hacking (and honestly I don't much care for it, since Auspex does that better), an area hitting debuff, another area hitting debuff that also damages enemies, and finally a single, powerful attack that will instantly kill mortal enemies and even do notable damage to bosses while also hitting them with a nasty debuff. Dementation is probably their best skill in a general sense, and it also affects dialogue, as certain conversations allow you to use Dementation to resolve problems, such as by making people see something friendly that makes them feel safer, make someone forget a troubling memory, or just plain make someone forget. As a result it works very well as a way to alternatively solve a large variety of quests that can otherwise be difficult given the Malkavian Persuasion issue.

As a result, Malkavian was a tremendously fun experience for me, making heavy use of firearms (which i otherwise have little reason to use, since my preferred clans benefit way more from melee for the most part) and debuffing enemies while making otherwise highly difficult stealth sections downright trivial. Actual combat was a bit difficult, but by the end of the game... well, how powerful was my character?

I beat the final boss, normally a long-term and tough battle, in UNDER A MINUTE. The powerful debuffs and damage afforded by high level Dementation, combined with the enormous boosts to ranged weapons Auspex gives, allowed my high level firearms to JUST shred that boss. IT WAS AMAZING.

So Malkavian, while requiring a LOT of going outside my comfort zone with this game, wound up being a lot of fun and a very different experience. I even early on used the console to give my character Potence as a fallback (since you can gain an additional Discipline through my version, if you do certain things, and I prefer to just add in something that adds some interesting elements to the play through), and ultimately I didn't actually need to? It wound up being completely unnecessary, and the only times I employed it was during parts where I ran out of ammo.

That brings up the flipside of this; while a late game Malkavian can be VERY powerful, it was a lot trickier early on, as their penalties, emphasis on increasing skills to make them truly useful, and stealth-focused skillset made combat and dialogue-based elements quite difficult. Late game, though, they get significantly stronger. I would honestly suggest that another reason to save them for a later playthrough is that they work best if you plan things ahead of time, and that requires KNOWING things ahead of time; things like which quests give the most skill points, where to find the books or tutors that give free skill points too, and which fire arms are worth it. Ultimately the Malkavian depends heavily on firearms, and ammo consumption is a big concern, especially if you sink a lot of money into getting a sniper rifle; I might have almost one-shot the leader of the Society of Leopold with it, but it was unwieldy and ultimately i could have spent the money i put into that elsewhere.

For my next playthrough, I'm thinking of going as a Nosferatu, for that 'garbage dwelling creature with a heart of gold' motif, and applying some of the stealth mechanics of Malkavian with the smashing capabilities of a Nosferatu!

#johnny plays #johnny plays vtmb #vtmb #vampire the masquerade bloodlines #vtm

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robotslenderman · 3 years

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I was talking with @ryttu3k and ended up developing Maddy’s sire a bit, off-the-cuff.

Recap -- my headcanon (and obviously this only works for a Malkavian Fledgling) is that the Cabbie was not actually Caine, he was a Malkavian Methuselah suffering delusions that he was Caine.

So during my playthrough of VTMB he decides he’s going to create a new Second Generation of Kindred to make their own new Antediluvians. He Embraces Maddy, literally gets bored and wanders off, and then joins up with Jack to prank all the Kindred in LA with the Sarcophagus. He gets bored again while waiting for it to pay off, and ends up LARPing a cab driver.

The reason why all the Kindred in LA are on edge is because he constantly emits a very mild Dementation aura.

(I figured that a Malk pranking people and being delusional made more sense than “Caine is literally your personal cab driver because of... Reasons, I guess?” although obviously it only works with a Malk Fledgling.)

So, stuff about this particular Methuselah, whom I will just refer to as “Cabbie”:

He has a very tenuous grasp on reality -- a lot of the time, he is intensely brain foggy, although he very rarely ever seems like it if you talk to him.

His brainfog, combined with his delusions, is why he has such a short attention span. He basically feels stoned all the time, even if his body and brain are perfectly imitating whoever he’s having delusions about.

These delusions can last from a few seconds to decades at a time, and some of them are recurring. Some of them are random, some come back in specific contexts.

He just has this constant sensation of being crowded by other people, like he’s standing in the middle of a packed crowd, and their ideas and personas blend and leak into him.

But it’s also very psychic -- when he’s in a delusion, he essentially acts exactly as the real person does with no foreknowledge of them whatsoever. Speaks the same, knows the same languages, acts the same, etc.

Due to this he keeps accidentally advancing other Kindred’s and Methuselahs’ plans, thinking they’re his and having psychic knowledge of them. The Methuselah that are still around (such as Marcus Vitel and Mithras) know him well enough they just let him do it and consider it a stroke of good luck when he shows up.

But it always freaks out the younger Elders when this random person turns up, pretends to be them, makes their life easier for them (or makes the same mistakes said Elder was about to make and therefore makes things harder for them), and then vanishes again.

So yeah, Marcus Vitel, Mithras, et al know him. He doesn’t know them (his brain is too fried most of the time to really remember any of them except when he has a rare lucid moment), but when he shows upthey’re like “ah yes, it’s that guy, may as well take a few nights off and let him handle things for me until he wanders off again.” They often take notes on what he does, what results he gets, and whether he incorporates other delusions and what those personas then do -- it can be very illuminating and he often speeds up their plans for them if he’s playing a whole cast of people when he drops by. (”Ah, he thinks he’s Queen Anne now, so I’ll be able to find out if she’s plotting something based on how he acts!”) They usually don’t even get mad if he blows things up in their faces because that’s just sort of a consequence of it, and he wasn’t going to do anything they weren’t anyway -- they just treat it as a warning that they were about to make a mistake. His presense is usually only a problem when he shows up thinking he’s their enemy, in which case they just point him somewhere else or distract him until he moves on.

Every now and then, every few decades to a century or so, he’ll suddenly end up lucid and it’s like waking up from a multi-decade drug and alcohol binge. “I did what? wtf.”

He accepted long ago that he’s completely out of his mind 99% of the time. He just goes with it. He’s just relieved he somehow manages to survive.

He’s the most dangerous when one delusion lasts long enough to see a payoff on a scheme.

When he’s not delusional he’s usually in some kind of dementia.

Sometimes even when he’s delusional he can deliberately invoke his delusions to advance the plans of... whoever his chief delusion is at that moment. Say he thinks he’s Mithras and Mithras wants an artefact, some part of his consciousness is present enough that he can then invoke, say, Beckett. He then logs into all of Beckett’s shit, acts completely like Beckett, gets the Thing in a Beckett-y manner, and oh look now he’s Mithras again.

Maddy inherited a lot of his traits, although they might manifest differently:

Maddy is constantly overwhelmed with voices. Cabbie is overwhelmed by feelings and sensations of other people, like his consciousness is crowded by ghosts. He is simultaneously aware and unaware of this.

Because of this, both of them are quite spaced out a lot even if they don’t seem to be, and have short attention spans. Maddy often can’t hear other people (or even her own thoughts) over the voices and so never has any idea what’s going on and has trouble doing anything that requires active thinking and mental problem-solving, and for the Cabbie the feelings of these other people are a lot more solid and real to him than actual reality and so dominate his perception.

Both of them struggle to absorb information because of this, and both heavily rely on their oracular abilities to compensate for it. If they have to deliver a message, it’s fine they didn’t hear the actual message because they’ll just... magically be able to deliver it anyway. Handy!

Both are oracles; Maddy gets her info from voices that sound like the people who know that information, or through just talking and channeling the information. Cabbie gets his info from these spectre-like “people” he feels crowded by, and channels the information through thinking he actually is them.

Cabbie usually takes on the speech patterns of whoever he thinks he is, but when he’s lucid he speaks in exactly the same way Maddy does.

Both enter full-on psychosis/dementia when tired and hungry.

#VTM OCs #VTM #the Cabbie #Madeline Jones #VTMB #Malkavian #I get the feeling he might have been an actor in life #and that's what his manifestation of the Malkavian curse grew on

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loxanchives · 3 years

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my parties down right trying to test what they can do in the campaign. an honest they havent really come up with anything to out of place like. they think their being ridiculous and their my seniors here. done this stuff for 10 plus years while im playing at dming this year alone.

my tremere player wants to sell wards to other kindred while shes staying in the city. like yeah go ahead. good way to make a living and meet more characters. do you want a shop too?? i recommend opening a shop.

the lasombra player wants what half the npcs want. to be part of the camarillas reclaim to the city and become a big ol real estate mogul. like yes stay a lil longer. make yourself at home.

thinblood is the down right neat one. hes a malk thinblood an he wants to connect to the madness network that he feels he missed out on. hes acting like its a cop out to being indecisive but no. thats really interesting. thats motivation to go out an about and interact.

is it just the people i know cause. everyone i see doesnt seem used to map wandering or just. having places you can revisit. my small one shot campaigns with vtr and them were terribly linear an now if i think on it. all our other campaigns are just built on going one way or new dungeon. new dungeon. oh look new dungeon.

why do they think its weird to imagine your character just living in a world. hell theres a small war on the horizon sure but its that cute chit chat that stands out form what ive seen. the talk an tell of just being a thought out person that you made an get to develop along others. not whats the loot whats the goal. though stuff is nice too. just words are nicer. i think.

#i talk on a scale of zero to zero an all these boisterous confidant people think its weird to not systematically crawl forward #when i told them they wont be lvling they actually freaked out for a second like #no im not putting you in impossible situations yes youll still be able to kick ass late game calm yourself #feel like a child putting a hand on their parents knee like its gonna be okay its new an scary buts its okay #ramble in the text ramble in the tags #fangs that function

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todayisafridaynight · 9 months

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REAL QUICK I am absolutely THRILLED you liked SP's finale I totally agree... IT GOES SO HARD AND FOR WHAT... BUT THE CHUCKLES ARE WARRANTED ALRIGHT... it has a Healthy Amount of lighthearted moments... I was laughing at that last scene with Inoue and Ogata too [MALK VIDEO COMPARISON WORKS SO WELL I'M MAD] because they clearly want us to think for a second Ogata shot himself but girl I can see him breathing... Tsutsumi's too good for a rookie mistake like that... It's like when Y7 wanted me to think Jo killed Arakawa... Why Is This A Twist... NEVERTHELESS. Thrilling Conclusion

Oh and I am very curious where Yasuo ends up ranking in the Cute Tier List :] Single dad Tsutsumis just hit different I SWEARRRRR

LASTLY I MAY BE COVERED IN BLOOD AND SWEAT AND VISCERA BUT I FINALLY FUCKING FOUND WE MAKE ANTIQUES TWO... but it's raw and only Chinese subs are up even though official English subs exist... I'm in SO much pain but watching with machine translated subs right now will let you know <3

sp's comedy is great cause It's Generally A Serious Show so the small funny bits get me the most since im just not used to it- intentional or not ☠️☠️ i know better than to think they'd actually let a chara shoot themselves tho.... but bonus points to inoue for just diasrming (literally lmao) him instead of outright killing him himself (╯▽╰ )

AS FOR YASU ON MY LIST THOUGH gotta say he sneaks past ikegami into #4 POTENTIALLY #3 idk nobata's still cute to me and his goofy-lil changing-in-cramped-spaces gimmick is still ridiculous (endearing) to me it's a very hard fight either way sorry tsugaru you're still cute to me but brother really didn't get much screen time compared to everyone else on the list...

AND WE MAKE ANTIQUES TWO REAL ????????? listen ill take the chinese subs if i have to i know a CRUMB'S WORTH of mandarin but it is SOMETHING i just NEEEDD the sequel.......

#snap chats #so funny you make a comparison to y7 tho cause In Regards to That Malk Joke i keep wanting to make a y7 joke with it..#never went through with it tho since it just didn't really hit in my head.. i prob could make it work i just gotta figure some stuff out--#ANYWAY. unimportant Lol y7 trying to convince us jo killed arakawa.... like i just couldnt buy it not even during a blind playthrough..#just didnt seem like he woulda done it.. esp not after takin someones eye out but i digress ☠️#ok i really have to get to work tho christ my time's more limited nowadays BYE

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vitaekin · 4 years

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@katharzis : “ i like strong words that mean something. “ kaien @ jo:) / accepting.

She blinks, and when she looks at the starboy he looks different. It’s not confused by the change; it happens a lot, these funny visions. Jocasta is more than used to never seeing anything and being certain it’s real. For a moment he blinks and he’s bright, glowing, stars - in - flesh. Jo wonders for a moment if he burns, if it hurts, if she could help. Their head tilts and their curls fall over their eyes and when it brushes the locks aside, the Chief of Stars is back to looking as he usually does. Or as she thinks he usually does. Often a difference there, they’ve learned.

Reality isn’t real if they can’t touch it. Not like the voices.

“I like strong words that mean something,” Chief of Stars says, and Jocasta wonders if that’s cruelty, the kind that is so intuitive to direct its way. If it’s prompted because Jocasta speaks nonsense ( malk, malk, freak, the others spit. even the damned dislike them. they think they’re playing, but they’re not ) and because others think her words are weak / mean nothing. ( isaac says kangaroo court and it should be funny but it isn’t. ) Jocasta wonders and the voices argue : IT’S A TANGLE OF ASPS. / STARS DIE YOUNG, IT’S AN AFTERSHOCK / SLEEPING PROMISE / HIS MOUTH WILL HAVE BETTER THAN MOCKERY. She doesn’t know which to believe.

Maybe he’s not real, in which case : none of them. Even if she did trust one of the whispers, he would have to decipher them first, and their mind is too broken to give such attention to any one task.

Jocasta wonders, and moves closer across the couch until it’s halfway into his lap, unsure of their intention with the movement but knowing that they want him to believe that their words are not mockery or silliness or NOTHING. They are mad but they aren’t the jester.

A voice interjects at the thought : JESTERS TOLD THE TRUTHS THAT WOULD COST BETTERS THEIR THROAT.

“Our words mean everything,” she insists, hands settling on his shoulders. “Not a game. Real. More real than anything. The only thing that’s real.”

They see things that aren’t real. Spiders and dancing cords and a million strangers. It hears things, too, his voice and others insisting. But the nonsense he spills, however rambling, however strange, IS NEVER A LIE. THE ONE THING IT CAN TRUST IN IS ITS OWN VOICE

Maybe that’s why it stings, when other act like mad must mean meaningless. They think it’s too mad to feel fear or pain, but she isn’t.

“I will try to make the words stronger for you. But they already carry forever, Chief of Stars.” But they will reinforce them nevertheless, with their own bones if they must. She would do more than anything for him.

A voice promises : YOU WILL.

#* answered.#katharzis #* jocasta & kaien : ‘cause this is his body & this is his love! such selfish prayers & i can't get enough!#* jocasta : post bloodlines.#i dont know what this means but i think thats ok

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valcissitude · 4 years

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💕(Malkavian) and What do they think of Fae, Werewolves, and Mages?

Hey Xerxes! Hope youre having a good one ;)

-💞 Do they have any opinions on Malkavians?

Oh yeah, Malks are great. I happen to be mentally ill myself so I get real mad when someone is ableist towards the clan. Dealing with that PLUS every thing they've got going on has to suck.

-Opinions on Fae

Honestly didn't know they existed until I saw them on Tumblr. Their politics seem a bit... Outdated, but I'm sure not everyone is like that (and kindred politics aren't that great either). Would love to meet one some day but I'm sure I'd scare 'em away.

-Opinions on Werewolves

Werewolves are good. I don't know why we have to hate eachother, I guess sometimes you fight for so long you forget why you're fighting? Or maybe it's just because trust is so hard in this existence. Or maybe even plain stereotyping. I don't really know the most about it myself.

-Opinions on Mages

I have 0 idea what's going on with them. Magic seems cool though.

#//thank you so much!!!

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victorluvsalice · 4 years

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AU Thursday: Londerland Bloodlines -- Kindred Fashion

To go with that post I reblogged earlier. . .I sort of briefly touched on this during my post about Wonderland interacting with Alice's Malkavian-boosted madness, with Alice seeing certain outfits of hers as Wonderland dresses, but I've been thinking on and off during the whole "making Londerland Bloodlines an actual fic" process about how Alice would dress in general. I have to admit, I'm not that familiar with 2004 fashion -- but on the plus side, neither is Alice, and she'd probably go for practical/her own personal taste over anything "fashionable." (Or anything like the canon look of the female Malkavian -- can you even imagine Alice in a skimpy cheerleader costume with a high thong? It's just not HER.) I'm thinking a lot of dark jeans and shirts to hide blood stains, solid leather jackets/outfits once she can get them, and big stompy boots for kicking. I do have two specific outfits in mind for her for the beginning of the story, though:

1. A modernized version of her London get-up -- black striped shirt, black skirt, dark vertically-striped stockings, black shoes. Picture my Sims Alice's usual "everyday" outfit and you'll be on the right track. I found myself picturing her in it (though originally with black jeans) while writing the tutorial stuff -- and realized I had a great opportunity to make things Symbolic because, well, the story is more realistic than a video game, and all the shit Alice goes through in the “tutorial” -- getting attacked by Fish pre-Embrace, getting staked, working her way through the Sabbat raid with Smilin’ Jack -- utterly destroys the outfit. She's still following public decency laws once it's all over, but only just -- and of course what's left is covered in blood and whatnot. The two agents of LaCroix I have take her to her new Santa Monica haven (Van and Terrence, a Toreador and Venture respectively, based off the two NPCs who take in a female Malkavian and her sire) promptly note that if she walks around like that, she'll probably be arrested and get her another outfit so she can function in polite society.

2. Said other outfit, as per Alice's own request to Van, is a nice blue dress that resembles Alice's "Classic" dress from Wonderland -- she even gets the right striped stockings, and later manages to pick up an apron. She's going to be wearing this one on Night 3 of her existence as a Malk. Why? Well, she's trying to dress up a little as she's stopping by the Asylum to meet the Voermans. . .

. . .aaaand I already established her as wearing that dress when she and Victor first met in "Trick or Treatment." I know, I could just rewrite the scene, but hey -- might as well use a good description while I've got it! :p And it feels somehow appropriate for Alice to look the most like her Wonderland self when she first meets her ghoul.

I also have an accessory for her that she wears constantly, no matter the outfit -- Lizzie's room key, as a necklace. Yeah, I'm going along with those who have suggested she puts it on a chain and wears it in honor of her sister -- it feels like something she'd do, and it helps to keep her family close. (When she's eventually reunited with Lizzie, said sister is a little puzzled until Alice explains the significance -- and then she's just glad Alice got Bumby's "trophy" back from him.) I'll figure out the rest of her outfits as I go along/they become actually relevant -- perhaps I should take some free time one day and dress up my Sim Alice for inspiration. :P

#londerland bloodlines #fashion #alice liddell #I dunno I'm just curious as to how she'd dress in this verse #I see people planning outfits for their OCs #and I'm like 'I kinda want to do that!'#'. . .what the hell fits in with 2004 Los Angeles'#though I guess Alice cares less about that and more about practicality #she probably changes the blue dress for jeans and a t-shirt once she goes to the Ocean House hotel #I imagine she's got a few standard shirts and pants #that constantly need repair before she gets a good leather jacket to help with protection #I'll figure it out eventually #(the real problem for me of course is Victor #my mental image of him always defaults to The Suit #at least I have that other post to poke at now!#thank you for being offended by the Toreador's fashion sense for a school project #it's very helpful)#queued

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rametarin · 4 years

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Little appreciation.

Thinking about WoD for a moment made me appreciate something from the first Vampire: the Masquerade game.

You see, there’s an entire clan of vampires whose sire/founder was fucking insane. Like, due to prophetic powers and general mind related disciplines, every single one of the characters is absolutely mad, both in the classical, Hollywood, trivialize insanity sense, and as raw and gritty and realistic the mental illness as you care to roleplay. Both are valid because it’s a supernatural and evil mental problem. The only thing that could ever relieve it were the vampiric healing abilities of another clan known as the Salubri (childer of their founder, the three eyed Saulot) and both Saulot and his clan are dead.

So Malkavians are, in modern terms, a little, “problematic.” This isn’t the 90s anymore. There’s no tolerance among the woke for a game in which an entire clan is, “crazy.” Despite the fact it was always politically correct enough to emphasize how normal mentally ill people are not crazy like Malkavians, Malkavian insanity and mental instability is only somewhat similar to mortal people. But that somehow translates into, “ablism” or what have you.

Beyond that, we have the proper way to conduct a Malkavian characters and utilize their sometimes unintentionally prophetic abilities in a scene. Some can even get a brief understanding of the future before their dementia makes them forget it. That makes them fun storyteller tools. As anyone that has played Vampire: the Masquerade- Bloodlines, can tell you.

But the Malk I wanna talk about today is called Dev/Null. I’ve done it before but I still really like this exchange.

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Just, meeting him, it sounds like fucking schizophrenic nonsense when you hear him talk. But that’s because you don’t have the facts in hindsight.

“Have you come from nowhere? Or.. Erewhon?”

This might reference how the main character, Christoff Romuald, is straight out of the middle ages. There’s a whole novel, but.. not gettin’ into that right now.

“You are not Ssssamuel. You are Samuel and a triune entity.”

Malkavians are auspex nerds. Just, super senses. If you fart or your joints creak or crack from 10 meters away, they’ll fucking hear you and know which part of your body did it. Which brings us to our next point..

“Hi, Chris. Or, is it ‘Maliki?”

Christoff back in ye olde dark ages was a French crusader of the Catholic church. Maliki means, ‘messenger of god.’ And he’s also indirectly throwing shade on something else. He may not have been able to tell if Christoff or Pink were the Arabic vampire clan assassin in disguise just yet. But he smelled them.

“Oh, tell Lily, ‘mom’s at the southern Bar of Clay!”

You find Lily the Toreador’s sire in the South Barclay section of New York. She couldn’t find the manic painter before that.

“Hi, Pink. ‘As a mite‘ stupid name...”

It’s here that if you were a wise person, and no one in the party is at this point, you might think Dev/Null was trying to tell you something.

“Byee~ee! Don’t use your knife, Kevin. I mean, Khabar. Or they’ll rebuke ya!”

The coterie member, presumed to be a punkish Brujah named Pink, is actually an Assamite clan infiltrator. The Assamite clan are Arabian/Muslim themed assassins that just do shit like this to kill people and sometimes eat other vampires to gain their powers. They’re consumate spies with vampiric powers revolving around assassination. Canceling sound around them and spitting poisonous blood and general rogue shit.

And Pink knows his disguise is like spun sugar in front of a blowtorch right now. That’s why he wants to leave.

Dev/Null tries to warn about alligators in the sewer, but it just sounds like garbled nonsense. Thankfully, the local Nosferatu, whom is quite generously sympathetic to Dev’s problem, interprets; He’s not being poetic, there are literal fucking ghouled alligators in the sewers and they’re pets of a fucking evil Nosferatu.

“Rafink is spooked by this mask of Cheshire whimsey? Nehehehe...”

Play on words. Dev/Null is poking at Pink’s disguise as a cockney punk Brujah by calling him Rafink. A Rat-Fink is a disguised, disingenuous, double crossing, traitorous asshole. Dev’Null has his number, and Pink doesn’t like it at all. So they’re kindly dancing around one another while Dev/Null tries to drop hints and Pink insists they leave because Dev/Null is unsalvagably crazy.

“Me doth wish for, liike... peace on earth, and stuff? And a player to be named, later...” Meaning, Dev/Null doesn’t care about much except doing something good for the sake of good. And, well.. the ‘player to be named later.’

“Well, I sure ain’t pickin’ up HBO! I guess I’ll have to stick to my dancing hamster videos. They’ve changed my life. Or what’s left of it. After the Y2K or not to kill the woozle- KILL the THOOZLE! To save your aunties, let sleeping aunties lie. They’ve been lying to you for a long long time- I can still remember.”

There’s a lot to unpack here. It helps if you lived through the Y2k, but basically a lot of idiots thought the numbers going from 1999 to 2000 meant God was going to say, “That’s it, we’re cutting production. Yall going to haven now.” And it was dumb.

A woozle is a creature from Winnie the Pooh. They’re honey stealers, weasel-like and thieves. Dev/Null might be throwing shade on Pink again. I’m not sure.

Thoozle is definitely a nickname for Methusalah. Very old vampires, named after the man in the bible that survived the flood.

‘Aunties’, is.. well. Vampire clan founders are called, ‘antidiluvians.’ But it could also refer to Assamite Clan antitribu. In game, after the middle ages, the Assamite clan was bound by a blood curse/bond that prevented them from sucking down other vampires to power up anymore. Some escaped this fate and kept on chowing down/making themselves more powerful on other vampires. Like our friend Pink here.

All the clan founders/antidiluvians are either destroyed (rarely) or in some manner of near permanent undead sleep, resting. And during the End of Days supplement that detailed the ending of Vampire: the Masquerade back in 2004, the antidiluvians actually DID rise from their graves to consume and feast on all their clan childer/offspring. There is a lot of in-game/meta theory among the vampires that their clan founders were planning to do this all along.

“Speaking of traps; I also emailed BILL, for a PINK and fluffy surprise... to eat your words.”

So, in the first part of the game, Christoff is in Prague. His first party member is a Germanic brujah named Wilhelm. Or, in English, William. Which, becomes Bill. I’m not entirely sure why this is a thing, but. It is.

Dev is hinting that he notified Wilhelm that Christoff, Lily and Samuel are unwittingly hanging out with an Assamite asshole that probably plans to chow down on them. So he sent word to Christoff’s old clan posse; his sire, and her childer. That includes Wilhelm.

Dev has effectively notified your old friends and is letting them know to come help you. Dev is a good guy.

Pink: “Oy..? Trap? What do you mean by that?”

Dev/Null: “Mmm. Kashmir weather data merged with the Library of Alexandria. I added a visit from God’s horses and threw in amethyst from the seely court.”

I have.... no idea what this means. The Kashmir thing is probably him poking at Pink’s alter-ego again, but unless Dev is being cute about how Brujah are philosopher/bards/librarian-barbarians with the library of Alexandria thing, I have no fucking idea what he’s trying to say here. The God’s horses line escapes me entirely. Amethyst from the seely court? Okay, this man is talking about fraternizing with fairies/changelings.. which are a thing in WoD and you do not do that if you are sane. I’m not sure how literal he is with that last part.

Pink: “SPEAK SENSE! No one pulls my beard and lives!”

Samuel: “.. Say. What!?”

Pink: “Errghg... I HATE Malkavians!”

Pink got so fucking frustrated he almost dropped character there.

Pink: “This better not be a trap, or I’ll split that cracked head open, ya damn bedlamite!”

Dev/Null: “Oh, my. That’s a big job. I’m already dazed and Kafir’d.”

Kafir being an Arabic term for a nonbeliever/infidel. Basically Dev/Null is saying, “Oh no, the cannibal assassin that wants to kill all other vampires that aren’t devouts of Islam wants to kill me, a non-Muslim, now. What a big difference this makes now that he’s angry and wants to kill me.”

Meaning, he doesn’t give a fuck. And he’s still poking fun at his alter-ego.

Later on, you go knock over a vampiric Italian Mafia warehouse for clues to the main story. Pink interrupts you interrogating the boss of the place and chows down on the Giovanni leader there.

Christoff asks why he did it.

Wilhelm shows up and lays down the facts: Pink is a liar, and an assassin. That’s why.

Wilhelm: “Dev’Null contacted us. He tried to warn you, but you did not understand him. The letter he sent was practically unintelligible, but when we read, ‘Pissed Off Christoff, we knew it had to be you.”

Pink then confesses that his real name is Abdul Al-Hasim, and his entire point was to misdirect Chritoff. Your entire meandering between razing and raiding a Setite night club/brothel and the Giovanni clan warehouse was simply to have Pink direct Christoff like an attack dog against Assamite enemies. And it worked like a charm. He says his Tacquiya is finished, that you and your party can’t reach the Tzimisce elder Vukodlak before he awakens and is powerful enough to fuck everybody up, and to have a good New Years before fading out and disappearing.

Just, this whole character and the way Dev/Null was conducted. It was handled so fucking well. The Cassandra the Prophet style madness and soothsaying, the infiltrator trying to minimize it.

It wasn’t a super amazing game, but it was fun and had some great writing in parts. Malkavians are so hard to get right, but this game pulled it off when you really don’t think they should’ve been able to.

#vampire: the masquerade- redemption #dev/null #christoff romuald #pink #brujah #malkavian #nosferatu #toreador #assamite #sabbat #camarilla

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