Hey!

So I have a bit of a question about how Lore Skills are actually supposed to work, what kind of information they entitle you to get.

I have a player in a game I am running; he's adept with the "Thy name I keep" background package, which entitles him to 1 boon of a dark pact. He picked True Savant, which grants him the ability to roll all lore checks as if he had them.

Now, their Inquisitor has sent him the team over to Isolated small hive on Malfi in order to investigate the disappearance of a noble. The adept heads over to his room after the meeting with the Inquisitor, and requests- and I quote- this:

"Az, wake up. I know you've been listening. I need everything that's pertinent to our current situation. Info on Prudenza itself preferably more in-depth then what we were given [Common Lore(Imperium)]; Info on the Noble houses there, and the current political goings-on [Common Lore(Underworld)]; any of the major cults in the area [Forbidden Lore(Cults)]; and how about the current state of the Church on Malfi, who the ruler is, as well as their philosophies [Common Lore(Ecclesiarchy)]. I would prefer to have a picture of the kind of mess we're jumping into before getting there as you can imagine."

It answered, reluctantly; but nowhere near as much as he intended- or not nearly in the way that he expected it to. I played it cryptic and vague, very demonic. All in all, I ended up giving his this information:

[Prudenza is a small coastal hive on Malfi of my Invention; its "big deal" is that an "accident" has blown up the Rails of the trans-system connecting it to the rest of the hive, making it officially "Off the grid"- and a perfect hub for those criminals who have the resources to either hire private transportation, or smuggle small easily transportable goods and artifacts. Not to mention the local nobility, who often show up to party, make a perfect target for the growing drug market.]

Imperium- Prudenza serves mostly as a "Summer Retreat" for nobles, who often have familial domains setup.

Underworld- Told him to check his Black Book; that everybody had a mansion or a manor there- even the Belscos (He's a Belasco himself, Malfian Noble); but the manor was kept a secret from him. [Now, he rolled 5/6 Degrees of success on this roll- a scum on the team had rolled it earlier; just a regular Underworld lore to get some info on criminality in the hive- and he got a lot more info, despite only rolling a few successes, However most of that info was fluff (For example, Thriving smuggling ring, Rise in Crime, Drugs becoming more popular amongst the noble). I feel that Including the name Belasco in the adept's post was an important piece of information- because their presence is actually a plot hook later on the game- he feels he should have gotten a lot more information.

Cults- He got virtually no information there. Pretty much told him "There are tons of cultists thriving on Malfi; to list them would take years- not to mention he might not like some of the names that popped up."

Finally- Ecclesiarchy. He got the most information out of this one; but again- "The Tip of the Iceberg" he says. I explained that the church on Malfi was split into three factions; the noble aligned clergy, the Ecclesiarchy and finally the puritan church of Malfi. I mentioned that only the latter had any hold on Prudenza, and that even that was slipping- the population were slipping into despair and the nobility into decadence.

I ended the conversation with "sSsoon, it will be time for change"- implying an impending rebellion/revolution.

Now, the question is- Does this actual Information fall into the scope of the lore skills? I felt it did; whereas my player wants things like- the name of the top three cults active in Prudenza, the name of the Noble Houses currently staying there- and their involvement in anything vile. All in all, I felt his requests to be more along the lines of Divination then lore...

What do you guys think? What kind of information would a lore Check entitle to? What crosses the line into Divination? How would you have handled it?

Thanks!

Saldre said:

Well, reading from the rulebook (and i am not very familiar with this particular section, but it seems to me that the True Savant is the boon of the pact, so the Adept would technically have known all this information without the need to ask. He invoked the demon for a google search pretty much, and there should be consequences for wrenching it out of the void to answer a bunch of questions. the "Knowledge familiar" boon might be more what they are after i think. the "invoking the demon" and "Counting the cost" sections of the DH rulebook should help.

If you apply the true savant boon to the "thy name.." package, you can summon the entity, but it has already given them the boon of the "all lores known" and free reroll on any failed test they have previous. Make them take the test and if they fail, and they want to ask the question of the entity itself, then have the entity put forward a TRUE Dark Pact, with the hefty corruption hit and costs mentioned in the DH rulebook. This demon has been 'captured' really, by a weakling meatbag. It is not going to be happy with its situation. It is going to want revenge, and to take back its power. Some thing i would do is have the demon overload the Adepts brain with the requested information. Int or WP test to prevent passing out/suffering severe brain damage, throw in some insanity points. Have a very hard int or WP test to be taken to see if you can retain any of the information the demon passed on. That way, depending on how well their test has gone, you the GM can either give him 'flashes of images" (faces, events, etc.), random sound/conversation, or actual coherent knowledge if they passed their test.

That is something i think a demon would do at least, if someone says, "I need ALL the information pertinent to our situation..." demon should have chuckled and said, Sure thing bud. KAPOW. Scanners time. You're dealing with a demonic entity, not some AI search engine. Az wouldn't like being ordered about, even if there is a pact in play. It is going to want out of this situation and to make the player suffer forever for the humiliation it is reduced to. I'd think of it as one of the old wish granting stories. Becareful what you ask, and HOW you ask it. If you don't word it correctly, the Demon will absolutely love for you to suffer for it and take over when you are a jibbering husk. The player chose to be in congress with "The Beast", so they pretty much ask for what comes. I'm probably repeating myself at this point, but you don't want it to be too helpful, or if you do, make it the creepy/sinister/ ulterior motive kind of way. The lead in to a soul burning, body possessing pact.

In respect to your other question, about whether the information you provided fell into divination or lore...the names of the cults and the noble houses would be do-able as lore. Their involvement in dark deeds however, would require something much more than a lore check, IMO. Names of groups or families, background history on prominent figures of said groups, politics, etc. That would fall into lore i think. What they ate for breakfast, what cults they catch an evening show with, and any kind of specific requires much more.

(double post)

As the adept in question, let me say that no, I was not summoning or invoking the daemon. I had added that little bit to give Saldre, the GM, some leeway in regards to RP'ing it, since we're going by a PbP. When we had went over the Dark Pact, and he asked how I wanted to handle it, I had explained that whenever I used the Lores, it would be like a voice in my head, feeding me the information. I went on to give the example of something like Bob from the Dresden Files. They were still just Lore checks.