Hello All

I need a bit of help with a project- seeing as I am rather terrible with balancing and mechanics.

I'd like to convert the a few things from Vampire the Masquerade to Dark Heresy.

In particular:

The Discipline "Quietus" as the forbidden rituals and rites of the Oblationist Faction.

& The three paths of Blood Sorcery:

The Path of Duat , The Hunter's Wind & Breath of Set (Weather Control)

In terms of mechanics, I want to use "Chaos Rituals" and not psychic sorcery- as I've already discussed it with the Oblationist in question and he really liked that idea (granted, I was improvising at the time but I don't want to disappoint hehe)

Quietus and The Hunter's wind would be the Priorities right now, as the player has decided on that particular path of knowledge.

In terms of mechanic, I was thinking a (Half-action?) Forbidden Lore (Oblationist) test would be required to enact the ritual, and it would be modified by three elements:

1- A previous half action scholastic lore/ Forbidden Lore (Occult/Daemonology/???) with degrees of success or failure modifying the subsequent test by +10 or -10 per degree. Choosing not to complete a ritual after this test has been rolled would immediately result in a contempt of the Warp.

2- The "Rank" of the discipline, with rank 1 being +20, rank 2 at +10, and so on and so forth until rank 6, which would be -30 (the more power higher discipline powers would take make this penalty even harsher)

3- Auspicious circumstances (Not doing the "Setup" occult lore would be a botched ritual at -20, a sorcerer would get +10, a master sorcerer +20, etc etc as per that list.)

Failure would cause a roll on the contempt of the warp table, with each degree of failure adding +10 to the result? And perhaps doubles would roll on Psychic phenomena.

Rituals would inflict 1d5+X - WP Corruption points where X is their rank.

What do people think of that?

I was thinking of instilling some sort of "prerequisite"

Forbidden Lore (Oblationist) would grant access to Rank 1 & 2 Rituals.

Forbidden Lore (Oblationist) +10 would grant access to rank 3 & 4.

Forbidden Lore (Oblationist) +20 Would grant access to the remainder of the powers.

The rituals would take X*months to research and learn, where X is their rank

Some powers are utterly useless and cannot be converted- but I have hope for the majority of them.

Let's take a quick look at Quietus, which is likely to be the most urgent:

1- Silence of Death (Scholastic Lore Occult)

Relatively easy to Cast, +20. Supernatural Silence- the Enactor draws an unholy rune on his person using his own blood (taking one unsoakable damage), which then absorbs all sounds in an area around him: what better way to conceal the screams of your daemon weapons...

Lasts an hour, don't need to change that- and for range Perhaps WP* Points of Damage Taken in meters? Or keep it 20? I'd like it to be "evolving" ritual- so, make the test more difficult to increase the range further.

2- Scorpion's Touch (Scholastic Lore Occult)

Again, easy to cast: likely the bread and butter of the Oblationist- who sacrifices his bodiliy purity to destroy both heretics and traitors to the cause. By carving a spiral wound in the palm of his hand then grasping a symbol of faith and completing a forbidden prayer, he turns his blood to deadly poison.

Perhaps the most difficult power to convert- if only because I don't want to be as "weapons coated by his blood gain the toxic quality". Whatever it does, the power should be linked to how much blood he spent [unsoakable damage taken after casting it].

I was thinking that that perhaps that the weapon would deal toughness damage, or would gain the felling quality [removing the TB of the opponent] based on the amount of blood invested? Ultimately, it could gain Toxic (X) where X is the amount of blood invested- but that would be kinda boring. Opinions?

3- Dagon's Call (Forbidden Lore Daemonology)

Ahh, what better way to eliminate a heretic than to drown him in his own impure blood? Ironic end, hoist by his own petard- hubris is the downfall of man. This power allows the Oblationist to kill virtually anyone after having touched him. I say virtually- in that some people are destined to greater things, and aren't this easily disposed of...

For the actual ritual, the Oblationist need only dab the skin of his victim with a drop of his blood, which squirms into the body of the latter almost instantaneously. Later, with ritualistic circle centered on a representation of the victim, the Oblationist sacrifices his own impure blood to bursts his victim's blood-vessels and drown her from within with her own blood.

This is the first discipline power to use Willpower points- which is Vampire's Equivalent of a Fate point. I am hesitant in applying the same cost to it in Dark Heresy, as vampires usually have 5-6 Will Power points. There should be a contested Roll with the Target, Likely WP vs WP, with degrees of success dealing damage, same as the Force Weapon quality.

How about, instead of spending a fate point- the player spends 1d10+X-WP damage per rounds maintained, where X is the number of rounds?

This mean the player gets to inflict a few unsoakable D10s in damage, but only if he passes his contested Will-power tests and is willing to keep investing his own precious hit-points.

4- Baal's Caresse [Casting this at -10] (Forbidden Lore Daemonology)

"The penultimate use of blood as a weapon" & "...transmute her blood into a virulent ichor that destroys any living or undead (Daemonic?) flesh it touches..."

The Oblationist utters and unholy and damning curse, and slices open his tongue as penance for his transgression with a chosen blade. He uses this tainted blood to augment any weapon- perhaps even his hands.

The normal reflex is to give a weapon "Warp Weapon" Trait, but I don't think this really applies. At this point, we go with something like: the Oblationist pays (MAX TB- Let's say Six) Blood/Wounds to coat his sword with the poison. The next time he hits his target, the attack further inflicts 6 points of (non-stacking) Critical damage and looses a charge of poison, The following attack would inflict regular damage +5 (non stacking) critical. Should the weapon also gain Force or Felling [so that it can hurt the big, tough guys/daemons?]

Assuming that we went with the "Prerequisites" idea than the player would need Forbidden lore (Oblationists) +10 to be able to use Dagon's Call and Baal's Caresse, not to mention the forbidden lore Daemonology Test before it.

So are these too strong? Too weak?

I haven't posted my ideas for the other Three paths (the player chose to follow the Hunter's Winds, so I will likely address that tomorrow morning.)

What do you guys think so far?

That was longer than I thought it would be, and a lot of questions were asked. So let's try to address some of them...

To start I think a Full Action Forbidden Lore (Oblationist) test would be needed, don't want to rush something that could bite your ass clean off right? The ritual will be in mind for the rest of the encounter and to change it would just take another Full round action to recall the new ritual.

I mainly play Dark Heresy, so I am assuming Contempt of the Warp is equal to Psychic Phenomenon. Going off of that, doubles would roll on the Perils of the Warp. Would this be any doubles that are rolled by the player? If so, I personally love the idea. You play with a bonfire you need to be prepared to lose control.

As for the rituals giving corruption points, your system would be fine, but a high enough willpower would make it zero. Thus I suggest you always have a minimum of 1 point being awarded for each use of a ritual.

The easiest way for some of the conversions is just using the Minor powers from Dark Heresy. Examples:

Scent of Deception: Psychic Stench, except that the player picks the smell.

Chameleon's Shin: Adopt a skin color of player's choice, or dyed skin (red, green, etc), and a living texture. Ex. Crocodile skin, other animals. I think this would be the perfect disguise power, but that is just my opinion.

Unassuming Pose: Gain Accustomed to Crowds, Unremarkable, I am assuming human crowds here. If you are trying to blend into an Alien crowd I would assume you take the shape of one of them, and still gain the two before mentioned traits.

Whiff of Kalif: The power Forget Me would fit this nicely, though it would affect a huge area I would think at this high level. Also look at the Telepathy Discipline for other ideas on this.

Ghost Body: Basically become incorporeal would work here, but you can not touch or harm anything in this state. No one can see you either or interact with you unless they also have incorporeal. Of course they are powers that could detect you...

Just my ideas on those powers.

Now onto the ones you made.

I would do the scaling meters of the silence ritual, that way they have to invest to make it strong.

Scorpions Touch....your idea is interesting, but I am going to go off the Vampire's version of it with "Create a contact poison that greatly debilitates a victim physically." I think they should be using this power outside of combat. This gives the play huge flexibility to brew their own poison that does a specific task that they want done.

Example: He could create a poison that does have the toxic quality when applied to a weapon, or he could create a stunning poison, fatigue inducing, or other type of poison. I just think this is a bit more useful then just another combat boost.

On Dragon's Call, I think it would be a willpower vs toughness test, because it is the victims body that's trying to keep itself together.

On Baal's Curse, I think that is a little strong. If going off of your wording is right. If the player hits a creature, they take the penalties that are on the -6 on the crit chart table. That handles everything from weak to bosses in one shot. Assuming it is rending damage, to the body, and using Dark Heresy, that knocks the target prone and deals 1d10 fatigue. As long as one other person is in melee range and is right after the player, that is a coup de grace right there. Ending a boss fight before it can begin really. I mean it a level 4 spell, but that seems a bit much.

Thank you very much for your comments- I really appreciate it!

A friend suggest to increase the difficulty of the rituals so that a Rank One would start at +10 instead of +20.

So, for a full action Oblationist Roll: the ritual itself would be a full action, but divided into two tests [a scholastic lore Occult- setting up the ritual, & forbidden lore Oblationist, casting it, a half action each. Did you mean however that both sections should take a full action? Or scrap the first occult roll?

Contempt of the Warp is Disciples of the Dark Gods & Radicals Handbook in the Chaos rituals section, and yes its an equivalent of Phenomena. It has 6 stages, 50% of nothing happening, 20% of taking insanity 20% of taking damage and corruption, 10% of summoning a minor daemon and then, if you'd failed the ritual dramatically enough to roll past 100 on a d100 table due to degree of failure giving you a higher roll [same as fear for example], you either get possessed or just die.

Rolling on the Phenomena when you get doubles might be an extra step to randomness to these powers, making that even a successful ritual might cause something freaky to happen- so I like that idea.

Minimum 1 is a great idea and would people to invest Exp in clearing away corruption, as these rituals would be learned trough role play and not trough Exp spent, creating a cost for them.

For the Hunter's winds, yeah, emulating that particular mechanically is very easy and I could plunder the actual powers for that. Approaching them with a different mechanic would be incentive enough to use that way instead of the Psy/Sorcery path, which I see more as wrenching the energies of the warp to alter reality.

Onto Quietus

Scorpion's Touch (Performed on base 0 modified by Scholastic Lore Occult):

So allow the player to actually "modulate" the strength of the poison? Or create some sort of table, where degrees of success would allow him to shape it as he hills?

For example.

Poisons have (per the GM Screen rules)

Three speeds [instant, Swift (Hours), Slow (Days)]

Variable Effects (Lethal [Toughness Damage + Coma if reduced to 0], Paralytic (Str Damage + Paralysis if reduced to 0), Sedative (Stunned 1d10 minutes + 1d5 Hours if botched) & Necrotic [standard damage, Toxic ability]

Variable Strength (+20 to resist Toughness Test ---> -30 To Toughness test)

How would we allow the ritual to craft a poison?

The starting poison would have a Strength of +20, be Necrotic and Slow and each success both increases its Strength and allows you to change one element from either its speed or its effect- so that two degrees of success would allow you to craft your own poison with a Strength of +0. Third success and up would just affect the Strenght of the poison.

Dagon's Call: (Performed at -10 modified by a Forbidden Lore Demonology )

Point noted, and I will amend that- Toughness instead of WP.

A friend has proposed that the Fate-point cost be kept in order to limit the use of its power, but I think that Vamp characters get a lot more leeway with their fate points than Dark Heresy characters. How about, instead of a convoluted 1d10+X-WP damage cost to cast and maintain this, it would be a standard unsoakable 1d5 damage, which is the Equivalent of a fate point?

Baal's Curse: (Performed at -20 modified by a Forbidden Lore Demonology )

That's exactly the wording I was going for-

So how about instead of a set value of damage you roll for the critical damage? If you invest 6 points of damage, its 1d6 Critical- so you can roll a Six, but you can a roll 1 as well. The next hit would be 1d5, 1d4, 1d3, 1d2 and finally 1. [These are all easily emulated using a D10 or a D6]

This "counter" would get reduced by One each round, regardless if the hit inflected any damage or not, as long as it hit. If a hit doesn't bypass a target's natural armor and toughness bonus, then there's no effect- so the real big bosses would be unaffected.

Further keep in mind that there are various talents that allow creatures to downright ignore the effect of critical damage, and that bosses could have the "True Grit" talent which halves them- which would mean that the most they could take from this would be a -3 effect. For a boss, or a person with Touched by Fates, the use of a fate point could Ignore all fatigue damage & there's a talent that allows you to stand back up as a free action instead of a Half-action.

I think that are a few ways to make this thing interesting as an option for the players, while providing the GM enough "ways out" that he can protect his "important boss." I can imagine it must be quite satisfying to kill Lieutenants by tearing off their arms or legs in a single hit- and in my games at least, quite a bit of the time, Combat's a "First to get hit, first to be horribly mangled" - so if a PC is willing to Inflict 6 points of damage on himself in order to horribly kill a mook or a lieutenant that he could likely have killed in a few hits without perhaps taking damage himself, I think its a fair trade- no?

No I meant the entire recalling and casting should be a full action. That way on his next turn he can move and attack or whatever he means to do.

Scorpion's Touch:

My idea was that the ritual is in the performing of the distillation of the poison. I know I have somewhere read that as much ritual goes into the brewing of "holy" and "unholy" concoctions. To put it more simply, it kind of follows the "Spirit in the Machine" idea, where a soul is in machines, and so a soul of sorts is in the poison, making it work. This ritual would be taking place during the whole brewing, and a Chem-Use or Craft (Apothecary) or etc would be the actual brewing. However, due to the soul of the poison, it does exactly what he wants. The GM screen gives examples and tables on how it should work, but I was thinking let the player think of the effects, which don't have to be limited to the GM screen. He could make an Uncontrollable Laughing serum to get his Joker side on.

Dragon's Call:

Yes Vampires is ALOT more loose with willpower points, I know I have played several campaigns. Be a jerk, regain spent willpower, lol. Because it is a rank 3 ritual, I would bump it to 1d10 unsoakable damage, maybe + willpower bonus.

Baal's Curse:

You fixed that nicely.

Ok, so the part with the ritual casting time is settled- One full action to "successfully" complete the thing.

We'll go over Dagon's Call real quick- so bump the damage back up to make it more horrifying to use- ideally, its an out of combat ritual, a method of secret assassination, so that the Oblationist can afford to take the time to heal once the ritual is finished.

Scorpion's Touch- the big power

"By changing the properties of her blood" is a big part of what I want to imply in this particular ritual: that the Oblationist's impure blood by itself is actually the poison, a supernatural solution instead of a Chem-use test.

Whereas I do agree in allowing more "leeway" in terms of the creation & effect of the actual poison, I want something that the player can do by himself around the table without necessarily asking me about it, so a hard set of rules would be necessary for the Immediate application of the ritual and its "enhancements" can he handled in downtime, privately with me later on with me.

Lets ponder this particular for a bit and move to the next bit: Blood Sorcery Rituals. These would not generate phenomena on doubles, just contempt of the Warp on a failure. They all require a number of reagents to be used.

Rank 1 Rituals:

Black Sunrise- A successful ritual enables the Oblationist to awaken at any sign of danger and count as having rolled max Initiative.

Blood Rush - A successful ritual enables the Oblationist to stave off the effects of hunger and count as having sustained himself, temporarily evading starvation or thirst.

Illuminate Trail of Prey- A successful ritual grants a +30 bonus to tracking tests performed by the Oblationist.

Sense the Mystical- A successful ritual enables the Oblationist to roll Psyniscience. The candle burns out after a few minutes at most.

Touch the Earth- A Successful ritual enables an Oblationist to speak with his student, or vice versa (for when an Astropath won't do).

Pebble From the Mountain- A successful ritual enables further occult communication between the Student and his Oblationist master.

A couple more that may be unnecessary:

Curtain of will (Darkness)- A successful ritual covers the area in supernatural darkness, staving off sunlight

Purity of Flesh - A Successful ritual purges the Oblationist's body of all impure/foreign objects.

Rank 2 Rituals:

Donning the Mask of Shadows- A successful ritual grants the Oblationist limited invisibility [a la chameleon minor power]

Eyes of the Night Hawk- A successful ritual allows the Oblationist to see trough the eyes of a bird or other flying creature.

Follow the Lie- A successful ritual allows the Oblationist to craft an esoteric "Tracking device".

Impassible Trail- A successful ritual allows the Oblationist not to alter a trail behind his passage, leaving no tracks (can still be tracked using scent.)

Run to Judgment - A successful ritual prevents the Oblationist's victims from escaping.

A couple more that may be unnecessary:

Draught of the Pebble- A successful ritual enables the Oblationist to store some of his blood in an unassuming object without it loosing its potency so that he may use it later.

And Finally- Rank 3 Rituals.

Approach the Veil- Perhaps a ritual at the core of Oblationist creed, it allows them to Quest for their ideal of purity. A successful ritual also allows the Oblationist to transfer all of the degrees of success (or grants a reroll?) on any ritual performed after.

Haqim's Disfavor- A successful ritual allows the Oblationist to poison another with but a single Touch. Opponents touched Roll Toughness - Degrees of Success of Ritual, a failure imposes a penalty to all of their rolls equal to -10 * Degrees of Failure.

The rest I don't really like, and feel are quite weak. Passage of Ghul is a weaker version of Ghost body, so I don't want to replicate it here. I do feel that third level needs a bit of love- though Approach the Veil is pretty damned good and should stay that way. Haqim's Disfavor is either too strong, or too weak. I am not sure.

Opinions?

It looks all good to me, the only change would be on Run to Judgement. I would add stipulations on that. Like they can not escape for X rounds, X is equal to number of degrees of success or whatnot. Or that they can not run in a particular direction.

Also...I know I lied but I reread it, and had another thoughts

I would add in Curtain of Will because that is a useful ability, perfect escape or distraction.

Hello all!

I am back and hoping to be more active now that both my groups are back on track and my plot is moving forward quite nicely.

My Oblationist player was asking me about rituals so I managed to dig up this old topic and work out some of the details with him.

Were still conflicted about the Scoprion's Touch ritual and how that would work, and what its exact effects would be- some input on that would be cool.

Alternatively, we've got the BIG ritual - the core of Oblationism, I find, which would allow a sort of transcendence. The creed is huge on purity, damnation and a thorough destruction of the individual, and I believe that, like the Quietus discipline which their rituals are based on, the Ritual of Revelation - or Quest for Godhead, ultimately represents an Oblationist's ultimate goal.

Through a specific meditative ritual, the oblationist enters a trance and attempts to pierce the veil of reality, hoping to gain knowledge that would help him further his cause.

On the first section of his journey, the Oblationist is opposed by visions of his past failures, secret shames, impurities made flesh. Few survive this stage, growing mad and gibbering with lunacy when faced with the seeming paradoxical nature of their creed. Only the true Oblationists, who has accepted the death of his former-self and is at peace with his choices, is able to continue further to the second stage....

MECHANICS- The first stage of the tower would, in theory, involve various WP tests with failure inducing insanity point gain on the acolyte. Being exposed to the ritual at this stage takes its toll on weak minds, often breaking them.

On the second section, the Oblationist is presented with the full potential of the warp: the knowledge that he is seeking is here. Corrupting power, in all forms, is available. From forbidden knowledge, to dark sorcery- pacts with daemonic creatures, the ability to harness infinite power... but at the price: it is in this stage that most oblationist falter, growing more and more corrupt as they fall victim (and slave) to the warp's enticing nature. It is then that the apprentice, often trained for this purpose, is oath-bound to hunt down and destroy his former master, the latter having been lost to the second realm corruption.

MECHANICS- Failing at this stage grands corruption points, but succeeding grants rewards - often as a price of corruption points as well. It can easily be used as a plot device, if can acolyte manages to reach this stage. The idea is to have him enjoy it- give him mechanical bonuses if he quits while he's ahead he gets some corruption and some rewards, and warning him that if he fails he gets NOTHING but the corruption points- sort of line an arena...

The third stage of the tower, this is where it gets interesting: no one has yet to achieve this stage, but some theorise this is where true power lies: ultimate truth. When the Oblationist reaches this stage, he parts the veil and "looks beyond it...."

MECHANICS- At the stage, the oblationist's purity becomes absolute as he gains and understands the true nature of the universe. He begins to SHED gained corruption points and insanity points until he reaches 0 on both, and perhaps even goes into the negatives. He no longer gains insanity points or corruption points- become a mixture of both Holy and Unholy, Damned and Divine at the same time, capable of wielding the most devastating warpish sorcery with his one hand while brandishing a holy anointed weapon in the name of the emperor in the other...

Throughout, this ritual should represent a successfully harder and harder WP, with the player constantly being enticed to quit while he's ahead. On the first stage of the tower, the reward would be moving forward. The second stage would be more concrete rewards, corruption points in exchange for power. The third stage would be reduction of insanity and corruption points. At the first player, the player should be encourage to FIGHT- a failed test gives insanity points, but the player can fight as long as he'd like to keep going. After each successful test starting with the second floor, the player is given an option to quit the ritual now and leave with his reward, or keep going and risk losing everything - instead gaining even more insanity and corruption points.

The tests would have to be modulated by multiple factors- from the players rank, to his Forbidden Lore oblationist skills, and any meditative preparation he takes ahead of time to ensure things go smoothly.

What do you guys think about the idea?