Lesser Wish

[Jim Kane]

Originally Posted by Skarg

I think what I would tend to prefer would be if demons were more detailed, specific and interesting. Like, they each have different abilities, personalities, names, goals, situations, and you actually bargain with them and they can help you with things they know or can do or find out.

Your wish is granted... referentially speaking, that is.

I would commend you to an easy-to-digest article, which will provide you basic qualitative information pertaining to the most basic characteristics and abilities of the 72 demons of the Ars Goetia; without having to translate Latin nor read either the Mathers or Crowley translations of the De praestigiis daemonum, of 1563.

The article will immediately provide you a *D&D Monster Manual*-styled listing - with some pictures - of the demons contained within the The Lesser Key of Solomon, also known as Clavicula Salomonis Regis, or The Lemegeton; which is an anonymous grimoire on demonology.

However, based on a recently expressed philosophical position by the designer on the subject of TFT providing basic qualitative descriptions for a thing in TFT: "There has to be room for the GM's creativity, and he should not be choked with detail that he might not use."

Which, on it's own, would appear to indicate that a published TFT supplement detailing these things for players - a Demon Manual for The Fantasy Trip if you will - would go directly against that stated philosophy; and if held, would reasonably indicate that the future publication of such a product for players, unlikely.

Therefore, your own imagination - *after being coupled to some well-informed preexisting research* - may be a much more fertile source of generating and defining phantasmagorical demons for your Cidri.

Thus, if you will pardon the pun, you may find this most elementary style of basic qualitative information with which to describe demons - or hazardous flora for that matter - bound to your own home game.

Sometimes, you just need to know where to look, or a friend point you in the direction of the where the information exists; the imagination is left to be supplied by you.

Here is the link to the article I referenced above: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...the_Ars_Goetia

JK

[pyratejohn]

Originally Posted by Steve Jackson

This might even tie in with a "karma" type mechanic, not called that, to both act as an XP sink and give characters a chance to survive weakly deathlike situations.

Would this be something similar to "Fate points" in FATE or "Momentum" in Star Trek Adventures? In any case, I think it is a trend in rpgs that I like. In the old days "karma" was me the GM intervening, and I was fine with that, but giving that option to the players puts decision making in their hands, upping their level of fun. Imho.

[zot]

Originally Posted by Skarg

I really don't like to have the Trance spell (or crystal balls) in my campaign unless the campaign is designed to have people using them a fair amount. I don't like having to think about who in the world might be gathering information with Trance or crystal balls on a regular basis. I don't like gameworld situations involving limited information being short-cut by people using Trance and/or crystal balls. So given that I will disallow those, and I think wishes should certainly be allowed to wish for a variety of inefficient things, I like having this be an option, especially when it's the only way to get such information. However I still want there to be some limits, as sometimes it seems to me to just remove something interesting from play to be able to force information from the world, OR it adds something annoying to play, such as a way to know something that shouldn't be knowable.

In another system, I'm letting my players run wild with divination and other knowledge gathering techniques and it's actually driving the entire story. I don't do any prep between sessions, I write the story at the table as we play, but the players don't know I'm doing that. Since I'm basing everything that happens on the questions they ask (and the answers I pull out of the air) the story feels to them like there's actually way more structure and intent than there actually is.

I guess I'll have to write up another proposed TFT system for knowledge gathering, based on non-attribute rolls (see the non-attribute rolls thread for details) and how to use it to create an on-the-fly story that feels deeper than it actually is. Flop back and forth between this technique and solid, pre-built story and you'll get something really cool.

[Chris Rice]

Originally Posted by pyratejohn

Would this be something similar to "Fate points" in FATE or "Momentum" in Star Trek Adventures? In any case, I think it is a trend in rpgs that I like. In the old days "karma" was me the GM intervening, and I was fine with that, but giving that option to the players puts decision making in their hands, upping their level of fun. Imho.

Yes, I use this in my games. It allows characters to increase in power without excessive attribute bloat. I call it "Hero" points, but you could call it Luck points or whatever.

[Tolenkar]

Just two really quick thoughts:

Karma: you know what she is. I like the idea. I have used karma points in a TFT style campaign and they worked well to offset those moments when she is being a, you know...

Rick and Skarg: Wow! Just, wow! The amount of great work both of you have put into looking at this is... wow. It will take me a while to digest it. I remember our group only getting maybe one wish, ever, in several years of play. So, I never really had to think about the choices. Thank you both for illuminating me on them.

Here's "wishing" you a great day (Doh! did I just use my last wish),
Tolenkar

[Steve Jackson]

Yes, the Karma being discussed is the kind of thing I am thinking about. I am working on another revision of XP rules and will include that when I post it.

No, I don't want to include a demonomicon. For those who DO want a batch of demons, there are, as has been pointed out, real ones out there. (Books, not demons.) (I hope!) If there were huge demand, it would need to be a supplement - once you open the door (so to speak) to a pantheon of demons, you need a lot of them to keep it interesting.

[KevinJ]

The last thing TFT needs id to become this centuries D&D by naming all the demons and devils you can worship. Perhaps a supplment with types of extra-plananr beings (normally called Demons) would be a better choice. And instead of basing them on religious works of earth, just making a list of abilities and then assigning them to the various beings. Major beings get 4 abilities or 2 greater and 3 lesser. Lesser wish and Wish being among them. Imagine, summoning your 'demon' only to find you used quail blood instead of pheseant blood and got the guy who only makes fart jokes and insults your parentage.

[Skarg]

When I said I would prefer demons to be individuals, I didn't want an official list published. I like that TFT Demons, like religions, are left for the GM to specify (or not) what or who they are. But I find it rather more interesting when a GM personalizes and varies demons so you can't count on them all having the same stats and personality and abilities, but rather you get a specific one, and you don't know what it's going to want or do or what its stats are (or possible whether it's going to go away). Also, all summoned creatures had us interested in where these things come from and whether it affects anything whether they're killed or not while doing service. Does a summoned wolf get brought from nearby woods? Another plane? Or is it assembled somehow on the spot and doesn't exist before or after the summoning? Maybe when people from a Judeo-Christian tradition summon a demon they tend to get something like what they expect, but people from other traditions might get more what they expect - djinn or nymph or bodhisattva or nondenominational mana monster or who knows what?

Particularly as regards to wizards and wish-coercion (especially if someone manages to get up the ability to make them safe to mass-produce), it seems awfully convenient that you know you're up against exactly IQ 20, and that you can do this one mechanical thing to get a wish out of them.

[zot]

Originally Posted by Skarg

Particularly as regards to wizards and wish-coercion (especially if someone manages to get up the ability to make them safe to mass-produce), it seems awfully convenient that you know you're up against exactly IQ 20, and that you can do this one mechanical thing to get a wish out of them.

There's "convenient" and then there's "convenient for an IQ 35 wizard".

I've never seen the second kind of convenient...

[Steve Jackson]

The whole demon thing will have to be reworked anyway, since IQ 35 wizzes are about to become very thin on the ground.