[theories] Where does dissonance come from?

Jason · 10-03-2009, 02:47 PM

Is dissonance imposed internally, based on the celestial's understanding of self, or externally, based on the Truth of the Symphony? Or, to put it another way: Do celestials get dissonance even when they're unaware that they've done something dissonant?

I realized that this question has been coming up for me repeatedly lately, and I foresee likely situations in my current campaign that would put the question to the test. I'll explain a bit more about what I mean:

To consider an example: In another thread, I was reflecting on whether Kyriotates of Destiny (who can read their hosts' memories) actually have it tougher than other Kyrios in terms of making sure their hosts are left in good shape. If a Kyrio of Destiny possesses someone who knows that taking that person over for a even just 20 minutes will make her miss an important meeting, ruining her career, he had better make sure he gets her off to that meeting in time.

Any other Kyrio might be forgiven — and might forgive itself — for thinking that 20 minutes couldn't possibly be a big deal. If an ignorant Kyrio possessed the host briefly and then freed her again with an extra fifty bucks in her pocket, it'd either gain no dissonance (believing itself to have left her in even better condition than before) or it'd gain dissonance after the meeting is over and the career is ruined — but the Kyrio would have no idea where the dissonance came from. As a GM in this situation, my inclination would be to feel like the second scenario is kind of arbitrary and unfair, and that the Kyrio should only get the dissonance for acting against its own nature of taking care of hosts. In this example, I'd assume that dissonance comes from within, not just from being imposed externally based on some objective evaluation of the Kyriotate's performance.

To consider another example, however, we have the question of whether Mercurians generate dissonance for ordering others to do their killing for them. I think the canon answer is no, technically: In A Bright Dream, Nicole, a Mercurian of Fire, calmly and musically instructs a mundane human to kill her backstabbing servant. She doesn't seem too broken up about it, and Gabriel doesn't seem to object, even knowing that Nicole had the human drain the guy's blood.

I took this to mean that it's technically not dissonant for a Mercurian to actively order someone else to do violence (which is probably good news for Marc, who needs to give orders to his Malakim). That would imply to me, at least, that dissonance rules are imposed by the true nature of the Symphony, not from within the celestial him or herself. Playing strictly by "the rules," if the Mercurian isn't committing violence directly, she's golden! Personally, though, I feel like it would start wearing down the souls of the "Friends of Man" to continually order others to commit violence for them. I just can't picture a Mercurian leading a crazed gunman around, pointing to passers-by, commanding, "Kill that one next," and not incurring dissonance for it.

Clearly I have thought about the fictional metaphysics of this world more than is healthy for one person. Please relieve me of this great burden (or feel free to justify it for me by pretending to be just as interested).

Dalillama · 10-03-2009, 06:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason

Is dissonance imposed internally, based on the celestial's understanding of self, or externally, based on the Truth of the Symphony? Or, to put it another way: Do celestials get dissonance even when they're unaware that they've done something dissonant?

Yes, they do.

Quote:

To consider an example: In another thread, I was reflecting on whether Kyriotates of Destiny (who can read their hosts' memories) actually have it tougher than other Kyrios in terms of making sure their hosts are left in good shape. If a Kyrio of Destiny possesses someone who knows that taking that person over for a even just 20 minutes will make her miss an important meeting, ruining her career, he had better make sure he gets her off to that meeting in time.

That's one of the major limits on the Kyriotate Resonance, which is otherwise an enormously powerful one. Speaking as the player of a Kyriotate without the Destiny attunement, I have to be very careful of who I take as a host and when, because unless the situation is very obvious or it's a regular human freind, Dissonance can happen at any time without warning.

Quote:

To consider another example, however, we have the question of whether Mercurians generate dissonance for ordering others to do their killing for them. I think the canon answer is no, technically: In A Bright Dream, Nicole, a Mercurian of Fire, calmly and musically instructs a mundane human to kill her backstabbing servant. She doesn't seem too broken up about it, and Gabriel doesn't seem to object, even knowing that Nicole had the human drain the guy's blood.

I took this to mean that it's technically not dissonant for a Mercurian to actively order someone else to do violence (which is probably good news for Marc, who needs to give orders to his Malakim). That would imply to me, at least, that dissonance rules are imposed by the true nature of the Symphony, not from within the celestial him or herself. Playing strictly by "the rules," if the Mercurian isn't committing violence directly, she's golden! Personally, though, I feel like it would start wearing down the souls of the "Friends of Man" to continually order others to commit violence for them. I just can't picture a Mercurian leading a crazed gunman around, pointing to passers-by, commanding, "Kill that one next," and not incurring dissonance for it.

First off, due to various factors which I don't fully recall atm, the Bright/Dark Dream stories are not fully Canon, and there are several points where an action or consequence would be different by Canon. That being said, it has been explicitly stated that in extreme situations Mercurians will call in other angels to do some righteous smiting if the situation is dire. Undead get this treatment most often, because they are still considered human by the Symphony, and Mercurians gain Dissonance from harming them. This means that it is explicitly not Dissonant by Canon for a Mercurian to order violence, jsut distasteful. You are correct about the likely effect of regularly ordering violence against humans on the average Mercurian. Most Superiors will disapprove of Mercurians doing it too often both because it skirts so close to the edge of Dissonant behavior and could potentially slip over, and because it represents a clear effort to get around God's design for Mercurians, which in turn skirts Rebellion. In the case of Gabriel particularly, as long as the human getting dead was cruel enough to deserve that level of punishment, then why not?

banditangel · 10-03-2009, 07:12 PM

Balseraph suggest that dissonance is internal - they can use their resonance to convince themselves that they aren't REALLY dissonant, which doesn't make a lot of sense if it's an actual Symphonic external thing.

It'd also make Seraphim really odd, if they got dissonance whenever they said something they thought was true ("And this is my partner Rex, he's also an angel" *dissonance ping* "Okay, maybe he's not...")

On the other hand, Cherubim already play under external rules - they get dissonance when the attuned is harmed, not when they learn about the harm!

---

Personally, I'd say GMs call on this one, and it really changes the flavor:

External dissonance requires angels to be a lot more careful, and puts them at a significant disadvantage. Demons, after all, don't have to worry about that sort of slip-up.

Kyriotates get it worst, but it means Seraphim and Elohim also have to be a lot more careful of who they trust. Malakim... *laughs*... I suppose "unaware of evil" means it wasn't their choice, otherwise the poor black wings will explode in a ball of dissonance.

Rocket Man · 10-03-2009, 08:33 PM

Based on my own imperfect knowledge of the canon, I think the answer is "it depends." ;-)

Some dissonance conditions absolutely depend on a celestial's knowledge. The Seraphim are the big example here -- to lie, you have to know what you're saying is untrue, otherwise you're not lying, you're just mistaken. (That's where the Balseraphs get away with a lot.)

Other dissonance conditions depend on a celestial's actions, but not necessarily his knowledge. The example here is a Mercurian who shoots at a demon, misses, and hits a human hiding five feet behind the Hellspawn. The Mercurian didn't know he was there, didn't intend to hit him, but has still committed violence against a human and gains dissonance.

And some are completely independent of the celestial altogether. A Cherub who's not paying attention (or has a low Perception) may not realize his charge is in danger. But the minute the charge is killed, the Cherub takes dissonance whether he knew about the danger or not. A Kyriotate is forbidden to leave its host in worse shape than it was found ... that dissonance does not depend on the Kyrio's knowledge at all but only on the fact "Is the host now worse off?"

Does this mean that angels have to be very careful? Absolutely.

Jason · 10-03-2009, 11:12 PM

Yeah, I suppose that "it depends" and "it's up to the GM" probably represent the wise consensus. Thanks to all for the thoughtful replies.

It would be very neat and tidy if the answer were that dissonance for angels comes from breaking the rules of the Symphony, and dissonance for demons comes from breaking the rules of the self ... but as we see in the above examples, that doesn't make sense for Seraphim speaking (sincere) untruths or Malakim avoiding dissonance for letting evils to live that they don't know about. I think there are even ways of understanding the Cherubim condition as "internal" (e.g., they immediately know when an attuned target is destroyed, and this knowledge is what causes the dissonance, not the other way around).

I think I may cut Kyriotates without the Destiny attunement some slack along these lines, especially as I didn't allow any of my PCs to purchase servants at character creation. I can't imagine a situation in which blacking out for a while wouldn't leave an ignorant mundane in "worse condition" if for no other reason that they might now be worried that they need to see a doctor about it.

Rocket Man · 10-04-2009, 12:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason

It would be very neat and tidy if the answer were that dissonance for angels comes from breaking the rules of the Symphony, and dissonance for demons comes from breaking the rules of the self ...

And actually, that is a pretty decent summation. It's just that for angels, "The rules of the Symphony" can mean different things from Choir to Choir. For some Choirs it means "Don't do that." For others, it means "Don't let that happen."

EDIT: And for demons, I find the dissonance usually comes when they let a shred of their proper angelic nature get exposed. For an Impudite, the restriction against killing is a small piece of the Mercurian that should be there. For a Balseraph, getting burned when caught in a lie is the universe reminding him that he's supposed to be a Seraph. And so on.

Acolyte · 10-04-2009, 12:32 AM

I agree with "it depends" but I lean much more stringently towards "external."

Seraph: A Seraph who says "This is my friend, an angel" when his friend is a particularly plucky Balseraph doesn't incur dissonance. The statement uttered isn't true, but the Seraph didn't lie. I think that to lie you have to actively deceive--we don't say students who put incorrect answers on tests are "lying", we say they are "wrong." However, Seraphim have to be very careful about what business proposals call forward-looking statements, because declaratives are known not to be true--"It will rain today" isn't an appropriate statement for a Seraph, but "Today, rain is likely" is.

Cherub: The rules make this very clear to be external in most cases. As for the betrayal, again I would rule that the Cherub has to knowingly betray someone to incur dissonance, since "betray"al requires knowledge of what you're doing. A Cherub revealing a safehouse's location to someone he believes to be another angel but is actually a demon of the Game isn't betraying the would-be Redemption candidate hiding there, though he will probably be overcome with remorse when he learns what happened. A Cherub trading the safehouse's location for the safety of an attuned human IS committing a betrayal, even under duress.

Ofanite: The failed-roll dissonance is clearly external, but the action/inaction dissonance requires that there was something the Ofanite could actually do at the time to trigger. If you tie an Ofanite down and make him watch you murder his friend, a Soldier, it isn't dissonant. If you capture and Ofanite and force him to choose between saving that Soldier or an innocent child (because apparently I think you are a depraved madman), he doesn't take dissonance for making a choice, since he did something. If the Ofanite acts and still fails to prevent something bad, there's again no dissonance unless there was an obvious (to the Ofanite) better course of action he didn't take for some reason.

etc, etc

tHEhERETIC · 10-05-2009, 05:42 AM

So let me make sure I understand: You tell an Ofanite "Stay put" and he does, he's risking dissonance. You tie him down and while he'll be annoyed he won't be getting dissonance.

Better invest in really good rope... ;)

William · 10-05-2009, 09:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tHEhERETIC

So let me make sure I understand: You tell an Ofanite "Stay put" and he does, he's risking dissonance. You tie him down and while he'll be annoyed he won't be getting dissonance.

As long as he keeps trying to escape. If he surrenders and stops working at the problem, he gets dissonant. Stopping physically moving to concentrate on thinking of a way out, or consciously acting as if they've given up and are now dissonant, are still doing things, but actually just sitting there would be dissonant.

JCD · 10-06-2009, 11:48 AM

How often dissonance?

Three examples

How often does the Ofanim have to attempt to escape?

If an Impudite sets a bomb that kills 3 people, is it one point or three?

A Seraph lies to one person. He lies to three people. He talks to three people on three seperate occasions but repeats the same lie they had already heard.

How much Dissonance in each case?

10-03-2009, 02:47 PM	#1
Jason Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Boston, MA	[theories] Where does dissonance come from? Is dissonance imposed internally, based on the celestial's understanding of self, or externally, based on the Truth of the Symphony? Or, to put it another way: Do celestials get dissonance even when they're unaware that they've done something dissonant? I realized that this question has been coming up for me repeatedly lately, and I foresee likely situations in my current campaign that would put the question to the test. I'll explain a bit more about what I mean: To consider an example: In another thread, I was reflecting on whether Kyriotates of Destiny (who can read their hosts' memories) actually have it tougher than other Kyrios in terms of making sure their hosts are left in good shape. If a Kyrio of Destiny possesses someone who knows that taking that person over for a even just 20 minutes will make her miss an important meeting, ruining her career, he had better make sure he gets her off to that meeting in time. Any other Kyrio might be forgiven — and might forgive itself — for thinking that 20 minutes couldn't possibly be a big deal. If an ignorant Kyrio possessed the host briefly and then freed her again with an extra fifty bucks in her pocket, it'd either gain no dissonance (believing itself to have left her in even better condition than before) or it'd gain dissonance after the meeting is over and the career is ruined — but the Kyrio would have no idea where the dissonance came from. As a GM in this situation, my inclination would be to feel like the second scenario is kind of arbitrary and unfair, and that the Kyrio should only get the dissonance for acting against its own nature of taking care of hosts. In this example, I'd assume that dissonance comes from within, not just from being imposed externally based on some objective evaluation of the Kyriotate's performance. To consider another example, however, we have the question of whether Mercurians generate dissonance for ordering others to do their killing for them. I think the canon answer is no, technically: In A Bright Dream, Nicole, a Mercurian of Fire, calmly and musically instructs a mundane human to kill her backstabbing servant. She doesn't seem too broken up about it, and Gabriel doesn't seem to object, even knowing that Nicole had the human drain the guy's blood. I took this to mean that it's technically not dissonant for a Mercurian to actively order someone else to do violence (which is probably good news for Marc, who needs to give orders to his Malakim). That would imply to me, at least, that dissonance rules are imposed by the true nature of the Symphony, not from within the celestial him or herself. Playing strictly by "the rules," if the Mercurian isn't committing violence directly, she's golden! Personally, though, I feel like it would start wearing down the souls of the "Friends of Man" to continually order others to commit violence for them. I just can't picture a Mercurian leading a crazed gunman around, pointing to passers-by, commanding, "Kill that one next," and not incurring dissonance for it. Clearly I have thought about the fictional metaphysics of this world more than is healthy for one person. Please relieve me of this great burden (or feel free to justify it for me by pretending to be just as interested).

10-03-2009, 07:12 PM	#3
banditangel Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Portland, OR	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? Balseraph suggest that dissonance is internal - they can use their resonance to convince themselves that they aren't REALLY dissonant, which doesn't make a lot of sense if it's an actual Symphonic external thing. It'd also make Seraphim really odd, if they got dissonance whenever they said something they thought was true ("And this is my partner Rex, he's also an angel" dissonance ping "Okay, maybe he's not...") On the other hand, Cherubim already play under external rules - they get dissonance when the attuned is harmed, not when they learn about the harm! --- Personally, I'd say GMs call on this one, and it really changes the flavor: External dissonance requires angels to be a lot more careful, and puts them at a significant disadvantage. Demons, after all, don't have to worry about that sort of slip-up. Kyriotates get it worst, but it means Seraphim and Elohim also have to be a lot more careful of who they trust. Malakim... laughs... I suppose "unaware of evil" means it wasn't their choice, otherwise the poor black wings will explode in a ball of dissonance.

10-03-2009, 08:33 PM	#4
Rocket Man Petitioner: Word of IN Filk Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Longmont, CO	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? Based on my own imperfect knowledge of the canon, I think the answer is "it depends." ;-) Some dissonance conditions absolutely depend on a celestial's knowledge. The Seraphim are the big example here -- to lie, you have to know what you're saying is untrue, otherwise you're not lying, you're just mistaken. (That's where the Balseraphs get away with a lot.) Other dissonance conditions depend on a celestial's actions, but not necessarily his knowledge. The example here is a Mercurian who shoots at a demon, misses, and hits a human hiding five feet behind the Hellspawn. The Mercurian didn't know he was there, didn't intend to hit him, but has still committed violence against a human and gains dissonance. And some are completely independent of the celestial altogether. A Cherub who's not paying attention (or has a low Perception) may not realize his charge is in danger. But the minute the charge is killed, the Cherub takes dissonance whether he knew about the danger or not. A Kyriotate is forbidden to leave its host in worse shape than it was found ... that dissonance does not depend on the Kyrio's knowledge at all but only on the fact "Is the host now worse off?" Does this mean that angels have to be very careful? Absolutely. __________________ “It's not railroading if you offer the PCs tickets and they stampede to the box office, waving their money. Metaphorically speaking” --Elizabeth McCoy, In Nomine Line Editor Author: "What Doesn't Kill Me Makes Me Stronger"

10-03-2009, 11:12 PM	#5
Jason Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Boston, MA	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? Yeah, I suppose that "it depends" and "it's up to the GM" probably represent the wise consensus. Thanks to all for the thoughtful replies. It would be very neat and tidy if the answer were that dissonance for angels comes from breaking the rules of the Symphony, and dissonance for demons comes from breaking the rules of the self ... but as we see in the above examples, that doesn't make sense for Seraphim speaking (sincere) untruths or Malakim avoiding dissonance for letting evils to live that they don't know about. I think there are even ways of understanding the Cherubim condition as "internal" (e.g., they immediately know when an attuned target is destroyed, and this knowledge is what causes the dissonance, not the other way around). I think I may cut Kyriotates without the Destiny attunement some slack along these lines, especially as I didn't allow any of my PCs to purchase servants at character creation. I can't imagine a situation in which blacking out for a while wouldn't leave an ignorant mundane in "worse condition" if for no other reason that they might now be worried that they need to see a doctor about it.

10-04-2009, 12:32 AM	#7
Acolyte Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Seattle	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? I agree with "it depends" but I lean much more stringently towards "external." Seraph: A Seraph who says "This is my friend, an angel" when his friend is a particularly plucky Balseraph doesn't incur dissonance. The statement uttered isn't true, but the Seraph didn't lie. I think that to lie you have to actively deceive--we don't say students who put incorrect answers on tests are "lying", we say they are "wrong." However, Seraphim have to be very careful about what business proposals call forward-looking statements, because declaratives are known not to be true--"It will rain today" isn't an appropriate statement for a Seraph, but "Today, rain is likely" is. Cherub: The rules make this very clear to be external in most cases. As for the betrayal, again I would rule that the Cherub has to knowingly betray someone to incur dissonance, since "betray"al requires knowledge of what you're doing. A Cherub revealing a safehouse's location to someone he believes to be another angel but is actually a demon of the Game isn't betraying the would-be Redemption candidate hiding there, though he will probably be overcome with remorse when he learns what happened. A Cherub trading the safehouse's location for the safety of an attuned human IS committing a betrayal, even under duress. Ofanite: The failed-roll dissonance is clearly external, but the action/inaction dissonance requires that there was something the Ofanite could actually do at the time to trigger. If you tie an Ofanite down and make him watch you murder his friend, a Soldier, it isn't dissonant. If you capture and Ofanite and force him to choose between saving that Soldier or an innocent child (because apparently I think you are a depraved madman), he doesn't take dissonance for making a choice, since he did something. If the Ofanite acts and still fails to prevent something bad, there's again no dissonance unless there was an obvious (to the Ofanite) better course of action he didn't take for some reason. etc, etc __________________ “The world is going to Hell in a hand-basket, but I’ve got Good News: I saved my soul by switching to Heaven.” —Baruel, former Djinn of the Media, now Cherub of Destiny and the Angel of Good News

10-05-2009, 05:42 AM	#8
tHEhERETIC MIB Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Life imitates art--I'm in Pohang	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? So let me make sure I understand: You tell an Ofanite "Stay put" and he does, he's risking dissonance. You tie him down and while he'll be annoyed he won't be getting dissonance. Better invest in really good rope... ;) __________________ Criminy...these two have enough issues, they can sell subscriptions! (ladyarcana55, in a PM)

10-06-2009, 11:48 AM	#10
JCD Join Date: May 2008 Location: Birthplace of the Worst Pizza on the Planet	Re: [theories] Where does dissonance come from? How often dissonance? Three examples How often does the Ofanim have to attempt to escape? If an Impudite sets a bomb that kills 3 people, is it one point or three? A Seraph lies to one person. He lies to three people. He talks to three people on three seperate occasions but repeats the same lie they had already heard. How much Dissonance in each case?