06-24-2011, 09:36 PM | #21 | |
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Boston, MA
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
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I don't have an opinion on the Babel thing one way or the other at present, but I could certainly imagine ways to fit it into the In Nomine cosmology (even if not entirely literally, as was cleverly done with the "Eden experiment"). Perhaps Babel was an early Infernal Tether (maybe to Pride, a Word which Lucifer reserves out of personal vanity?). The Archangels and/or Demon Princes may have battled over it or rallied to strike it down, with the unintended effect of damaging the way communication works in the entire Symphony, or at least among all humans in the area. |
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06-24-2011, 10:42 PM | #22 |
Petitioner: Word of IN Filk
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Longmont, CO
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
Don't forget also, in listing humanity's Symphonic impact:
* It's the collective consciousness of humanity that created and maintains the Marches, aka the ethereal dreamworld. The dream-spirits of that realm have their birth in human imagination and gain or lose power as their stories become more or less compelling and enduring. ========== For what it's worth, in In Nomine as written, Lucifer doesn't understand why things are so human-centric either. In the "canon" version of history, his early dispute with God was because God said humans were special creations who should be left alone by the celestials; Lucifer didn't consider them to be so great and felt celestials should be free to interfere at will -- for mankind's own good, of course. ;) The result was the Eden Experiment (which Lucifer contaminated) and, shortly after, the War. That said, in the official IN continuity, Lucifer and his forces may owe their freedom to humanity's unique position within the Sympony. It was Lilith who freed the demons from Hell, creating the first infernal Tether to do so. And after the liberated demons began messing with humanity, God gave permission for the angels to act in its defense ... but quietly and subtlely, so as to preserve humanity's free will. Which is part of why the War is so often fought from the shadows.
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“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" |
06-25-2011, 01:20 AM | #23 |
Join Date: Jun 2011
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
related thought:
the Blessed don't need to learn Angelic; when they turn up in Heaven they just 'know' it. If it's hardwired in to humans the way it is to Celestials, then the decision to lie/tell the truth is probably *thought* in Angelic, rather than in the local language. And since you can't lie in Angelic, the Seraphim are probably just hearing the Angelic thoughts behind the corporeal words. |
06-25-2011, 01:27 AM | #24 | |
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Seattle
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
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And if Babel isn't canon, it can't be used against the argument that Seraphic resonance isn't language-dependent. Might be worth its own thread, that. Its potential as a Tether (or as a "battlefield" of the War before War really took its current form). Someone make that thread.
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“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 |
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06-25-2011, 07:01 AM | #25 |
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Upper Peninsula of Michigan
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
Let's try this another way.
You can't lie in Angelic. Humans can lie. Therefore, a Seraph resonating a human who has just lied cannot possibly experience what the human has just said in Angelic. ----- Possibility: the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Language shapes concept, and so what the human has uttered would be a different statement entirely in any other language. What they said was what they said in that language, and no other. ----- For meta-game reasons, Seraphim characters shouldn't be able to resonate every speaker they come across and get a free pass on comprehending every corporeal language. You want to speak Cantonese, spend the points on Cantonese. ----- Finally, however, if you want Seraphim to be able to do this, go ahead. We promise that the Canon Police will not come and beat down your door. (Note: Asmodeus actually has some of these. They tend to be young, 7- and 8-Force demons with serious Earth-adaptation issues. If they burn a Vessel in an argument over any given canon, however, Asmodeus will not replace it. Unless they were defending the position that Greedo shot first.) |
06-25-2011, 08:25 AM | #26 |
Join Date: Jun 2007
Location: Life imitates art--I'm in Pohang
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
I've played with this resonance in my game and had no confusion on it at all, even with polyglot NPC's. When the character is lying in a foreign language, I tell the seraph "He's lying." I figure that truth/falsehood/Symphony is like music and the words he's speaking are lyrics--and the angel knows a lie because the guy is singing off-key. Higher CD's are powerful in that they say what the Truth is, so in a very vague way they are translating what the guy didn't say.
CD 2--and mind you, I'm reading an unrepentant 1st edition--"which statement he thinks is most false" will give the angel a summary translation of one part of what was said. This doesn't strike me as overpowered. CD4 seems like a giveaway, but I read it as only working when the guy chose to lie in the first place. If your subject told the truth, all you'll get is "Yep, it's all true. In Turkish." CD6 yeah, ignores the language barrier. I can't explain the theory there, I just find it a plausible result. A smart demon will tell the Seraph the truth in an obscure language and watch the angel get upset at the lack of lies. Oh, comedy!
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06-25-2011, 10:28 AM | #27 | ||
Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
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“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster…when you gaze long into the abyss the abyss also gazes into you…” –Friedrich Nietzsche Last edited by DBloch2012; 10-10-2012 at 07:46 PM. |
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06-25-2011, 11:17 AM | #28 | ||||
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Seattle
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
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__________________
“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 |
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06-25-2011, 01:35 PM | #29 |
Untitled
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: between keyboard and chair
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
My bad - I misremembered. The Timeline in the Game Master's Guide says that David and Uriel's angels killed off the Nephallim... so, unless it was a metaphorical flood of blood, it wasn't The Flood that killed them.
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Rob Kelk “Every man has a right to his own opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.” – Bernard Baruch, Deming (New Mexico) Headlight, 6 January 1950 No longer reading these forums regularly. |
06-25-2011, 02:20 PM | #30 |
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Upper Peninsula of Michigan
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Re: And ye shall know the Truth ...
Right, the Flood is definitely non-canon in In Nomine. The GMG timeline jibes with standard geologic history. The Noahic Flood would by definition be a cataclysymic event, and it isn't listed there. The physical impossibility of preserving the Earth's ecosystem in an ark against a global flood (Songs or not, drowning every tree on North America will render the continent barren, and drowning the Brazilian and African rainforests would render the world uninhabitable) also explains that it didn't occur.
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in nomine, languages, resonances, seraphim |
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