Custom, Cannon and Chaos

[Orlin]

I had a hard time coming into the wonderful world of In Nomine, but this was largely because of my incredible fondness for the World of Darkness and my nearly obsessive fascination with the Demon the Fallen game line. I remember reading the Overture of the Core Guide and thinking, sold! Then I remember reading the first lines of A Bright Dream, and thinking, eww! I held onto the latter sentiment for a long time, and afterward I spent countless hours pouring over other, “better” games like Scion and Demon.

My loss.

Demon the Fallen had instant appeal because it was vastly misunderstood, even by those who’ve read the core book (especially if they never went farther.) At first glance, it appears to be a game where God is a tyrant, Lucifer is a passionate-yet-tragic hero and the Fallen are poor, misguided puppies that deserve eternal love and forgiveness, while we, the ungrateful little bastards that we are, gave them cold-hearted suspicion and ignorance instead.

It shows the War in a completely different light. It shows Michael as cold and merciless, God as childishly petty, and the demons the victims in it all, from the despicable-yet-uncomfortably-humanized Raveners, so wracked with pain that they want to destroy the world to the to the tragically endearing Reconcilers, who just want to be forgiven, or who failing that, to make the world a better place.

The more you read, the more you learn that all is not as it seems, and the truth – as the game line presents it – is somewhere between the tragic tale of demonic heroism and the things we learn from both the Old and New Testament bibles. As you read on, you learn that God is not petty; She never was. You learn that Lucifer and his Fallen fell because of pride, not love, however they deceived themselves. You learn that Michael may have seemed cold, but his ultimatum was not unjust: live in opposition to God or cease to exist and be forgiven. Demon was very pretty, and turning away from an eloquent tale of “tragic heroism” to the "black-and-white" world of In Nomine was, in a word, difficult.

The trouble is, while Demon had an awesome metaplot, an endearing Lucifer, a God that was easy to hate and a vast array of colloquial Angelic names (in a pretty language called Enochian), In Nomine had something far better:

Playability.

I tried to work with Demon the Fallen – I really did. I read chapters upon chapters, books upon books, I even read the layout for the end, and ultimately I was disappointed. Most of the big questions were left unanswered or up to me to decide, which was all well and good, but their biggest hook was ultimately about one thing, and sacrifice is not a concept that my players are all too keen on. The vastly different ideas of demonic redemption presented in In Nomine, much like the less-than-loveable Lucifer was really hard to digest. And don’t even get me started on the Ethereals.

I’ve run six different sessions in the In Nomine campaign setting for three different player types, and the one thing I’ve discovered is that I never seem to run out of is ideas. Somewhere in downtown Los Angeles, Xyphriel kills deals by day and demons by night. In San Bernardino, two would-be renegade hellspawn make a desperate gamble for God against their demon prince even as they embark upon a road trip toward redemption. In Malibu, The Red Room hosts a slew of special guests (most with more money and fame than morality) at the behest of a newly-christened Soldier of Heaven, who doesn't even realize his bouncer is a Watcher that likes to tip off the good guys from time to time. All the while, another Malakite prowls the streets of South Central, picking up breadcrumbs left by her remorseful prey even as she deliberates over what she’ll do when she finally catches them.

Ideas are easy to come by in the land of In Nomine. They just happen. They don’t require much prompting or forethought. They flow, and in the World of Darkness I can’t seem to get the ideas to run quite so smoothly.

But I guess what I’m saying is, I still feel like my games are still lacking something.

I don’t want French names, I want names that make my players feel like I’ve done my homework. The Words, I sometimes like and sometimes don’t (the Garden, or Flowers? The Aegis, or Protection? Passion or Fire?) but changing them is sometimes more trouble than it’s worth. Sometimes I want to map out the hierarchy of the major Wordbound to a T (that's the plotter in me, nagging at me to have every eventuality neatly penciled) but in every game I've run I come up with them on the fly and write them down later. The history is another thing I desperately look to rewrite (some parts just don't jive well with me personally), but the more and more I play, the more and more I realize that the players probably don’t give a toss about the history. What does it matter to them how the world was made if their characters were Imps, Gremlins and Relievers only two hundred years back?

Sometimes it’s the little things I want to change. What if the Ethereals were Celestials that refused to take sides and sought refuge in the Dreaming until the inadvertent (and later, the desperately sought-after) worship of mortals transformed them into something else entirely? What if this? What if that? What could I incorporate – whether from Scion, Demon, Neil Gaimon or Terry Pratchet – into the In Nomine campaigns that I run that would somehow sate that desire to tinker with and change things, even when they aren't broken? Even small things?

I think someone else once started a thread about canonical metaplot, so here’s the point of this long-winded child of sleep-deprivation that I’ve churned out and edited a dozen times:

I want to know what you guys have changed in your In Nomine games. What did you toss? What did you keep? What was your custom and cannon? For those experienced GM's, what worked and what didn't? What have you done to tinker with the History of the Symphony? What names have you changed? Where do Vampires come from? What about the Undead? Sorcery? Enchantment? Alchemy?

What would you, could you, did you do differently, and how did it work out?

[JCD]

It would help to know what books you have already.

For backstory and analysis, the GMG and Infernal Players Guide are crucial, IMO. For magic, the imagery from Night Music is wonderful but the rules in Corporeal Players Guide is much better.

I tried to READ Demon and it was a slog. They got too worked up in their own religious viewpoint, IMO and spent so much time on no doubt historical names and backstory that they sacrificed accessibility.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems all of the demons need to beg, borrow or steal a body from a human? Eh.

There is so much left undefined that you can put your own stamp on the game.

[Rocket Man]

My own GM has added about a dozen Superiors to the mix as well as a new type of Marches-centered celestial, the Grays, and I'll let her tell that story. I mention it, though, because while I liked her version of Raphael -- an active Archangel of Healing instead of a dead Archangel of Knowledge -- I didn't want to give up the Legion incident to get it.

And so, when I began thinking about setting up my own Boulder-based campaign, I included the following bit of fiction as a new backstory ... one in which Legion happens a couple of centuries earlier ....

@@@
Baal gritted his teeth. They had been close, so close. And then ...

DAMN Saminga for trying his little experiment too soon!

It had all been so perfect, the Prince of The War mused ruefully as he remembered. Heaven had been tearing at itself ever since that ridiculous Arab merchant began seeing Gabriel's visions and babbling. Lovely little insurrection there, almost like the old days.

And then, even better, Uriel went completely off his rocker. Wasting the Host on dreams and figments! Baal snickered evilly. A political move, it had to be. All Hell had had to do was stand back, watch, and take in a few Ethereal refugees, so desperate for Essence they didn't care when it came from. And then the politics had backfired badly -- oh, so badly, he gloated -- and Uriel himself was ON TRIAL for overzealotry! It had been beautiful, the sort of crisis in the "holy" ranks he had dreamed of.

And then ...

Baal sobered.

And then Hell's dumbest Prince had to get involved.

Even an idiot should have been able to see it, Baal cursed. So long as the trial continued to a conclusion, any conclusion, Heaven's ranks would be split asunder. But all Saminga could see was that the eyes of the Archangels were elsewhere; the perfect time to unleash his pet Shedite Legion on the world.

The idiot had given Heaven a common enemy. Hell, too, come to think of it, once Legion proved to be *completely* insane.

It had cost far too much to destroy the warped Corrupter, the general recalled with a shudder. But at least he had the bitter satisfaction of knowing that Heaven had paid the dearest price of all. Bitter, because it healed rifts that should have been left gaping and painful.

In the end, Uriel himself had taken the field to "purify the world of this abomination of Hell." The two had battled soul-to-soul with such intensity that only the strongest Archangels dared draw near. A star exploding would have caused less Disturbance in the Symphony and wreaked less havoc.

Uriel was a warrior, strong in body and soul. Legion was an insane monster. The end was inevitable, really. Legion fell, the Archangel of Purity ripping his final Forces apart with his bare hands and scattering them on the Symphony.

But he had been weakened and weakened badly. Uriel's own Forces were unraveling, his soul "bleeding" into the universe. Even Raphael's mighty healing, aided by Jean's precise mind and Yves' foresight, could only slow the loss, not prevent it.

Uriel was dying.

And then it happened. A Voice spoke from the Heavens.

"Uriel, come to me."

The wounded Archangel of Purity rose. Those nearby were transfixed with awe as Uriel ascended into the Higher Heavens, into the direct presence of God Himself. With a last Symphonic whisper, the Archangel vanished from view.

There had been fallout, of course. Some of Uriel's servitors believed Heaven had hung a "disgraced" commander out to dry. The Tsayadim sent themselves into the Marches, continuing "Uriel's holy work" and being a general nuisance on the borders. And of course, God had appointed that young whelp, Laurence, as the new commander ... a familiar sneer came to Baal's lips at the thought of the Archangel of The Sword trying to fit the place of his betters, like a child dressed in his father's over-large clothes.

But the larger objective had failed. Uriel had redeemed himself in the eyes of most of Heaven, had gone out a hero rather than a hypocrite. Heaven lined up easily behind the chosen heir. The Marches would still remember and hate, but Uriel's Crusade had left them with little power to do anything but hate. Even Michael's beautiful feud with Yves had begun to cool in the light of how much Destiny had done to try to save Heaven's brightest.

There was even the disturbing possibility that Uriel might return someday ...

The Balseraph shook his head, shrouded himself comfortably in his resonance. Ridiculous. Hell *would* find a way to re-open those bandaged wounds, would find a way to press the advantage that two idiot Shedites had endangered. Heroism makes great stories, he sneered, but bad battle plans.

"We'll get that edge back," the Prince of the War muttered. "Or there's going to be the Devil to pay."

[Jason]

The tricky thing about deviating from canon is that the canon materials are so good that I still want to use some of them even when I'm using a custom world -- which means working hard to find plot holes between them. Now I run one canon campaign when all my players can get together, and one custom campaign when only a few of us are available at a time.

I got some suggestions for my custom campaign in a thread called In Nomine, Minus the Angels. The basic premise is that angels have not been visibly active on Earth since Uriel's Purity Crusade, which ended abruptly. Heaven's doors appear locked, the Angels of Final Judgment guarding the gates of Hell have been replaced by statues, and the last time angels were seen on Earth was since then the Legion incident, when Raphael leapt in to save the day, much to everyone's surprise.

In game terms, this implies a lot: sorcerers, ethereals, Renegade demons, and "uninitiated" humans are more the focus for PCs, as Soldiers on both sides and Servitors of Hell in "good" standing are kind of bastards. Anyone ever working for Valefor is especially distrusted because he appeared after the Crusade with all of Janus' old attunements. A group of spirits purporting to be the Tsyadim, Uriel's orphaned angels, are still rumored to roam the Far Marches, hunting dream spirits, but opinion is divided on whether they're actually the only active angels outside Heaven or if they're dream spirits born from the most terrifying nightmare the dreams themselves have ever had. And so on.

I haven't really changed anything in my canon game just to make things easier on players who buy the books themselves. If I were to change anything, though, I'd change the name of the Djinn (probably to Se'irim), maybe change David to Peter, and definitely change Kobal's Word from Dark Humor to either "Mockery" or "The Joke" (either implying the sick senselessness of existence, which fits in better with his old, pre-Kronos role of opposing Destiny). I've also kicked around ideas on whether Servitors of Dreams should have more useful attunements for use on Earth (even if given by special Word bound Servitors to keep things canon), or whether angelic Servitors of Fire should have some bonus to their attunements to account for the frustration of being derailed by spotting cruel individuals. I also have a tendency to create lots of minor Word bound for my campaigns, any number of whom are vying for Superior status of their own, so that roster is ultimately up to change. (I maintain that there should be an Archangel of Bread, eventually.)

Also, you may find use in this list of "cosmetic changes" for In Nomine that I once saw mentioned around these forums. Does away with all the French names for Hebrew. There's also a whole thread on renaming the Djinn band.

[tHEhERETIC]

As an ex-Cam/WoDder myself--welcome to the Bright Side! :) I'm from L.A./San Bernardino myself--have we met?

I play what I like to call "loose canon" (a pun on loose cannon, obviously). I stick to canon when it's convenient, which is usually, but in the places where canon is vague or leaves holes I like to fill them in in ways I consider a little different. For instance, God in my campaign isn't the personal Father--though some angels think of Him in those terms--but merely the sum total of the Universe. That's my philosophy background talking, and as a plot point it really doesn't come up much.

I emphasize the ethereals, again my background talking. I'm not a monotheist. Uriel tried to get them all but there are more gods on Earth than the angels think, hiding out mostly but also being born as archetypes.

Poke around the threads at "brightness level" and you'll find lots of variations. I like mine mediumish, where the angels can be harsh, stubborn, or sometimes stupid, but their hearts are all in the right places. Look too at the Revelations cycle--I follow it until Fall of the Malakim but ignore the books after that. I divide the angelic factions a little differently that most, but we all have different opinions on that.

Here's my game page--right now it's on the (likely) tail end of a three-year story. There are many, many more by various GM's and fans all around.

[Archangel Beth]

Names: http://www.sjgames.com/in-nomine/art...biblenames.txt is invaluable. (I forget where I found the file, but I stuffed it onto the SJGames site when I got a chance. O:> )