Deconstructing "A Dark Dream"

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Archangel Beth

The interesting thing is that Nicole hooks him up with a demon, to go be demony, rather than knocking him out, stuffing him in the trunk, and dragging him to a Tether of Novalis or Destiny. "Here! Fresh Djinn, just Fallen! FIXIES!" Perhaps Nicole has dark thoughts from time to time and wants friends on both sides, just in case.

That's just another data point for my theory that Nicole is a Balseraph of Fate with the Mercurian package, IMHO.

(As to why Gabriel doesn't notice - well, how much is Gabriel really noticing, these days?)

[Archangel Beth]

*snicker* Well, there is that.

I should have realized sooner that it would be thematically appropriate, for the setting as Derek wrote it, if the iconic characters swapped sides. I don't know if he was planning that, since he never mentioned it, but it would totally fit.

[JCD]

Sorry to resurrect this, but it just occured to me. Does anyone else wonder about why Haagenti and Andre told their Servitors to work together given their animosity?

[Matthias Wasser]

Nicole is a Mercurian; it's in her nature to conceptualize things in terms of relationships first and only then in abstract principles - hence not only her caring for Tariel but her continued fondness for Marcus. Nicole the Malakite would torture and murder an old friend without thinking twice (insert your own joke about whether Virtues have friends.)

Originally Posted by JCD

Sorry to resurrect this, but it just occured to me. Does anyone else wonder about why Haagenti and Andre told their Servitors to work together given their animosity?

I suspect that if it doesn't involve pornography (or a few similar fields) Andre and Haagenti have no big beef with each other. Rivalry and cooperation don't have to be mutually exclusive - politics wouldn't exist if they did.

[JCD]

Originally Posted by Matthias Wasser

I suspect that if it doesn't involve pornography (or a few similar fields) Andre and Haagenti have no big beef with each other. Rivalry and cooperation don't have to be mutually exclusive - politics wouldn't exist if they did.

It isn't rivalry, it's hostility.

I'm mostly going by Superiors II. Andre has a HUGE beef with Haagenti. Haagenti is pushing his word farther from gluttony and into 'hunger' with the subsidiary effect of taking out 'Lust' 'Drugs' 'Greed' and 'Theft'.

Hence Andre, Valefor, Fleurity and Mammnon are all pushing back at him HARD. IIRC, all are hostile to him. Only the strength of his word, underestimating him, and the protection of Kobal has heretofore kept him from being drugged, robbed and raped.

On a related note: Andrealphus, Asmodeous, Beleth, Belial, Malphas, Kronos, and Valefor are all hostile to him. I would grant your point as far as the plain text ones. Beleth thinks he's gross and stupid, for example. The ones in bold are 'sharing a conceptual border' with Gluttony and are most threatened.

[Archangel Beth]

When Princes say "work together," it probably means "in order to skew things towards *my* Word" with a side order of "and backstab the suckers when convenient." The more hostile the Princes normally are, the more that interpretation should probably be put on things. (At least, that's how I'd play it. It could also be some form of "Kobal said make nice-nice this decade, so we're making nice-nice in order to not get the cream pies with the bombs thrown around the place, until we make sure all the cream pies with bombs are aimed at someone else" politics.)

[JCD]

Originally Posted by Archangel Beth

When Princes say "work together," it probably means "in order to skew things towards *my* Word" with a side order of "and backstab the suckers when convenient." The more hostile the Princes normally are, the more that interpretation should probably be put on things. (At least, that's how I'd play it. It could also be some form of "Kobal said make nice-nice this decade, so we're making nice-nice in order to not get the cream pies with the bombs thrown around the place, until we make sure all the cream pies with bombs are aimed at someone else" politics.)

Uh huh. And it has nothing to do with ex post facto rationalizing for an early version of story vs final product, right?

[Archangel Beth]

Dude, everything that Derek wrote tends to have a little ex post facto rationalizing in it. Great ideas, probably an excellent "roll-and-shout go go go go" GM, but sometimes his execution needed a certain smack when presenting it in slow-mo.

Either that, or this may be the thing that had a bait-and-switch double-agent who was going to be revealed in the next Cycle. I dimly recall something like that somewhere in the notes. >_>

[JCD]

Originally Posted by Archangel Beth

Dude, everything that Derek wrote tends to have a little ex post facto rationalizing in it. Great ideas, probably an excellent "roll-and-shout go go go go" GM, but sometimes his execution needed a certain smack when presenting it in slow-mo.

Either that, or this may be the thing that had a bait-and-switch double-agent who was going to be revealed in the next Cycle. I dimly recall something like that somewhere in the notes. >_>

HA! At least you're honest about it.

I wish he wrote more of the stuff. I loved the characters, even as I nit pick due to OCD.

[Archangel Beth]

Come, now, why should I hide what would be obvious by looking at the errata files?

And let's not discuss the interregnum in Line Editorial before I took the helm and really grasped it firmly. (Well, we could, actually -- the melding of Dominic between the core rules and H&H was not as easy as I'd have liked, for instance.)