Aberrant RPG - Taint, to fear it or not???

[Guest]

I don't have Aberrant, but I hope that someday it will be translate to spanish (my languaje).

I read all what I can about Aberrant, but I have a question:

Is really the taint a big problem for the novas???

What kind of aberrations becomes a character whit taint 4 or more??? Are they cool???

Have you in the past big problems whit it???

[Hugin]

Go to the 'Whats your character like?" Thread. My character is listed there with a healthy dose of 7 taint and towards the bottom of his write up is a detailed explanation as to what his aberrations are, for the most part the ST made them up out of whole cloth.

Atwights character also has some cool aberrations as do a couple of others.

Embrace your taint.

[Guest]

Well depends on what type of game you're playing. If you playing Utopia or Directive games Taint is a very bad thing. It's bad mainly cause it make you stand out as a nova. In a terragen campaign Taint isn't a bad really, it's like a personal growth kinda thing which leads to chyrisals, a kinda mini-eruption. Lastly in a standard game, Taint is not a good thing typically. But if you play a character well it doesn't really matter. So basically don't fear taint and let what happens happens.

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Well that was intresting....

[Guest]

The problem is that white wolf fucked up taint. On one hand the say that taint is a result of the human body not being able to handle the flow of quantum energy and its subsequent mindwarping and bodywarping effects. On the other hand taint is supposed to also be the novas acension beyond humanity something that mearly makes interaction with baselines hard. The bottom line is White wolf was torn between their instictive desire to angstify this game and the practical issue that taint should be bad for other people not you. Truth be told taint is a flashback to games of "personal horror" like vampire

[Kane Knight]

What shrimpus said. It's like Humanity (Well, the opposite), but much harder to come back from...

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The Eleventh Wonder of the World.

Hype, Sacrelige, Uniforms...

[Guest]

Of course others are going to compare the different games from the same company. They are, after all, made by generally the same group of people. Taint is very similar to Angst Points and so forth, even with the whole Temporary/Permanent allotments (10 temp. = 1 perm.).

I've spoken to others about the White Wolf tendancy to always make it melodramatic and so on -- there always seems to be an element of doom waiting around the next corner. In Wraith it's Oblivion, in Werewolf it's the Wyrm, etc. However, the hopelessness in Aberrant isn't as asphyxiating. Just play your character carefully and you shouldn't gain taint. Taint is entirely controllable. There really isn't some gargantuan and inevitable evil everyone is fighting against, either. THere is intrigue and plotting and so forth, but most of it is more realistic in the sense that it might be what everyone would be doing should this be a real world situation. Novas are accepted worldwide. It's almost the reverse of most World of Darkness situations, where the truth has to remain hidden or something. Well, I guess it's very similar. heh. However, as I said the Taint issue doesn't have to get out of hand, and you can discard the Aberrant/Trinity timeline altogether, if you wanted.

I have found in this series more than the others that White Wolf is encouraging you to make up your own plot and direction. You could just play it as close to real life as you want. It doesn't have to be dire and angsty more than your average day. (Which is less than exciting, of course.)

I suppose they just needed to balance out giving players the power to warp space, bend time, and bend spoons or whatever.

Just an opinion, I guess.

neXus

[Jager]

Actually, if you should discover that gaining taint, or Chrys for that matter, is really difficult.

I have been playing with the idea of let character pick up some taint to push their powers that extra step, sort of buying successes. I wouldn't use it for hitting or dodging, but for damage, power rolls, "maxing-out", ect. I think that fits with the spirit of the game. What do the rest of you think?

I havent' tested it, so I am not sure how it would play out.

[Guest]

Are you referring to gaining Taint when a character uses their powers above and beyond "normal" limits? If so, it might be alright, if balanced using common sense. I guess, in terms of rules, that's what it states... The character is handling quantum energies beyond what he is normally able to absorb or handle, which would be like drinking a poison you are normally able to handle. Small sips, to start, bigger sips with time -- growth with experience -- could explain the ability to handle more and more quantum energies.

What I wonder, though, is about losing Taint, if possible. Could a player "buy" off Taint with sufficient experience, much like a Flaw? This would sort of be like not over-using their power or concentrating on purging it or a new procedure or whatever. How does Temporary Taint go away, or does it?

neXus

[Guest]

Unfortunately, Taint (both temporary and permanent) does not just "go away." The only way to get rid of permanent taint that has been published is in the Teregen book. It is called Chrysalis. And while yes, it does give you the opportunity to lower your Taint, it means spending those gained exp. points from the Chrysalis to do so. It is not cheap either. There is something in the core rulebook about reducing temporary Taint, but it takes a long time and is not very effective.

The other thing to remeber about Chrysalis is that it doesn't negate any of the negative effects of Taint. So say you go from 6 Taint to 2 Taint, you still have those 2 aberrations and the difficulty penalties to interact with baselines. If the character goes back up to 6 Taint, you get 2 more aberrations and more social difficulty penalties, on top of those you already had.

Oh, and one more note. It is obscenely difficult to achieve Chrysalis. I know that this is intentional, but it is only slightly easier than achieving Golconda from Vampire, so effectivly chrysalis becomes more of a plot device than a useable game mechanic.

[Jager]

Yep, as written, Chrysalis is unusable. I guess you could sit around all day, maxing your power, hoping to screw up so you could turn it to taint. Maybe get a friend to use probability manipulation on you to 'worsen' your luck.

Then there is the roll to actually enter the Chrysalis. It is too difficult, and to easy to screw your characters.

I guess they had this 'kewl' concept but didn't want munchkins to abuse it so they made it too tough for anyone to use. Come on now, your rolling not enough dice at a +2 difficulty. On average, you would need 7 dice to have a chance at success, 5 if the ST lets you spend a willpower on this. So, roleplayers were left with a quandry; how do we use this?

I say, if you are going to use Chrysalis in the game, make it so players may use it to. I know that you pretty much restructure the mechanics, but I have never believed that WW people could count, anyway (proof of my thesis is in the origonal V:M Auspex 2 power, Aura perception with its TN:8. A TN:8 for a basic power makes what kind of sense. Don't make me go into first Editions Stamina rules).-END RANT-

Since Chrys is a cornerstone of the Teragen, it is difficult to dismiss. Likewise, unless you gain it getting powers, I have never seen a character gain 10 points of temp. taint at one time. In a group of 5 people with extensive powers, playing over 150 hours each (750 hours total), I never saw the group as a whole have ten temporary taint among the lot of them (discounting the time someone 'gave' us some taint - it was their attack form). Covering 4 years of game time, only three points of taint were earned, and both times it came from increasing their quantum stat, tainted (Q:5, bought tainted = 2 taint).

I once had a fellow ST, who complained how much he hated the whole taint/angst thing. I told him, "What taint? The only taint you get, you give yourself." Taint is a non-factor in game play.

Without taint, Chrys is a no-go. Who needs it? Buying powers tainted isn't helped by Chrys. Your not likely to pick up any taint normally, so why bother. So, the Teragen doesn't have an answer, after all.

Okay, you need to increase the 'availability' of taint if you want Chrysalis in your game. Allowing characters use taint is one answer. I am sure there are others. The one codisul to this is you must emphasize the aberrations. Hammer home the inhumaness of the Chrys character. Baselines will shy away at +1 or +2 and start running at +3 or more unless the player is a social-god. More human novas will sense the baseline unease, and act accordingly. Very human novas will shy away as well, while others will know something is 'wrong' but not know exactly what it is. Just as novas are evolving past baselines, you are evolving past most of your fellow novas. How do you think they will feel about that?

Enough from me for now. What do the rest of you think?

[Stheno]

I had lots of fun dealing with the whole Taint/Chrysalis thing in the first Aberrant game I ran.

I figured Taint was too hard to get, and not that worth getting when creating characters.

So I made it nicer[/].

Every point of temporary taint a character gained got them a point or two of xp to spend on powers. A character could accept a point of temporary taint while maxing out a power in order to really blow the opposition out of the water.

Most of the PCs still had a mortal terror of it for some reason.

Hell, one of the players spent the following month calling me a taint-monkey...

As to Chrysalis...the Archetypes are another limiting factor in terms of PCs and Chrysalis - In general, a Marvel will have to be showing off at the same time as he uses his powers in order to gain Chrys.

A Monster...don't get me started. How the sweet fanny adams do you get taint from ritual scarification and so on ? Not to mention the fact that most monsters have aberrations which prevent them from using their powers in the "quiet, controlled" way necessary for them to gain Chrys.

This leaves the Portent...and all things considered, they have the best of it. In general they need to be pushing their limits, or the limits of their understanding to gain Chrys. Given the kinds of powers a portent typically displays, any max-out roll comes under that heading.

And they still have all the limitations Jager mentioned.

I'd better stop here. I don't want to start ranting about WW and math either...

[Guest]

I'd like to disagree with Jager. Chrysalis is a totally usable game mecahnic. You use it to control your taint levels all the while buying up higher level powers. Since if you can stack up 5 or 6 points of chrysalis your ready to risk it. You bleed off all of your taint then you use the xps to buy transferr abberation and use it on some poor sap no fuss no muss and your nature already hinders intersaction with baselines so fuck the social penalties.

[This message has been edited by shrimpus (edited 06-27-2001).]

[Guest]

The idea to give XP to encourage others to gain Temp. Taint is an interesting one. I suppose in the efforts to be dramatic, you could present situations where a character would be "over-using" their powers. Thus, it would be warranted to give them extra XP for their sacrifice.

All in all, I think it's a nice compensation, and might make players much more likely to take risks.

...Then, of course, later you may laugh at them for becoming a rampaging mutant monstrosity. "It all seemed so reasonable!"

neXus