Re: Humanity

[Hyoseph]

Humanity, in games that I run, is fairly straightforward.

The book states that Impassioned Killing is a Humanity 4 sin, Premeditated Killing is a Humanity 3 sin, and casual killing Humanity 2.

The question that comes up most often is this: "What if I'm killing self defense? What if I'm killing Belial's Brood? What if I'm killing a guy who just unloaded an uzi into my chest?"

The answer is: "Are you killing?" If yes, "Did you plan to kill?" If no, then roll for committing a humanity 4 sin. If yes, then "Is this a regular thing for you?" If yes, then roll degeneration for committing a humanity 2 sin. If no, then roll degeneration for committing a humanity 3 sin.

Long story short, killing people = low humanity. Killing in self defense = losing humanity for a good reason.

What's a 'people'? Most thing that you will encounter in the World of Darkness that's not a Spirit or an animal is a 'people'. Mages, Werewolves, Vampires, and, of course, humans. These are all people.

On average, Neonate(which is, recent embracee) vampires tend to stick to a 6 or 7 humanity, which is pretty much base mortal. Elders tend to level out at around 4 or 5 as they settle into the pattern of being a predator. Accidents happen, but they're still not habitual killers. Then again, they could also go the other way and rigidly act on a code of conduct that would make a monk look immoral and go to Humanity 9 or 10 as they fight to keep their Beast at bay.

I would not be opposed to the creation of Paths of Enlightenment, but keep this in mind...

-- All paths must be approved by me. The path of "I can do what I want and it's ok" will not be accepted.

-- All path creation must be done in character and for a reason.

-- At the moment, there are no paths of enlightenment so you will be doing something that is heretofore unheard of.

-- To step onto a Path of Enlightenment, you will have to go down to Humanity 0 and come back. No easy feat, even for those who had instructors. And since there are no instructors, the odds of success are slim. Just warning you now.

-- Remember that the Paths are by their very nature inhuman so any resemblance you once had to a human being will be effectively gone. You will appear as if you are humanity 1 or 0, and you will have the social penalties when dealing with mortals as humanity 1, and you will have the daytime activity penalties as humanity 1.

Paths are not meant to make you more human. They are to keep the Beast at bay.

Any questions involving humanity that I can answer?