Loresheets "Descendant of Hardestadt"

[@sarodinian7089]

Voice of Hardestat came in real handy when my coterie went up against a roach-human abomination that was able to crush eardrums, stun the heavy-hitters in the coterie, and flood the area with sound. It was human enough that the voice of hardestat was able to overpower the noise and deliver a dominate command to the roach to shut up, freeing the party.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

Interesting...

[@sarodinian7089]

@@VoivodeMekhet my storyteller basically interprets it such that I can effectively ignore the auditory conditions around my character for the purposes of Dominate, Presence, or just speaking. My character is heard regardless of the cacophony around him.

[@TheCourtsOfLove]

I find that Voice Of Hardestadt could be used for Dominate in the presence of loud noise, not to mention this would be a god-send for Kindred politics, you 'never' want to get caught using Awe in a Kindred meeting, keep in mind Ventrue all know they have Presence and so the fear of getting caught and demolishing one ventrue's Dignitas is strong...that's not the case with this loresheet you essentially have a no consequence Awe with the exception of what you decide to say, other Kindred will be intrigued to listen to you until a certain point.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

Very good points. I might have to take back what I said about this sheet.

[@TheHunterD69]

Hearing this described made me think of how my more clever players might make this devastating. Voice of Hardestadt + Irresistible Voice + Mass Manipulation = a story teller muttering "Fuck" under their breath for what the player is about to do.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

LMFAO! yes, very much so.

[@JCinLapel]

I am having a bit of the same experance in a different power set Fata Morgana and Unseen Passage. Jaxxs is a very old Ravnos Illusionist/Singer/DJ that uses a young Justin Timberlake as his looks style. He has used his Fata Morgana to turn ran down bars or wearhouse into clubs. Some of the other things I have done with it is letting indiviuals go to a between of ogemented reality letting him make the halusinations look like a translucant hallogram over the real world. I have also started calling a group halusination into calling it the mindscape. I have pulled into WWII vet Nos that has had his lower face blasted of to look like his human form to have a conversation. I have used it to let the party hear each other while in the mindscape. I am also going to try having a character with the Cob Web Lore sheet to call to the Web to contact Jeanette/Therese Voerman because Jaxxs the character stage name has their performing Monkey Lore sheet. Jaxxs knows the trueth of the twins and have pulled them both into mindscape into the past.

[@JCinLapel]

Jaxon (Jaxxs) Taylor Ravnos Gen 10 potency 2 Man 4 Dex 3 Char 3 Witt 3 Str Dominate 1 Cloud Memory Presence 2 Awe and Lingering Kiss Obfuscate 3 Cloak of Shadows, Passage Unseen, and Fata Morgana Lore Sheet: Jeanette/Therese Voerman (Performing Monkey) Advantage: Fixer, Fire ResistantJaxon (Jaxxs) Taylor Ravnos Gen 10 potency 2 Man 4 Dex 3 Char 3 Witt 3 Str 1 Dominate 1 Cloud Memory Presence 2 Awe and Lingering Kiss Obfuscate 3 Cloak of Shadows, Passage Unseen, and Fata Morgana Lore Sheet: Jeanette/Therese Voerman (Performing Monkey) Advantage: Fixer, Fire Resistant, and Archangel’s Grace Mawla ( Mad Hatter- Thin Blood Master Alchemist, Tea House/Bar/Occult Shop Owner, and secret drug dealer ) Flaw: Double Cursed and Prey Exclusion (Old)

[@dannytzanopoulos5573]

I have a ventrue character that has a helicopter... and prior to landing in werewolf territory she asked for a meeting with the leader for a temporary non aggression pact... but for the safety of her chopper... whirly noises and all... they rejected the offer... but they still heard it... lol

[@VoivodeMekhet]

lol, amazing.

[@geminianpoet]

Hardestadt is one of my favorite loresheets (tied with like 10 others for first anyway). One of my players used Voice of Hardestadt to get an antagonist to look at him during a combat so they could use Dominate. True, there’s no mechanic, but if used creatively, it’s very handy. I can certainly understand you wanting more mechanics though. They didn't use it INSTEAD of Awe, they used it WITH awe. You're right that the low levels of this sheet have overlap with the clan's discipline though. i don't find that to be bad though, as they work well in tandem (Presence & the loresheet). Supreme Leader basically gives you the power to send people on suicide missions & they actually go. Again, pretty handy. There are penalties to social rolls that are a person would be violently opposed to, or is against their nature, so the “no penalties” part can be pretty useful in dire situations where you don’t want to (or can’t) use Presence - like persuading a whole group to go hunt down a Sabbat pack or loose Garou in their own territory. Your video actually gave me a new idea for a plot hook in my chronicle (where there’s a whole line of Ventrue [2 NPCs & 1 PC] descended from Hardestadt), so thank you. The Elder’s castle has a hidden treasure trove of records & I’m going to have an unsigned letter of inheritance hidden among the yellowed parchment. Essentially the equivalent of the L5 of this loresheet just sitting around waiting to be found & fought over :D I agree with you completely that Ventrue are an amazing (& under appreciated) clan. They're not my favorite either (Nosferatu & Brujah take that position for me - like Tzimisce & Grangrel for you), but I frequently use the Ventrue as some of my most important NPCs (& not JUST as princes)

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I just get bent out of shape when I think the Ventrue aren't being used to their full potential. The more thoughts I hear on this Loresheet the more I tend to like it however.

[@nguyennhuhoang5211]

I personally really like the Ventrue. They're my favourite clan, and I agree with some of the points you make like for supreme leader power, still not too sure how it would be in game. But when I think about the Hardestadt's heir I think it's a nice tie to the major lore and a nice plot hook granted the ST has a lot of say in this power but so does yourself. I think Hardestadt's heir is like Caesar's will whereas you are named his successor and and will inherit everything he has including his name. In Augustus case he went on to be the first roman emperor with his brilliant skills in politics so if you do well history might repeat itself.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I've come to like this loresheet over time. I'm a big Ventrue fan, always have been.

[@reservedcheese]

Adding a like because I agree. Maybe treat the level one as a-1 to difficulty to speaking rolls both good and bad?? To reflect how much more attention their voice gets

[@VoivodeMekhet]

That's a good idea.

[@reservedcheese]

@@VoivodeMekhet all the credit goes to you cause it’s your concept

[@theOriginalS.P.]

I mostly like the Loresheet, actually. Tier one is easy to be overlooked but can be really creatively used in a number of situations. I mostly like the loresheets better which are lighter on mechanics but have story elements in it. To get a die more or two is not as much fun as to introduce your self to an enemy as basically his new boss now or to have this thing in your pocket that everybody would die for to have. The thing with Supreme Leader is, I guess, that it implies a mechanic but dose not really explains how it is meant. I read it as that: if you try to convince, force, or lie to another character to put him self in danger, you might get a penalty in addition to whatever your opponent is resisting with, since it becomes more likely that the person says "no", if they have to put they live in to jeopardy. With this Lorsheet tier, you can overcome that. I don’t know if that is actually how it was meant and it is not a great mechanic, but I would know how to use it if a player would be eager to buy it for a character.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

Don't get me wrong, I love the story element of the Loresheets. I just feel that Descendents of Hardestadt is lacking both Story and Mechanics. Where the Mechanics shine, the story lacks and vise versa.

[@JCinLapel]

I think this lore sheet is ententionally vage so the story teller can give it as much or little power as they want.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I can not disagree with this.

[@anvos658]

The Dot 1 is obviously for buffing Irresistible Voice, so people can't try and drown it out, otherwise its mostly a you can't ignore me power. Dot 2 I'd say either removes the ability to get stains from that action, and/or dominate and presence ignores the self preservation roll, and a third option might be say you don't take any penalties to the difficulty of a roll based on the situation,. Though yeah poorly worded and too open for interpretation. Dot 5 this again falls under my Loresheets shouldn't have dots that don't make sense if others in the world have them. Let alone how could somebody sired after his final death have this, yet its a descendant lore sheet.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I think the whole loresheet system is both a boon and a blessing. It's one of those things where hindsight really puts it in perspective. Things need to be a lot more organized for it to work. The idea is great though, and that's why house rule exist.

[@SkullCowboy333]

Ventrue or Ruthven imagine if the texts when into the roots of the names of the Clans where the trail of blood might lead and maybe break the myth of Caine.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

A Noddist after my own heart.

[@TheGrimEater40]

I mean when I used this in a campaign I kinda broke it. Ummm it was based on the bloodlines game instead Mithras was still alive controlling things from the shadows trying to retrieve surviving members from the camerilla inner circle in sarcophagus’s. I was able to use the five point heir to basically rally the camarilla clans, anarchs and some sabbat together to face off against the prince. Needless to say the game ended with me becoming the prince of London. For the amount of xp it costs it is a tad overpowered. This is as I was able to get the loresheet where I’m next in line to become the ventricles justicar if I wanted and a 4 dot ally para military team. If you run this with a face character with good speech skills if your dm makes you roll for it then you’ll be getting a lower difficulty to get essentially people to rally to your cause.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

That sounds like a great story line. The Loresheet does have the ability to be a bit OP but a good number of them do. That's why they are limited to one per players (not counting bloodline loresheets). But it's up to the ST and the player to work together to not intentionally mess things up.

[@kvanderbeek1]

I agree that this lore sheet is disappointing. Having everything based on the story tellers digression double edge sword. It's can be great if the story teller likes how you are playing your PC. It can be downright awful if you have a storyteller that thinks world of darkness means world of fail.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

After making the video I've gained more of an appreciation of this Loresheet but it is 100% up to the storyteller. That's risky.

[@johnwalsh4857]

Looks like Sabbat V5 info is now masssively out. Yep Sabbat bears little resemblance to V5 or pre 2nd inquisition Sabbat. Their Power structures have been destroyed and remade and the Sabbat now deny their own clans and are more of a hive mind like cell base de centralized terrorist organization. and my fave character Lucita seems to have lost all her humanity and is now a monster. Wow...

[@johnwalsh4857]

@Paul Gauthier as for the Anarchs, not surprised a large number of sabbat defected to the Anarchs probably from the loyalist faction, who are disillusioned at the state of the modern day sabbat. along with defectors from the Camarilla (Brujah and Gangrel) massively swelled the Anarch numbers to actually rival the Camarilla. I daresay the Anarchs in terms of numbers may be bigger than the Camarilla.

[@johnwalsh4857]

@Paul Gauthier and I agree the new Sabbat will not be shallow, I suspect that the Black Hand is in the leadership position of the Sabbat now that the Sabbat leadership power structure has been badly sundered, the Black Hand probably has the remaining leadership structure intact and is now steering the Sabbat , hence the name of the book Sabbat the black hand. I suspect Lucita is now the new regent of the Sabbat. and I think the Sabbat inquisition is still alive in some form.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I was just flipping through the original Chicago by night and there's a handful of Sabbat in there. No clans for them. In the old days our storyteller would just say everything goes dark and we'd all collectively shit ourselves and prepare to be 3 traits down in the coming combat as well as needing to throw retests on everything we won due to the darkness. There was a time when there were no rules fore the Sabbat and the storytellers just made shit up. I feel like the Sabbat are returning to their roots with V5 both storywise and mechanics. The best part, we get to keep the Tzimisce and Lasombra as player characters. Win win.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

Very good point.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I think I prefer the idea that the Sabbat is broken without formal leadership now. Roaming packs looking to take back what they've lost.

[@thebestguy1987]

Personally, I don't really care for this loresheet. I like the Pure Ventrue Lineage a lot better, as I think it is more crucial to the Clan and embodies them in a very good manner. Personally, I love the Descendant of Xavier and Descendant of Zelios sheets, as they really flow together into their Clans. If you are still doing "Clan" discussions, may I suggest the Samedi bloodline? I just love everything about these guys, with Baron Samedi, the 5th Generation Founder of the bloodline, getting MASSIVE respect from me for just walking away from Augustus Giovanni, their death magics focusing more on decay and making zombies, and even their rotting bodies almost perfectly reflecting a Cappadocian flaw from Clanbook Cappadocian, thus tying them back to the Cappadocians. But really, Baron Samedi commands respect for never bowing to Augustus.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

I will be covering our rottie vamps soon. I love the Samedi and I want to do them justice. When I get into the Cults of the Blood Gods Loresheets I will be dedicating a week to them. Medaplot Monday to cover their Loresheet and Thursday Clan discussion to cover their greater story.

[@BlackZaitan]

I disagree on how your interpretation of the "Voice of Hardestadt". Awe are ment to be all within listening range of you. With the Voice of Hardestadt you can take the attention of an entire concert hall of people to listen to you (I would argue within ten meters). So from my point of view, Voice of Hardestadt are closer related to Majesty, which is all within Eyeview (100 meters maybe?). I semi agree with you on "Supreme leader", but you are missing an important point about Hardestadt. He was a military leader - literally his blood drinking flavour were his own soldier - he quite often had to send people into dangerous situations. Furthering I would argue that trying to convincing/recruiting other kindred to go into these situation would legitimise a raise in difficulty. I would however understand if you would not raise the difficulty for those rolls, I would. "Hardestadt's heir" omg where can I begin, for me it can be two things, th feudal angle and the corporation angle. Feudal idea: Hardestadt the Elder actually had an empire, Fiefs of the Black Crosses which consisted of The Holy Roman Empire and perhaps later France, which got dissolved when he founded the Camarilla, and the original areas of the Camarilla (The Holy Roman Empire and France) were made from the Fiefs of the Black Crosses. So you can more or less claim those areas, and depending on how you see it, the Camarilla itself. The Corporation idea: to take a case of Batmat. When Bruce Wayne's parents died who got the majority share of Wayne Enterprise and the wealth? Bruce Wayne. Being named Hardestadt's heir makes you the heir of his influences, be a claimant of seats and company shares, any firms, mansions, retinue and well... His army? His seat in the Inner council? In any case you would be boosted into the stratosphere in wealth, influences and claims. I agree on that it misses a mechanics and other places Fluff. Disclaimer: I am a huge sucker for the feudal aspect in games and Ventrues were my favourite clan even before I found that they also are the closet thing to these feudal ideals. Even more I am a huge fan of Hardestadt, the closest thing to a modern day emperor (yay feudal again). So I am biased as hell, but I think that the 3,4,5 points could be really fun game wise. I am still somewhat dream of playing a ventrue game with those loresheets, declare myself Hardestadt and make a new Convention of Thorns to make peace with thr Anarchs and Camarilla.

[@VoivodeMekhet]

Thank you so much for your take on this Loresheet. It helps me see things in a wider range.