Out of Character Thread for OOC Conversation

Hello everyone, we have four players for the pack. Please introduce yourselves and talk about the narrative elements you're interested in as I'll work to weave these into the narrative.

Everyone's onboard with the 90 day irl length of the game. I won't start that clock until we actually open the first scene after characters are created.

As I said in the character gen post, I love everyone's character concepts so please keep them.

Just adjust them such that you'd be students, even part time students at Tulane and living in New Orleans at this point in your lives.

I'll wrap up character creation next week and we'll probably get started the Monday after next, 03/20

Hey, all. :) I play an Ithaeur Bone Shadow who's a big ghost lore nerd.

Hello. I also wished to play an Ithaeur Bone Shadow but with a big focus on spirits.

I imagined my character as the smart guy and the investigator of the pack who use wits and misderiction in combat instead of brut force.

We can make it work I think, bu if our two characters overlaps too much I will change my character.

Hello and welcome, all. I'm running James, an Irraka of the Iron Masters, and feeling very spiritually safe right now. XD

I imagine James'd be majoring, appropriately enough, in anthropology...of course, not for the usual reasons, and with side courses across chemistry and mechanical engineering that would probably look like a very odd spread to people who have never considered "hunting humans" as a holistic profession.

G'day everyone!  I'm super excited to be here.

I'll be playing Tori, a street rat trying to make something out of herself.  She's an Irraka of the Blood Talons.

Tori's probably not as on board with the chosen prey of the Suthar Anzuth as they'd like, but she definitely falls into line with the tribal Oath, which is ultimately why I went that route.

Narrative elements I'd like to see?  We're in New Orleans; I think it's be crazy to ignore the rich Louisiana Voodoo -- the loa and the veve, and associated spiritual lore.  I've only been to NO once -- rebuilding houses after Hurricane Andrew struck in 1992, so I didn't get to experience much of the city life then.  I did watch all of Marvel's Cloak and Dagger very recently, so that's my most recent frame of reference.

I love games where the pack leans on each other, and draws strength from each other -- not just in combat, but an emotional sense as well.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:27, Sat 11 Mar 2023.

And we have a fifth and final pack member with Blake!

Hello everyone! Blood Talon Rahu here, but not a mindless murder hobo. Just a guy from a small town on an amateur wrestling scholarship majoring in Exercise Science. He loves a good challenge and making people smile. Kinda of a bro who knows the ins and outs of protein shakes and workout circuits. He is protective of his friends and is that guy who walks up behind the bullies and wraps his muscular arms around their shoulders and says, “Do we have a problem here fellas?”

Welcome, tribesmate!

Hey tribesmate! Blood Talon fist bump

With us being students at the university, does anyone have any opinions on a totem? Do we know what the school mascot is?
This message was last edited by the player at 03:29, Sun 12 Mar 2023.

The mascot for Tulane university is Riptide the Pelican according to wikipedia.  That's an awesome name and conjures up some great imagery, but we shouldn't feel limited to that.

In reply to Lucie (msg # 4):

That doesn't sound too similar. :) I have some Investigation too, but otherwise my main skills are Stealth, Occult and Medicine. I also know Barghest (see and attack spirits in the Twilight) and Read the World's Loom (get psychic insights).

What about a librarian made of paper?

As for gifts, my character is all strength and combat. His primal urge is 3. He has a lot of ranks in intimidation and persuasion.

In reply to Melissa (msg # 12):


With three other packmate we can have a bit of overlaps. My character will focus on investigation, academic and occult. So I think we are good.


In reply to Tori (msg # 11):

Could be cool pack totem too.

I know that we may eventually get xp as the game goes on, but could there be a smaller separate pool of xp for pack specific things (totem merit, pack gifts/rites, etc)?

My intention with avoiding the additional experience purchases is to expedite character generation.

In lieu of exp I'd rather you all sort out a pool of 10 points for pack specific things.

If there's 1-2 things you're interested in drop them in this thread here and you all can sort out the top items.

In reply to Loki (msg # 16):

My thoughts are totem merit, group resource merit, Banish rite, Shadow Call rite.

Do we have a face person for the group or someone that would negotiate with spirits?

I've got Subterfuge, and I'm sure one of our Ithaeurs will have social prowess for actually dealing with spirits.

I'd suggest: some points in Totem (of course), some points in Safe Place and Dedicated Locus, and some points in Residential Area for territory purposes.

Eh. I have some rudimentary talking-to-spirits skills, since I'd be a rather poor Itheur if I was completely useless at it, but all my social stats are pretty low. Possibly Lucie is better?

Yes my focus is occult but as a secondary I have talking to spirits.

Everyone receive a free dot in the totem merit at character creation for the totem. I have two (or four if I am willing to sacrifice a little) merit dot I reserved for pack merit.
This message was last edited by the player at 09:06, Mon 13 Mar 2023.

I put 2 points into Totem.

I'm busy re-reading the core book.  I realise I never got into 2nd Edition, so there's a little bit to catch up on for the changes.

As for totem, I've got the obligatory 1-point dot into it, and not much else.  Seems like something we'd determine after actually got a totem, right?  Just hold the points in reserve?  I assume anything like specific rites we could use with our totem would be somethign the totem itself could teach us (after it was all said and done).

For my part I have 2 dot in the Crescent Moon Gift and the gifts Heart of Water and One Step Ahead. As a ritual I took Sacred Hunt.

For merits I have two dot of contact (police and occult blogger) and a personal totem at two dots. I have 2 free dots (or 4) for pack merits.

Hello everyone,

So two things.

I messed up the request to join by including breed, I've removed that it's a holdover from WtA.

Also, the character sheets were something I fought with to update so there's some traits up there are also holdovers from WtA. Ignore Enlightenment, please.

Has the discussion around group merits/traits concluded, if not please add anything you're interested in the group having as you have a pool of 10 points to allocate.

If it has, I'll review the thread and post again tomorrow with the top items everyone's asked for. I'll also provide a comparison indicating if the 10 point pool has been exceeded and asking for clarification/sources for the points/merits.

Disregard my suggestion about the rites.

My character sheet is udapted. Feel free to have a glance and tell me if you think I made a mistake somewhere. I have yet to choose all my merits.

For the pack merit I thought we should at least have a rank 2 totem, so at least four dots (plus the five free). And maybe a Dedicated Locus and the Safe Place with it. Since we are a new pack, Residential Area is maybe not realist.

So 4 pack merit dots for totem, 3 for safe place, and 3 for locus maybe?

Works for me.

And for me.

I'm also taking a personal dot of Library (Crafts) on the assumption we'll end up with at least one dot in Safe Place to connect it.

ST, are we clear to use Merits from the Chronicles of Darkness core? Specifically Fighting Finesse, Interdisciplinary Specialty, and Professional Training now, but in the future I'd like to pick up Good Time Management as well if possible.

On the assumption that we can spend XP to improve the totem, I think the suggested values work well.

In reply to Blake (msg # 27):

Good for me.

GM you still here?

Reposting from a PM I sent to the GM:



Anyone else think it's a good idea?  Anyone opposed?

In reply to James (msg # 29):

I'm fine with the merits.

Everyone, my apologies for the delayed start. Work's been a pain this week.

I'll post the first two scenes tomorrow and I've sent everyone PM's about their sheets if I have questions.

Tori has brought up a great idea for how to make the character tags more useful. I'm all for this, but I want to know if YOU ALL are interested in using them in this fashion. Once you come to a consensus, I'll make the update.

The tag proposition looks good to me.

Good idea for the tags.

I wil put two dots in our pack totem on the four, I let you divide the rest of our totem and our safe place between you.

For our totem I was thinking, either the spirit of the University or a Spirit of the swamp aroun NO, what do you think?
This message was last edited by the player at 16:09, Mon 27 Mar 2023.

Could be literally anything.  Especially around New Orleans, where you have the loa (spirits of New Orleans voodoo) -- there are literally 1000s of them.