Madness Meters for World of Darkness

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Skill in magical Lores is limited by the character's highest number of dots in Hardening or Failure for a specific track: Death (Violence), Dream (Helplessness), Madness (Unnatural), Passion (Self), and Time & Space (Isolation).
Skill in magical Lores is limited by the character's highest number of dots in Hardening or Failure for a specific track: Death (Violence), Dream (Helplessness), Madness (Unnatural), Passion (Self), and Time & Space (Isolation).
==Violence Meter==
==Violence Meter==
-
# Engaging in combat, seeing a dead body.
+
===Intensity===
-
# Being in conditions of war, seeing a mutilated body, witnessing torture.
+
# Be attacked with a weapon, witness an act of torture, get shot at random, or be tortured briefly.
-
# Torturing someone or killing someone helpless.
+
# Kill someone in a fight or be present at a massive battle with hundreds of deaths on both sides.
-
# Being tortured; witnessing a brutal mass execution.
+
# Perform an act of torture or kill a helpless target.
 +
# Get tortured for an hour or longer or witness a brutal mass execution.
# Watch a loved one tortured to death.
# Watch a loved one tortured to death.
 +
===Failures===
 +
# At this level, you're superficially fine. Perhaps you're a little edgy whenever a knfie in the room happens to be pointing your direction.
 +
# You are very aware of violence, both as it exists and as it is depicted. It strikes you as somewhat odd that so many people don't realize that movie violence is very different from real violence.
 +
# You get alert or uneasy every time you see blood, even badly faked blood in a horror flick or when someone cuts a rare steak. Sometimes you have nightmares about violence you've witnessed.
 +
# You instinctively take a defensive posture whenever there's a loud noise or raised voice nearby. Your nightmares are frequent, and you have a hard time looking at anyone without imagining (if briefly) what you would do at that moment if they attacked you.
 +
# Insanity.
 +
===Hardening===
 +
# Superficially, you're much like everyone else.
 +
# Your attitude towards violence shows on your face when the subject comes up in conversation, unless you work to keep it hidden. It might be intensity, or nervousness, or just a grim silence, depending on how you cope.
 +
# Violence is a common feature of your mental landscape. Unlike less-hardened people, you show little reaction at all when it is discussed or depicted in fiction.
 +
# Your callousness shows in your every word and expression unless you make a continuous effort to suppress it. Again, the exact tone is up to you: it could be bitter and harsh, feverish and vehement, or icy cold.
 +
# It's not hard for people to realize that the deepest horrors of torture and brutality have become commonplace to you, unless you work very, very hard to keep it hidden--which means you come off as tense and guarded all the time. The death of others, or yourself, has no intrinsic significance. You might prefer to stay alive, but it's only a matter of personal taste. Life, in the abstract, doesn't mean anything.
==Unnatural Meter==
==Unnatural Meter==
# Hearing disembodies voices, seeing an unattended object move, attacked by something invisible.
# Hearing disembodies voices, seeing an unattended object move, attacked by something invisible.

Revision as of 01:43, 30 September 2008

Converted for Kult for World of Darkness.

Sanity Checks

Sanity checks require a Resolve + Composure - Intensity roll. Success gives a Hardened dot and failure gives a Failure dot and a choice between fight, flight, or freeze. Dramatic failure gives two Failure dots.

Magic

Skill in magical Lores is limited by the character's highest number of dots in Hardening or Failure for a specific track: Death (Violence), Dream (Helplessness), Madness (Unnatural), Passion (Self), and Time & Space (Isolation).

Violence Meter

Intensity

  1. Be attacked with a weapon, witness an act of torture, get shot at random, or be tortured briefly.
  2. Kill someone in a fight or be present at a massive battle with hundreds of deaths on both sides.
  3. Perform an act of torture or kill a helpless target.
  4. Get tortured for an hour or longer or witness a brutal mass execution.
  5. Watch a loved one tortured to death.

Failures

  1. At this level, you're superficially fine. Perhaps you're a little edgy whenever a knfie in the room happens to be pointing your direction.
  2. You are very aware of violence, both as it exists and as it is depicted. It strikes you as somewhat odd that so many people don't realize that movie violence is very different from real violence.
  3. You get alert or uneasy every time you see blood, even badly faked blood in a horror flick or when someone cuts a rare steak. Sometimes you have nightmares about violence you've witnessed.
  4. You instinctively take a defensive posture whenever there's a loud noise or raised voice nearby. Your nightmares are frequent, and you have a hard time looking at anyone without imagining (if briefly) what you would do at that moment if they attacked you.
  5. Insanity.

Hardening

  1. Superficially, you're much like everyone else.
  2. Your attitude towards violence shows on your face when the subject comes up in conversation, unless you work to keep it hidden. It might be intensity, or nervousness, or just a grim silence, depending on how you cope.
  3. Violence is a common feature of your mental landscape. Unlike less-hardened people, you show little reaction at all when it is discussed or depicted in fiction.
  4. Your callousness shows in your every word and expression unless you make a continuous effort to suppress it. Again, the exact tone is up to you: it could be bitter and harsh, feverish and vehement, or icy cold.
  5. It's not hard for people to realize that the deepest horrors of torture and brutality have become commonplace to you, unless you work very, very hard to keep it hidden--which means you come off as tense and guarded all the time. The death of others, or yourself, has no intrinsic significance. You might prefer to stay alive, but it's only a matter of personal taste. Life, in the abstract, doesn't mean anything.

Unnatural Meter

  1. Hearing disembodies voices, seeing an unattended object move, attacked by something invisible.
  2. Being attacked with magic or seeing a clearly supernatural creature.
  3. Conversing with a dead loved one, seeing someone attacked by magic.
  4. Seeing the dead rise.
  5. Realizing your spouse is not human.

Self Meter

  1. Lie to your best friend, secretly gratify an urge contrary to your upbringing.
  2. Cheating on your wife with her best friend, stealing from friends or family, ignoring your Noble Stimulus.
  3. Deceive your loved ones or inadvertently commit cannibalism.
  4. Act contrary to your Noble Stimulus, kill someone you love.
  5. Deliberately destroy everything you've risked your life to protect.

Helplessness Meter

  1. Being mugged or locked up for a short time.
  2. Being kidnapped or spending a month in jail.
  3. Put in a situation where you have to maim yourself or die, watch a loved one commit adultery.
  4. Watch someone you love die.
  5. Be possessed and watch your body commit unspeakable acts.

Isolation Meter

  1. Spend a day without seeing someone you know or three days without talking to another human being.
  2. Spend a week in solitary confinement or be institutionalized by a loved one.
  3. Spend a month in a country where you don't speak the language, see someone you thought you knew behaving contrary to normal.
  4. Be betrayed by someone you love or treated like a stranger by close friends.
  5. Spend a month in sensory deprivation.
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