New Skin: The Incubus

A group of us who play on Infrno.net were looking for something different, sexy, but more empowered than the other demonic options available on the market. ;)

This skin is inspired by the show Lost Girl and is a blend of vampire, infernal, and ghoul. Here's a rough draft of The Incubus.

Please offer constructive criticism.

Many thanks.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/37403859/The%20Incubus-Succubus.pdf

This has been updated after careful review. The new version is much less powerful, but still can kill while feeding. Pretty much every section and move was overhauled.

Further feedback would be appreciated. Playtests coming soon.

Hmm.  Interesting . . .

Comments:

Backstory:
There’s someone you want to corrupt.  One of your victims whispered secrets to you. Take two strings on your target.
The 'one of your victims' part looks like it's part of a different backstory.

Darkest Self:
You escape your darkest self when you expend all your Demonic Powers or someone freely declares love for you.
Might want to add in a (at which point, all active demonic powers are expended) at the end, just to deal with what happens if someone declares while you still have five active demonic powers.

Soul leech:
You must feed on sex daily.  What happens if you don't?

Predatory instinct:
So what if they're a virgin and a thief?  How about 'you know the key ways in which they are naughty or nice' or something along those lines, that can handle the grey areas that many people live in?

Power of warding:
To be honest, don't get this one.  Do you mean that an attacking PC gets a -2 penalty (NPCs act at disadvantage)?  Might want to clarify if it only applies to physical attacks, or if social attacks (shutting someone down) counts as well.

Power of summoning:
Might want to change it to 'someone you've recently fed on', just so you don't need to keep track of exactly who it was who activated the power.  Less paperwork = good, in my opinion.

Harm and experience points sections seem to be missing key info.

The advance option to take a rock & roll band is great.

All the above is just my opinions, take them for what they're worth.

Thank you very much for the feedback. I considered it carefully and made a few alterations. Also, I have a proper image for the playbook now.

It still needs to be playtested, but it's in much better shape now.

The link above still works to get the latest rev.

Predatory instinct is *much* better now, I feel.

However, regarding the 'power of warding' I at least suggest you change the word 'advantage', as that actually means something in the mechanics, though only to NPCs, as well as the fact that it's unclear exactly what it means.  +2 forward or ongoing means something, but even then I don't really get it.

Okay, an example to show where I'm getting confused.
PC2 is standing behind PC1, who is unaware of PC2.  PC1 is an incubus with the power of warding active.  PC2 hits PC1 with a bat, lashing out physically and getting a 10.  PC1 has a +2 'advantage' thanks to the ward, but as they're not rolling, it has no effect and they get hit.  Not much of a ward.  If PC1 had to be aware of the attack, they could get a bonus to a 'hold steady' roll to dodge it, I guess, but they don't.

Now, it's possible I'm missing something, but if you're not going to change the move as I suggested before, can you at least explain here what you intend for it to actually do, please?

Thanks again. I really appreciate your feedback. Sorry for the delay.

This is the new ward power:

? Power of Warding
With this power is active on you, expend it to summon the person you fed upon, teleporting them immediately into your presence. If you give it to your prey, they can expend it to summon you.

The idea is a magical shield that will protect you against one physical or magical attack. So it is good against werewolves and witches, but not so much against the vampire. It imposes a penalty to an opposing PC's roll or a bonus to your defense roll against NPCs. In my games I often have PCs roll to keep their cool when trying to accomplish non-fighting tasks in high pressure situations, just like you mentioned. This power would grant a +2 bonus on rolls to avoid attacks and spells. This version also seems to make more sense with the rules for disadvantages.

One reviewer felt a real dislike for anything that penalizes a roll, but disadvantages are part of the game, and to me it is better to have a chance of success than to have the attack negated entirely or something like that.

Firstly, you seem to have quotes the power of summoning instead of warding.

However, since you've updated the .pdf, I can comment on the move:

Yes, this now makes sense and is an improvement.  If you want to avoid penalties without negating the move entirely, you could say it means you can ignore the next harm inflicted on you, but not any secondary effects.  Thus, if someone successfully lashes out physically at you, they can still choose to force you to hold steady before you can retaliate, for example, though that is a bit of a nerf to how the move stands at the moment, I think.  (Especially since it doesn't affect attacks that don't do harm.  Though that does avoid arguments about whether, say, hypnotism counts as an attack.)

Anyway, think that's me done here.  Nice one.

Doh! It was late and I was excited. Thanks for the feedback.

The latest version of this skin is here:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/37403859/The%20Incubus.pdf

There's been a lot of play-testing and feedback and some great artwork incorporated into the skin. Please let me know what you think.

Thanks, again for your time.