Beastmen Heart's Blood

[Jukashi]

If a Lunar eats a beastman's heart, does she get their shape added to her library? And, if they do, does that count as a human shape or an animal shape?

 

[Flagg]

If a Lunar eats a beastman's heart, does she get their shape added to her library? And, if they do, does that count as a human shape or an animal shape?

Prey's Skin Disguise allows this. It would count as a "basically human creature", as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Jukashi]

That's handy. Not satisfied with your Deadly Koalaman Transformation? Go chow down on some claw-strider Lunar's kids. Then you can be much more impressive!


Though it will be all the more embarrassing when you're locked into your true forms...

 

[FluffySquirrel]

I have a kinda linked question regarding this actually..


At what point is something a creature tainted by the wyld (and needed that lunar knack to gobble it down), compared to something that any lunar can get the shape of?


I personally think that.. if the particular creature can breed true, doesn't need to live in the wyld to live etc, then it's probably valid as a creation race.. otherwise.. it might be wyld based.. but unsure really.. curious what others use

 

[Lord Ben]

I just make anything with wyld mutations need the wyld charm.

 

[FluffySquirrel]

That covers pretty much everything though ^^


At what point do you know the creature to be of the wyld.. or a naturally occuring rhino with lava for blood and orichalcum horns etc?

 

[Haku1]

Well... you'll know when you try to drink its blood and you just get burnt.  

 

[Jeppe]

At what point do you know the creature to be of the wyld.. or a naturally occuring rhino with lava for blood and orichalcum horns etc?

Actually, I think that the Furnace Rhinos are natural creatures, not Wyld mutated ones. At least they have bred true and live in Creation, as opposed to the Bordermarches or Middlemarches.


Correct me if I am wrong, but I think this discussion has been held before, no?

 

[Sherwood]

On the topic of heartsblood, I've noticed in the 2e Lunar book that the act of snacking on a critter to get it's form is a extended ritual and hunt.  It starts with a 15 minute ritual to dedicate the hunt to Luna, and a six hour hunt to persue the creature and take it down.  The six hour hunt part is mentioned again in the Charm that lets you take a insect as a form, saying many Lunars feel silly stalking a fly for six hours.


In my 1e game, we always played it that if you are attacked by a wandering pack of whatever, and the Lunar kills it and drinks its blood, it gets a new shape.  It did not require the six hour thing.  So, in 2e, do you not get the shape if you encounter a creature as you travel because you didn't make a ritual hunt of it?


How many of you are going to require this of your Lunar players?

 

[Flagg]

So, in 2e, do you not get the shape if you encounter a creature as you travel because you didn't make a ritual hunt of it?

Correct.

How many of you are going to require this of your Lunar players?

I, for one. I think this handicap is more than made up for by the fact that Lunars can now mimic almost every conceivable being with the right knack.

 

[Persell]

Me for sure. The hunt is a sacred duty to luna and not some punks bashing critters while travelling around. It is also a solitary duty to luna because as far as me and luna are concerned only those lunars with the balls to wrestle doawn a tyrant lizard are fit to wear his shape.

 

[Jeppe]

In my 1e game, we always played it that if you are attacked by a wandering pack of whatever, and the Lunar kills it and drinks its blood, it gets a new shape.  It did not require the six hour thing.

There's a Lunar knack designed for this particular event. Life of the Hummingbird (Lunars, p. 134) lets you assume any animal's or human's form, as soon as you've had a taste of its blood. No need for rituals there.

 

[Dracogryff]

In my 1e game, we always played it that if you are attacked by a wandering pack of whatever, and the Lunar kills it and drinks its blood, it gets a new shape.  It did not require the six hour thing.  So, in 2e, do you not get the shape if you encounter a creature as you travel because you didn't make a ritual hunt of it?

Well, in 1E, it wasn't necessary. The 1E Sacred Hunt was a monthly ritual hunt dedicated to Luna where you went after the toughest thing possible, and didn't drink its heart's blood. I find the methods for 2E much more interesting than 1E, personally. It makes it more significant if you gian forms, and makes it that much more difficult to go and blithely get human forms. I like the morality issues it can raise now. Also the six hours is a baseline...it can take as little as an hour or two if you have a good Wits + Survival score. Each extra success beyond the difficulty on that roll for finding it makes the hunt take one less hour, so it's not necessarily half the night.


As for requiring it, my ST does make it so I can't get a form without participating in the Sacred Hunt. As would I if I ran a game with Lunars in it. To me, it makes more sense to have to go through the proper rituals to attain permission from the spirits to be allowed to attain a new form rather than just killing and eating deer for dinner and thus being able to turn into it. I like the feel it brings to things...that of respecting nature and everything within it, as you are the guardians of it.

There's a Lunar knack designed for this particular event. Life of the Hummingbird (Lunars, p. 134) lets you assume any animal's or human's form, as soon as you've had a taste of its blood. No need for rituals there.

Aya, but it isn't permanent, remember. A lethal health level's worth of blood from a given creature gives you a day of having that form. It is handy in that you don't need to kill them to get the shape, so if you just want to impersonate someone or something for a short time to get information, you can do so without having to kill them permanently.

 

[Jeppe]

Yes I remember


Life of the Hummingbird is useful in a variety of ways, impersonation being one, but also escaping whoever is chasing you, by eating the beggar in the street (Admittedly not the best example I could have come up with...), or infiltrating a settlement, where you're not going to stay long anyway.


I originally mentioned Life of the Hummingbird to point out that eating someone and then immediately taking their form is still possible in 2e, now its just a specific knack with strings attached.

 

[Haku1]

My main regret with the knacks of 2e lunars is that they made the plant-form knack essence 4 instead of essence 2 or 3.


I want a Poison Ivy lunar... y'know...

 

[Jeppe]

Best get started sweet-talking your story-teller for a houserule, then

 

[Haku1]

*laughs* nah... I've got more interests beyond a plant lunar...


If I'm playing a lunars game and this pops up as an interest... I'd be all over it.

 

[Sherwood]

I like the idea of plant-forms for the Lunars.  There is dozens of examples in the movies, anime, and video games of moving plants.

 

[Haku1]

I like the idea of plant-forms for the Lunars.  There is dozens of examples in the movies, anime, and video games of moving plants.

Indeed... we need more triffids, more Audreys (little shop of horrors).

 

[Vanman]

I'm with most of the rest of the respondents here concerning the Sacred Hunt. Were I to run a Lunar game, they'd have to engage in the Sacred Hunt in order to gain the form. The 1E way of kill a random creature and gain their form seems imminently cheeseballish. And I agree with Safim and DG regarding the sacred part of the Sacred Hunt. It's a requirement given by Luna in order to use her gifts. It's part of the price the character has to pay to receive her blessing.

 

[Lord Ben]

I find it insanely amusing when people start with no hearts blood and by the end of the session they have like 10 forms.   You could begin play with 1000 year old lunars and there would be a guy with HB at zero.  Then within minutes of the game opening he'd kill a flying creature and a swimming creature to add them to his library.

 

[Ker'ion]

I'd force a background of 1 dot in Heat's Blood for every zero tacked onto their age since the second breath. :?


So, a Lunar that's a thousand years old would have a minimum Heart's Blood of 3.

 

[Persell]

At what point do you know the creature to be of the wyld.. or a naturally occuring rhino with lava for blood and orichalcum horns etc?

I think I read somewhere that a "creature of the Wyld" is defined by having 5+ points of mutations (where afflictions are 1 point, poxes 2, etc).  


That might have been somewhere in the Lunars book as I've been reading it pretty steadily today. But I've also been browsing around fan-based resources a lot today too.  So I honestly can't say for sure if it's canon or homebrew until I find that source again.

 

[Persell]

Rhapsody seems to be mostly right.  According to the 2E Wyld book (pg 150) a creature is to wyld to live in creation if mutations exceed willpower.  Points are 1 for a Pox/Deficiency, 2 for a Affliction/Debility, 4 for a Blight/Deformity and 6 for a Abomination.  For a normal mortal 5 points would exceed their willpower and make then unable to survive in creation.  


However any taint of wyld prevents a creature from being a valid target for the sacred hunt (2E lunar pg 129) Unless you have the wyld form Knack which lets you hunt any creature with wyld taints even the weird cross species ones like the snake cactus.

 

[Balota]

I'd force a background of 1 dot in Heat's Blood for every zero tacked onto their age since the second breath. :?
So, a Lunar that's a thousand years old would have a minimum Heart's Blood of 3.

Just out of curiousity why?