4.10 star(s) 194 Votes

Arigon

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Hey!! I keep running out of reacts.

I don't think Ptolemy writing is amazing, but I think is good enough! and I like Alexandra quite a lot, even if obviously not nearly as much as Rebirth.

I am always happy to share what I believe are good novels. If they are in my signature, they tend to be things I consider great. So if you have not tried Summer's Gone, for example, be my guest. Although, while I do believe it has the potential to be a fantastic*, know that I am potentially very biased because Bella is in it.

I do enjoy very terrible visual novels too, but I don't recommend them.

About the conjecture: remains to see. I am not assigning it a very high chance, but we are here just hypothesizing for fun's sake and given that Alexandra is by the same author, I thought it was worth it.

*To give more information about this. I don't give a masterpiece rating to anything that is not complete. So Summer's Gone cannot be a masterpiece. But so far there is nothing I can complain about even when I try to remain objective (which is a hard thing to do). And I have only given a masterpiece rating to no more than 5 novels so far: Muvluv trilogy, Fata Morgana, Steins Game (which is not without some flaws but overall is so good that you can let it pass), the others I need to think further but most likely candidate would be Rewrite.
I think if I were to list my top 5 AVN at this exact moment they would be
1-Rebirth
2-Heavy Five
3-City of Broken Dreamers
4-Leap of Faith
5-Timestamps the whole saga.

I ranged a bit on those. Timestamps is campy, full of kinks, and very sex heavy, and who doesn't love Bacon?(but, the story, and there is a very involved one, is good) Leap of Faith is "wholesome!!!" when compared to the rest, and I totally love the main character and his wingman. The girls are fantastic and the story, which some have called far fetched, is still great. City of Broken Dreamers is what CP2077 should feel like, great writing and good MC. Love the girls. Heavy Five appeals to my inner rocket scientist which I have the education for, and worked some years for a NASA contractor, but now that I took an early out from civil service, I can enjoy the happenings of real science, and sci fi novels like this one. The girls are very different, and deeply written. The story is great, and I love the unknowns that we are dealing with. Rebirth is Rebirth. I am completely sold on it, which probably does not come as a surprise.

For each of my top 5 I not only love them with words, I have financially donated to them, some more than others, but I support financially my favs so they can continue their development.
Anyhow, Rebirth is my fav, and looks to stay there by a wide margin. This is not a review, but it definitely is a shining endorsement!
***No-BaDIK is not on that list, for the reasons that I have stated sometimes viciously on that thread. I have bought the game on Steam though, and I am a fan of the renders if not the writing.
Peace
 
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D3xzalias

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I am not underestimating MC's power and I'm still convinced that what we believe to be claws is the advanced protean power called "fist of cain" (it does aggravated damage), what I'm not underestimating is the archon's combat experience and expertise, unless your bf/gf's mommy makes you an archon, it takes recognition, effort, skill and power
I believe you, In that Marcius has way more combat experience and if they fight, that MC won't go unharmed during their exchange. but with MC powers has, Yes i'm gonna fall back on it. If he get's the invis under controle. With his speed and his claws and invis, Marcius won't stand a chance. What i understand Marcius is a brujah. From what i understand from Arigon, The powers he has are celerity and potence, pressence. I don't underestimate Marcius with his strength and his age But due to Mc bloodline i believe he is way stronger then Marcius.
 

mistwolf_2k

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I believe you, In that Marcius has way more combat experience and if they fight, that MC won't go unharmed during their exchange. but with MC powers has, Yes i'm gonna fall back on it. If he get's the invis under controle. With his speed and his claws and invis, Marcius won't stand a chance. What i understand Marcius is a brujah. From what i understand from Arigon, The powers he has are celerity and potence, pressence. I don't underestimate Marcius with his strength and his age But due to Mc bloodline i believe he is way stronger then Marcius.
It really depends on whether or not the dev incorporates the weaknesses present in the clans. Also, just because the MC is of a low generation doesn't mean he is invulnerable. Sure, he has the "potential" to become insanely powerful, and he is developing powers at an alarming rate. But he doesn't have the age to sustain it all. The difference in power between an elder and a welp would be like putting a bear against a kitten. It won't matter if your kitten has magically infused teeth and claws, it will still be a small toy and a nuisance. Given a few decades or even just a few years the Mc's bloodlines and potency will definately prevail, but he is still so young.
 

Tserriednich'sNen

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Jan 16, 2020
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I believe you, In that Marcius has way more combat experience and if they fight, that MC won't go unharmed during their exchange. but with MC powers has, Yes i'm gonna fall back on it. If he get's the invis under controle. With his speed and his claws and invis, Marcius won't stand a chance. What i understand Marcius is a brujah. From what i understand from Arigon, The powers he has are celerity and potence, pressence. I don't underestimate Marcius with his strength and his age But due to Mc bloodline i believe he is way stronger then Marcius.
MC's bloodline is stronger then just about every other Vamp. It's what makes him unique. To your point about him beating Marcius I'd have to disagree. I believe Marcius would mop the floor with MC without much difficulty. As an Archon Marcius is an elder making him a couple hundred years old at minimum compared to MC who's been a vamp, what a few weeks? a month? You can't just make up and cover that difference by sheer bloodline alone unless it's stupid overpowered in which MC isn't.

When you're immortal, time becomes an object at your disposal rather then a dire reminder of your fragile mortality. Marcius has had probably dozens of times the average human life span to hone his abilities along with combat experience. MC on the other hand is just coming to terms with the fact that he even has powers/abilities as well as how to use them. With time MC will obtain combat experience and master his abilities.

For the time being however he's just a noobie with little understanding of the secretive world he now lives in surrounded by hot babes . :cool:
 

D3xzalias

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Aug 1, 2018
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It really depends on whether or not the dev incorporates the weaknesses present in the clans. Also, just because the MC is of a low generation doesn't mean he is invulnerable. Sure, he has the "potential" to become insanely powerful, and he is developing powers at an alarming rate. But he doesn't have the age to sustain it all. The difference in power between an elder and a welp would be like putting a bear against a kitten. It won't matter if your kitten has magically infused teeth and claws, it will still be a small toy and a nuisance. Given a few decades or even just a few years the Mc's bloodlines and potency will definately prevail, but he is still so young.
I believe you on that he is not invulnerable. Maybe i worded it wrong but i only believe in Mc beating Marcius if he gets his invis under controle so that he can use it like the Nos just dissapear and appear so he can attack and dissapear didn't say he had to fight honestly
 
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Arigon

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Here is where I will step in a second to make a comparison.
I was conservative on all of this, but I wanted to put it to rest that now that the MC has some disciplines and combat experience, some training by the hound, and the feral ghoul behind him, that he is a fledgling of a mega powerful vampire, and can toast an elder of the Archon's court.
Peace

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mistwolf_2k

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Here is where I will step in a second to make a comparison.
I was conservative on all of this, but I wanted to put it to rest that now that the MC has some disciplines and combat experience, some training by the hound, and the feral ghoul behind him, that he is a fledgling of a mega powerful vampire, and can toast an elder of the Archon's court.
Peace

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You are correct in all that. Unfortunately we are still speculating on generational gaps. The largest consideration is how low of a gen is the Mc actually. I know we all believe he is somewhere 4-6. We just don't know what the Archon is. I would hazard he is somewhere 6-8. It has been quite some years since I delved into the source material(late 90's) but isn't 7th around the max that a player would normally achieve. I am not here to rain on parades or play devils advocate but the experience of centuries can play a huge role, even if you take aggravated damage into consideration.
 
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Arigon

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Indeed, Summer's Gone. You can just click in the middle image of my signature to go to the thread.
Summer's Gone, With the Wind...... My Baby's Go-onnnnn with the Wi-nnndnnnnnnd ahh ahh!
***See Lynard Skynard Tuesday's Gone for the pop reference. Excellent remake by Metallica
 

Arigon

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You are correct in all that. Unfortunately we are still speculating on generational gaps. The largest consideration is how low of a gen is the Mc actually. I know we all believe he is somewhere 4-6. We just don't know what the Archon is. I would hazard he is somewhere 6-8. It has been quite some years since I delved into the source material(late 90's) but isn't 7th around the max that a player would normally achieve. I am not here to rain on parades or play devils advocate but the experience of centuries can play a huge role, even if you take aggravated damage into consideration.
8th gen is the lowest that a player could get. Aggravated damage is why Garou universally can pretty well stomp on Elders with impunity.
Even under old system for Elysium Archons, which were servants of Justicars, were not an office in the city. The Archons are taking on the Dark Ages role of Barons and 8th gen is a good lower limit for them. I think the lowest the MC can be is 5th and I think that is what he is after much reflection. You are not raining on anyone's parade. The aggravated damage output of the MC will overwhelm all but the most battle hardened vamps with lots of fortitude and armor, or a shit ton of celerity to act first and hopefully put the offender down first. Unlikely though.
Prince is probably 7th. That is the usual low for a prince in America pre Beckoning.
Marcel (I think that was his name) prince of New Orleans was 8th.
By contrast, for centuries the boss vamps of both Mexico City and London were 4th. The Prince of Berlin was an insane 6th gen, and the current head of the Camarilla Tremere is now Karl Shrekt, 5th gen Tremere. Just to give you perspective
 

Warscared

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Here is where I will step in a second to make a comparison.
I was conservative on all of this, but I wanted to put it to rest that now that the MC has some disciplines and combat experience, some training by the hound, and the feral ghoul behind him, that he is a fledgling of a mega powerful vampire, and can toast an elder of the Archon's court.
Peace

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dude i can speak 8 languages 4 of them fluently the rest it varies! i was captain of my chess team when i was a teenager with a link of almost 1800 if i was to write down the amount of serious authors i have read it would be double your post in as varied terms as philosophy theology physics political science economy genetics and so fort and so forth and from what you said i understood this sentence

"Let's assume that Archons are not Prince level vampires, " ...

and besides the serious authors i am in the process of reading the malazan book of the dead saga probably the hardest fantasy series out there! calm down i love wall of texts but i do not appreciate feeling like a dumb kid :\ ... or perhaps my mental capacities are starting to fail me...
 

mistwolf_2k

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dude i can speak 8 languages 4 of them fluently the rest it varies! i was captain of my chess team when i was a teenager with a link of almost 1800 if i was to write down the amount of serious authors i have read it would be double your post in as varied terms as philosophy theology physics political science economy genetics and so fort and so forth and from what you said i understood this sentence

"Let's assume that Archons are not Prince level vampires, " ...

and besides the serious authors i am in the process of reading the malazan book of the dead saga probably the hardest fantasy series out there! calm down i love wall of texts but i do not appreciate feeling like a dumb kid :\ ... or perhaps my mental capacities are starting to fail me...
A lot of that post centered around mechanics of the PnP game. Unless you are familiar with the rules it is goobly gook. It doesn't resemble the mechanics of any other games, except the other games from the same publisher, of which there are many.
 
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Arigon

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A lot of that post centered around mechanics of the PnP game. Unless you are familiar with the rules it is goobly gook. It doesn't resemble the mechanics of any other games, except the other games from the same publisher, of which there are many.
That is correct.
I apologize if I went overboard guys. I just wanted to explain, in terms of the game that Rebirth is pretty much lifted from inspirationally, how the MC actually could pretty effectively paste Marcius. Which he could do, all within the pen and paper rules. If we were to put it in terms of say Bloodlines 1 it would be almost exactly the same, with the MC exceeding the max values allowed for most if not all of the social and combat abilities. Possibly mental as well, though he is no mental giant.

If Bloodlines 2 is ever finished, and they follow the rules, it will be set in the 5th edition rule set, which is a very very watered down version compared to most of what I referenced which was the second edition. Most vampires in the time of Bloodlines 2 and the other visual novels are extremely high generation, some as high as 16, which may as well be a ghoul. They actually are weaker than legitimate ghouls as they rely on Thin Blood Alchemy for their powers. The goal in the new edition is to find some legit vampires to commit diablerie on. Anyhow

To put it very clearly, the MC will start off actually more powerful than most of the vampires he encounters.
Think about Interview with a Vampire by Ann Rice... granted she is in love with herself and with Lestat, but his sire Magnus had never sired another vampire and was actually as close as her books get to having a Tremere. Magnus used sorcery to entrap and use a captured vampire to become a vampire. Eventually he got tired of living, and passed his blood gifts to Lestat, and then I think he jumped in a fire.
Lestat is very powerful due to how powerful his sire was, and the fact that his sire had not diluted his vitae by siring a lot of childer, meant Lestat got it all. While that doesn't translate over 100%, it is close enough. The MC is the first child in centuries if not thousands of years for Calisto, and he is of a lower generation than any vampire around him with the possible exception of Fabian and of course his Sire.
Marcius, unless he figures out who the MC's sire is, and what that means, is basically going to walk into a wood chipper completely unaware of why he is lying on the floor dead before he could spend a blood point, if he picks a fight with the MC or Sharon, as the MC will no doubt step up, especially if you developed his Prowess.

There is a lot of merit in age of a vampire over generation, if you are talking the more common vampires of 8-13th generation. Once you cross that 7th gen barrier, vampires ramp up very quickly, and by the 5th generation you are looking at something that has well over 100 freebie points more of powers and abilities than an 8th generation vampire. Calisto could have 750-1000 points more, and Artemis would be off the scale.

The good news for most of the vampires, is that vampires love to humiliate and dominate their foes much more than simply kill them. This is why Sharon is alive still after her initial attack in the woods (in my humble opinion).

Anyhow, I will try and keep the mechanics out of most of my discussions in the future!
Peace
 

Raptus Puellae

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Heavy Five appeals to my inner rocket scientist which I have the education for, and worked some years for a NASA contractor, but now that I took an early out from civil service, I can enjoy the happenings of real science, and sci fi novels like this one. The girls are very different, and deeply written. The story is great, and I love the unknowns that we are dealing with.
enjoy the 20k renders in chapter 4.....
1 presence (allows him to make sure he is noticed, and when he develops it, will give him great powers of dominion.
I don't think he spent any dot on presence as Marcius is obsessed with getting Sharon's eye powers...
Calisto has a limit of 4th generation.
keep in mind that Calisto was ( according to our consensus) a priestess before she was embraced. That means that she was a human with exceptional social stats by the time she was embraced, she might have even been a magi, which would make her an enlightened soul, that part was destroyed with the embrace (but a good Story teller would trade that for some extra freebies... let's say she was turned around 400 BC. That would make her a 2400 years old fourth generation vampire. lets's assume she diablerized few vamps along the road. her dots pool should exceed the template. as a matter of facts, let's look at the vision from Fabian's past. we see him in his templar armor kneeling in front of Calisto, what's intersting about that is that after the destruction of the templar order in 1314, many templars joined other orders... so lets' assume that Fabian swore loyalty to Callisto in 1315 (and that's the flashback we did see) that makes him circa 700 years old. Quite the asset to aquire... there's also Cindy, she seems strong enough to be guarding Calisto's chamber. she wears a glove, but what if she's doing that to cover the fact that due to being gangrel, her hands changed to a more feral shape?
 

Arigon

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enjoy the 20k renders in chapter 4.....

I don't think he spent any dot on presence as Marcius is obsessed with getting Sharon's eye powers...

keep in mind that Calisto was ( according to our consensus) a priestess before she was embraced. That means that she was a human with exceptional social stats by the time she was embraced, she might have even been a magi, which would make her an enlightened soul, that part was destroyed with the embrace (but a good Story teller would trade that for some extra freebies... let's say she was turned around 400 BC. That would make her a 2400 years old fourth generation vampire. lets's assume she diablerized few vamps along the road. her dots pool should exceed the template. as a matter of facts, let's look at the vision from Fabian's past. we see him in his templar armor kneeling in front of Calisto, what's intersting about that is that after the destruction of the templar order in 1314, many templars joined other orders... so lets' assume that Fabian swore loyalty to Callisto in 1315 (and that's the flashback we did see) that makes him circa 700 years old. Quite the asset to aquire... there's also Cindy, she seems strong enough to be guarding Calisto's chamber. she wears a glove, but what if she's doing that to cover the fact that due to being gangrel, her hands changed to a more feral shape?
Ok, so if we assume that Marcius relies totally on his physical beastly strength, we could have him with Potence 2, Celerity 1 to start. Then in making that choice of a last point to spend, instead of working on anything social he decides to either boost his strength or celerity. Potence 3 with a 5 strength base would allow him to be an extreme bully, or Potence 2, celerity 2 would make his combat stats a tad better with an extra initiative point and 3 actions a round. Sadly this still puts him significantly at a disadvantage to any of Calisto's brood, and even Fabian, whom I think descended from Titan->Zeus->Apollo-Hekate/Hecate-Fabian which would make him a 2200 year old 5th generation magister, who served as a martial guard for his order, and eventually swore his faith to Calisto, either through a blood bond, or directed by Apollo to do so, or Hecate who might be battling Calisto in the Jyhad, though I doubt that one. I think Team Olympus is being faithful to their historical myth which is they have Jealousy, fight, kill minions, but ultimately pull together against an outside force, in this case, team black /Team Vahalla.
I could build such a fun, complicated story around this.... might well do it, if it all turns out to be wrong from LikesBlondes vision. Greek and Norse gods and heroes are so much fun to mind game. As I sit here sipping coffee, I can envision many things.

If we pause a moment, and compare all our theory crafting to published work, we take Mithra for instance. Ventrue Fire God of Babylon. 4th generation without diablerie. Incredible figure throughout the history of our entire Western Civilization. I think the only Disciplines that fucker didn't have 9 dots in was thaumaturgy, but at his power level he kind of was his own kind of magic.

Helena was also a force to be reckoned with.... a un-repentant hedonistic Toreador, who masterminded so many things in the Americas. Merlinda from the Tremere was up north, and as powerful a mage as she was, and then turned vampire, she still lacked the thousands of years that Helena had. However, Helena did have to contend with Mictlántecuhtli who was the Gangrel Methuselah who is believed to have been the first vampire to invade the Americas via the Land Bridge around 8k BCE. Hard to gamble against a Gangrel of any serious age....

Interestingly there is a Gangrel 4th gen who is named Odin, who pretty much fit the bill of the All-Father. Most all of the vampires in Scandinavia were his brood, and they ruled there for thousands of years until the coming of christianity...Odin was said to be a true childe of Ennoia.... I love reading the histories.... but anyhow I stand behind my very quick analysis of the fictitious battle between Marcius the 8th generation pseudo elder Archon (Baron) in our story, and the newly blessed knight of Calisto, who is amped up on so much raw power that he is a danger to everyone if he frenzies. That truly would be a shitty ending to have him frenzy and kill Sharon and Carmen and Laurie and Andrew, and pretty much not break a blood sweat.....gotta keep that boy meditating with Sharon for many years.
I fucking love this stuff,
Peace
 
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Warscared

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what about and hear me out... Astrid is Loki ... i mean he already impersonated Jesus to weaken team valhala (read the myth of Loki´s punishment and him being suspended as a T does not reflect a certain monotonous religious sect...)
 

Raptus Puellae

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who is amped up on so much raw power that he is a danger to everyone if he frenzies. That truly would be a shitty ending to have him frenzy and kill Sharon and Carmen and Laurie and Andrew, and pretty much not break a blood sweat.....gotta keep that boy meditating with Sharon for many years.
I fucking love this stuff,
what if Marcius threten Laurie, Carmen and Sharon making the MC go into frenzy? and Calisto would snap him out of it... that would be a perfect episode's fnale
 
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D3xzalias

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Here is where I will step in a second to make a comparison.
I was conservative on all of this, but I wanted to put it to rest that now that the MC has some disciplines and combat experience, some training by the hound, and the feral ghoul behind him, that he is a fledgling of a mega powerful vampire, and can toast an elder of the Archon's court.
Peace

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Thank you for the in depth explanation on how strong his blood is

Laurie looks amazing thank you for this
 

Ayhsel

Chocolate Vampire
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May 9, 2019
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This is a simple reminder that an overpowered MC or character usually is bad for the story. As in the end, you need to justify why they simply don't force the outcome they want?

So, MC is potentially very powerful, but it is shown a few times he can be killed. Which is good, as he being invincible would make the game quite boring. A reason why Rebirth is sooo good is that you can see that characters always feel in danger: precautions they take, plans they make, allies and foes they seek and fight..

But if Ptolemy is doing things right, he should not make MC that powerful so early. As we would run out of emotion very soon.

Thank you so much for this!
 
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4.10 star(s) 194 Votes