So are you saying that all the mechanics are generic enough that they don't support the Forsaken's specific story anyway?
pteryx
joined 2 years ago
Isn't Werewolf: the Forsaken built around a completely different story and cosmology, though? At that point you may as well use a generic game...
On the second point, Asimov's Laws of Robotics are very commonly mistaken for serious cybersecurity by the general population, instead of being the seeds for stories they were intended to be. That's a misconception that a mind-reading "AI" might well absorb, not recognizing their many flaws.
On the third point, one example of a context mixup I've seen pointed out: talking about the D&D stats of a scimitar in the middle of a generated archaeology article.
That particular decision begs a question: What do your *players* — not their characters — think of real LLMs and diffusion models?
In other words, does this seem to have been an IC mistake made despite the actual players knowing better in order to set up the obvious conflict and Aesop, or something the actual players believe was a great idea and would throw a fit over if it goes as badly as you're thinking?
If the players don't know better, be ready for a RL, OOC conversation or confrontation.
The thing to remember about RL "AI" is that it doesn't actually have a concept of true or false, of reality actually existing instead of being a theoretical construct. That, above all else, is what makes it so dangerous.
That being said, Zaktor has a point: how are the players perceiving this NPC? Do they honestly see it as trustworthy themselves, are they seeing it as a neutral force they could exploit, or what? Being betrayed by a "friendly" NPC can traumatize some players for life.
An important thing to understand about "AI" is that it'll tend to say not just a probable thing give or take a roll of the dice, but the thing the prompter wants to hear. It's not just a pathological liar, but one that can't even keep its story straight from person to person. So there's a good chance that the thing hasn't created just one mass delusion, but lots of clashing mass delusions (one group thinks everything's fine based on one story, another thinks it based on an incompatible story).
I'm thinking Ecology would likely be very useful for helping to restore areas damaged by the machine revolution -- the worse the damage, the harder the job. Maybe one easy roll to replant after a clearcut, a whole adventure to restore a mechanized town.
As for Academics... the use of that sort of skill in TTRPGs in general is often to enable exposition and determine how extensive that exposition is. (Basically look at how Sally's handheld computer Nicole is used.)
I have never played nor read this game, but the moment I heard about it I was struck with how it was clearly inspired by a specific cartoon from the early 90s which I'd hoped would eventually see inspired-by, serial-number-filed knockoffs: the ABC Saturday morning version of Sonic the Hedgehog. If you're not familiar with "the SatAM", looking into it might help you make some connections (it's obvious to me what an Ecology skill would be good for in a SatAM game, for instance).
This also relates to my mention elsewhere in this discussion of what used to be called "special snowflakes" (before the birdsite ruined the word "snowflake"). Some people want novelty and creativity above all in their RP, and that doesn't always come with a sense for how to balance that with intended theme or tone. And as you point out, if *no one* is playing things remotely straight, things can become farcical, or at least like an "Oops! All Foils" situation with no requisite normal.
It used to be that the opposite of "crunch" was "fluff". These days, instead of "fluff", people say "lore" — definitely a more respectful term for worldbuilding, metaplot, and the like than "fluff", which has implications of filler.
Nowadays, rather than contracting "crunch" with "fluff/lore", people are more likely to contrast it with being rules-lite.
It could also be applied to the "Chaotic Stupid" interpretation of Chaotic Neutral.
...Which does bring up the "stupid" alignments topic in general. There's also "Lawful Stupid" (being an asshole enforcer of rules and laws beyond all reason; one of the more infamous ways to play a paladin), "Stupid Good" ("I'm sure the dark lord is just lonely and needs a friend!"), and "Stupid Evil" (being malicious and destructive in ways that don't serve one's interests and might even endanger oneself).
Just that while the setting sounds fundamentally very similar between the two Vampires with just differences in details, it sounds very different between the two Werewolf settings and the two Mage settings. Notably, from what I've heard the relationship between werewolves and spirits is fundamentally completely different between the two, to the point that I'd expect system differences.
Plus I've heard Werewolf: the Forsaken criticized as being more of a shaman game than a werewolf game.