easiest way to save a black court vampire and return them to a human

[BumblingBear]

Turning a Black Court Vampire human is one thing, but making an Angel like Black Court Vampire is another.  The Dresden RPG is a game of snowflakes and if Thomas (a White Court Vampire) can have a conscience then why not a Black Court one?


Richard

This is an excellent point... and one I have actually already used.

I /may/ have a BCV or two in my campaign who are are not completely evil...

And /maybe/ how the PCs choose to deal with them will have consequences down the road...

::evil laugh::

[evileeyore]

Have you read the short story where Harry goes to the mall to give Thomas a birthday present?

Yes.  That doesn't change a thing I've written.

BCVs definitely still retain their personalities and memories they had in life.  They're just... more evil and a lot more powerful.

They are also dead, reanimated, and possibly host to a malevolent spirit of some sort that has access to the deceased's memories.

Based on how Mavra acts too, I really don't think that vampires are easily classified.

Finally something we can definitively agree on here.   

WOJ is that Renfields are done, their fates irreversible.  Harry says so with great authority in the casefiles.  I believe him.

Not to argue this point... but I don't treat Harry Dresden's words as Gospel.  If I were to run a DF game I wouldn't even be treated Jim Butcher as Gospel, which is beside the point.

I have a hard time believing that in the last few thousand years, a BCV has not turned a wizard's family member into a renfield out of spite.  And just like Harry did for Susan, I have a hard time believing that said wizard would not turn every resource they had available to them to the cause of "curing" their loved one.

Again, who is to say they haven't.  Harry is an outsider to the White Council, pariah to other Wizards... when he's finally accept as one "one of the Godd Guys" by the Council, he doesn't have time to really get in any real study on these matters.

If thousands of years of wizards could not do it, I doubt PCs could.

Thousands of years of Wizarding couldn't wipe out the Red Court either...   

[Richard_Chilton]

Not to argue this point... but I don't treat Harry Dresden's words as Gospel.  If I were to run a DF game I wouldn't even be treated Jim Butcher as Gospel, which is beside the point.

Um. WoJ = Word of Jim.

As in the guy who writes the books sometimes explains how things work behind the scenes.  Since the dresdenverse comes from his thoughts him saying "this is how something works" is basically the final statement on that.

Which means more than Bob saying "The original Merlin and some Saints tried and couldn't do it" means less than Jim making an off hand comment during an interview.

A very nice person had organised most of the WoJs at one spot:
http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,21772.0.html

It's worth looking through.

Richard

[Taran]

EDIT

I just want to remove my post...sorry.

[BlackMage]

I've seen a whole lot of "your table, your rules" type bits on many matters since I got here.  I personally agree, once I think about it, that even an Unravelling couldn't save a Blampire.  It would undo the enchantment exactly as described and leave a corpse as stated earlier.  If I was handling GM duties (ha!) that's how I'd run it on the off chance someone managed to get their hands on such an item.

But!  "Your table, your rules," and all.  If a GM is willing to go with it, then for the purposes of that game something could be worked out.  Even if a purist like myself would be loathe to go against WoJ.   

[BumblingBear]

I've seen a whole lot of "your table, your rules" type bits on many matters since I got here.  I personally agree, once I think about it, that even an Unravelling couldn't save a Blampire.  It would undo the enchantment exactly as described and leave a corpse as stated earlier.  If I was handling GM duties (ha!) that's how I'd run it on the off chance someone managed to get their hands on such an item.

But!  "Your table, your rules," and all.  If a GM is willing to go with it, then for the purposes of that game something could be worked out.  Even if a purist like myself would be loathe to go against WoJ.   

This is how I feel.

But like I said, just putting myself into the shoes of a RL PC, I have a hard time believing that the real "good guys" would be ok with icing creatures that could revert back to humans.  That would make them victims, not monsters.

It would be the difference between exterminating a monster, and murdering a victim of magic so they could never be redeemed.

::shrug::

People can do what they want.  Shoot, we have a poster here in a game that includes a duck in a robo suit.

My argument is that if people are playing within the canon world, they should try to follow canon.

If people want to make their own world - great.  And if that is the case, they don't need to ask us how anything is done because they can make it up as they go along.

Just like the discussions in the spoilers section about redeeming Lash, I hate the idea because it would trivialize what a monster they are.

The neat thing about the DV is that while there are a lot of shades of grey, there /IS/ black and white.  The Fallen, BCV, and the Red Court are all far, far on the side of the black.  White court is definitely grey.  And the Knights of the Cross are white.

Sorry - I just realized I am rambling now.  I will gracefully bow out. lol

[MijRai]

Just like the discussions in the spoilers section about redeeming Lash, I hate the idea because it would trivialize what a monster they are.

Because that stuck out a little, I wanted to make a quick comment. There is a difference between Lash, the shadow of one of the Fallen, and Lasciel the Fallen Angel, one of the thirty strongest and smartest Fallen Angels.

[BlackMage]

Then a look of almost childish resentment came over her face, and she looked over one shoulder before
turning back to me. "I…" She shook her head and said, very softly, wonderingly,"She… doesn't deserve
you."

Both Harry and Lash herself seem to accept that Lasciel and Lash are very separate beings.  Lash was supposedly as malleable as Harry himself, and gained free will (which makes perfect sense, she is after all not an Angel fallen or otherwise, but a shadow, and one who exists in a free willed being's mind at that).  So unless later events show this to be a lie/misunderstanding in some way, I am entirely fine with the idea that Lash was redeemed... or if not fully redeemed at least became a better being prior to the end.  But that is rather far afield of the original question this topic was meant for, so I shall now bow out until I have relevant thoughts again. 

[Tedronai]

In this, and all similar matters, my opinion can be summed up with a simple 'Plot wins.'
If the plot of your game demands that such a thing be possible, then it will be possible.
If the plot of your game demands that such a thing occur, then it will provide the means, likely in the form of assistance of some sort from an extreme-'plot device' npc (be that a faerie Mother, archangel, minor god, or whatever is appropriate to the Plot).

[BumblingBear]

Because that stuck out a little, I wanted to make a quick comment. There is a difference between Lash, the shadow of one of the Fallen, and Lasciel the Fallen Angel, one of the thirty strongest and smartest Fallen Angels.

I meant Lasciel.

I usually designate the two, "Lash", and "Shadow Lash".

[Viatos]

But like I said, just putting myself into the shoes of a RL PC, I have a hard time believing that the real "good guys" would be ok with icing creatures that could revert back to humans.  That would make them victims, not monsters.

This to me is funny, not in a mean way - my laughter is a kind of hollow, envious thing. My "good guys" are generally okay with icing the receptionist at the hotel they think a Big Bad might have slept in if her Social defenses could be classified as "annoying" to overcome. And the rest of the staff, since they might as well while they're at it. That's a my table versus your table kind of distinction, but it serves as an introduction for an important point - morality is subjective. What if the "good guys" don't have magic of their own, or simply can't be bothered to dredge up massive plot-level rituals for every BCV mook? Are they evil because they choose the easier option in service of a higher good? Isn't that some ancient philosophical territory being strayed into?

I mean, take the Animorphs. Perfect example. The innocence of children, the wisdom of soldiers: their enemies frequently include Hork-Bajir (a Neutral Good race) and human Controllers (who run the gamut). If you capture a Controller and subdue it for three days, the Yeerk in its head dies. The Animorphs don't have three days for every Controller. They kill people. A lot of people. They have to, because everything is at stake, and they can't afford distractions.

Again, I don't think morally complex decisions necessarily "lessen" anything. You keep mentioning this, and I don't get it. Isn't it more horrible having to kill when you know you might be able to save? Isn't a creature that remembers what it means to be human more terrifying and insidious then one that can't get into your head, not really?

If thousands of years of wizards could not do it, I doubt PCs could.

This is another thing that varies widely according to taste. I personally don't believe in ever letting NPCs outshine PCs at something the PC wants to do. I am fine ruling that the thousands of years of wizards before the current party just weren't HARDCORE enough to get the job done. PCs are different, destined, special, they have "it", they have spirit or strength of will or some indefinable trait that allows them to succeed where everyone else failed. Because they're PCs.

[evileeyore]

Are they evil because they choose the easier option in service of a higher good? Isn't that some ancient philosophical territory being strayed into?

Strayed?  I think it just mamboed right into the middle of Philosophy 301.

PCs are different, destined, special, they have "it", they have spirit or strength of will or some indefinable trait that allows them to succeed where everyone else failed. Because they're PCs.

Another way to look at it is so:

Modern PC have something many old and ancient NPCs wouldn't have had, modern scientific methodology imparted into them from their earliest school years.  Modern thinkers have a much more natural "out of the box" inclination to thought and reasoning than even people from 50 or 100 years ago.  This age has not just considered or thought about, but experienced rapid sweeping changes in every facet of life, fluidity of ideas must be kept up with...  every few years.  Not every few decades, or a few a century.  Multiple changes just within ones own childhood.

[evileeyore]

Um. WoJ = Word of Jim.

I know.  Don't care.  Thanks for the link though, I've read it before but didn't save it.

Were Mr. Butcher to sit at my table he'd have to deal with how my table runs things, our consensus and my take on how things work.  His "authorship" would have little bearing. 

As in the guy who writes the books sometimes explains how things work behind the scenes.  Since the dresdenverse comes from his thoughts him saying "this is how something works" is basically the final statement on that.

Sure and if you want to run that way, kudos.  Cold Iron is not the end all be all Anti-Fae device in my worlds.  I go by the olde myths a little more stringently than Jim does at my table, just for instance.


And we're not even going to get me started on his horrible mistreatment of the very honorable Hobgoblin.  Just don't.   

[sandchigger]

I know.  Don't care.  Thanks for the link though, I've read it before but didn't save it.

So your real question is "how would you do something that's against canon?"

In that case, I'd get in my rocket ship, fly them out to Neptune and have them cured by the friendly aliens there.

[devonapple]

In that case, I'd get in my rocket ship, fly them out to Neptune and have them cured by the friendly aliens there.

Alright, to get that Rocketship, roll Contacts at a +2 Difficulty to know a pilot who won the lottery and owns his own rocket ship. Or Resources at a +1 Difficulty to rig a lottery so your pilot friend wins, and then convince him to buy a rocket ship.

Feel free to roll a few navel-gazing maneuvers if those are going to be too hard.