Law Talk

[blackstaff67]

At the risk of being blasted for opening a necro'd thread, I have a 7th Law question.  Our group (WC Wizard, Sorcerer, and a Champion of God) have acquired a library (of sorts) that may provide data on fighting Outsiders.  Can either of the first two read it w/o picking up Lawbreaker?  If no, can the CoG peruse it w/o picking Lawbreaker?  Since she is not a "spellcaster" is she even capable of picking up 7th Lawbreaker?  If so, then am I right in asserting it is the only Lawbreaker stunt even a "vanilla mortal" can pick up?   

[Taran]

I don't know what the right answer is.  That Law is a bit weird.  You could skip past it and let the CoG use his "guide my hand" ability to find the right answers without risking himself to corruption.

Or maybe it'll corrupt him and that would be fun too!

[Sanctaphrax]

Necroing this thread is totally appropriate. That's why it's stickied.

Anyway, I recommend against handing out Seventh Lawbreaker to non-casters. It doesn't present an interesting story, it just subtracts from an abstract mechanical number and throws off the game's balance.

But some kind of corrupting mental attack/Aspect change could be cool.

[Mr. Death]

Generally speaking, I tend to take it as the seven laws of magic can only be broken by, well, doing magic. So finding a book about Outsiders wouldn't, on its own, break the Law. But if you took that book and used it to try and summon an Outsider, that would.

[Taran]

But some kind of corrupting mental attack/Aspect change could be cool.

As you research you slowly get corrupted, represented by mental attacks.  The longer you research, the stronger the pull/attacks.  Aspects can represent

(click to show/hide)

The nemesis' influence.

I agree that Lawbreaker should only be for spell-casters.

[Serack]

Sanctaphrax, as a "curator" I love the work you did here.

I'll probably be going through some of these links later to see what kinds of insights they have that pertain to the canon proper.

[Sanctaphrax]

Thanks, Serack. Very kind of you to say so.

Hope the links are useful in a non-gaming context.

[Serack]

Thanks, Serack. Very kind of you to say so.

Hope the links are useful in a non-gaming context.

Ok, I finally published a topic I've been building that does some heavy thinking about "Law Breaking" and black magic.  It's not gaming centric, but those that are wrestling with this topic might find it insightful. 

Law Breaking Vs Black Magic [Spoilers for everything]

[blackstaff67]

An incident came up in-game recently:
Party captures a ghoul that did a car-bomb on the local Club Zero that also caught the local watering hole of the region's paranormal community (yes, the local Neutral Grounds was across from Club Zero.  Somebody thought they'd get a two-for-one deal).  In any event, the party had a sorcerer in the group.  Upon being asked why he didn't just invade teh ghoul's mind, he replied:  "Third AND Fourth Law violations there."  Party's reply:  "That exists to protect mortals."  "Doesn't matter--not gonna do it, 'specially with a WC Wizard a few blocks away."  He also claimed that in Storm Front, holding a demon by its name was a 4th law violation.  I have the guy a Fate Point for his self-Compel.

I had to give it to him, he erred on the side of caution.  Was he being too conservative, given that a ghoul is as far from human as a critter gets without being an Outsider?

[Sanctaphrax]

From a pure rules stand-point he was being too conservative. But his attitude sounds like a sensible one for a sorcerer to have. His character hasn't read the rule-books and doesn't know what his Refresh total is, after all.

[jaythejay]

My character is a werewolf (the learned kind like the Alphas). if he kills a human while transformed, a la teeth, claws, or even knocking off a building, is he breaking the 1st law since his magically augmented form contributed to the kill?

[Rossbert]

I would say no, but he might want to feel bad anyway.

[Sanctaphrax]

He should be fine.

Apart from the normal trauma of having killed someone, of course.

[Katarn]

I have a lawbreaker question regarding Binder, in Turn Coat.  Would he be guilty of:

*First Law?  A Grey Suit (acting in his will) kills a Warden.
*Fourth Law?  Binding "Grey Suit" Fae to his will.  Morgan's reaction to Harry summoning Toot-Toot in Storm Front supports this- Binder definitely bound the fae to his whims.

[Sanctaphrax]

-Dunno. I generally use wyvern's approach: if the summon has its own free will and can disobey/take initiative, you're fine. If it's just a puppet, you're guilty.

-No. Morgan was just harassing Harry. (Actually it probably has more to do with Jim not being quite sure what he was doing with the series yet, but whatever.) Non-humans don't count.