[DitV] Difficulties with demonic attacks

[Betsi-G]

Brendan, Matt, Alisanne, if you're reading this, you might want to stop here. I'm plotting. Don't feel you have to, I guess, but you will have prior knowledge when I end up GMing next.

That said, I'm having difficulties figuring out how to have the demons attack the town when Sin happens. We've only played twice so far, and we're doing a rotating GM campaign. This means that while so far the demons have attacked in ways that reflect the Sin, this doesn't mean that the next game or two before I get to GM next will be that way. Personally, I like it best; it gives the players some idea of what they're looking for, as oftentimes the demonic attacks seem to be a bit more obvious than the Sin that caused them.

For example, in our first town, the Sin way sex. All the unmarried women in town became mysteriously pregnant. And in the game I GMed last night, the Sin was Violence, specifically a young girl badly beating her sister. So the demonic attacks here were a) growing disdain felt toward women's older sisters, and b) short temper with women's younger sisters. Basically, all the women in town who had sisters were feeling the same way the two sisters did before the one beat the other unconscious. More of a complex attack than in our first game, I'll grant you, but it seemed to work. And again, this was a town that I created, and my point is I'm having problems figuring out what the demons do as a result of Sin.

Currently, I'm working on a town where the Steward is growing increasingly corrupt and his Pride has lead to a variety of Injustices, which leads to a variety of Sins.

Specifically, the Steward has been putting pressure on a local boy to "prove" himself worthy of being a Dog. The boy, Isaac, is in fact fairly suited to be a Dog, but pressed into a situation where he feels he has no choice, he's been making up the occassional lie to make himself look better or make others who might be made Dogs look worse. Specifically, the Steward's been egging him along the lines of "Your brother is at least as fit to be a Dog as you, what makes you so much better than him?" As a result, Isaac has been conspiring to make his brother get in trouble, and look bad. So here we have the Sins of Deceit and Disunity.

Also, the Steward has been persuing a local woman, Rebecca, to become his second wife. Two problems arise here; Rebecca is one of the few people in town who's seen enough of him to notice the slow fall toward corruption in him, and so she doesn't want to marry him. The problem is, she also gets the distinct impression he could make her life miserable if she doesn't give him what he wants, so she lies and says she loves him. (I'm considering continuing this to have her say it enough, and say it in front of others enough, that she and they all start to believe it, creating False Doctrine... but I'm not sure how that would work, if at all.) So she's committed the Sin of Deceit. The Steward's wife hears about Rebecca's pledge of love, and she ends up decking the poor girl, breaking her nose. She has a lot of reasons she got so upset at what Rebecca said, including that she fears for Rebecca, because she, of all people, knows what an ass this guy is. She's pissed off at her lot in life, and doesn't think the man he's become deserves the one wife he has (her!) let alone another.

So with a complex and partially intertwined set of Sins going on, what do the demons do? Any suggestions? Especially generalised advice on the problem of how to determine what the demons reaction/attack-on-the-town should be? Either way, I'd like to hear your thoughts, I'm a bit too in my own head right now, some one else;s opinion would be great.

[lumpley]

Betsi! I'm following your rotating-GM thing avidly. I hope I can help.

Here's how I approach demonic attacks:

The demons want one-time sins to become habitual, and they want to create false doctrine.

Looking at your town, where's the potential for false doctrine? The steward's wife seems an excellent candidate to me. What would have to happen for her to disavow the Faith in some way?

Why, the steward marrying this new girl, of course. False doctrine: a second wife can replace the first. The first wife seizes upon the new marriage as an out, she can use it to get away from her crappy husband. No divorce, no shame, she hands off her marriage like a relay runner's baton. That'll gnaw on her conscience though, so she'll try to get other people to buy into it, and then it's a cult, and the demons are happy.

So what can the demons do to make this marriage happen? Can they put Rebecca in a position where, economically for instance, she has no choice?

The Dog-to-be kid is an excellent candidate for false doctrine too - or better yet, his brother. What and how?

So that doesn't answer the question of how should the demonic attacks be related to the sin, but maybe it'll help anyway.

-Vincent

[Betsi-G]

Ah, helpful muchly! I think your thoughts on where to take this have given me a decent sense of direction with this. I think I'm going to just skip ahead a bit, plan out what happens next, and go back and fill in the demonic attacks after I have a clearer picture of what the results on those attacks are. Thanks in particular for the helpful oneliner of "The demons want one-time sins to become habitual, and they want to create false doctrine." It really helps understand better how sin flows to demonic attack which flows to false doctrine. The other parts of the progression followed well enough, but I was having a hard time getting my mind around that part of it for some reason.

I am, of course, still open to ideas (specific to this town or not) if anyone else has some.

[Betsi-G]

A nitpicky question for whoever wants to field it.. Who performs marriages? Stewards? Dogs? I've seen it treated either way, and for the purposes of what I'm trying to work out for my current town, neither works that well. If Stewards perform them, I'm simply faced with the question of "who performs marriages when the groom is the local Steward?" and if it's Dogs, well, that makes it so I can't have the Steward's wife already have run off when the Dogs arrive in town. See, I'm thinking the best point for the Dogs to come to town is shortly (like maybe just a couple days) after Rebecca has married the Steward, and the Steward wife, Miriam, has run off to live... I'm not sure. With another man, her mother, on her own, anywhere but there.

[Christopher Weeks]

I'd think that Stewards normally do and that Dogs certainly can.  Also, it might not be unheard of for folks to travel to Bridal Falls for marriage in the big temple.

[Joshua A.C. Newman]

A nitpicky question for whoever wants to field it.. Who performs marriages? Stewards? Dogs?

It's your world. Maybe there's a mayor in town? Maybe the Steward's Steward has to come visit (oh, hey, that's good stuff!)?

Who do you think officiates a rabbi's wedding? More rabbis!

[joshua neff]

A nitpicky question for whoever wants to field it.. Who performs marriages? Stewards? Dogs? I've seen it treated either way, and for the purposes of what I'm trying to work out for my current town, neither works that well. If Stewards perform them, I'm simply faced with the question of "who performs marriages when the groom is the local Steward?" and if it's Dogs, well, that makes it so I can't have the Steward's wife already have run off when the Dogs arrive in town. See, I'm thinking the best point for the Dogs to come to town is shortly (like maybe just a couple days) after Rebecca has married the Steward, and the Steward wife, Miriam, has run off to live... I'm not sure. With another man, her mother, on her own, anywhere but there.

I assume that Stewards perform marriages. If it's the Steward getting married, I would assume a Dog would do it.

But if you want your Steward already married to his second wife and his first wife run off when the PCs arrive...maybe another Dog or couple of Dogs were in town (& left) before the PCs arrive.

[Lance D. Allen]

Maybe he presided over his own wedding?

Seriously, there's story fodder there, especially if you're wanting to play up how the Steward "just ain't right".

[Betsi-G]

All interesting ideas.... I shall have to ponder it. But thanks muchly everyone for you nicely varied replies. Gives me a good idea of what I could do and how to do each.

*ponders*