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Yeah, yeah, resurrecting an old thread; is that a bad thing?  I know rpg.net sometimes gets all buggered.  But I'm new here, and I'm looking through threads from the beginning going forward, and I'd rather just reply in this thread than start up a new one.  Economy of space and all that.  This might happen again as I go through old threads, so if there is a problem with resurrecting old threads, please send a PM.

Okay, on to the commentary:

I have to ask why the immediate (kneejerk?) reaction of everyone posting here is "Mind Control of PCs" when the initial post introduced the idea of "demons can't compel their masters" (easily extrapolated to demons can't compel sorcerers, as Bailywolf did later).  Most of the objections I see are also in the form of "PCs will react badly when being mind controlled" when the THRUST of Mind Control as a demonic power is "PCs USING mind control on others."

(Then again, I've been a player who's happily allowed my PC to attack his former comerades when Charmed, and I've known other players who are in the same boat.  I guess I'm the kind of guy who "gets a kick out of briefly playing an alternate state of consciousness for a character" as Bailywolf put it.)

So, why the hate?  Why is it better to have your arm cut off than it is to (briefly) experience an altered state of consciousness?  Is it better to be told "you now feel/see/experience this, play it!" or "you black out; the next thing you remember, your best friend is on the ground at your feet, dead, and there is a smoking gun in your hand"?  OR neither?

I also have another question, though.

Quote
As for managing mental control when used against players... well, this is easy... a GM controls a player's perceptions... the demon compells Joe to go and kill an importiant CEO... but the GM tells Joe's player he is on the run, and the only way to make it stop is to go and take down a major crime boss... GM controls input.

How would you do THIS in Sorcerer?  Not controlling a person's mind, but controlling a person's perception of the world.  Hallucinations and the like.  As I said, I'm new; perhaps this has been covered somewhere before.  How can I make that guy right there, person X, perceive me as his friend, and perceive his friend as me (thus maybe shooting the wrong person, or perhaps hesitating to shoot anyone because he's not SURE which image is the real one).  How can I make THAT guy over there think that a little girl just darted out onto the street in front of him, thus (perhaps) getting him to swerve and cause an accident?[/quote]

Hello,

Welcome to the forum! Nice to have you here.

First, some thread-iquette biz. Making a new thread is better than resurrecting an old one. This forum follows the same guidelines as the Forge general forums, mainly because the same guy wrote both. Lxnder, check out the Forge Etiquette sticky at the top of Site Discussion to see what's what. (Also, moderation here is way different from RPG.net moderation; you'll see a lot more public moderating rather than PM-driven.)

Lxnder originally posted to the end of the thread Why no mind control?. We've had a few more discussions about the topic in the interim, too.

On to the discussion ...

The effect you describe of briefly experiencing an altered state of consciousness is best handled by a combination of the Perception ability and, if it is to remove the player-character from the player's control for a short while, the Taint ability. Works great.

QuoteHow would you do THIS in Sorcerer? Not controlling a person's mind, but controlling a person's perception of the world. Hallucinations and the like.

Easy as pie. The demon ability Perception must be customized regarding what is perceived, and almost any demon ability must be customized regarding who does the perceiving (demon or someone else). Therefore this ability is perfect for what you're describing.

Best,
Ron

So can you use the perception ability to change another individual's perceptions of their own emotions/feelings/thoughts?

Hi there,

H'm, that's a bit recursive, I'd say, and you're starting to confuse me. What you described in the previous post were simply hallucinations, or perceiving guy A as guy B and vice versa. Those are pretty easy. Changing a character's perception of his own feelings and thoughts sounds a lot more drastic to me, to the extent that I'm not even sure what you mean. It strikes me that it's synonymous with changing the feelings and thoughts themselves, which as I've said, is probably best handled with the ability Taint.

Generally, "Can you ...." questions aren't very easy to handle, because in a game like Sorcerer, so much depends on local customizing of certain aspects of play. In our current game, which is best described as modern necromancy, practically none of these hallucinatory effects would be usable except in terms perhaps of divination. In another game in which "what is reality" is a central issue, such effects might be the most important things in play.

You've clearly been checking out a lot of Sorcerer threads, so here's a recent one which I think you'll find interesting: Name that demon, which is about using the abilities list to produce unusual or complex in-game effects.

Also, one last thing - slow down a bit. In this forum especially, you'll get a lot of great replies over a few hours. So it's good to post, then let it bake for a while, and come back and look later.

Best,
Ron

Hi folks,

One thing I think makes mind-control so opposing to Sorcerer style play is that the major crux of play, Humanity decisions, get short circuited when someone else is "controlling your guy".  The other issue is that Sorcerer is all about protagonist play(likewise, mind control is bad for this).

When we're talking about a possessor, or parasite hopping into a PC, let's not forget that this guy isn't completely helpless.  He can Punish this thing, Banish it, Contain it in himself and hop into a furnace, he can even Bind it if he's gotta.  Not only that, but most sorcerer's have a solidly high Will, that gives them a shot at influencing actions("Jenny run, I can't hold it for long, soon it will take over!")

So yeah, following the rules, you can control people's bodies, you can feed them false imagery, but you can't dictate how they feel about it.  That is the core of protagonism.  Sorcerer is about making a statement about morality and theme using your character.  It starts with violating natural law for power, and the actions you do with it afterwards.  And how you feel, or WHY you did what you did, makes that theme happen.

Chris

Bankuei>

Can an NPC be de-protagonized?  In a sorcerer game, is the NPC ever a protagonist, or is he only ever the antagonist/extra/guest star?  Your post (and posts elsewhere on this board) seem to use the terms "PC" and "protagonist" interchangeably in re: Sorcerer, a usage I can agree with, but am not entirely sure is what is meant.  Is that what you're meaning to do?

You appear (to my eyes) to be focusing your concerns and concepts about mind control solely on the use of mind control on player characters.  My initial post tried to address the idea of mind control in the context of "PCs using mind control on others" (implied but not specifically stated to be NPCs, not other PCs) and did its best to deflect any discussion about using mind control on PCs (either PC vs. PC or PC vs. NPC).  I guess my best wasn't good enough.  :)

Am I missing something?  Is there any argument against using telepathy and mind control in a Sorcerer setting other than "it can be bad when used on PCs"?  Is the only counter-argument the "My Guy" argument?

(As a side note, AS A PC I don't mind being mind-controlled; I do think it can add something to the story if an outside agency suddenly causes me to fly into a berserk rage against my will, or temporarily change my allegience, as long as it's internally consistent to the story; but at the same time, I notice that it seems to be a hot button in this community, so I'm trying and hoping to confine the discussion of mind control in this thread to PC-on-NPC mind control only)

I know that, MYSELF, the ability to control the thoughts/feelings of others would be one of the few things that I'd be interested in selling my soul for (yeah, welcome to my own personal perversion).  I also know that I am far from the only one who'd sell their soul for that particular ability.  In a very real sense, that is what I would want, were I a sorcerer.  And all I saw in the thread I resurrected is, "Nope, the people who want THAT are out of luck.  Demons won't do that for you.  You can kill someone, but you can't subvert his will."  And I feel sad.

Seems to me there's a wealth of decisions/plot concepts that can be made in that little bundle.  "Do I want to subvert THIS guy's will/feelings?"  "Am I doing bad if I mind control him into giving up his drug addiction/leaving his abusive boyfriend/taking the gun out of his mouth and throw it out the window?"  "I'm used to controlling people, why can't I control HIM?" (In the case of "Demons can't control anyone with a Lore above 0")  "Do any of these people like me for who I am, or are they just hanging around because I control them?"

I don't see how controlling others fails to make a statement about my sorcerer's morality (as you seem to suggest mind control inevitably leads).  To some extent, he'd show the nature of his morality by twisting the will of others, by violating THEIR natural law, and by seeing where he'd STOP.

So... what am I missing?  Help me.

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Ron>

A few questions about using perception as a hallucinogen>

(1)  Say Sorcerer A tells Demon B to make Person C hallucinate (i.e. perceive things differently from the way they are).  Obviously, Sorcerer A is the master, and the definition of host is unnecessary for this example.  But who is the user?

(1A)  If the user ("The Person who controls the demon ability") is Demon B, then the perception dice are given to Demon B (perception gives dice to the user of the power).
(1B)  If the user is Person C, then I have to ask: does a power that is conferred HAVE to be used?  If Demon B confers a power to Person C, does Person C have to USE that ability?  To use a different (and possibly simpler) example, if Demon B conferred Big upon Person C, could Demon B also say "Okay, you're getting bigger, ha!"

(2) Mechanically, perception is defined as "Adding the demon's Power to the user's appropriate score for the purpose of perceiving things."  With that mechanic in mind, is Perception really the appropriate demon ability for what I'm trying to achieve?  Having now read the mechanic (which various threads have convinced me is the way to look at demonic powers) I'm pretty convinced Perception is NOT appropriate.  In fact, I'm not entirely sure there is one mechanically, though both Daze and Cloak seem close.  Please note I only own the main book (so far).

Am I missing something, once again?  I thought I understood it earlier, but now I'm confused.  I would expect/hope for a CONTEST of rolls, of some sort, and Perception seems entirely devoid of a contest between user and victim (as does Big, above).

QuoteI know that, MYSELF, the ability to control the thoughts/feelings of others would be one of the few things that I'd be interested in selling my soul for (yeah, welcome to my own personal perversion). I also know that I am far from the only one who'd sell their soul for that particular ability. In a very real sense, that is what I would want, were I a sorcerer. And all I saw in the thread I resurrected is, "Nope, the people who want THAT are out of luck. Demons won't do that for you. You can kill someone, but you can't subvert his will." And I feel sad.

an aside.  If you're into this sort of thing.  I can't recommend the book Children of Thunder highly enough.  I never wanted to BE a character in a book as much as I wanted to be those kids...even if they were malicious to the core...

These are some damn good questions.

Let's take on the "how do I affect others' minds" issue, for sorcerers. Solid question.

The first concept is, in Sorcerer, there are no guarantees. But given that, here are some of the ways to go ...

1. Plain old Possession by a demon. Tell the demon what to do, have it possess the person, and there you are. Given some of the possible subtleties of possession outlined in The Sorcerer's Soul, you can bring substantial degrees of host complicity into the picture that well resemble the "control via the victim's darker urges" concept in lots of mind-control horror fiction. You can even have the demon's personality be defined as the host's "other/inner side," using some appropriate abilities and concepts.

2. Taint - bluntly, this is the easiest and most straightforward. If you're talking about a player-character as victim, the rules say, "Taint reduces Humanity potentially down to 0," and if you use the default Sorcerer rules, that puts the character under the GM's control. So! That means, if a player-character uses Taint on an NPC, it's only fair to state that (given agreement about the effects of Humanity 0) the NPC comes under the player's control. I buy that.

Now for the rules questions (I love these).

Quote1) Say Sorcerer A tells Demon B to make Person C hallucinate (i.e. perceive things differently from the way they are). Obviously, Sorcerer A is the master, and the definition of host is unnecessary for this example. But who is the user?

As you describe it, Person C is the user. Demon B is supplying him with the ability in the first place, under the order of Sorcerer A. It's a little subtle - works best if some other ability (this is subtle, see below) is also used to "kick off" Person C's use of the Perception, and also if the demon has Cloak to mask Person C's awareness of all these shenanigans.

Quote(1A) If the user ("The Person who controls the demon ability") is Demon B, then the perception dice are given to Demon B (perception gives dice to the user of the power).

Yeah, that would be the case if Demon B were the user.

Quote(1B) If the user is Person C, then I have to ask: does a power that is conferred HAVE to be used? If Demon B confers a power to Person C, does Person C have to USE that ability? To use a different (and possibly simpler) example, if Demon B conferred Big upon Person C, could Demon B also say "Okay, you're getting bigger, ha!"

No, the ability doesn't have to be used. That's why a "trigger" ability ought to be tacked into the picture as well. Or more accurately the trigger would be a Will vs. Will roll against the host to make him or her use the ability, and the context of that roll needs to be customized in all kinds of ways, e.g. who is the instigator (demon or another person), what is its psychological content, and what is the medium of communication (could be a whole 'nother set of Perception abilities right there).

Quote(2) Mechanically, perception is defined as "Adding the demon's Power to the user's appropriate score for the purpose of perceiving things." With that mechanic in mind, is Perception really the appropriate demon ability for what I'm trying to achieve? Having now read the mechanic (which various threads have convinced me is the way to look at demonic powers) I'm pretty convinced Perception is NOT appropriate. In fact, I'm not entirely sure there is one mechanically, though both Daze and Cloak seem close. Please note I only own the main book (so far).

H'm, I think it's more of a combination along the lines of Cloak + Perception + Daze, plus something tailored to the desired hallucinatory effect as described above.

This is fun - hope it's making sense ...

Best,
Ron

Hi L,

Sorry, I must have skimmed the NPC vs. PC part.  What I was trying to say is that according to Sorcerer rules already, you can pretty much control what folks are going to do, although my bid would be using both Possess/Parasite + Perception, to make it happen.  If you're concerned about NPCs being deprotagonized, don't forget that your "most important" NPCs will probably have a high Will(up there with the PCs) if not Lore outright, in which case, you've got a whole new thing going on.

Chris

Ron

If there were guarantees, I wouldn't enjoy it so much.  :D

Let's go first with your concepts in order:

1.   Possession by a demon.  Maybe Sorcerer's Soul will make it more palatable, but there is a distinct difference between "a possessed demon made her feel that way" and "she's exactly the same as she was before, only she loves me instead of you now."  The latter is closer to what I'm trying to emulate.

(An admission:  most of my inspirations for mind control in all its various forms come from the Erotic Mind Control Story Archive, which is obviously not a worksafe site.  These stories often explore the darker sides of the person with the mind control ability, who can be seen as the sorcerer; some of the best stories explore the descent into depravity, and sometimes even the eventual redemption, of the ostensible "protagonist".)

2.   Taint - At first, I was skeptical; I didn't want to destroy a victim's humanity before I could tweak something about their attitudes/mind.  Then, I went and re-read Taint, just to make sure.  It's easy to overlook for some reason - the formatting of that entire section is actually a bit difficult to read.  But that's beside the point.  

I discovered that Taint's effects include "physical as well as psychological malformation" with each bit of humanity loss; this means that I don't have to completely destroy the humanity of my victim, and furthermore means that (as I sometimes prefer) I can handle cases where I don't want TOTAL control over an NPC, but rather just the ability to tweak certain things about that NPC before returning them to the GM's control.

So, assuming I, as the player, could decide on the psychological malformations given to my character's "victims," this seems like it could possibly fit the bill.  On the other hand, if the GM is the one who decides, then it's not quite what the doctor ordered, but is still the easiest/most straightforward example.  I'm somewhat concerned about duration issues, but that's a minor point.

Ron Part 2:  Rules Questions.  :)

   So making someone the user of an ability doesn't require a roll; but once doing so, forcing them to use it would require a roll?  Thus the "trigger" ability and/or the Will vs. Will roll?  Is this enumerated anywhere in the rules (either in the main book, which I do own, or in the supplements, which I do not own)?

   I'm becoming more and more convinced that Daze is the appropriate ability, or at least necessary to bring the whole thing off.  Mechanically speaking, Daze reduces the target's perception rolls.  The SFX of that could be "perceiving the false reality" when perception rolls are failed, no?  Thus, whenever the character succeeds in a perception roll, he SEES some real thing; if he fails, he sees the false thing instead.

   Am I getting it?  Or am I at least inching closer?

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Bankuei

   In point of fact, I don't believe that using mind control on a character necessarily deprotagonizes them, either PC or NPC.  As a player I sometimes enjoy such things happening to my characters.  But that's neither here nor there; I want to specifically avoid that particular minefield, for that's what mind control discussions seem to devolve into - one person says "hey, this could be an interesting tool for PCs" and everyone else says "my lord, that sucks, don't ever use it against PCs!"

   Anyways.

   From reading the main book, I see how Possessors can make it look like a person is doing something (different, mind you, from that person actually doing it; having a demon possess a bank president and then steal money from the vault is qualitatively different from using a demonic power to make that bank president WANT to steal money from the vault for you).  

   On the other hand, I don't see how a Parasite demon has any control whatsoever over its host, unless that host is an animal and the demon happens to have the basic Control power.  So I'm unsure why you're presenting it as an option.  What am I missing?  Is it in another book?  Is it some creative use of parasite demons I've yet to imagine?

   I am not concerned with my NPCs becoming deprotagonized.  If I run a game and allow mind control as an ability in the hands of the PCs, I should already have expected it will be used, and will have made plans for (or at least have some ideas about) any NPC the PCs could control.  Besides, the PCs are the protagonists, not the NPCs, right?  So how could the NPCs actions be "deprotagonized" under any circumstances?

Hi Lxndr,

We'll agree to avoid the minefield.  It's fine by me, no sacred cows here.  On note of Parasite...Consider the Parasite arm or hand as its own entity, you see this in Idle Hands and Vampire Hunter D.  These may not constitute full "mind control" but I'd say they are in a related area.

Chris

I love this topic!  Glad to see it back in play.

I myself have coem 180 degrees on this (and many other such questions) when I actually started to play Sorcerer rather than just wish like hell I was playing Sorcerer.  Sorcerer- more overtly than any other game I have played- only comes to life when implemented by a group.  It took me ages to 'get' this.  I've found the rule 'no mind control or telepathy' kind of irrelevent when engaged in actual play.

There are several abilities which you can use to seriously screw with your enemy's head.  My recent fave (from a S&S game I got to play in) is Psychic Force.  This mean puppy is brilliant for 'look into my eyes... you are getting sleepy...sleepy...' Hammer film hypnosis.  You Zap your target's resisting dice down nothing, then use your Will order him to do your bidding.  I defines PF as "Overwhelming Presence" for my character- a sort of pulp-barbarian Immortal vampire Old One halfbreed.  It did exactly what I wanted it to do.

In running Sorc, I never worried about the 'No Telepahty' rule, because no matter how well defined the telepathic Perception ability may be, you still basicly have to take you demon's word for it.  You read Officer Bob's mind (or rather, your demon does and relays those perceptions to you...) and get a flash of "he's about to shoot me!" so you run like hell.  Now, if your demon is well fed and satisfied and doesn't stand to gratify a desire by screwing you, this might be acurate.  But then, perhaps not- and you just ran from the cops.  Welcome to trouble.

Sorcerer really only comes to life in play.

-B

Hello,

This is one of those wonderful discussions like we used to have on the Sorcerer mailing list five or six years ago, back when the game was all scruffy.

Lxndr, one thing to remember about Taint is that it wears off - the loss of Humanity isn't permanent. So you're not destroying Humanity, just "damping" it.

All this subtle Parasite and Possessor stuff, and how it relates to acknowledged or unacknowledged host complicity, as well as to demon/host conflicting agendas, is presented in The Sorcerer's Soul.

Best,
Ron

So let me summarize various possible types of Mind Control as described in this thread:

(1)  Using Daze (or Perception) to cause someone to see/experience false things, and then react based on those.  I'm still inclined to think that this is just Daze stand alone, with the SFX being "if he fails his perception roll, he sees the false things."  (Maybe its' Daze bought twice, the way buying Hold twice can be worse than buying it just once)

I'm honestly convinced that, mechanically, the demon ability Perception does not fit at all, at least in terms of "conferring Perception upon the victim."  Perception mechanically seems to be used when making the user "see" things better, either through enhancing existing senses or adding new senses, not when trying to dull/change senses - that's Daze.  To use Champions/HERO terms, it feels like you're saying "Well, you can use Enhanced Senses, Usable on Others to make him hallucinate."  Any rebuttals/clarifications?

(2)  Having someone possessed by a possessor demon (or infected by an appropriate parasite demon).  While this seems nice if all you want to do is reap the results of the demon's actions, it's qualitatively different from actual mind control (barring commentary/complications in Sorcerer's Soul, which is on its way to my house through the post as we speak).  Nonetheless, it's still an option.

(3) Using the Taint ability, with the caveat that either (a) the psychological malformations are pre-defined or (b) the user can dictate the changes (along with ensuring no PHYSICAL malformations unless that's part of what's desired).  In addition, if Taint is used enough to completely demolish the victim's humanity, then, if an NPC, it will be placed under the PC's control until its humanity is regained.  I like this option a lot.  However, as Ron pointed out, it's only temporary.  I can't PERMANENTLY give a person horns, or change their hair color, or reduce their intelligence, or make them love me.  Or can I?

(4) Bailywolf's most recent offering:  Pound their Will down to zero using the appropriate demon ability, and then just hypnotize them/cajole them/order them around, as appropriate (maybe even Boosting your Will if necessary).  This feels good for Svengali-esque mind control, the whole "Look into my eeeyyyess" creepiness.  How well does this handle the concept of post-hypnotic suggestions (or does it, even?).

(5) Bailywolf's original offering in the thread that I resurrected before I learned that, for some reason, they don't like that here:  Have some sort of Ability adder or take-it-multiple-times mechanic for the Control power, such that the Control mechanic extends to humans whose Lore scores are zero.  This also feels mechanically clean.

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I also want to renumerate some questions I've yet to see answered though, or other questions I've come up with as a result of thinking about it more:

(a)  Is there any argument against mind control, in any of its forms, that doesn't involve "But using it on the PCs can be a bad thing!"?

A subquestion to Ron:  You've mentioned in the past (in that previous thread, actually) that you feel that mind control is often the lazy writer's excuse to avoid stories.  You specifically mentioned Wild Cards.  Do you feel that Puppetman's use of mind control from Wild Cards was sloppy/lazy/etc?  He seems to me to be rather a good example of the kind of sorcerer I seem to keep imagining.  How would you emulate him in Sorcerer, or would you?  Gregg Hartmann seems to be the sorcerer, and Puppetman the demon inside him (parasite?  possessor?  he comes complete with Desire and Need, either way).

(b) To Bankuei:  Can anyone other than a player be deprotagonized, in your view?  Do you equate "player charcter" with "protagonist" or, if not, how do you differentiate the two?  Do you feel that ALL mind-control deprotagonizes, or are you imagining some specific form of mind control that you feel is deprotagonizing, and that you're inferring/implying in your discussion?  I consider everything listed above (except possibly flat-out standard possession, which is closer to body control) as a form of mind control.

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I think it's about time for me to give some actual examples, and ask "So, what's the best way to build THIS mind-control situation?"  I'm also seriously considering writing up some sort of sorcerer supplement like "Sorcerer and Slavery."

But I'll do that in another post.  I have to go actually work now.  Maybe I'll even do it in another thread.  "Name that Demon" looks like it'd be fun to start up again, and I have some non-mind-control questions I want to ask too.

Hi Lxndr,

Here's my take:

1) Player characters are always protagonists

They may be sidekicks, or secondary to a "primary character" as agreed to by the group, but all PCs are protagonists.  This is my own player bias and view that folks in general, like attention, like to be important, and are playing because they actually like to have input.

2) Can anyone else be deprotagonized?

This is a fun little grey zone that meshes into the power dynamics of the group.  When we're talking about deprotagonization, what we're talking about is player disempowerment(GM and players alike).  When the player is being disempowered, he's having his area of control(My Guy) stepped on.  When the GM complains of power players or abusive players, he feels that his power(My World) is being stepped on.  This is all Social Contract stuff in the happening.

Here's my take on it though:  The players are usually limited to input solely through their characters, so to be deprotagonized stops their only means of input.  The GM can create new characters on the fly, introduce new elements, etc.  So having one NPC controlled, removed, whatever, is not going to be disempowering as it would be for a player to their character.

So, my view is loss of control of a character means very different things to folks who only have one character to work with, as opposed to someone with many, amongst other powers.

3) Can mind control be functional?

Sure, but here's the deal:  The "owner" of the character(PC or GM) still needs some form of input.  The player has no input without their character, so they need some form of input.  Even if its the Fulminata Social, Trollbabe relationship, or Donjon facts "I state your action/goal/fact, but you roleplay it" sort of thing.  But this also requires some Social negotiation amongst the group.

Comments? Questions?

Chris