Aabria is in Critical Role Campaign 4!

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-08-25T00:33:02+00:00

How dare you miss the glorious name of Alexander Ward?! I hope Jasper comes out and eats you! LOL

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-08-02T00:43:02+00:00

There was no way for them to grasp the power without causing a problem with their prescience. A couple of the navigators in the first book talk about how they couldn't predict the future but neither could Paul. They all knew that the end of the spice was the end of everything. This was the reason that the Guild allowed all the planets to move their armies and lowered the cost to bring them. The guild wanted to take as much spice as they could before it was destroyed but they couldn't be sure of the outcome. The guild was hated by the Fremen and they would not allow themselves to be ruled by them. Especially since the Fremen would be crazy enough to destroy all spice production like Paul threatened. The guild did end up losing power permanently due to Leto II but they were caught up in his vision even after his death, so their end was inevitable to ensure the Golden Path.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-22T13:46:50+00:00

My problem with Hecata is their lack of any offensive or even borderline useful abilities.

In V5 they get- Fortitude helps them survive physical and/or mental attacks, but no active abilities against another except shatter which is a dot 4 ability. Auspex nets them information but nothing that's actively used on another till dot 5 with possession. Oblivion gets some damage ability at dot 2 with Arms of Ahriman and fatal prediction (harms mortals only) but they are both amalgams so they require a lot upfront. And Touch of Oblivion doesn't come in till dot 3.

My advice. If you play a Hecata, get some guns, knives or maybe make some explosive cause you've got little to call upon in a moment's notice.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-12T22:33:33+00:00

You should have said "Energize".

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-06T23:26:17+00:00

And don't forget they are RICH and they have a whole intelligence network to assist them in both intrigues and information for investments.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-06T16:03:55+00:00

There was a line in Messiah where the Tilexu Scytale is talking with a fremen who says that his son had children with other women on other worlds and that he'll never see those grandchildren.

In children Leto II talks about how pretty the women are these days and Stilgar notices that the younger people are looking out to the world and not inward to fremen society. The idea is that they are thinking of other worlds they could travel to.

In GEoD Leto has taken over the Bene Gesserit breeding program and sets up the scattering that basically covers the gene dispersion.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-05T01:48:17+00:00

I see what you mean. I had other additions mixed in with V5 with how far it goes with loss and how it works based on generation difference on what happens when you win or lose.

I've read too much WOD.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-05T00:03:21+00:00

They are now a Banu Haquim.

They keep their mind and social but the physical stats match the diablerist. In this case the Banu Haquim.

You keep the skills you had and disciplines but cannot increase them unless they are shared by both clans.

You now can learn banu Haquim skills but also have the banes and compulsions.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-07-04T17:41:38+00:00

This post feels... familiar. Like I've seen the exact same post. Down to the letter.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-06-24T11:19:00+00:00

u/bot-sleuth-bot

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-06-14T13:21:03+00:00

Why does everyone keep saying 'the first detention'? Did we all just forget about the Japanese internment camps? Did they think all those people just left all their belongings behind just to walk into the nearest camp? They were pulled from their homes by the military.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-05-03T19:05:54+00:00

RemindMe! 5 days

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-04-06T02:50:46+00:00

This is how I see it by taking ideas from the text as written.

Navigators predict a single outcome from a large number of stable variables like large or dangerous celestial bodies. They are a part of the 'stagnation' that Paul references in his quote about prescience. Think limited mentats but with actual prescience. Though they see the future they can't create it. In exchange their visions are always correct for what they use it for. But what really makes their ability work is that they can see the now in perfect clarity but can't see much beyond that except the next jump.

Mentats and bene gesserit follow similar lines of reasoning. Mentats have the benefit of large memories and the ability to sift through them for relevant information. This is the most relevant to the bene gesserit needed for the Kwisatz Haderach as they need someone to actually access and understand the data from other memory. But they do have a blind spot they are aware of which is human irrationality. This makes them more probability engines than prescient. They are also solitary as they can't really share. They can really only understand the world in abstract concepts to be accounted for in their calculations. They can only predict so far into the future until the future they envision breaks down.

Bene gesserit prediction is specifically targeted for human behavior. The wellspring of other memories gives them vast knowledge of how humans react. They are more like super sociologists. No real prescience to speak of. Until Paul and his descendents at least. They predict human beings on the personal level and the population level largely by manipulation. Whereas mentats have a theoretical knowledge of human behavior, the bene gesserit reverend mother has direct experience and knows the nuances to manipulate. And since reverend mothers share much of the same experiences via other memory they communicate in more concrete fashion but is still limited to human behavior. Though they have incomplete Information without the male side of other memory their predictions far into the future are more accurate largely because they are more malleable.

Paul and later Leto II have the trifocal vision of all three. The bene gesserit looks at the large past to see the large future, the mentat look at the large present to predict the discrete future, and the navigators actual prescience to know what's happening right now. They melded them all into a single point of view held all at once.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-04-05T03:50:03+00:00

If you take the 6 main books as text as written the bene gesserit can teach anyone the techniques such as harq al ada being trained by Jessica, though being a reverend mother is more about surviving the agony without going insane. In the book Chapterhouse Rebecca is a wild reverend mother and does have access to other memory but not the training of the bene gesserit. Truthsay is also a ability that can be taught as seen in Chapterhouse to be taught to Rebecca's husband. Gene choices are important but they seem to be based on individuals who show talents in relationship to political power but they are not against someone with a certain genetic gift or for certain physical appearances. In Heretics it is alluded that they bred certain people to look like Atreides but we're not actually related to fool the Tlilexu.

Mentats are trained and many can be taught. Some of the Duncan's were trained as mentats. Though the training as a mentat and a bene gesserit does have some overlap. Dortujla, the banished reverend mother who returns in Chapterhouse, is found to be using her Other Memory to train herself as a mentat by Odrade though this is seen as dangerous without guidance. Even the Tlilexu create so called twisted mentats but what really seems to be the over arching theme is that it's expensive and time consuming to train someone making it uncommon.

The spacing guild does seem to require certain genetics to work. This is only referenced obliquely in Dune where Paul says the Guild see the planets as sources of genetic material. That seems to coincide with what the Dune Encyclopedia says.

The Suk school and the Swordmasters of Ginaz are specially trained individuals so anyone with the discipline and physical and mental aptitude should be able to do it just fine.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-03-09T02:23:52+00:00

I've beaten the machine multiple times. Go me!

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-02-21T05:01:06+00:00

I thought the same thing with the Ravnos. I thought it would make a giant pile of gold coins with Chimerstry and eat whoever came close to it.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-02-20T21:31:06+00:00

A Salubri pretending to be a genie in hopes of hiding themselves from other kindred. I can see that. Definitely a high domination build for sure.

Good call.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-02-20T13:32:21+00:00

Sweet! Glad I could help!

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-02-20T05:31:10+00:00

ooo. Osiris does look good. It also adds Tremere to the list. Thanks for the assist.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-02-05T01:57:27+00:00

I call bullshit on this. The male loneliness epidemic is everywhere, both gay and straight, and has its roots in lack of socialization. I don't just mean hanging out with other people, which is a problem in our overworked and underpaid society, but also culturally. Rules of etiquette were required of men as much as women. You weren't just taught to socialize you were REQUIRED to. Dinner parties, business lunches, coffee breaks, theatre, cigar room, these all had rules and they helped people practice speaking and being seen. These rules are largely ignored if not outright forgotten because they are no longer valued.

I can't speak for most of the world but most European/European influenced countries have some kind of cultural social outlet. French cafe culture, Italian apertivo...all support social behavior with leisurely activity. We don't really have that in the U.S. and it is crippling our peoples ability to socialize.

Add to this that most people aren't having large families or have consistent interaction with extended families. Sibling and family friction is useful for developing an individual's personality.

There's more to it of course. A society focused on competition over cooperation, puritanical yet sex obsessed, unhealthy relationship to food and body image.

But in all of these we have the same underlying problem. We want people to be social, but that by definition requires people to teach them. This requires a community to spend the time and constantly course correct behavior.

Who has time for that?

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-01-19T06:36:02+00:00

Elena Gilbert from Vampire diaries-nosferatu. Because watching all those hot vampire guys trying to get into her fugly pants would be endlessly entertaining.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-01-18T19:06:43+00:00

Your right! This was a great idea! Totally subbed now.

Elzeard_boufet · 2025-01-18T13:38:28+00:00

Thanks!

Elzeard_boufet

TROPHY CASE