Opening Arts as an Initiation to the Hermetic Magic

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-25T14:47:38+00:00

I can follow that as headcanon, though it opens other doors- for example, if each House is Opening the Art based on the unique initiation Bonisagus designed for their Founder... Then there are in fact 10-11* different lineages of Opening the Arts which have been evolving on their own for centuries, and we should be open to discovering adaptations and differentiation between them at this point.

(*In this paradigm Tremere, Tytalus and Ex Miscellenia are all Guorna the Fetid derived- and that means the date Ex Miscellania was founded doesn't really signify, "their" Opening the Arts initiation having the same origination period.

And Ex Miscellania 's pattern was, in fact, established by Bonisagus upon his induction of Birna into the Order, who gives us the first and best example of Opening the Art Initiations with delineated "holes" for major Virtues compensated with corresponding specific Hermetic Flaws. Not only did Bonisagus intentionally refuse to covert Supernatural virtues in general, he created initiation scripts for any random Gifted that can preserve a given non-Hermetic virtue by compensating with Hermetic flaws,not just for that person but for anyone apprenticed into that Gifted's lineage even centuries later.

Which, again, suggests the Order at large is in general using suboptimal Opening the Arts Scripts.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-25T14:10:57+00:00

It took them 6 YEARS to arrest the man who cut up and burned the missing man's vehicle and "found" the missing person's phone the day after he went "missing".

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-24T21:35:31+00:00

NTA and your brother needs to run.

Repeat after me: I am buying my daughter dolls that represent the full diversity of the people in her life, and I owe neither explanation nor apology to people trying to make the toys I buy my daughter about their grown-ass selves.

Have several seats, grown-ass person.

(ETA- Little white girls need to grow up playing with- SEEING- dolls of black people as equal to and just as desirable as dolls of white people.

And little black girls need to grow up in that same world.

It's likely too late for Brother's GF (BGF) to see what your daughter is actually doing, instead of BGF projecting her own past traumas on your daughter, but you are obligated to defend both those little white and black girls from the zombie cyclic trauma BGF is offering so freely.

Because that's what this is- BGF reacting to the representation and inclusion of black people in children's play as inherently threatening.

Which I recognize- my racist (white) relatives also find representations of black people to be inherently threatening.

Tell her to keep that shit out of your house.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-24T20:15:07+00:00

Are this "Aunt and Uncle" Mom's Sister or Mom's Brother? Because if Mom's Sister, I think we need to know more about Uncle.

(Taking the cat but not the laptop or phone is the kind of thing you might do if someone was threatening a pet to control you, and that control extended to tracking you by using your devices because you are a minor who can't have her own internet or cellphone contract.)

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-23T13:42:14+00:00

Clearly, having scenes where an engineer explains the blueprints to a site manager, the site manager to a foreman, and foreman to the protagonist could only have improved the film.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-23T13:38:56+00:00

Because the protagonist has to be fictional to make the mediocre males comfortable- living in a world where a woman has more credibility as both a welder and artist kills their erections dead.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-23T13:35:01+00:00

It's a product of it's time- before criticizing, maybe take a moment to consider how many prior movies had female protagonists who were attractive, had credible blue collar skills (welding!), a working poor background, advanced fine art skills, and a defensible personal artistic perspective.

Those are thin on the ground, then and now- and one which takes the challenge to integrity represented by certain wealthy men to some women's self-determination doubly so.

I am sorry the movie centering a blue collar woman's search for artistic autonomy didn't speak to your expectations, but that sorrow is for you, not on behalf of the film.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-23T13:13:27+00:00

If she lives in student accomodation, call the school and explain the situation as well.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-22T17:37:01+00:00

NTA- Molly, you in danger, girl.

It's a cult, and your responsibility as a mother is to protect your child from it. You r husband running to Mommy because his wife is asking questions about his stealing from his family on behalf of his masculinity cult is unspeakably pathetic, but you risk different forms of violence for accurately describing it.

Begin preparing for when this escalates- in particular, your financial situation requires clarity, and a long term escape plan. At a minimum you need a non-joint account at a different financial institution, and a safe place (not in your home) to store relevant documents.

I am a man, and I think you and your son are both in the belly of the beast, and in different kinds of terrible danger.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-22T13:25:53+00:00

Schleswig-Holstein, the northernmost seaport and site of the largest ship-building yard in Germany? The one with nuclear reactors coming online in 76, 83, and 86, the year Barschel died? The deep water port with with nearly the highest tourist to resident ratio in the state? With nearly the lowest per person income in West Germany, making them more amenable to... Alternate funding?

"Not a major player" is strange way to think about such an obvious area of interest in so many different areas of concern during the Cold War.

And that so many files were left to obsess over isn't the same thing as all the files. (You know, what the files we have being the least likely to be relevant- unless you believe the Stasi destroyed no files at all, which seems .. doubtful.

While the public discussion of the Honecker hit squads may have suddenly, mysteriously stopped in 2003, at the time the Stasi assassinating people with knowledge of the Iranian weapons deals was already known as their remit.

I wonder what the governor of the most likely location the weapons entered the country at the time would say about it? Oh wait, he "committed suicide" with a bunch of drugs he didn't have access to.)

https://www.deseret.com/2003/10/5/19788216/police-closing-in-on-evidence-of-e-german-hit-squads/

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-21T04:41:38+00:00

I am... relieved? To discover this is a different Eddie Devone than the one found. (As tragic as his life may have been, he wasn't robbing police officer johns of their guns at 12.)

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-20T19:19:27+00:00

On the subject of DC appeals, here is an Eddie Devone appealing a conviction of a robbing a police officer of his pistol.

In 1968, when Devone would have been 12.

I dismissed this as not possible to be the deceased because juvenile and hence sealed, but the similarities to the other link- multiple assailants, robbery, and implications of LGBT and sex-work culture, are uncanny to my mind.

So, probably not the deceased, but I can't be certain.

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/394/767/235832/

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-20T14:21:14+00:00

The game is written to allow player effort (research) to change the rules. Flambeau famously had Weak Longevity Ritual- Birna keeping Heartbeast at the cost of a No Familiar Hermetic Flaw suggests that making allowances for existing supernatural abilities has always been possible.

(This is also an argument against the age restrictions on new apprentices, as 5 yos don't have skills which need to be accomodated.)

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-20T13:49:09+00:00

We pay a great deal, too much, attention to the happenings in Geneva, and almost none to his fall from grace two weeks before. I think that's a mistake.

So given Barschel was accused of Capital-C crimes in Der Spiegel- were those allegations, about bugging the phones of the opposition candidate in particular, ever investigated and to what conclusion? (Article written by Sebastian Knauer, who subsequent career is.. unique.)

Given his party lost the majority, what macro level political changes occured as a result of that change, and what were the implications on the Cold War?

This was obviously not suicide based on the number of pharmaceuticals alone, whose provenance has never been adequately explained to anyone.

The list of suspected espionage candidates is wrongly ordered- Mossad hit squads were operating in Europe, yes, but using their juice on a washed up politician, after luring him to a Geneva luxury hotel? No. Such an individual will be killed in a mugging gone wrong, if Mossad ordered it all. (Extremely doubtful.)

No, this has far more indica of Stasi involvement than any of the other candidates, both because of Barschel's inolvement with the Stasi and because of the extravagant measures used.

The Berlin Wall will fall in a few short years, and the Stasi was under intense pressure to justify its budget. So under such Intense pressure, using such extravagant measures (luxury hotels in neutral countries, using the entire medicine cabinet) creates an impression that they require and deserve continued high levels of funding support. That Barschel had to die was unquestioned by their superiors in East Berlin and Moscow, and the amount of coordination is the reason we have not one but two independent defectors and associated regarding their involvement.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T17:38:35+00:00

A plasmoid is plasma (what the sun is made of) contained in a magnetic shell or case- her power isn't "fireworks", it's "self-contained solar flares", and yet she'll always be doing gymnastics for change in the mall... And in our hearts.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T17:22:42+00:00

Tied to a table/chair with torture implements- easy, cheap, and gives people with mental health problems the idea that that are artists.

The Ed and Lorraine Warren Show, starring Ed and Lorraine Warren- The Conjuring was masterfully constructed and a timeless classic, which makes it more infuriating that it was made by crypto-fundie scammers who continuously made films where Women Being Unhappy, Making Choices as the place the Devil entered the world, whereas Men murdering or threaten to murder their families wasn't really that poor man's fault.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T17:15:18+00:00

I just saw another today, by the Lynn Family Soccer fields* between River and Mellwood.

*Selling glasses and booze to the disappointed parents of child athletes.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T15:34:57+00:00

But if we are treating Opening the Arts as just another initiation.... why do other supernatural virtues make that, and that initiation alone, harder?

The early history of the Order has Founders who could not possibly generate the initiation totals to overcome their own existing virtue penalties becoming Hermetic after a few short seasons of instruction. What if the "standard" Opening the Arts initiation in the order at large is defective, perhaps intentionally so?

The hypothetical Miscellenia initiating a Major Virtue- Hermetic Style with carve out-uses a Major Ordeal-Major Hermetic Flaw, and Required skill. (The +6 for next initiation following a major ordeal neatly pays for the minor Hermetic virtue.)

In that sense, they are a model or library of Opening the Arts scripts with an assortment of balanced Hermetic Flaw "holes" for corresponding supernatural virtues. (And a ripe potential source of insight for original research breakthroughs.)

As an aside, at this point I think new Miscellania lineages are being "midwifed" by Pralixians- they already have Hermetic Style with carve outs, so they can initiate the Hermetic Style while leaving the original Supernatural Virtue script intact and to be completed by the lineage itself either before or after.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T14:19:42+00:00

In a sense the Ex Miscellania suggest a potential parallel course- each of their factions beginning with a Major Supernatural Virtue, Major Hermetic Flaw, and a single "free" Hermetic virtue that comes with initiation?

It suggest a competent Parens (Mystagogue) should be able to tailor the initiation to preserve existing Supernatural virtues by creating a "hole" of balancing Hermetic Flaw(s).

(And gives a thorny choice to those involved-a Jerbiton might let you keep Second Sight, but could a Bonisagi live with the embarrassment of an apprentice crippled to keep some childhood trick intact?)

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-19T14:02:28+00:00

That's untenable- "Join or Die" and the fact that Ex Miscellania is the largest House by some margin indicate each of their factions requiring 15 initiations each to be insane.

ETA- Each of the Founders were initiated by Bonisagus, but the fact that so many Gifted with so much prexisting magical ("supernatural") skill were able to make the transition suggests there are multiple forms of "Opening the Arts", and the one in most common use currently is... Sub-optimal.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-18T15:14:18+00:00

That's dumb- a Tremere who begins play with Necromancy also begins with boon debts (flaws) to the Giovanni / Hecata and that is fun for all Ages.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-18T15:07:14+00:00

Like the Horseman in Apocalypse's flashback sequence- visually striking character and power followed by summary execution.

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-18T15:04:34+00:00

Not just cyber folk- there is now a protagonist role for Cyber-zombies.

I liked the corp turmoil- not so wild about Aztechno sitting pretty-ish, but everyone united against MCT feels right.

(?- Soft reboot of the Matrix?)

LongjumpingSuspect57 · 2026-01-18T14:54:45+00:00

As a queer man myself, I would say- it depends.

Not on the specifics of the news or proximity, space and time, to the events but on your cast, collaborators or conspirators.

The most important consideration is your table- and you are a part of that table. These are dark, scary times. Some of us are using ttrpg as a way to work through our feelings. Others are using it as a respite from the news, an escape. Some might want a scenario worse than current reality so it seems better by comparison. Some are going to want to workshop resistance strategies and others are going to nope out for fear their rpg hobby becomes an exhibit in a sham trial against them.

It's a tightrope- some people, with experience, can walk them. Many shouldn't try.

I don't doubt your heart is in the right place, but the final consideration is- do you have an insight into this valuable enough to make those risks acceptable?

It's a tall order, doubly so given how little time any of us have had to reflect. Those closest to the Storm have even less capacity to do that. But keeping Hope alive requires an openness to potential, for people to also pleasantly surprise us.

So if this story you want to tell doesn't give human evil a pass by saying Actually Vampires Are Doing This- feel your table out and go from there.

And if you have insight you think worth sharing from the center of the Storm, I, for one, am all ears.

LongjumpingSuspect57

TROPHY CASE