Thoughts on black lunar magic

The rules for playing Selenim were never published in English, although the author posted a preview way back in the 90s. It's not clear how different this would have been from the French version, but there are some facts we can discern.

In the American adaptation, the Selenim had invented "sarcophagi" that served as precursors to the stasis and pharaonic tombs used by Nephilim. (This is in contrast to the French version, where the stasis was invented by the secret societies to imprison the Nephilim.) The Selenim were unstable due to the lack of an independent black lunar field to sustain them, so they used their tombs to insulate and replenish their ka by drawing on the ambient magic fields. They could apparently survive indefinitely this way, at least until they started drawing on the more plentiful solar-ka found in mortals.

Anyway, the French version was written haphazardly like a lot of 90s games so the Selenim ended up being given their own sub-systems that didn't work anything like the Nephilim magic. In the 3rd edition, these were more standardized by getting three circles of proficiency just like the Nephilim magic. Frustratingly, this revision was completely reversed in the 5th edition.

Rather than sorcery, summoning, alchemy, and metamorphosis, the Selenim used their own magic systems known as necromancy, pavane (renamed "tenebrae" in the proposed English adaptation), black summoning, and imago. Necromancy, pavane, and black summoning were treated as skills but unlike the Nephilim magic didn't have circles. 

• Necromancy allowed the selenim to communicate with and manipulate the souls of the dead in a variety of ways, including appeasing the deceased (a distinct sub-circle that had spells but was entirely the purview of roleplaying). 
• Pavane allowed the selenim to perform various songs with ill-defined effects, including manipulating other selenim, mortals, and even black lunar elemental creatures. 
• Black Summoning allowed the selenim to summon various entities, which unlike the Nephilim summoning magic were all given full statistics like elemental creatures. 
• The imago was a replacement for metamorphosis that allowed the selenim to essentially build their own metamorphosis and with greater mechanical effects compared to the otherwise cosmetic metamorphosis mechanic, and each aspect had a cost in magic points that the player had to pay. 

In the 3rd edition, necromancy, conjuration (renamed from black summoning), and anamorphosis (renamed from imago, altho imago was still used for the the first two circles) became occult sciences with three circles of proficiency, as well as a number of sub-circles with more well-defined effects. Necromancy in particular added a bunch of additional effects for possessing the living, astral projection, and body modification of zombies. The old appeasing spells were tightened up into a mechanic where dead souls had a "torment" degeneration that made necromancy harder to perform and had to be relieved by appeasement spells or relevant evocations.

In the proposed American adaptation (some notes archived here), Necromancy would have been divided into two skills of Communion and Command, which would have been used in conjunction with the Tenebrae skill somehow. Black Summoning would have been divided into three circles with guidelines for their effects (which the normal summoning rules at the time lacked, though a revision was probably in the works). Imago would had added the Personality Trait rules from the revised metamorphosis rules (see Chronicle of the Awakenings), but kept the magic point payments. Looking at it from a modern perspective, a fair amount of it looks clunky.

While I can understand the appeal of giving the selenim their own occult skills, I feel like it would be more efficient to just have them use the same occult sciences as nephilim but with their black lunar-ka determining the effects. The American Secret Societies book did this for Saturnian magic, rather than inventing new Saturnian magic skills, and I think it worked fine. I feel like the revised sorcery and alchemy rules would be better able to represent the various takes on necromancy, pavane and so on a lot better. Furthermore, Ex Oculis made metamorphosis significantly less cosmetic, so it doesn't need a separate mechanic for selenim.

Furthermore, I got this idea to make anamorphosis into a distinct occult science that anyone could learn. This would incorporate aspects of l'allomorphose from Vision Ka #6 and the "create elemental akasha" spell from the French version. I would also tie it into the Afro-Caribbean nephilim, who are stated in the core rulebook to live in their own pocket universe and I feel this would be the best way to represent that.

So here's a brief overview of how I would handle black lunar magic:

• Selenim utilize the same occult sciences as Nephilim: sorcery, summoning, and alchemy. However, they are limited to black lunar effects.
• Selenim possess a metamorphosis like Nephilim, but don't have a particular archetype: a selenim chooses their own Personality Traits based on the emotions they prefer to assuage.
• There are two origins for Selenim: ex-Nephilim and natural Selenim. Natural selenim awakened to the occult as selenim and never experienced what it was like to be nephilim. Ex-Nephilim were transformed into selenim and retain the knowledge they learned as Nephilim. During character creation, they may select unique traits.
• And more to be discovered...