My Nephilim Occult RPing Blog

I recently transcribed and auto-translated the rules for playing Khaibans from the third edition French supplement Le Codex des Nephilim . In this post, I would like to compare and contrast that with the Devil's Arcane Techniques given in the US version's Major Arcana . As I noted previously , Khaiba works different in the French and US versions. In the US version Khaiba total just affects how likely the Nephilim is to suffer a Khaiba episode during certain enthronements (but Khaiba total doesn't affect the Metamorphosis ratings), is decreased relatively easily, and won't kill the PC if it reaches 100. Whereas in the French version the effects are persistent, while Khaiba total determines how deformed the Nephilim is, how warped their emotional state is, and kills the PC when it maxes out. One bit I find interesting is in how the Metamorphosis changes between the two versions. In the US version, a Khaiba seizure raises all Metamorphosis traits to max and then warps it i...

The US version mentioned dragons a handful of times, but never went into detail. The most we got comes from Major Arcana , where both Strength and The Devil are apparently quite knowledgeable about dragons. The dragons were apparently one of the "old races" from before the evolution of humanity and the Fall of Orichalka. Like Nephilim they're composed of the five elements, but that's where the similarities end. They're bestial monsters that Strength Knights set out to hunt when discovered, while The Devil venerates them. Strength and The Devil believe in the existence of an entity or force known as The Dragon, among other names (e.g. The Beast), of which the dragons are manifestations. Strength fights it as an eternal enemy, while The Devil worships and emulates it. ( One issue of Chaosium Digest gave The Devil the goal of becoming dragons themselves!) Both are aware of the existence of sacred sites known as "Gates of the Dragon," where the power of the...

Source The following extract was translated from the fourth edition’s  Le Codex de la Lune p30-1. The 666 is a secret organization organized by a Nephilim called the Devourer who resembles the god Seth or Anubis. Its existence was only hypothetical until the Major Conclave of the Apocalypse where the identity of the members of 666 was revealed. Some think that it has existed for more than three millennia. The Nephilim have long believed that the 666 was only a sect of Khaiban or Selenim dissidents, or even a new Minor Arcanum. Everyone now knows that the 666 is an initiative of five Nephilim whose Pentacle has a Black Moon Core instead of the Moon-Ka. Their members are perceived as aberrations by the Nephilim. However, they may sort their modified Pentacle and do not seek pure and simple destruction but renewal by a radical magical tabula rasa . The organization of the 666 is very opaque: around the council of the five gravitates a nebula of occult actors who act on its behalf. Th...

The Devil Arcanum has consistently gotten a bad rap in the official books, which has been unable to paint them as anything other than an NPC-only villain faction. Even in the Major Arcana book! The only times I've seen someone try redeeming them was in two old articles from the Chaosium Digest : "The Devil Arcanum" by Peter Larsen and "The Devil Arcanum and the Future" by Nick Christoforidis . Even the French version tried a similar route when they realized The Devil wasn't very interesting as is. I also need to revise The Devil for my reinterpretation of Nephilim psychology in which they're a "higher self" brought about by the fusion of a human soul and an elemental spirit. What you would call a symbiotic perspective, I guess? One way I thought of to reimagine The Devil is as the occult equivalent of the “Return to Monke” internet meme. The Devil rejects human civilization and culture, even despises it for its decadence and hypocrisy. They h...