My Nephilim Occult RPing Blog

The French and US versions of alchemy developed in very different directions. The French version was further developed across multiple editions and included brief rules for different cultural variants used by Chinese, Aztec and Amerindian Immortals. The US version reprinted only the first edition French rules and didn't benefit from any of the subsequent French revisions, so Chaosium ordered a rewrite of the alchemy rules to be printed in the canceled Slaying the Dragon supplement (although the author shared his draft on the mailing list). However, these rules were later adapted to generic BRP and reprinted in Enlightened Magic . If you're a fan of the US version then you should already be familiar with those. I found a fan-made French netbook that described the Old World traditions of Alchemy side-by-side and revised them for third edition (here: alchemy rules , western formulae , spagyrie artifacts ). I found this a very useful overview of the French cosmology and it got me ...

In the fanzine  Palimpseste issue #1 and issue #2 , Houses based on the Chinese zodiac are introduced. These work different from the Western houses: they lack a fixed dominant Ka. The sign is determined by the year in which the Revealed is "born", while his dominant Ka is determined by the temporal circumstances of his birth. A Nexus that formed in a forest would birth a Heart with dominant Earth-Ka. In the French version's cosmology, the Chinese Nephilim used magic to purify the Ka of China's magical landscape. Air-Ka and Moon-Ka became Wood-Qi and Metal-Qi. This renders them immune to Black Moon contamination, so there were no Chinese Selenim (although there were "Khan" in Siberia who wanted to invade). So only those Ar-Kaïm born in China would display Chinese zodiac Houses. (In the US version, Chinese Nephilim are called Xian-ren but nothing more was written about them. Ian’s Selenim notes specify they coexisted with the Chinese Selenim or Xixiegui.) I...

Sidereal and tropical astrology are two different systems of dividing the zodiac. Sidereal astrology is based based on the positions of the stars, whereas tropical astrology is based on the seasons (pictured below). By default, the Nephilim rules use tropical astrology to determine the boundaries between zodiac months. But GMs are free to pick which to use. If you want to explain why magic is measured by tropical astrology, then you could contrive some magibabble about how the Earth's Grail shifts the positions of the Rays compared the stars alone, that the way spells are designed based on this system is responsible, etc. The image below compares the two systems: Source Two other systems exist as well, but rarely used: the actual widths of the constellations, and mapping each sign to a month of the Gregorian calendar (pictured below). Pearson Scott Foresman, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Lastly,  synoptical astrology compares the sidereal, tropical, and constellation posi...

Back in the day when the US fandom discussed Chinese Nephilim on the mailing list, the idea that each culture would have different elements and so on often came up. The idea was that the cosmology given in the rulebook was too Eurocentric and not inclusive of other cultures, mixed with the general exoticism and poor understanding of other cultures because it was the 90s. Firstly, I think it's okay for Nephilim to have a unified cosmology regardless of what a given Immortal's culture is. Trying to invent a new cosmology for every culture and then have them all play well together is infeasible. Secondly, I don't think the cosmology is too westernized. It's actually a mix of multiple Eurasian astrology traditions. The idea of a pentacle of five elements , and associating the planets with specific elements , doesn't come from Greek philosophers but from Chinese astrology. The idea of five elements composing reality rather than four comes from Vedic philosophy. Indeed, ...

I'm currently translating the chapter on the Yohual-Tecuhtlin from the French book Exils  published in January 2000, which provides a wealth of information on the Mesoamerican Selenim. (They're given rules for character creation in the third edition Codex des Selenim a few years later, but it's very light on fluff due to space constraints.) The US version developed its ideas independently a few years earlier , and Ian's notes for the canceled US Selenim book were never publicly shared until 2001, but I wonder if any of the US version influenced the French. For example, the US version posited in the rulebook that the Selenim's tombs were precursors to the Nephilim's Stasis, and Serpent Moon had Selenim in suspended animation, then lo and behold the Yohual-Tecuhtlin in Exils are described as using pyramids and obsidian figurines as Stasis items! Perhaps most damningly, the Amerindian Wowakan are given rules for Chronicle of the Awakening -style Emotional Metamor...

In this post I provide an overview of the various Selenim tribes in my campaign setting. This draws from the US version, the leaked notes for the canceled Selenim book ( source , although I'm making my own adjustments), and the French version 3e to fill the gaps. Though the Nephilim of the Major Arcana are largely ignorant of it, the Selenim do not stand united under the banner of the Unnamed Arcanum. Even in the "Western" world dominated by the Major Arcana, they are divided between multiple secret societies particular to their locales. The United States is the setting of my campaigns, so I speak mainly from that perspective. As a general rule of thumb, stated in the 3e GM book, the population ratio between Nephilim and Selenim is 8:1. Ar-Kaïm are fewer still. Despite this, the book recommends mixed groups consisting of 2-3 Nephilim, 1-2 Selenim and 1-2 Ar-Kaïm. Locales and origins In the Americas, the Selenim are divided between the Unnamed Arcanum of the Bohemian Tradi...

The Loa are Immortals of the Afro-Caribbean Tradition , mentioned in passing by the US rulebook. In the French version they’re barely more detailed and most of their lore focuses on the Haitian Selenim. What we’re told is the following: There are three nations of Loa: the Loa Rada , the Loa Petro , and the Loa Gédé . They rule the island of Haiti, home to a permanent, powerful, and massive Nexus. The Loa of all nations are able to temporarily incarnate in voodooists who invoke them. This is essentially a Summoning ritual, except even mortals cast it! Loa Gédé The Loa Gédé are Selenim and differ only culturally from those in Europe. They came to Haiti by exploiting the European settlers and Assuaged the suffering of the slaves. They encountered the Haitian Nephilim, the Loa living in Ginen, grouped into different nations based on their cultures and arrival dates. The Loa offered their services to mortal supplicants, invoked through invocations to temporarily possess them. The Selenim d...

Something that I think would make an interesting alternative occult science would be Oneiromancy or “Dream Magic”. The only times I’ve found this mentioned was in  an article  in the Chaosium Digest mentioning that Australian Nephilim practiced Dreamtime magic,  an archived page  mentioning that Oneiromancy in general is practiced worldwide with variations for culture, and  a document  suggesting ideas for dream magic spells. The second offers names for circles and nothing else: Lucidity, Influence, Entrance and Prophecy—a hypothetical fourth circle! The fandom got pretty weird… So here’s my current ideas on collating the subject: Oneiromancy is an ancient occult science, possibly at least as old as Sorcery. For unknown reasons it remains obscure to the Western Tradition but was studied and applied by other Traditions like the Mayan and Australian Aborigine. It is something of an inverse of Summoning, in that it projects the caster’s spirit into the magic...

As I alluded to in prior posts, I came up with the idea to divide Summoning into a number of separate Traditions that view its function differently. Here I explain the traditions of Kabbalah and Theurgy most common among the Western Tradition. While all summoning traditions use the same basic rules, they're considered distinct circles and techniques. Kabbalah (This based directly on the rulebooks and the French.) The Kabbalist Tradition or Kabbalah views Summoning in terms of the Olamot and Sefirot . It developed at least few centuries prior to the birth of Christ, but exploded in popularity through the teachings of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. This is the most common summoning tradition among Nephilim of the Western Tradition. Each Circle corresponds to an Olamot: 0th Circle Assiah , 1st Circle Yetzira , 2nd Circle Briah , 3rd Circle Atziluth . Each Circle is separated from next by a series of occult veils: the Veil of the Profane or Maya , the Veil of Paroketh , the Veil of the Abys...

This is a house rule adapted from the rules for  Psychomorphe and  Métamorphes totémiques from the French version. Totems for Western PCs The indigenous Nephilim of Northern America developed their own metamorphosis archetypes or "totems" independently of the Western Nephilim. I hope to provide detailed rules for them in later posts, but in the interim here is a way for their legacy to influence PCs following the Western Tradition. Nephilim PCs by default will be Western Nephilim that emigrated to the United States. A player may choose to play a Nephilim who was born from a Nexus in the United States after colonization and taught by the Major Arcana. Rather than a Western Metamorphosis, this Nephilim was born with a Totemic Metamorphosis. The rules for this are provided below. As with Western Metamorphoses, Totemic Metamorphoses are divided into several archetypes or "totems." Each Totem corresponds to a mundane animal that was/is held sacred or spiritually signif...

Over the course of my archiving old dead fansites, I found  a grimoire bookshelf  that mentioned a few original ideas in passing. One of these was “blood stone alchemy.” As the page said: Blood Stone is a path of Alchemy involving sacrificial blood and its elemental bases; it is equivocal on levels to Black Stone. Few cultures ever possessed this knowledge, but amoung those that did, were the ancient Celts, Vikings, and, more notably to history, the Aztecs. There are other Circles imagined—involving consuming blood and flesh, the semi-mythic cannibalistic peoples in Africa, Asia, and Pacifica—but no known references exist. Perhaps fortunately… Not much to go by, but it sounds pretty easy to adapt under the enlightened alchemy rules as a flavor of laboratory and athanor for Black Stone using something like Craft (Sanguimancy). I imagine the Xibalbans probably practiced this form of alchemy, but without the Silk Road they probably weren’t able to advance into the higher circles ...

The Nephilim rulebook p189, Major Arcana p9, and  Ian Young’s notes  mention that there are several Traditions of non-Western Nephilim in “wholly non-Western non-Islamic areas like China, Japan, India or sub-Saharan Africa.” Only three were ever listed by name: the Xian-Ren (Nephilim) and Xixiegui (Selenim) of the Chinese Tradition, the Loa (Nephilim) of the Afro-Caribbean Tradition, and the Xibalbans (Selenim) of the Central American Tradition. Since the line was cancelled in 1998, these Traditions never got supplements. However, there were some discussions on the mailing list about possibilities for East Asian , Maori , and Australian Traditions, among others. In the French version, the Loa got their own Loa scenario supplement in 1998. The supplement Exils (“exiles”) released in 2000 covered various non-Western Traditions: the Shen of East Asia, the Jukurrpa of Oceania, the Wowakan of Northern America and the Yohual-Tecuhtlin of Latin America. Unfortunately, like ...