Nephilim Magic System

[Tywyll]

Hey,

I was thinking of an old BRP game I had, Nephilim, a Chaosium rewrite of a French (I believe) game. I played it a few times, but that was years ago.

Does anyone remember it? Any thoughts or comments on its magic system? Was it any good? Worth yoinking for use in BRP?

[Jason Durall]

Originally Posted by Tywyll

Hey,

I was thinking of an old BRP game I had, Nephilim, a Chaosium rewrite of a French (I believe) game. I played it a few times, but that was years ago.

Does anyone remember it? Any thoughts or comments on its magic system? Was it any good? Worth yoinking for use in BRP?

I am quite fond of the promise of Nephilim, less so about the game that was released.

There's some recent discussion about it on rpg.net, and I believe it comes up on gamingtavern.eu from time to time.

The magic system from the core book was woefully wrongheaded in that it attempted to be a representation of Western magic. It was replaced by the system presented in the supplment Liber Ka.

If you want an alternate magic system to the two presented in BRP, it would work (with a little finessing), but if you're looking for something approximating what people think of as "real world" magic, stick to Liber Ka.

I would absolutely love to see a new English-language edition of the game that rethought the origin of the Nephilim, redid their relationship to their human hosts, and emphasized the "modern incarnations of mythological beings" aspect rather than trying to glom a Western occult conspiracy game around them.

The success of the entire White Wolf line demonstrates that there's a market for a game featuring semi-human immensely powerful beings living in secret amongst humanity engaging in a secret war with one another and other forces.

[Tywyll]

Originally Posted by Jason Durall

I am quite fond of the promise of Nephilim, less so about the game that was released.

There's some recent discussion about it on rpg.net, and I believe it comes up on gamingtavern.eu from time to time.

The magic system from the core book was woefully wrongheaded in that it attempted to be a representation of Western magic. It was replaced by the system presented in the supplment Liber Ka.

If you want an alternate magic system to the two presented in BRP, it would work (with a little finessing), but if you're looking for something approximating what people think of as "real world" magic, stick to Liber Ka.

I would absolutely love to see a new English-language edition of the game that rethought the origin of the Nephilim, redid their relationship to their human hosts, and emphasized the "modern incarnations of mythological beings" aspect rather than trying to glom a Western occult conspiracy game around them.

The success of the entire White Wolf line demonstrates that there's a market for a game featuring semi-human immensely powerful beings living in secret amongst humanity engaging in a secret war with one another and other forces.

Oh, I totally agree that the promise of that genre exists. I'd love to see BRP do something in that field, with player's portraying supernaturals in the modern world.

What changes happened in the Liber Ka book?

My biggest disappointment with Nephilim was that it didn't actually give you enough to run a campaign in the rule book (always a bad idea, I think). I understand that the Gamemaster's Guide really fixed a lot of that, but still...

[Jason Durall]

Originally Posted by Tywyll

What changes happened in the Liber Ka book?

Liber Ka basically said "We don't like the system from the core book. Here's a completely new system to use instead."

[Ian Absentia]

Originally Posted by Jason Durall

If you want an alternate magic system to the two presented in BRP, it would work (with a little finessing)...

And in that regard, it's kind of neat for a fantasy campaign, especially if you're looking for an elementally-oriented system of magic that takes astrological influences into account. It's a pretty "flash-bang" sort of magic, and will require specialist skills in order for player characters to cast the spells. I don't think it should take too much finesse to get it to work.

!i!

[Aycorn]

Yes, I thought the original Nephilim magic system had great potential for uses in other settings.

I also think Nephilim is a pretty interesting game/premise. Someday, I might do something with it.

I did cook up a FileMaker Pro database to help create characters which came out pretty good.

[Charles Green]

There were actually three magic systems in Nephilim: Sorcery, Alchemy and Summoning. Liber Ka only replaced the Sorcery system, as the Alchemy and Summoning systems were already more in line with Western Occultism.

I'd love to see a re-worked Nephilim. Who owns the right these days?

[Kloster]

Originally Posted by Tywyll

Hey,

I was thinking of an old BRP game I had, Nephilim, a Chaosium rewrite of a French (I believe) game. I played it a few times, but that was years ago.

Does anyone remember it? Any thoughts or comments on its magic system? Was it any good? Worth yoinking for use in BRP?

Nephilim was indeed a french game (by Multisim), translated in english by Chaosium. This is, as far as I know, the only foreign game using BRP that has been taken back by Chaosium.

The game has been created during the White Wolf craze of conspiracy games, and uses the same kind of supernatural powers hidden amongst humans.

It is in itself quite good.

Runequestement votre,

Kloster

[Jason Durall]

Originally Posted by Charles Green

I'd love to see a re-worked Nephilim. Who owns the right these days?

Chaosium still owns the rights to any English-language version of the game.

Despite interested developers, they have chosen not to release a new version. This might change in the future, but it's unlikely.

Consider that until their sale earlier this year, they still had copies of most of the core books in stock, 14 years after the game's release. Not the best-selling line they've ever published.

There has been recent interest from an outside source (at least, I've been in contact with someone who is considering making Chaosium an offer on it), but time will tell if it comes to anything.

[Ian Absentia]

A few years back (three, four?), Charlie Krank was apparently amenable to a monograph version of an updated edition. Times change, though, for whatever reasons.

Maybe what some enterprising soul needs to do is simply buy up all the warehoused stock of Nephilim, freeing up Chaosium's need to recoup their investment. Then, as a guerilla marketing scheme, said person could stage a public book-burning to stir up interest in a renewed edition.

!i!