Hi, gang. Last week, we began our discussion of one of the most fundamental aspects of a mummy’s existence — his fivefold soul. Today, we continue that discussion with a look at the most important game element derived from the fivefold soul: the decree.
During the Rite of Return, its subject truly died. He endured a gauntlet of knives, teeth, talons, and venom to stand before the dread Judges of Duat. Against the accusations and tortures of the final Judge, he pronounced a defiant summation of his being: a decree that favors one aspect of his fivefold soul. A mummy’s decree determines his general outlook and the part of his soul — the Pillar — to which he is most deeply and inherently attuned.
Here’s a look at a sample of one of the five mummy decrees:
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Rule from the chariot, not the throne. The high seat displays power, but doesn’t use it. If you don’t exercise your might, someone else does it for you. Your priests, scribes, viziers, cousins, board members… they’re all ready to take your command through the pretense of “advice” and “delegation.” A throne-bound king wallows in delusion and pretension, shouting commands he can’t enforce. He declares victory even while enemies tear down his palace. Eventually, he swallows his own propaganda. When assassins’ knives edit his superfluous life out of the state, nobody is more surprised than he is.
True strength is action—the thunder of chariot, bow, and mace. It emanates from the ba. When a mummy utters the decree of spirit, he ascends that chariot and promises to lead from the front. Even in defeat, his dedication is above reproach, and he cannot be dethroned except by his own hand. Ba is the inner voice that says, “I will do it.” So the decree cultivates taciturn humility and martial bravery, and perhaps a little impulsiveness. Followers don’t scorn contemplation, but rather believe it has no significance unless it translates into worldly action.
The so-called Charioteers roar out of their tombs, issuing orders as soon as Sekhem solidifies into a throat and tongue to speak them. Of all the decrees, they might feel the most desperate in the face of [redacted]. It limits what they can do with a given incarnation. He who hesitates loses a thousand years. Thus, they lead cults on the hunt before the plan is set, preferring to improvise instead of prepare, and often to micromanage instead of delegate.
The Charioteer prefers command but doesn’t demand on it. He recognizes superior leadership when it gets results, and attaches his loyalty to it without hesitation. In generals and grunts alike, the ba drives hard work in the service of a worthy cause and unhesitating sacrifice. Fear is the sweet spice of bravery, not the poison of hesitation. The Charioteer scorns emotions that might give him pause. Stillness is death, the chasm between cycles when the brave accomplish nothing. Follow a fast current along the river of [redacted] and you’ll drift past every pain or useless pleasure, until only your accomplishments remain.
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Until next time,
Senebti!
The Falcon-Headed Charioteer
Sweet!
Any details yet on exactly when and how MtC will be released? Is August just for the PDF? There was mention of a Kickstarter for a hard-copy and/or boxed set – when will that begin?
In short, I want this game – when and how can I buy it?
I like that despite being focused on the same soul-bit as the Khri-Habi, they’re completely different. Representing the ba less as the seat of personality and more as the seat of agency. I am pleeeeased.
Any chance we could see the others? I am really intrigued to see what happened with the Sheut. The sefekhi were always my favorites, but I felt like they were a little bit overly tied to wraith metaphysics in interpreting the Khaibit as The Shadow.
err, capitalized “The Shadow” meaning the wraith term. Obviously the khaibit *is* the shadow, that just doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing it does in wraith.
Excellent question, Belial. And yeah, the misapplication of the khaibit as sheut is one of the (few) issues I’ve always had with the way MtR handles the aspects of the fivefold soul.
The decree of shadow in Mummy: The Curse is quite different from the design and implementation of the Sefekhi. Stay tuned.
Another bit that catches me out of left field. Degrees seems rather complex. In some aspects it reminds me of early descriptions of Twilight Caste Exalts from Exalted. Who do not simply while away as recluse scholars. They USE their knowledge.
All this talk about rulership and command is – interesting.
I wonder if it applies to the other decrees as well as to this one.
Awesome as this all is, wasn’t something of a big deal made about how this game would also apply to non-Egyptian mummies?
Hi, Shakes. Where would this “big deal” have been made, exactly? Wasn’t made here, I can assure you.
I believe it was on the White Wolf forums, but in retrospect I might be mis-remembering the event as having developer backing when it really didn’t.
That being said, will there be rules for non-Egyptian mummies?
Hi, Shakes. Yep, we already had/have those rules. They’re in a classic WoD game called Mummy: The Resurrection. Check out the other blog posts here (starting with the first one, from a couple months back) for more.
That said, I’d check out what Mutant X and DaveB have said on the topic. The mummies of Mummy: The Curse are their own thing, through and through, regardless of the feel of the culture that birthed them, and that’s the most important thing, I think.
*reads back-posts*
Ok, so MtC Mummies are going to be from a society so ancient that it makes Pharaonic Egypt look Flying-Cars-and-Dome-Cities-on-the-Moon-level futuristic, and they have been cycling through other cultures throughout all of human history. Assuming a relatively small global population, that would mean that any given mummy-making culture would probably have far more mummies than they would Mummies. This being the case, if any of those mummies were to rise up, it would most likely be as something only tangentially related to, and more than likely completely different from, the MtC Mummies.
Does that about sum it up?
I believe that one of the developers at the beginning, when it was first mentioned (long before it had been deemed the Curse). They said that they WANTED to explore non-egyptian mummies with the game, and included the south american and asian mummies as examples. However, as this was VERY early on in development (perhaps even the first ideas for the game). It seems that this has either been completely nullified, or been redefined as to mean that you can play a Mummy that isn’t exactly straight up Egyptianized. What I take it to mean in the game’s current incarnation is that the Arisen have had plenty of time to wander around, and even forget where they’ve been. Though this doesn’t quite capture that original idea of a world-wide diversity of Mummies, it does still leave individual players some creativity and culture choice.
Seems pretty high-concept for a X-splat. I like it.
Can we assume that the cults spoken of are the mummy “parties” (cf. coteries, throngs, motleys)?
Hi MG!
No, “Cult” isn’t the name of the character-party group.
Might it be the name of the Y-splat, then?
Nope!
Is it a merit?
Is it bigger than a breadbox?
Like I said in the last thread, I don’t mind if the current incarnation of a given mummy manifests through the body of an Italian college student or a Vietnamese artist, as long as the mummy inside them is from the Egyptian or Proto-Egyptian culture. Players should be able to make characters from whatever culture they want as long as “Mummyhood” is uniquely Egyptian or Proto-Egyptian bestowed phenomenon. I say this because if there is only going to be one source of Mummies, it should be E/PE – and I think that Mummies should come from one, ancient utterly isolated culture that does *bad things*.
Ultimately, I just want my Mummy to be a FUCKING MONSTER for once. Just once!
I wondered where we would get our breakdown of five – the soul parts. Makes sense. I continue to be intrigued and pleased.
Any info you can give out on that Kickstarter you mentioned?
Hi, Ariosto. Not just yet, I’m sorry, but when I do, you all will be the first to know.
Cool deal. And thank you for replying. Mummy has always been my favorite venue in WoD. I was worried about them making one more go at it with NWoD, wasn’t sure they’d really come up with something new that was really Mummy. So far you really seem to be on track from what I’m reading. I’m excited.
Ah of course, I didn’t have my white-wolf translator activated, of course, five soul pieces, five types of power. Return of the fives!
I’m guessing we’re heading for five main reactions of the mummies to their purpose/resurrection!
Sometimes, things just fall into place in your favor.
Great direction.
Great ideas.
I love it!
Keep it up guys, your keeping my faith in the White Wolf strong and happy!
Really good stuff here. I, too, am curious about the references to “rule”, “leading”, and “kings”. So, were all of these [proto-egyptian] Arisen mummies created with the intention that they might rule? Someone had in mind a way to control or influence the birth and course of nations? Epic. Love it.
But, given this seemingly inherent purpose, the y-splat now seems more of a mystery to me. Wouldn’t “5 main reactions to their purpose/resurrection” as Josh W suggested become a little redundant? If the Pillar/Decree is How they do what they do, and the nature of being Arisen provides the Why, what are we then left with?
I hope that whatever it is (if it is more of the Why or How) is as specific and interesting as these Decrees.
Well, bear in mind that even if they were all created for the same specific purpose (and I’m not as sold as you seem to be on that, based on what we’ve seen), it sounds like the creators aren’t especially around anymore to enforce that purpose, so the “why” has probably gotten a lot more diverse.
I mean, look back at Demon: The Fallen. Just because the demons were all originally created to serve God and Mankind, and then eventually changed sides to fight in Lucifer’s army, didn’t mean that they were all interested in doing one or all or *any* of those things in the modern day. It left plenty of room for an assortment of factions.
oh, i’m not saying they couldn’t have more than one specific purpose on their own. just that they may have been meant to have one general one. i’m also not convinced that those original creators aren’t still around (or at least that they aren’t still a factor or a threat). if you’re going to reference DtF, remember that Lucifer actually was still around, the founders of those factions were still around, and their original leaders were either on earth again, or were still influencing things from hell. not that demons couldn’t also work at cross porposes to their leaders. but i wasn’t much of a Demon fan, it was ALL metaplot.
Things we know about the “purpose” of the Arisen:
.) There’s some definite connection between vessels and vestiges and the purpose of the Arisen.
.) The Arisen believe that this purpose has been given to them by whoever enacted the Rite of Return on them. They also think that these beings have given them tools in the form of affinities to help them achieve their purpose.
.) It’s Big and Important to the game as a whole. It’s also Big and Important from a setting perspective. The Rite of Return wasn’t used lightly and without reason.
.) There is some sort of healthy friction between individual character motivation and the “purpose”, as well there should be.
Thoughts:
.) There’s an awful lot of talk about rulership and command in the Ba decree writeup. It remains to be seen if this is a specific quality of the Ba decree or if all Arisen are focused on the idea of rulership.
.) With memory being such a big thing in the game and all, I find it to be ultimately unlikely that many or most of the Arisen will accurately remember or know whatever their purpose might be and what it all means.
oh, and I’m with Mutant X (i think). i love how this is developing, but i don’t want to lose sight of the gothic horror mummy element. unfortunately, the more we know specifically about how/why Mummies are what they are and do what they do, the less mystery, and thereby, horror we are left with. The monster is scarier in quiet shadowy tombs than it is on noisey streets at noon.
I don’t know if my question ever got answered, but will other cultures than just ancient Egypt be represented in the book? The Peruvian sky mummies, bog mummies, all that other stuff could be really interesting additions to the overall flavor of Mummy.
Define “represented”. If you mean “will Peruvian sky mummies have their own splats” no; that’s what the Purified from WoD: Immortals are.
If you’re worried that all Arisen stayed around Egypt through the period we call Ancient Egypt, picked up that culture and then stuck with it for 5000 years, then worry no more.
No, it’s been said that all mummies come from one culture, which is heavily hinted at as being a predecessor to what we think of as Ancient Egypt. So that means that the other culture mummies were maybe INSPIRED by these mummies, and may or may not have achieved unlife somehow, but they’re not MUMMIES as represented in this book. The Mummies in this book are represented through a philosophy unique to Ancient Egypt, or rather their predecessors mentioned earlier, and if you consider THAT to be the important part, rather than the simple act of mummification of a body, it doesn’t make sense to have that many other mummies.
However, I think how it’s going to go is that due to the memory issues, your actual character may identify more strongly as, say, a confederate soldier due to having more memories of that time.
I mentioned this on the previous post, because I hadn’t seen this one was up, but I had a quick note about boxed sets.
White Wolf did a boxed set for Exalted a few years ago and…well, suffice it to say things did not go well. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me to discover that the whole debacle had something to do with the fact that WW switched over to pdf and PoD.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t do a boxed set, just that you might wanna talk to whoever it was that did the one for Exalted, so that you can try and avoid having the same problems happen to you.
The circumstances with what happened with the box set were somewhat unique and given the time period involved. It’s highly unlikely that such a thing is going to happen under a very different business model.
This sounds like a story. Storytiem?
At the time, WW books were printed in China. Getting the Dreams of the First Age box printed over there, then shipped to the US, was hell itself and made the box very very late.
Well that was a less interesting story than I was expecting, but I agree, unlikely to be a problem this time.
The Pillars are sounding more and more interesting.
Also, I could swear that one of the previous blog comments noted that the game would allow for non-Egyptian mummies. Am I mistaken?
Hah. Very funny, Wuse.
More!
*insane cackle*
MORE!
i refuse to read anything until someone tells me if there will be non-egyptian mummies!
Heh, nowadays almost every modern first-world corpse is stuffed with enough preservatives for open-casket presentation, that I’d say almost every first-world modern corpse counts as a mummy
Duat… is this a fancy term for the Underworld, or do we have a new realm? Is it possible that Duat is the true afterlife, beyond the underworld, where souls seem to go when they move on? This would be interesting and unique. Even Sineaters haven’t seen what really lies behind the final layer of death’s curtains.
Also, as the basic question of players styled as non egyptians has been answered, a perhaps more useful question.. did the Rite of Return stay in Redactedland and die with it? Did the Rite get stolen or bribed handsomely into the hands of other cultures? Is the rite still in circulation, or is it lost?
We still haven’t really gotten an answer as to who or what exactly developed and enacted the rite in the first place. For all we know, it’s not doable by humans at all.
There has been some talk about an “original/initial” Rite of Return, and by beings who “copied” their great art.
At a wild guess, I’d say the antagonist mummies are those who copied the great art.
That was in reference to relics, though, not mummies.
Not just relics, no. There’s an original/initial Rite of Return. The first culture has been mentioned as the one where the “original” Rite of Return has been performed.
This might again suggest that the Arisen are a clique, like the Children of Horus in old mummy. They include the original recipients of the rite, with all the meaning, culture, and age behind it.
Then, there are those mummies created by a stolen and bastardized Rite that spread across the world, and may be in use today. These mummies may be Deathless, but they are not Arisen. They don’t have the age or societal backing to such a claim, and as such, they stumble through their baned mummification selfishly and without any care for the purpose that the Deathless were created to serve.
It fits, certainly, and leaves open an option for non arisen characters.
No new update?
THE GODS DO NOT APPROVE.
The Gods do not approve at all!
Your wish is my… well, you know.