Page 284 - Hunter - The Vigil

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Unholy Attribute (• to •••••) into this world by beings too powerful to enter themselves, or
This power grants a monster incredible potency in a sin- having sneaked through some tiny crack in the borders between
gle Attribute. The monster spends Willpower to boost that the material world and that of the Abyss.
Attribute by the number of points invested in Unholy Attri- The Truth
bute. This bonus lasts until the end of the scene. Monsters us-
ing this power recalculate appropriate traits (Speed, Health, about Demons
Initiative, Defense) using the new Attribute score.
The following rules apply across the board to all demons.
• Demons do not possess a Morality score. Certainly they
Demons adhere to some kind of diabolical law and codes of infer-
nal sanity, but those inscrutable commandments remain
The power and the glory are His, forever and ever. I want outside the knowledge of man.
them back.
Let’s start by clearing something up. A lot of monsters • Demons do possess a Virtue, but this is something of a
either claim to be “demons” or are called as such by ignorant ruse. The demon gains nothing from his Virtue. For some
occultists. Some hunters are sure the whole lot of unnatu- it is the “mask” it wears when it wants to appeal to a
ral nasties are Satan’s own spawn, and it’s hard to argue with human’s more honorable sensibilities, while for others it
them. Indeed, the powers of the Lucifuge are effective against perhaps represents what the demon once felt or embod-
most spiritual and infernal adversaries (see Castigation, p. ied during its more beatifi c existence.
164), implying they’re fundamentally the same. • Demons possess a Vice, but they do not gain Willpower
That said, some things are defi nitely, irrefutably demons. via this Vice as humans do. Instead, they gain Willpower

They are creatures born of iniquity, forged raw from the fires (or Essence if the demon is bodiless) whenever in the pres-
of sin and vice. They’re also selfi sh and deceptive, so it’s hard ence of a human performing an action in service to that
to get a straight answer from one as to its actual origins. Most, particular Vice. Any time the demon is in the presence
of course, claim a diabolical pedigree: born in Hell as servants of someone serving the demon’s Vice, the demon gains a
of Lucifer or formed as angels who chose to follow the Morn- point of Willpower. However, if that someone shares the
ingstar in his War against Heaven. Others refute such tales demon’s Vice and commits an act that gains the character
as being a part of “The Great Lie,” and instead claim to be Willpower by serving that Vice, the demon gains an ad-
anything from old gods to trapped spirits, from the “shadow ditional point of Willpower. (A succubus gains by stirring
side” of humanity to “poor, misunderstood” beings. one to Lust, but gains even more by stirring the truly Lust-
That said, this is the story most demons tell: in the time ful to new levels of submission to his sin — in the latter ex-
before time, there was a terrible war fought by wonderful be- ample, the demon feels more “connected” with the act.)
ings. No one really knows why (remember: the only beings • If a demon is without Willpower or Essence, it can be
who claim to remember also cultivate reputations as liars and banished or summoned all the more easily: rolls to do so
manipulators). The stories are all similar, though. A garden gain a +2 bonus.
destroyed. A tower shattered. A city of clocks stopped one by
one. And the beautiful, brilliant creatures who created them? • Demons are broken out into three tiers, or degrees of dam-
Each put to the sword by their brothers. nation: Lesser, Greater and Elder. These are described in
The leader of the fallen soldiers was banished to oblivion, detail, below.
where he created form from void, something from nothing, a • All demons have a True Name. This name is rarely easy
city from chaos. His soldiers, the ghosts and ashes of angels to find (and often less easy to pronounce). Knowing a de-

and heroes, free fall forever between Earth and this Hell. mon’s True Name gives a person some power over that de-
After that, the tale gets a little fuzzy. A good majority of mon, providing +2 to all rolls made against the demon.
demons claims they are or were brought to earth by human • All demons are subject to a Ban: a weakness in their
will, able to stick around because man is so mired in his sins. makeup, which hunters can exploit. Some demons are
They cling to this place because it feeds them and because repulsed by burning sage, or are blocked from possessing
Hell isn’t pleasant for anybody, even them. Some, though, anyone wearing a strip of red ribbon, or cannot abide the
claim that this world is the repugnant punishment and that sound of singing from within a church. The more power-
they’re just here doing the work of their masters, still trapped ful the demon (Lesser, Greater, Elder), the more strident
in the mists and fi res of the Abyss. the Ban becomes.
The theory is that the demons that exist on this plane are
only a frighteningly small majority of what exists beyond the • Every Greater or Elder demon has one Fiendish Flaw that
physical world. Are the rest in Hell, or whatever infernal realm marks it as an infernal being (found below).
from which they come? Seems to be the case. Some occultists
(be they vampire, sorcerer or even Lucifuge hunger) are capable Fiendish Flaws
of summoning demons trapped in Hell back to this world. Many All Greater and Elder demons radiate one of the follow-
demons, though, arrive here by mysterious means, either thrown ing effects:
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