Students of Hate

By Adam Scott (wingedbeast@hotmail.com)

Description

Students of Hate are, for the most part, normal human beings. What makes a Student different from the rest of us is his pain. Some time in the Student's past, he has lost something, or otherwise been hurt in such a way as to scar his mind, a trauma that can't be healed. Most importantly, some one or some thing caused this pain.

In most human beings, there are two common responses to a percieved threat: fear and hate. If somebody murders your wife, chances are that you will develop a deep hatred for that person. This is the kind of thing that makes a Student of Hate. First, a great pain must leave a great scar, and I'm not talking about anything so wimpy as a broken leg. I'm talking about seeing your entire family killed right before your eyes or being forced to watch as the person you thought was your best friend rapes and mutilates your wife. Lets not rule out the possibility that your pain was the result of random chance: your wife was killed by a drive by meant for somebody else. The pain needn't be the result of any violence: by digging up a piece of dirt in your past, a detective has just ruined any chance you may have of attaining your life's dream of becoming a doctor. All of these and more are possibilities.

In addition, in order to become a Student of Hate, you must steadfastly refuse to let go of your pain. You must hold on to that pain. Every day, you must consider how you were hurt, why you were hurt, and how you will take revenge upon those who hurt you. In addition to that, any pleasure, such as friendship, love, or pride, is a luxury that you cannot afford.

Finally, you must have a teacher, someone who will teach you how to focus all that pain and hatred into a force to be feared.

Primary Hatred

Every Student of Hate must have a Primary Hatred. This is the person or creature that first caused your pain. It could be the Hitman that killed your son or it could be the drug dealer that ordered the hit. Either way, it is one person that caused your pain and embodies what it is that you hate. When having direct contact with the Primary Hatred, the Rage pool is automatically raised to its maximum, like Garou with its auspice moon.

Secondary Hatred

It isn't necessary that a Student of Hate have a secondary Hatred. The Secondary Hatred is a person or creature that you associate with your Primary Hatred, one of his friends that watched or just a lacky that assisted him in causing your pain by following his orders. Having direct contact with a Secondary Hatred means rolling your Hate score at difficulty six and raising your rage by 1 per success.

Tertiary Hatred

Every Student of Hate must have a Tertiary Hatred. This isn't a specific person or thing, but rather the type of person or thing that caused your pain. If your Primary Hatred was a KKK member that bombed your students for being too active in the equal rights effort, your Tertiary Hatred would be racism. With a success on the Hate roll, diff 6, having direct contact with those who exhibit your Tertiary Hatred will give you one Rage.

Hate

Hate is the stat that puts a number to how far a Student of Hate has refined and focused the emotion of hatred into a functional Willpower. Every Student starts out with 1 level of Hate. Those who become Students of Hate during the course of play spend 20 xp for the first level of Hate. After that, each new level will cost 10 X current to advance.

First, it should be noted that Hate, itself, is not supernatural. It is a focus of your abilities that allows you to do what most people don't think they have the ability to do. And, Hate is not an external thing coming into you, such as vampiric blood. Hate is the expression of your own hatred, as such, it comes purely from within.

Ignoring pain: For each level of Hate a character posseses, the character can ignore one die of damage penalty. By the time a student reaches level 5 the focus of Hatred is so powerful that the character can walk on a broken leg without wincing.

By level 7 the student will not let anything but death stop him.

At level 8, the student actually ignores wounds that would kill other mortals (it takes 2 past incapacitated to kill the student).

At 9, it takes 3 past incapacitated to kill the student.

At 10 levels of pure Hate, the Student of Hate literally ignores death. Nothing can stop the Student of Hate, that has achieved this level, from destroying his Primary Hatred. At this level, the end of the student's enemy is the end of the student as it is only focused hatred that is keeping him alive.

Rage: For each level of Hate a Student of Hate has, he has one point of rage, more aptly named "temporary Hate." Spending one will allow for extra actions, ignoring a stun, or ignoring wound penalties for one turn. Students of Hate can spend Rage for automatic successes on Strength rolls, particularly for damage. A Student is limited by Dexterity to how much rage he/she can spend in a turn of combat.

On the occasion that some form of supernatural mind control is used against hte Student, a point of Rage may be used in place of a point of WP. However, the mind control must be of a nature to become a barrier in between the Student's goal and the Student. Spending a point of Rage must be followed up with violent action on the part of the Student, most likely directed at the one controlling.

Awakening Supernatural Talent: This happens when a "normal" Student of Hate reaches 6th level and beyond (which is rare in and of itself). Each time a Student focuses his Hate by one more level, he has a chance of forcing his supernatural abilities into power.

Allegedly normal human beings might warp reality by the incredible power of their focused Hate. Kinfolk might, through focusing their Hate, awaken the shifting gene. In any such case, the awakened student is unlikely to know anything about what they have become and won't learn additional Gifts, Spheres, Disciplines, or whatever type of power he awoke.

A Student of Hate that awakens himself into a Mage will not realize that there are specific powers. Unless a mage finds him and educates him, the Student's power will be a wild talent, activating in occasions when the Student activates his focus.

One that awakens the shifting gene will have the advantages of a Crinos form, when the focus is used, but will not be able to force the shift under calmer situations, unless he/she is taught the truth of the matter by an appropriate shifter. The student will not have any gifts. If he is inducted into a werewolf tribe (not a very probable occurance) he will effectively be without an auspice, so all Auspice gifts will be of the non-Auspice cost.

Raised Physical Maximum: For every level past 5, the Student raises the trait maximum for Strength and Stamina. So, a level 7 Student of Hate could achieve a Strength or Stamina of 7, but not any other stat.

Wyrm: With the first level of Hate, the Student takes on a Wyrm taint. While there are moments when hate can be useful, hatred of injustice for example, devoting yourself to it is an act of destruction that is more than likely to mark you with the Wyrm, even if you are a Garou who's Prime Hatred is the Wyrm.

When one gets into the top 5 levels, the taint of evil becomes increasingly noticable by Bete who don't have the gift Sense Wyrm or a similar gift. So, the chances of a Student of Hate having an ally of a were-creature that doesn't serve the Wyrm are slim to none.

Banality: This, for a Student of Hate, is very much a problem. By they're nature, they aren't going to make any fae friends. Even the Unseelie know that evil is bad. And, whether the Student of Hate has what can be considered an evil goal or not, he is tainted by something that no fae would enjoy.

Charisma: Charisma + Hate can never equal more than 5. By focusing your Hate to just 1 point, you take on an aura of "threat". By your attitude and the feel people have about the Student, his ability to win friends and influence people is going to drop. But, that doesn't really matter, friends are a luxury. The pain is the only thing I need to finish my work before I die.

Humanity: Humanity + Hate can never exceed 10. Humanity is compassion and love. For hatred to be at its most effective, it must crowd out compassion and love.

Patience: There will be times when the opportunity presents itself to make an attempt upon the life of your Primary or Secondary Hatred, or just to hurt somebody who exhibits your Tertiary, but doing so would be disadvantageous. Sometimes plans need patience. But, hatred is not patient. When the opportunity arises and the character does not wish to, he must make a WP roll to the difficulty of his Hate score. +2 for Secondary Hatred. +4 for Primary. Success means that the Student effectively resists the impulse.

Recovering from the Pain

It is a rare occasion, but it does happen that some Students of Hate will feel that they have fulfilled their goal or that they have gone too far for too little. This Student of Hate may decide to reclaim his/her humanity and attempt to recover from the years of focusing entirely upon hatred. This is a slow process with many setbacks.

To recover from the Pain, a student must try to redeem himself. He must try to make himself humane again. After years or even decades of thinking about nothing but pain and revenge, this is a difficult process. The character must resist the urge to violence. Every time a recovering Student of Hate resorts to violence (even if it is the absolutely last resort), a Fall Check (explained below) must be rolled.

In game terms, this means that the character will have to buy back humanity. When this doesn't clash with the Hate stat (such as Hate level 5 and Humanity being raised to 4), it is at normal cost Current x2. If the humanity increase does clash with the Hate stat (such as a Hate level of 6 and humanity being raised to 5), the cost is Current x4.

Note, after first focusing your destructive negative emotions into Hate, you can never reach a full 10 Humanity again. That one point of Hate will always be there to remind you of what you were and to provide a door way so that you can Fall back into your old ways.

When Humanity clashes with Hate, the clashed Hate point becomes a Shadow Hate Point. This means that the point of hate produces none of the benefits or pitfalls of Hate, but is there for the character to Fall back into. For example, a recovering Student of Hate has a Hate level of 7 and a Humanity of 5. Being that 7+5=12, there's a problem. So, two points of Hate become Shadow Hate points.

The Fall: The Fall is what keeps any Recovering Student from completely recovering. Every time the Recovering Student resorts to violence (for any reason), comes accross any of his Hatreds, a Fall check must be made. To make a Fall Check, roll your complete Hate level (including the Shadow Hate Points) against the difficulty of your Humanity. For every success your Hate has, you fall one point back into your old ways. In game terms, that means that for every Hate success, one Shadow Hate Point becomes activated and you lose one point of Humanity, to be regained by buying it as if you never had it in the first place.

Notes

This isn't a supernatural organization by any means. In fact, the majority of Students are quite mortal and quite without supernatural ability. The abilities that come from focusing one's Hate are purely a result of the focus on emotion of destruction. While supernatural creatures can become Students of Hate, the power remains completely within the mundane.

I am considering writing up rules for two other such organizations. While the Students of Hate would correspond to destruction and the Wyrm, I may write up students for other emotions to correspond to Creation and the Wyld or preservation and the Weaver. If you have any ideas, I would love to hear them.