Customer Reviews

Demon: The Fallen

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

DEMON:THE FALLEN is a role-playing game by White Wolf, set in the original WORLD OF DARKNESS setting. This game is about demons (obviously), but portrayed differently than in Judeo-Christian theology. Lucifer and the other fallen rebelled against God in order to love and serve humankind. There was war on Earth between the heavenly and fallen hosts resulting in great destruction and cruelty to humans, as the fallen used the humans they claimed to love as tools in their rebellion. Finally, the heavenly hosts were victorious and cast the fallen into Hell, a place of eternal isolation and nothingness. There, the fallen remained for all the aeons of earth's history.

And now all hell is breaking loose.

In DEMON, many fallen angels have managed to escape Hell, but it continually pulls at their essence. The only way for them to remain out of hell is to merge with a mortal body. The book implies that it is only possible to take the bodies of people with weak or broken souls; the brain-dead, the incurably insane, the suicidal, and those whose spirits have been crushed by the weight of a world of darkness. In this body, the fallen are very limited in their abilities; their memories of infinity and beyond have to fit in a mortal brain, and much is lost. Their fleshly shells are fragile, and the demons must continually search for faith to sustain themselves. They do retain some of their lore, their original ability to shape the universe, and their angelic form can be called upon at times. Whether they appear angelic or demonic depends on the fallen's level of torment, or how much they have succumbed to the dark side.

The book is exceedingly well written, with the first third of the book exploring the setting and abilities in narrative form - it makes for very interesting reading. I also found it interesting that some of the fallen have realized their error in rebelling against God and are in search of redemption (a position that surprised me given White Wolf's propensity for sticking a thumb in the eye of Christian belief whenever possible). I'm also surprised that people think that DEMON borrows from Judeo-Christian tradition when it is clearly Gnostic. It has a very Gnostic view of God, creation, Jesus, and humanity.

Many people (including myself) have wanted White Wolf to redo DEMON for their new setting. I think that they have chosen to replace it with PROMETHEAN: THE CREATED. It is billed as a "game of stolen lives", where a dead body is resurrected as a different creature, one with a mind but no soul. This new being searches for redemption, trying to understand humanity and to eventually become human. Prometheans even have Torment as a state they fall into over their suffering and have an "apocalyptic form" where their true selves are revealed. Many of the themes of DEMON seem to have been taken over by PROMETHEAN. If that is the case, it is an interesting decision by White Wolf.

Well written, with an intriguing, "believeable" (for a fictional world) concept. Christian mythology is handled with dignity and respect, though devout Christians would probably disagree. As per usual White Wolf fare, it is well-written, well-illustrated, and designed so that the possibilites for game themes are endless, from the descent into mindless evil, to a Dogma-esque search for forgiveness. Fans of hack-n-slash games and aspiring politicos alike will find a home in Demon, and I look foreward to future releases for this title.

I learned of this book a month after it was released and picked it up out of curiosity. It turns out that this book has an incredible amount of history and depth that pulls for a very immersive game. It has the seven houses (like most Whitewolf games it seems like) with their own powers, but then it has the extra five factions, and then multiple lores per house to give you the opportunity to really customize your character. The metaplot is set up real well and will be better developed in later books. I like this because you can choose to play with that, making it a political game, ignore it, making it very unique, or choose to bring it any direction you want. Yes the Demons themselves are pretty weak, as I was surprised, but a good storyteller will adjust the game's difficulty to make it as challenging as he wishes. This extensive backround can make any game a hack and slash blood fest, an evil trip into the madness of surfaced hellspawn, a heroic tail of one trying to regain honor or any meaning, or a mix of all of them. This is also the first game I have ever ran myself, and I personally like to involve the other aspects of the World of Darkness as well (especially Hunters, who make great antagonists) which the storyteller's companion explains in further depth. But anyway, being new to running games instead of just playing in them, I love this one's versitality. And seeing as it's relatively new, you don't have a few dozen books to read to catch up to older gamers.

This game was very well thought out, and the stories were very well written. Demons make excellent additions to the world of darkness. Yes demons have been mentioned in White Wolfs WoD books before, White Wolf was disapointingly vague on detailing demons. The new take on demons while definately different than what White Wolf did with them before, gives demons a lot more depth. The book also gives an all new layer of depth to the over all history of the WoD role playing world, making it very useful even if you aren't planning on having Demon PCs. The only flaw of this book, which unforunately White Wolf often does was a few rules which were poorly worded, this is certainly not enough to subtract from the over all score of the book.

What can be added to what others have written? Its well written, well researched and fun to play. It combines the best elements of Vampire, the esoteric nature of Mage and the sheer brutality of Werewolf with a little bit of Mummy thrown in for good measure. This is going to be one of WW's most successful games.

Demon: The Fallen is in my opinion the best game that White Wolf has made since Mage: The Ascension. White Wolf obviously put their best writers on this and it definitely shows. The system that was designed for showing off the players supernatural prowess is great! Sure it isn't as versatile as a Mage's sphere magic or as overtly powerful as a Vampire's disciplines but it can sure kick some serious tale if used correctly. The beauty of the system of the book as that characters can be made SO distinct. They can be fighters, manipulators, redeemers, assassins, etc. As to their power-level relative to the other denizens of the WoD... lets just say that a well-made Angel of Death (slayer) could probably send any elder vampire into the afterlife. That said... if you are a die-hard roleplayer pick up this book.

Beautifly writen demon the fallen is a great white wolf game that finaly allows non-n.p.c.'s to play as demons from the under world, this is backed up by a magnificently writen history of the demon era of humanity where demons ruled with humanity. And a full detailed accounting of Caine's fall from grace that all vampire fans have been waiting for. The only slight problem you may have with reading this book is if you are to bound to christianity and offended, probably white-wolfs greatest game next to Kindred of the East.

I've been playing White Wolf games for a few years. I gotta say I love the game, and I've been waiting for this book since I heard it was coming out, and in fact pre-ordered it through my local bookstore so I got it the day after release. I was a little dissapointed that the book left out a system for dealing with other World of Darkness creatures such as Vampires, Werewolves, Magi, etc, like the other rule books contain, so that they could put in the long (and sometimes redundant) history of the fallen and rules on the faith and torment system (which the first time through I had trouble understanding, probably cause I hadn't slept in a day because I was so interested in getting into the game). Overall, it's a great game, but I'm hoping the Storyteller's Companion, dated to be released December 9th, contains some of the info that this book lacked.

Very interesting. Requires more thought than most other RPGs. Ranks right up there with changling as far as the limits of the game is only your's (and the storyteller's) imagination.

IMHO(in my humble opinion) White Wolf's most unique and interesting gameline ever produced. Imagine playing as a being who not only existed before humans but shaped the stars and planets, given a terrible edict to love humanity but do nothing to aid them as a terrible disaster looms near. Wouldn't you protect your charges? This is the forefront of the concept of Demon the Fallen, a book where you play as a rebel angel who chose to side against God in order to aid humanity, fought a losing war for millenia, then was thrust into an abyss of isolation and torment and stripped of power for millenia more. Now, you escape as the abyss cracks open, and find a weak and broken soul who resonates with your spiritual essence, merge with or outright possess it's host, and become a denizen of the World of Darkness.

The book's mechanics can be downright confusing, which is the only downside to this otherwise excellent roleplaying game, yet still not as confusing as Mage the Ascension's are. The only other thing I would recommend throwing out are the Nature and Demeanor, if your group is experienced at roleplaying at all, as these are merely guidelines to behavior your player should establish in the beginning of the game anyway. Nature is your player's true personality, and Demeanor is his social face.

The book details a history of the fall and briefly , the war, the seven houses of angel(which make way more sense than vampire clans or mage cults), the five factions of political angels returned from the abyss, the mechanics, and so on.
If you do purchase this book , also consider purchasing at least the player's guide and the storyteller's companion, since they have alot more information not included in the core book. Particularly useful to me(and my friends) were the merits and flaws in the player's guide, since we are used to a system with many more options in that respect, GURPS.

The duality of the characters comes through in that every demonic house starts out with a Torment rating, and can easily accrue temporary Torment points through negative actions, with ten leading to another permanent Torment point. Ten Torment points(as I understand it) makes the character an unplayable ravaging beast, intent on sating his demonic Torment on others, while a rare character with a Torment of 2 or less could be very nearly a paragon of earthly virtue. Once again, the best use of a "Morality System" of any of White Wolf's books.
Also shines through the fact that demons rely on faith to fuel their powers and abilities. Although it's pretty hazy how faith relates to or is akin to energies of other gamelines, like the quintessence(primal essence) of Mage, or the glamour of Changeling, it's an interesting catch-22 for the Fallen, in that they exist in a fairly faithless world(comparative to before the fall), but that empowering humanity as a whole with too much faith risks legions of Demon Hunters or worse rising up against them. Faith is, and should be, a scarce and coveted resource, and there are only two ways of getting it: reaping it once per show of power they perform upon a hapless mortal, or enthralling a mortal with a demonic pact, which requires they give the mortal something in return.

The Villains are also interesting, aside from regular-old villainous fallen and their political organizations, there are the EArthbound, those who inhabited an object, retaining much more of their power at the cost of being bound up in an object and having no bulwark of human memories and emotions to stop their Torment from going through the roof. Imagine a fallen angel who is summoned into an object, still feels the pull of hell's hate, and then begins to be worshipped as a dark godling: and then imagine how insane such a creature must be.

All in all, an amazing read and buy, with the only problems being whether you have a good group(role players not roll players, right?) and crossoverability with the other gamelines. I like it enough that I have been using it with the nWoD(new World of Darkness), and so anyone wanting a conversion to the new system, email me and I'll send you a copy.