Which is funny since his themes seem to have been so heavily “inspired” by the Warhammer character of the same name- who by just about every depiction is about as fat as you can get haha
For me the Baali are not only A clan but THE clan. Apparently the Unnamed One could be either the Crone or Zillah, both 2nd Generation vampires, making the 2/3 founders of the Baali 3rd Generation vampires. Either way, they posess secrets the Tremere would love to have (dark thaumaturgy and other secrets) they are immune to fire (6 dot discipline) they masquerade inside other clans, they can convert anyone into their own ranks, willing or not, they allied with the Tal'mahe'ra and the demons, their Name translates to "the Lords" and they may have had the biggest impact on the world in total (Plagues, Civilisations in the Americas, Carthage etc.) and with the Azaneali and the Shadow form they have kind of god mode, vulnerable only to magic. Given that Baali can be converted into the Clan from another means they can come with any set of disciplines youd like to have And thats for official canon. I dont see any reason why the Baali shouldnt also hae powerfull Koldunic Sorcerors aming them, given that Koldunic Sorcery stems from Earthbound demonds like Kupala, they likely have all the thaumaturgy paths the Tremere have and more that the Tremere dont have allowing for a lot of creativity and freedom. That said they uphold a masquerade inside the masquerade and are the darkest of vampires.
@@DMEGC thats in the werewolf book yes. Thing about World of Darkness canon is that it tends to contradict itself across splats and across versions. as example 2nd edition said there were 13 original Baali all of which were antedeluvians. 3rd edition said - nah its 3 4th gen. 4th edition said - its technicly 3 but actually its 5
I want to begin with saying this technically doesn't have to do with the Baali directly but rather their signature discipline, Daimoinon. Forgive me, but after watching this video I decided to go check them out in the V20 corebook and I started to look a little closer at the discipline. I also realize this is going to be somewhat long winded but it has to be get my thoughts across. For V20 i have to say, Daimoinon is a helluva discipline to have on a caitiff or a normal vampire the additional discipline merit. At 1 dot you can gain insight in the weakness of someone. At 2 dots you can exploit this weakness through conversation, possibly driving the person into unconsciousness or frenzy. At 3 dots, YOU HAVE THE ABILITY TO HURL MOTHERFUCKING BLACK HELLFIRE. Did I mention the target stll has to roll for Rotschreck in addition the aggrevated damage? At 4 dots, you can cause a person to hallucinate a physical manifestation the most dangerous, shameful from their own subconscious. Finally at 5 dots you can curse someone. Now how it works is by dividing your succeses by severity and duration of the curse but man can it get devastating. If you put five successes in duration it is PERMANENT. Even if its a minor curse, it being permanent is going to really suck. Now there is a decent argument to be made that the baali in V20 were not meant to be played by a PC, and instead were meant to be something a storyteller could use in a plot line based on what I'm about to mention next. There is little to no restrictions on the level 5 ability. Maybe I should rephrase that. There is little to no *explicit* restrictions. The only things it mentions is that the difficulty is determined by the target's willpower, split the successes by duration and severity, and the baali can willing choose to end the curse at any time. It mentions nothing on range, how many curses you can inflict on a person at any given time, knowing the face of the target, or how to remove it outside of the outlasting the duration or the baali choosing to end it. So that means you could, in theory, continuously lay endless curses on an individual you've never met, who is currently the other side of the planet, with no way of getting rid of them. Now of course, no reasonable storyteller will allow you to do that and would probably nerf it. Personally speaking, I would restrict it to the following: you have to know the true name of an individual, you have to have met them before, you can only have one curse placed on an a particular individual at a time (meaning you can't have more than one curse on a person at a time but you can have multiple curses on multiple people. One per person), and it can be ended by some thaumaturgical ritual. Sidenote: Daimoinon actually works quite nicely for a holy inquisition type vampire if you were to change when and how you used it as well a reflavoring it a little. The black hellfire? Recolor it to white hot holy fire (I would require the vampire to have true faith in order to do this). Make a sinful vampire face a physical manifestation of his beast. You could curse a vampire to never lie, be as ugly on the the outside as he is on the inside, be unable to sire or blood bond.
My GM accidentally made my PC a child's of a baali because of jokes I made about my character being vampire Jesus. So I currently find myself in a very particular position to make use of this discipline lololololol! Unfortunately, we are playing with v5, so I have to go homebrew hunting for it.
@@mekaelbayati8040 If you haven’t figured it out yet, I’d try and get in contact with Rey, from Post Mortem Gaming here on RU-vid. He’s been running a Baali chronicle and he homebrewed the clan discipline.
The fire is actually a sickly green bale fire, which I think is actually even doper because it lets you know right away you’re about to get fucked by some demonic flames.
A tragic tale of love, loss, revenge, mistakes, the lengths that some go to justify their actions, not to the world, but to themselves (Mary, Michael, Peter).
The Baali are almost as cool as the Setites and I have always wanted to see a hybrid lineage that sees Set as the Baal or Lord over all of the Darkness that was before the light.
Not exactly a bloodline, but the Children of Judas (a faction inside of the Followers of Set that wanted corruption for it's own sake) were known to sometimes practice infernalism.
Ahhh the Baali they are fun at parties. As a Black Spiral Dancer, I met a elder Baali who mistakenly thought I was going to eat her. Spilling most of her blood she called a "greater demon", actually an incarna of Abhorra my urgewyrm. The look on her face when instead of smiting it greeted me was priceless.
I always liked Baali and wish it was more acceptable to play one. Baali’s can be played correctly they just need a be calculating evil not wild laughing maniacs. Their lore says they like bargains but aren’t likely to making Fausting deals. Baali are very cool
If I ever use the Baali as a big bad (not rushing but it seems interesting) I intend to use them as a Sauron type villain. They're not super obvious as they prepare but if you find them it's usually because they're ready to make big moves.
The one good thing about the Baali is that if you ever want to take a break from the usual VtM play style and just toss in something that just needs killing, the Baali are a good choice.
For the record, I'm pretty sure that Samuel Haight's last name is pronounced like the word "Hate". San Francisco (where I'm from) has a street called "Haight Street" that's pronounced that way, and it's a lot older than both the character and the game he comes from. Also, has Samuel Haight made it into any of your videos yet?
I love this bloodline and I have learned that Baali don't have to be devil worshipping monsters. I had an idea for a Baali who is basically Wod Ghost Rider. They can be Aztec worshipping cultists among other things.
- If I ever do play the table top I really want to make whatever guy I play actually be secretly Baali even if it doesnt come up or have anything to do with the game. Them being such a secret society within a secret society is so neat. Its like a Masquerade within the Masquerade! plus being immune to fire and gossiping with demons is radcore as it gets!
wait, in the lore Shaitan isn't Nergal? Cause i remember that the third Baali that emerges are Nameless, and the others are Moloch and Nergal, that changed your name to Shaitan after the baali war, or not? i'm asking, cuz this lore is amazing lol
The answer to that is yes. Nergal used the name Shaitan during his time as master of Chorazin and Knossos. It's a 2nd/3rd edition lore ambiguity as to whether Shaitan Nergal and Shaitan Huitzilopochtli are the same Baali.
A number of Shaitan have appeared and always try and claim to be the head or even founder of the clan. I’d suggest looking on the white wolf wiki because it’s all very convoluted, but interesting.
They could have made the Baaly the main antagonist in one of the end of times. They could had the unnamed come back, or Nurgal. I think it may be an interesting ending where in order for you to save the world you have to go on a pilgrimage to raise your humanity. After that you convince Kain to reconsider Gabriel's proposal. Then a war with the Baali. In the New world of darkness they have a group in 1st edition that are alot like the Baali but seem to discontinue them in second edition. One thought I have is they can have it where most of them do it as they come to a conclusion that a loss I. Humanity is inevitable. They can say the first of them had a strix (shadow like owls) whimpering in his ear. And instead of fighting he replied "I'm listening." To them the strix are what to aspire to. They have no humanity and yet they can even talk in complete sentence. Stories can go about successful Baylis in the new world of darkness being a complete monster. But instead of a rabid beast they are cold calculating preditor that keeps no emotional ties, has no sense of narrative, and lost all memories of what they were. If ask who they were they would lie and do it enough you can see some inconsistencies. Talking to them can be like talking to an alien that is attempting to blend in even more so than an average kindred. They can read but stay away from literature that explores Humanity like Novels or Philosophy out of how alien and irrelevant they are. Their virtues are just on being better predators and not better human beings. Like patients of a house cat waiting for its pray. They do not like working with one another. Too get there is a training on the fall. They can have a mentor but it not the nicest of relationships. It can be similar to a syth master apprentice relationship. This does put them at a disadvantage as they are alone and sometimes get surprised by human behavior they cannot understand anymore. They may kidnap someone daughter just to have the parent hunting them down, and be surprised. They cannot come up with complex social groups as one will stab the others in the back at first opportunity. They can get to 0 and still read talk and use firearm as intended. But they are completely alien.
Depending upon how you count a clan, there’s either one or three, and no way for there to be two. Salubri -are- were a clan because they have a antediluvian. All three have at least a good few Methuselahs running about.
I sdapted Baali to V5, but without Demons as a Theistic Satanist and after a Caitiff crippld my touchstone I first tortured them and then when I attmpted to kill them accidentally hurt that player. So no Daimonion to Amalgam power use and thees diablerized me. I'm not doing that again. Player will be my ST in the future for a V20 game, not even there. Hope they will like my Warrior Assamite xDD
Hey, no joke those characters tend to be able to use true faith and are capable of wiping entire coteries. Some of them have even achieved golconda and as such are OP as hell.
@@griogere580 Well, If they are truly blessed by god it would make sense they have divine protection. is it plot armor or are they not dumb enough to put themselves in danger without significant cause? Its very much a chicken or egg situation. In any case in the world of darkness its best to just leave the beacons of light alone no matter which game you're playing.
considering that shaitan is...yknow..satan, i wonder if baal refers to belzebub (pronounced ba'al zeboob in hebrew) naturally baali or ba'ali would mean a follower of baal i like that they cared enough to make the names make sense
@@wrinkledhands4720 I played a VtM: Dark Age Balli a couple of times, my crowning moment was diab six Tzimisci for their Fleshcraft, after that I was just an insane flying spider Lovecraft monster eating my way through the game. I also had Werewolf the Apocalypse covering Bane spirits. Once that character corrupted the area's leading heavy hitters into an underground cult, I ate them and move to the next location. Leaving a blood cult behind. Once I landed on the Red List, I leaded two parties of players to my dark god speaking into my thoughts, ( who I made up for game play leading my actions.) Since they said I couldn't play a bronze age Baali, I made one up on the side who just happen to be my god. The whole cavern temple was crawling with ghoul revenant rats, and the blood god was a giant spider made up of a mass of a few dozen vampires. End result was a TPK. The player groups hated me and loved me all at the same time. 2.) My tops favorite books are, .. Old world of darkness Vampires of the East, Wraith, Werewolf and VtM: Dark Ages. New World of Darkness, Changeling the Lost, Mage the Awakening. I normal play a country Gangrel/ my group normally plays Sabbat, and Malkavian. Along with being one of a few people who knew the rules well enough to larp Changeling the Lost in a VtM game. Sadly due to pass work hours, location, and other things I haven't gamed for the past 15 years.
...Yeah, nine times out of ten, if two or more tabletop settings have characters with identical or similar names, they got them from a historical or mythological figure.
@@lazarofstygia2241 Well, in their respective universes, both Baali and Cenobites understand that people usually are far more given to lust, ambition, knowledge and power at any price, despair and the like, than they to good sense
@@ilnigromante666 Good thing for infernalists, demons, and Cenobites that mortals are unaware of just how valuable a soul is until they've mortgaged it for money, sex, knowledge, power, etc. It's like Tremere and the Paradox of infernalism. No demon that is weak enough to be controlled is powerful enough to give you the power you want. But a demon powerful enough to give you everything you desire is also likely to use your soul as a condom with you being unable to prevent it.
To your last comment, it's kind of sad in retrospect but Old WoD DID have multiple factions and sects beyond the Camarilla and Sabbat. The Inconnu, the Anarchs, the The Black Hand. Better (or properly) fleshed out each could have provided a broader spectrum of philosophies and antagonists. Even bloodlines like Children of Osiris or Ahrimanes or Baali or Clans like the Tzimesce or Assamites or Malkavians or Tremere could have been bumped up to sect status with a little tweaking. The major shackle, in my opinion, was over emphasis on the Clans for diversity and being shackled to the biblical Cain origin story. More than a few clan and bloodlines were either redundant or not particularly original. Their respective gimmicks or spheres of influence having too much practical overlap. And while the Cain and the Antediluvians origin story was interesting it would have worked better as AN origin story rather than THE origin story. Just one more possible explanations for a curse and condition that no doubt had haunted humanity since its beginnings but nobody really understood or could properly explain. It's one of the reasons I limit players to Camarilla clans, dropping the Malks and Tremere since the Malkies are basically just vampires with derangements (and nobody ever plays them right anyway) and the Tremere are overpowered and pains in the ass (though various blood magic traditions, including infernalism, do exist and can be learned as out of Clan disciplines but good luck finding a willing teacher.) The rest of the clans and bloodlines I relegate to the "You may have heard rumors and stories of them but never actually met one" territory and will use them VERY sparingly as antagonist NPCs (Nagaraja and certain Gangrel offshoots are good for throwing out the odd "what the hell WAS that?" moment.) I tend to view clan more like ancestral heritage than subsects unto themselves. It's where you're from, not who you are. Strictly speaking the only practical difference between them is what disciplines and weaknesses they start with so why introduce a headache like the Setites or Giovanni when a Toreador with an taste for Egyptology or a Ventrue with a necrophilia fetish can fit the bill? I also follow the (somewhat obscure) rule that vampires undergo physical mutations and changes at around 500 years old or so true ancients are not only rare but hard to come by, either isolating themselves from society or slipping into torpor to stay out of sight. For the setting itself I prefer to downplay the whole Cain/Antediluvian bits, treat in game "history" as possible but apocryphal, and focus more on intersect politics and personal character conflicts. Regional geographical location influence how the local Licks flavor and organize themselves, favoring small personal coteries, cliques, gangs, cults and broods rather than clan centric strongholds or regions. The various organized factions that do exist are more loose networks than monolithic institutions in nature. The Camarilla is basically the stodgy, established old guard who focus on tradition and old school protocol. The Anarchs are the younger, more progressively minded bucks. The Inconnu are elder semi monastic historians, quasi spiritual leaders and ecclesiastes. The Sabbat are those edgy shitlords who "embrace their monstrous nature" (but get spanked the moment a bigger fish shows up.) And The Tal'Mahe'Ra seems to be mostly scholars and arcane researchers who are...up to something but nobody outside it (or many within) is entirely clear as to what. Everybody follows, or does their best to avoid getting caught breaking, the Traditions after a fashion (because those who don't tend to get hunted down and staked by humans sooner or later) and is more focused on expanding or maintaining their own personal power, prestige, or obsessions than worrying about some doomsday prophecy. I find doing so lets me still enjoy some classic WoD style without getting bogged down in the meta narrative and gives me a big toybox to draw from, letting the players personalize and invest in their characters rather than fall back on the lazy clan stereotypes.
Personally, I find the Caine lore to be a great defining aspect of VtM the seperates it from other generic vampire/monster games, and it was the lack of stuff like that that really turned me off of VtR and V5. As is, I mean Setite, Assamite, Ravnos, Gangrel origin stories outright contradict or vary from traditional Cainite lore, allowing for plenty of possibility, while most modern Kindred do not even believe it.
Around 25 years ago at my first game shop, we ran an Egyptian campaign set in the late stone age / copper age. And we ran " Anubis " as a kinfolk to Silent Strider jackal garou werewolves. Who was a very minor Dream Speaker with a couple of dots to deal with minor spirits/wraiths. Then " Cain," shown up. Which we played up as being a blood/death spirit which the local mages and werewolves were dealing/ battling with. Plot wise all clan founders were caitiff and their leader's personality flaws and dealing with spirits lead to their clan curses. Then you have the Gangrel, .. humans were wild raiders and herders at the time of the copper age. And on the flip side, all of the bronze age city state heroes were Mages or kinfolk to the werewolves. Another plot Anubis and Set were mages fighting the restless wraiths and death spirits found in the mage game book and the werewolf book. Due to the plot of the story the GM is doing that push the two high priests into becoming possess by a vampire spirit. Main plot to figure out, and I was dealing with a few dozen college students and other dungeon & dragon players in their forties. How do you create a family drama set in the copper age that inspire the myth of the Egyptian gods. Now when the revise books came out, such as Mage Awakening which had clearer rules on creating new bodies and creating spirits along with calling the dead. Changeling the Lost was also a fun read for me.
No such thing as "playing Malkavians right". The lore portrays them a dozen different ways, and the editions eventually get to a point where they expect you to do the same.
@@VenomousHigh With all due respect, in my experience there really is. Mostly because I've seen too many players misunderstand exactly what derangements are. Namely that they are basically mental diseases or defects, not goofy or silly quirks. Severe and in some respects crippling psychological problems that essentially take control from the player as they suffer the effect of their psychosis. To wit: Malkies are John Wayne Gacy and the Manson Family. Not Bugs Bunny and the Animaniacs. And you can still play a "Malkie" without being an actual Malkie. So to me they are ultimately redundant in terms of lore and mechanics and can be dropped without really losing anything.
Excuse me sir.... how do both Mary the black and the assamite you name both take his essence? You don't cast doubt like you do in other stories. You specially say in both videos they did it... reference Mary in other videos but also say the assamite did it and he's changing his attire... looks in the mirror and sometimes sees a different face and so on. Which one did it?
Its good that V5 shakes up things and hope continues. I personally would find it interesting if the Salubri comeback big or in a way through Tremere... I also hope the Baali are used and updated in a good way there. So can we assume that first "Shaitan" is the third 'brother' maybe? or even another antideluvian? i like the theory that there are more and it seems possible that magic, infernalism or both actually created them. (i personally could believe there are older ones than Caine. certainly Mithras believes it) And what do you think about Namturu? Sounds like an earthbound and sounds similar to Namtar, the haluku thing.
The Baali are probably too edgy for the current iteration of Vampire. Namtaru's "hat" is diseases and plagues, which fits with the Halaku. However, it also supposedly predates Creation itself.
@@lazarofstygia2241 Demonds that predate? That sounds intriguing. Can Celestials go corrupt in that way maybe? edgy, yeah. but never too late to include them in a different way. i bet there are creative ways to shake them up instead of just delete or retcon them :)
Yes, that's the big conflict in Demon the Fallen. I suspect Namtaru might be a Neverborn/Malfean, but the story is ambiguous, so it could be and Earthbound, or an aspect of the Wyrm.
@@lazarofstygia2241 I just read of the Talons of the worm and as it was described as a Hand... gives one right away the (obviously to literal) picture of big MF under the earth, if wyrm or something entirely else. Even if not wyrm, heck, it could be anything. just mysteries intrigue me always, total hatelove.
@@lazarofstygia2241 Actually the people writing V5 considered adding the Baali to the upcoming cult of the blood gods book but decided to focus on the Hecata so we might see them in upcoming books, if a bit more updated and maybe not as edgy as before or perhaps only insinuating the horrors they commit instead of saying them outright.
A clan with obfuscation, presence and some obscure version of thaumaturgy? Sounds like an errant bloodline of the Ministry to me, certainly no real clan, nothing to see here. - some Camarilla regent, probably.
@@Michael-bn1oi I'm sorry I can't answer anymore how I got that impression, while listening to this video, because I can't remember anymore the content of that video. But maybe the overall impression that the Baali are more ancient and more powerful than "normal" vampires and also play a role in the impending doom of the whole vampire race ...? Would that be a little bit accurate ...?
... I'm honestly surprised there are even ten Baali in canon who have names and stories. Hell, compare the length of this video to the ones for canon characters of the other clans, you see differences of like 15 to 25 minutes. Not to bash the Baali, they're also a fairly poorly defined group, ya know? Hazily defined groups don't usually have a ton of signature characters, and the ones they get don't have all that much to say about them. Likely 'cause the intent of the Baali was for GMs to just take the group and fill any blank spots with whatever their individual games need to fill the mold of "fucked up, horrific, otherworldly *things* that make even the Tzimisce want to be sick all over the place" whether it's an allegory for uncontrolled corporate greed, a one off joke referencing the Hellraiser Christmas comic, or whatever else will keep their players from going apeshit on a slow night.
