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Total War

2019-02-23T06:29:19Z

2601:1C0:5C80:28EF:A927:E20D:2B68:140B: /* Total War: Three Kingdoms */

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[[File:P7pnr.jpg|500px|right|thumb|The Total War fandom in a nutshell...]]

Total War is a wargame franchise based on movement of groups of units on a battlefield map, and maneuvering armies in an overlay map. In many ways the series is reminiscent of tabletop wargames, which has made it a popular subject for discussion on [[/tg/]]. That and having a rather great ''Warhammer'' trilogy among it's catalogue.

Note that due to being a huge participant in the DLC craze, as well as the...''lackluster'', let's say, quality of some entries in the franchise the game has become quite [[Skub|Skubby]] in many circles, although when detractions are brought up others are quick to claim modding makes up for it, others say any game you have to mod is shit, which prompts references to games like [[Fallout]] and [[Vampire: The Masquerade]], which results in the reply that those games are bad as well and since Medieval II is a better game that means Total War is by default objectively bad, which is when the conversation [[Fail|devolves into namecalling and Warhammer 40k reaction images]]. Yeah...

==Gameplay==

Total War has two main features: Turn-Based on the campaign map, and Real-Time on the battle map.

In the campaign map, you must manage your economy, keep the peace among your subjects, ally, trade, or war with other nations for vital resources, assassinate your rivals, and crush brigands and pirates as soon as they show their filthy hides. In other words, your pretty much playing [[A Song of Ice and Fire|Game of Thrones, without the ice demons or dragons]].

In the battle map, you must prove yourself [[Creed|a genius of tactics]]. The rules pretty much work like this throughout most of the titles save for Empire, Napoleon, and Shogun:

*Spear Infantry: Great for bracing and taking down charging cavalry, but only do OK against melee infantry. Usually best if placed on the flanks. (Which, of course, is strange, considering the fact that the spear was the mainstay of most ancient and medieval armies, as moderately trained blokes armed with spear, shield, a helm, and inexpensive padded jacks/gambesons usually made up the biggest portion of most armies.)

*Melee Infantry: The hard heart of your strength. These are used to form the main line most of the time, as well as the reserves, and are absolutely vital in siege assaults. Usually tanky with decent defensive stats to grind down the enemy and pin them in place for whatever shenanigans you have planned. Good against spear infantry, can hold it's own against most cavalry except when charged by shock cavalry or withered down by archers. Usually pretty useless vs horse archers except as pincushions.

*Shock Infantry: The big blokes with big weapons. Typically armed with huge axes, poleaxes or two handed swords. But can also have other weapons such as sword n board but being bat shit crazy enough to be considered shock infantry regardless. Work as a foot version of shock cavalry and will usually be charging around flanks or bashing their way through infantry lines. Will usually destroy the things they charge and take less micro than shock cavalry since they'll have the numbers to smash through other infantry with a flanking attack, but with high attack and less defense they are especially vulnerable to archers and Cavalry charges themselves.

*Ranged Infantry: Your slingers, archers, javelins, and crossbowmen. These guys are extremely useful for softening up an enemy force or clearing out a wall of defenders. Be warned, however, that they are very vulnerable to most forms of cavalry. Place them behind your main line if you value them.

*Pike Infantry: A virtual wall of death for anyone foolish enough to charge head on. The best thing to use for defending a narrow choke-point or holding a battle-line. Immune to cavalry from the front but very scared of archers and generally are only barely better than ranged infantry when flanked.

*Ranged Cavalry: Your horse archers, primarily. These guys are great for flanking shots, ambushes, and harassing the enemy. They are vulnerable to the faster light cavalry and will get shredded by foot archers however.

*Light Cavalry: Primarily the scouts and vanguard of the army. Useful for quick movement around the map harassing and killing soft targets like skirmishers, artillery and horse archers, or chasing down routing foes. Not great for direct charges but can be great at rear ramming.

*Melee Cavalry: The jack of all trades of cavalry. Can charge units decently enough but preferably in the flanks or rear unless they are light. Will beat most shock cavalry in a melee fight.

*Shock Cavalry: Your knights, cataphracts, and mounted men-at-arms. These are the hammers to your melee infantry's anvil, breaking a foe like water upon rock. Used primarily for exploiting gaps in enemy lines, charging into the rear of an unsuspecting foe, or flanking attacks. Depending on the game, they can also go straight at anything without a spear and watch them die beneath lances and hooves on their charge, but probably then have to withdraw for another go or they'll get grinded down by any serious infantry unit (even without spears).

*Artillery: Ballistae, Scorpions, Onagers/Mangonels, and Trebuchets, mostly, with the odd cannon here or there. Used mostly for smashing down some poor chap's walls, though it is also useful for flinging hate at an enemy during a field battle, [[Troll|And possibly killing their leader in one shot, completely ruining the battle.]]

*Siege Engines: Ladders, battering rams, and siege towers, used for getting through those pesky things called battlements.

*Special Units: Any number of units not in the aforementioned lists, such as war dogs, incendiary pigs, and most importantly, elephants. Hilariously, [[DISTRACTION CARNIFEX|elephants make for excellent distractions.]]

Players can use any number of tactics from actual battles of yore, such as hammer and anvil, forcing an enemy to turn his flank to you, Mongol-style shenanigans, etc.

With the release of [[Total War: WARHAMMER]], it introduced even more special units with even more specialty (being a fantasy setting and all). These are:

*Monsters: often 12 models or less in a units. They are generally taller and bigger than an average human infantry, having high health pool per models and most of them deal great armor piercing damage meaning, they are fucking dangerous and they tend to be the number one priority and are targeted by the likes of range units like crossbows. Having a larger models meaning they can be targeted by even more enemy models in melee combat. But having the ability to hurt armored units as well as having a lot of health meaning they are good against high tier armored units like the Empire great swords. They gets countered hard by units with Anti-large trait like Calvary so it is best to have them fight side by side with high model count units like a low tier infantry. It's also noted that some monsters tend to be very dumb and cowardly like trolls which results in them routing most of the time, but they have regeneration ability so it's actually a good way for them to heal back up. Most monster also has fear and terror trait, which helps them rout enemy units as well as not to be terrified of enemy units with the same traits.

*Flying Monster/Infantry: The newest addition to the Total War franchise available only in [[Total War: WARHAMMER]]. They have the ability to fly so they are safe from the feel of cold steels shoved into their spleen, but are vulnerable to the likes of range units, especially the fast projectile range units like hand gunners. Due to their ability to ignore terrains and melee units, they are often tasked with raiding enemies artillery line or range units. The fell bats of the Vampire Counts are designed for this purposes. Since they are not obstructed from anything, it is easy for them to charge into enemy line like Calvary, especially for the likes of dragons and wyvern(an orc boss mount) who possessed fear and terror trait. The newest edition of WARHAMMER 2 gave dragons breathe attack and it can dealt a fuck ton of damage from up in the air to anyone that is blob up.

*Casters/Heroes/Lord: Every army has a lord. But in likes of Warhammer, they are single unit with the health equals to a units with 90 models or so . Some of your agents from the campaign map can be embedded into your army and served as models killing machines. These special single units can cause a shock wave of aoe damage every time they attack and are much powerful than a regular infantry unit. Although they are a single units, meaning that can be easily surrounded and hit by many other enemy models if there's no proper back up. Caster are mage who cast the lore of magic from the tabletop games. They are single modeled too but some of them are not suited for melee combat due to low health and low melee attack.

==Games==
===Shogun===

The first, more obscure game in the series, and for good reason, but set a good standard for the series to come. Difficult as fuck, as early rebellions spawned enough forces to overrun even major clans, and an assassin unit called Geisha was so overpowered, legendary Geishas could off entire Dynasties giving the Ordo Assassinarium a hardon.

===Medieval===
Much large strategy map and benefited from better graphics for 2002. Improved politics and strategy. Truth be told, the cleanest, lowest system requiring, simplest and most user friendly interface in strategic management screen of the series.

===Rome===

Rome: Total War takes place in the era of Classical Antiquity, just before the beginning of the First Punic War. The campaign setting is that of the Ancient Euro-Mediterranean world, with its borders stretching from the coast of Portugal to the West, just past the Caspian Sea to the Northeast, and the edge of the Sahara to the South.

Players have the choice to take control of a variety of factions, from the Elephant-riding Carthaginians, to the fierce and savage Barbarians of Iron Age Europe (Celts, Germans, steppe nomads, etc.), the pike phalanxes of the Hellenic States and Egypt, the superb cavalry of the Parthians, and finally the wrecking ball legions of Rome herself.

Interestingly enough in the campaign, Rome is actually divided into four factions; the House of Julii, who focus on the northern barbarians and securing Western Europe for Rome, the House of Brutii, whom primarily are concerned with expanding Rome Eastward and thus are in conflict with Macedon, the Greek city-states, and the Eastern kingdoms, the House of Scipii, whom vie with Carthage and Egypt for control of the Mediterranean and are focused on securing Africa for Rome, and finally the Senate itself, whom directly control Rome and thus boss around the Three Houses into doing their bidding (and unfortunately no, you can't play the Senate faction and boss people around). The advantage to this is that you only have to worry about attacks from a single direction, as the other Romans quite literally have your backs. The disadvantage is that if one House becomes too popular and decides to march to Rome to declare himself Imperator, then a huge civil war breaks out among the families, with a huge player determined battle taking place near Rome, usually.

The game was also very historically inaccurate with Gaul, Germania, Britannia, Scythia, and the Greek Cities all being one unified faction (from a gameplay perspective, this is a game balance to ensure that each faction has at least more than one province to start out with so that they don't immediately get steamrolled). The Egyptian units are all based on New Kingdom Egypt when by the year 272 B.C, the Greco-Macedonian Ptolemy's were ruling Egypt, Rome's lands being divided into 3(though Rome being a Republic with decentralized rule makes sense), Greek Hoplites wielding fucking pikes like Macedonian phalangites (to be fair, many Greeks at this time did adopt Macedonian tactics, but the models and formations are still closer to pre-Alexander hoplites), and the Parthians looking like they were ripped off of Miller's depiction of Achaemenid Persia even though Parthians were more central Asiatic than Iranian around that time. But perhaps the biggest (and coolest) inaccuracy is a special little easter egg, where if you manage to get an army all the way north past a massive forest, you'll discover the home of the [[Amazon]]s. Yes, the fucking Amazons are in this game.

Also of note are the two expansion packs; Alexander (takes place during Alexander the Great's conquest of the Middle East and Central Asia and sadly only lets you play as Alexander.), and Barbarian Invasion (takes place during the Germanic Migrations). The latter was an incredible update around the time of Hunnic invasions and all factions were polished to perfection, including the new Horde system: meaning desperate Iron Age clans of Europe fleeing before the Huns and dogpiling the Romans who had fuck-all armies to contend with. Notable for the Sassanids, Parthians' grandchildren being monstrously overpowered in the strategic screen: fertile and stable middle east, Germanic Migrations ruining your enemies, Clibinarii cavalry who are basically Iranian [[Mongols]] who wore armor fit for a [[Dreadnought]], wielded maces AND composite bows, and a safe Map edge to expand.

This game is either: The best Total War game ever and no other Total War game will ever supersede it because it was the first I played and all the current games suck because its not a remake of it.

OR

It is a great game. In 2004. But now its just a mess that hasn't aged well and literally every aspect of it sucks compared to all games released after it and the only people who like it are a bunch of nostalgic neckbeards who still wish it were the early 2000s.

OR

With mods such as Europa Barbarorum and Roma Surrectum, it is still a fantastic game both in terms of graphics and gameplay.

N.B.. The game is so simple from a graphical point of view that is had been ported to the I Pad, making it light years ahead of most of the competitors on the platform.

===Medieval II===

Continuing on the success of it's predecessor, Rome, Medieval 2 is probably just as good as the previous title. The setting is that of the Old World in the aftermath of William's conquest of England, with the Americas showing up near the campaign's end as the Age of Discovery begins in earnest.

Each turn took 2 years sucking hard, but the plague was an interesting new event.

Heavy cavalry is also pure unadulterated broken [[lulz]], with a general's bodyguard being able to handle half of an early, poor-quality army by itself (and if the general's Dread is high, they might be able to handle it ''all'' by itself), with only good quality spears, pikes and kiting horse archers being able to hope to deal with them. Oh, and expect Milan to backstab you, which is a bit of a [[meme]] to this day.

Out of all the Total War titles, this one spawned the most mods, including several highly valued ones such as Third Age: Total War (a mod that transforms the setting into that of Middle-Earth on the outbreak of the War of the Ring) and Call of Warhammer: Beginning of the End Times (a mod that turns the game into as close a recreation of [[Warhammer Fantasy]] as possible given the game engine's capabilities), the latter serving as a pretty viable alternative if your PC is too old or weak to run CA's official, well-made adaptation (see below). While a few individuals see this as superior to the official Warhammer Total War, they are usually laughed at by crowds posting images of barely animated (and awfully modelled) griffons, and an extremely archaic spellcaster system. Everything after MTWII bar Shogun 2 and Warhammer tends to be seen as having serious flaws to many [[grognard]]s.

It also includes the kingdoms expansion which adds a bunch of new campaigns to the the game as well as new factions and units, including the eternally bad ass Teutonic knights.

The downside to this game is that even though the Mongols are featured in the campaign map, they are: A) an absolute bitch to fight (as it should be),and B) Not available as a playable campaign faction, only as a custom battle faction. C) MOTHERFUCKING TIMURIDS. Yes, a second wave of Mongols arrived with cannon-mounted elephants. ELEPHANT TANKS MAN. SERIOUSLY.

===Empire===

Good old Enlightenment Era and Revolutions with authentic voice acting for nations.

Here marks the descent of CA into darkness, as minor issues with playability, a lackluster musical score, and the beginnings of infamous DLC craze that would be cranked up to eleven with later titles such as Rome 2, all start to crop up during the game. This is probably the least popular entry in the series by modern eyes (not considering the even older titles that probably the majority of Total War players at this point haven't even played), and even its fans are probably going to say "The game's great, but only with mods."

The setting itself is during the Age of Colonialism, during the 18th and early 19th Century before the rise of repeating firearms. Unlike in previous titles, emphasis is less on melee combat and more on '[[Dakka|shooting the fuck out of the other guys until they die]]', city management, industry, and research, making decaying martial empires like Ottomans need dire reforms to get back on track. Also the game had a crude, but entertaining commercial, colonial and societal system, changing to a new order with industrialization.

The societal evolutions of the era were played well: modernization, factories and research for new technology made lower class citizens want extra entertainment, and republics rather than kingdoms. Upper class populations just want to stay in power and low taxes. Either social strata revolting meant a choice: one could side with loyalists or rebels in a do-or-die mini campaign, winners changing the government and leadership. Research buildings would also bring modernization demands AND new researcher characters. You *could* stay a totalitarian kingdom with few technologies but have fun being ran over with Dreyse needle guns.

A special campaign called "The Road to Independence" unlocks the United States as a playable faction, finally giving Amerifags their long awaited chance to spread freedom to the unwashed masses all over the world. Manifest Destiny, bitches!

Crunch-wise: FUCKING MARATHA AND MOTHERFUCKING MORTARS WITH PERCUSSION CAPS DAMNIT.

===Napoleon===

Take everything about Empire, get rid of the bad stuff, and make better the good. That is Napoleon: Total War in a nutshell (though Empire definitely still has the advantage of a much larger map if you're really into that). It also helps that the short man himself delivers [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7RHiyWHuV0 one amazing monologue].

Even though the title should be self explanatory, the game takes place during the Napoleonic Wars that tore Europe apart for 12 years.

===Shogun II===
Shogun II takes place in Medieval Japan during the Sengoku period, although an expansion called Fall of the Samurai places players in the era of the Meiji Restoration.

Many see Shogun 2 as the last subjectively good Total War title. Complaints were mostly focused on the long load times and the fact there's very little variation between the factions you can play other than their bonuses and start location, although given the period to do anything radically different would have been unfitting. Particularly an event called Realm Divide turned the violence up to eleven: After a certain amount of player expansion, *every* other clan would unify against you just to deny victory by any means necessary. Put as a method to prevent a snowballing victory, it became a [[Skub]] matter amongst gamers for arbitrarily having pretty much ''all'' of the AI gang up on you to stop you and rather invalidating diplomacy or bothering to make vassals of anyone, though it has some basis in reality with the Sengoku period being full of political backstabbing (though probably not literally everyone else against one clan...) and can be easily worked around with the prior knowledge by getting ''almost'' enough territory to trigger Realm Divide and sitting around building up your armies and stockpiling cash to deal with losing significant territory to the inevitable doomsticks before you place the straw to break the camel's back.

Notably, the game received a second life from the modding community and Steam Workshop support.

A tabletop game quite similar to Shogun 2 is [[Kensei]].

The game had 2 expansions, the first being Rise of the Samurai which was basically the vanilla campaign with a 500 years prior flavor, and the second being Fall of the Samurai which is considered to be one of the best expansions for a total war game to date, with many fans of the expansion pack calling it the better-version of the Empire entry of the series. It is essentially that one movie where Tom cruise becomes a samurai the game but is much more accurate than the film as all sides possess modern (by 1870's standards) weaponry including gatling guns, which when added to a game automatically increase its inherent quality because gatling guns are awesome. Icing on the cake is that *you* can control gatling guns and artillery units, giving the game an extra, unbalanced but fun feature.

Also you can fire across the map using ships and calling artillery strikes to shred entire armies if the timing is right, preventing turtling by a huge margin and forcing both sides to close in and get slugging as soon as possible. Also Realm Divide is fairer now: Pro-Shogunate and Pro-Imperial sides would ally *together* into two huge blocs to combat each other when it happens, and the player's choice would make him the "Shogunate/Imperial Vanguard" Faction and make every clan on his allegiance unbreakable allies...unless you want to declare yourself as an independent republic to get the old "absolutely everyone wants to murder you" treatment.

Does have a bit of a problem with being unplayable even today if you have the 'wrong' video card. This issue was never patched or fixed, probably a foreshadow to the poor quality control latter down the line.

===Rome II===
Rome 2 was announced and everyone was hyped, but then it was released apparently in a broken state with DLC. Cue rage.

Now, 2 years later...is the game good? Well, it's at least finally bug free. The campaign was noted to be horrible, but at least multiplayer is better than base game Attila. Newfags and oldfags are fighting over it like they do in every other game series. A better question to ask is: did Creative Assembly really "fall into darkness" with this game? The game was presumably rushed with the number of bugs it had, but those have mostly been fixed though it did take 2 years. And DLC, the game had 4 culture packs which added 3 factions each, the quality of those seem to vary from pack to pack. And a bunch of useless unit packs which were blatant money grabs, there was also 3 campaign packs which each added a mini-campaign that focused on a specific conflict and (save for Wrath of Sparta) added cultures pack worth of factions to the main campaign. There were also 6 Free-LC factions added while the game was being fixed, and a free campaign pack (Imperator Augustus) so maybe Creative Assembly has not become an evil corporation that cuts games to sell more DLC since one of those would not give free stuff. Pre-order factions are still scummy as hell. And even after all the bugs were fixed, snowballing is still probably among its worst out of the Total War games because Rome 2 doesn't really have a way to hope to challenge after you've gotten big, unlike Shogun 2's Realm Divide or Attila's...Attila. Unless another faction got really lucky or you've gotten extremely powerful politically among your faction which you'll generally kinda have to try to do by avoiding letting any other political factions' men become generals and gaining any influence (and with that's civil wars causing an army to spawn inside your borders and try to take your capital, why would you want to?) - looking for mods that improve AI's late-game power is advisable.

On a more positive note, Rome 2 does get the history of Classical Antiquity more correct, namely that:

* The Roman Republic is now a unified, patriotic entity controlling most of Italia, though the wheeling and dealing between the Gens still exists

* The Greek city-states and European tribes are now independent of each other.

* The hoplites are actually hoplites now, and not phalangites (Granted, the city-states still use some pike units in the game, but this is now due to Macedonia's influence than anything)

* Mostly, the Egyptian faction now looks like it actually belongs in the Ptolemaic period, although some of their more crappy units still look like they belong with Ramses II than Cleopatra Philoraptor.

* Individual soldiers now look varied, as the concept of a modern uniform didn't really come into being until the late 17th Century

There are six expansions to the game: Caesar in Gaul (Gallic War), Hannibal at the Gates (Second Punic War), Imperator Augustus (Antony's Civil War), Wrath of Sparta (Peloponnesian War), Empire Divided (3rd Century Crisis), and Rise of the Republic (Early Republican Era).

===Attila===
Like Napoleon before it, in regards to Empire, it ironed out many of the flaws found in Rome 2, and is considered a good entry into the series, albeit with the difficulty cranked up to eleven, due to the fact that the game is less focused on building and maintaining an empire and more on [[Grimdark|surviving the wrath of Attila the Hun]], [[Doombreed|Daemon Prince of Khorne]], [[Imperium|and rebuilding your cities and economy after the Apocalypse passes, but your civilisation are permanently diminished by the changing weather and religious climate, with only the mythical relics of it's founders left]]. The main criticism being the ridiculously aggressive DLC policies Sega's been doing. The DLC is generally all over the place, ranging from mediocre - celtic tribes culture pack - to downright great in terms of gameplay offered -empires of the sand or the slavic cultures pack- CA also releases a free to play faction in the same culture group for the DLC they release, with the exception of the celts. And again, though the title should be self explanatory, the game takes place during the Fall of the Western Roman Empire (hence the apocalyptic feel of the campaign), with one expansion taking place during Belisarius' campaign to reclaim Italy( In all honesty, it's kind of a 'meh' DLC.), and the other taking place during Charlemagne's conquest of Western Europe 400 years after the events of the base game, in the Early Medieval Period.(This one was noted to be quite good, with good balance to actual battle mechanics, more reasonable AI behavior, great multiplayer, and a setting perfect for those yearning for Medieval 3.) A "Saga" game based on Attila's engine named Thrones of Britannia was also made, set during the Viking Age on the British Isles soon after Danelaw start fighting against Wessex again. With a large variety of changes to the series' formula in recent years and a bit of a rough release even in its supporters' eyes, it is very, very, very [[Skub]].

Also reintroduced and remade the Horde play-style from Rome: Barbarian Invasion. Now instead of a faction just spawning a bunch of stacks out of nowhere when their last settlement is taken. Horde factions can switch between in encamped stance where they set up camp to build migratory buildings and a regular army stance. Playing as a horde is also completely different since you do not have any home territories and are constantly moving from place to place. This will inevitably make people around you like you less since you crash on their couch and eat all the food in their fridge, unless you vassalise them. It is one of the major features of the expansion, and it provides the player with a new way to play a faction instead of settling down like in previous game.

Cavalry is also only slightly less nutso than in Medieval 2, with even ranged cavalry standing a very good chance of beating actual spear/melee infantry if successfully charging them while they're not braced/in the flanks or rear, though the game's flanking penalties are so severe that even cavalry will probably take significant losses from breaking off from a successful rear charge.

However, the game DOES have its flaws, namely in that the base game, the AI has a ridiculous tendency to default to the "Raze" option when capturing new settlements, meaning that by 300 or so turns into the game, three-quarters of the map is already desolate wastelands,(although it was toned down a lot by the end of the game's product cycle) and the stupidly high required specs to run Attila smoothly on even average settings. [[Troll|CA has stated that the game was designed for future graphics cards]] (If you want a game with amazing graphics, be prepared to fork over several thousand dollars for a high-end gaming computer) The game's actual visual design itself is also a bit [[Skub]] with some finding it utterly brown, drab and boring, unlike, say, Shogun 2 where the entire game still looks beautiful years after and only people that don't care for it in that regard just don't care for its setting in general.

===[[Total War: WARHAMMER]]===
The real reason the series has such relevance on /tg/. A [[Warhammer Fantasy]] Total War game (nicknamed Total Warhammer by fans, even before the game was officially announced, and probably bemoaned by a few to this day that it wasn't the official title). Due to the debacle and shitstorm that was and is [[End Times]] and [[Age of Sigmar]], many Fantasy fans heralded the game as the last great stand of Warhammer Fantasy. Then they heard of the [[Chaos]] faction was announced to be DLC, and the reveal that the pre-order was full of [[Dwarfs (Warhammer Fantasy)|Dorf]] goods. Cue butthurt on the part of Chaos fans, and triumphant glee from the long-suffering Dwarf fans who were soon joined by [[Bretonnian]] players as their faction was announced as a free DLC (soothing the pain of being entirely [[squatted]] in [[Age of Sigmar]] somewhat). Chaos was later made free to anyone who pre-ordered the game or bought it in the first week of release.

Besides being the first game based entirely on a fictional setting, this is also the first time it will feature air units, tanks, magic, and so on.

The game was met with almost unanimous praise both from Warhammer Fantasy fans and the <strike>/v/irgins</strike> video gaming community with many saying it is the most entertaining, or at least unique, Total War game to date. Campaign was extremely well received, known to be fun, and challenging at the same time, as this time, the horde has more realistic behaviors, unlike Attila who raped everyone with the armies appearing from thin air. Instead, Archeaon would just spank you with the armies that spawned out of nowhere. but CA managed to fuck up the multiplayer balance yet again. Games Workshop rushed to put a link to sites to purchase the game on their main page along with a link to the models featured in the game...[[Fail|which consisted of only nine models thanks to massive Squatting of the Fantasy range only months before, almost all in the $50-$90 range, and the named character now simply called generic names with absolutely no realization that any fans of the game visiting the section would be wanting the tools and paints as well.]]
Warhammer Fantasy fans on /tg/ were quick to explain to inquisitive cross-board visitors how the tabletop of Fantasy was destroyed in favor of a...[[Skub|''vastly different'' game]] and were pointed towards early editions/[[The 9th Age]] and [[Reaper Miniatures|alternative]] [[Shieldwolf Miniatures|companies]] [[Mantic Games|to]] [[Mierce Miniatures|buy]] [[Avatars Of War|similar]] [[Ral Partha|looking]] models from.

Total War: WARHAMMER was announced to going to be a trilogy, an entirely logical decision for CA since its first game was definitely their most popular. The announcement of the sequel caused massive [[butthurt]] in fans of more historical settings, even after CA stated and teased a bit about how they've got separate teams working on expansions for their previous historical titles and a whole new one. Despite already covering the vast majority of canonical armies by the launch of game 2, CA has shown an excellent job of representing underdeveloped armies, signaling the possibility of creating entire workable factions for those that never saw the limelight when Warhammer Fantasy was still around. With only so many booked armies left for game 3, this may indeed be the case.

===Total War: Three Kingdoms===
LU BU BITCHES

The first total war game takes place in the infamous three kingdom period in China, as well as the third game that takes place in Asia (Counting shogun 1 and 2 as being the first for taking place in ancient-19th Japan). The initial reaction of this game's sudden teaser is so popular that it made even [[heresy|the total war warhammer fans to forget about the upcoming tomb kings expansions for total war warhammer 2]]. <s>Sorry Settra.</s> <span style='color:gold;font-size:100%'>SETTRA IS NOT TO BE IGNORED!! SETRRA. DEMANDS. ATTENTION!!</span>. Turns out there will be a dueling system for lord to shank each other in melee without being interrupted. Losing the duel grants penalty while winning grants benefit. The gameplay is also character focused, where the player gets to control many special character at one with many units served under each of them. Another cool new feature is revamping the spying system; instead of generic NPCs being sent to investigate enemy armies and cities, your own army generals are now all potential spies. Even better, if you discover a spy, you can potentially turn them into a double agent to feed false information to the enemy.

Interestingly, the game will offer two different modes; one that’s based more on the historical text of the period which is called ''records of the Three kingdom'' which is generally regarded to be accurate-ish, and one based on the book ''"Romance of the Three Kingdoms"'', The mods are un supriseingly called ''"Record"'' and ''"Romance"''. One of the differences is that your lords will be able to buff your armies and wipe the floor with any mooks who come after them, much like how it works in Total Warhammer. While the game has yet to truly happen, it's been discovered; to the [[Rage]] of many fellows knowledgeable about the three kingdoms' period; that naval battles are not going to be a mechanic within the game.

Funny enough, this game also comes with a day 1 DLC for the Yellow Turban Rebellion faction (You know, that mook faction you always gets to fight first in every Dynasty Warriors game?) like when Total War WARHAMMER 1 was released with their Warriors of Chaos DLC but without even the fig leaf of an excuse of the choas warriors needing different animation models and rigs compared to other factions. As usual, CA has already receiving back lashes in the form of dislikes on its release trailer just like the Chaos DLC. Will CA never learn?

[https://twitter.com/totalwar/status/1082681118711865346 As of 2019 January, CA has tweeted that the development of three kingdom will delay the skaven vs lizardman dlc pack to after three kingdoms' release.] The news angered many warhammer fans, especially the skaven player since their faction's winrate is so low that they can't win without their new rattling, jezzail toys. But the lizardmen player suffered the worst for not having a single new content (even a legendary lord like Tretch) since game 's release...which eventually turned to joy, and mockery of the history fanbase, as CA eventually delayed Three Kingdoms and announced the DLC pack in question would be coming before it after all. Keep in mind this does not mean the fantasy DLC will be coming sooner as its release date or announced date remain unchanged. It however gave the fantasyfag an advantage in their usual shitposting contest against historyfag on [[Board-tans/vg|/vg/]]'s /twg/ (total war general) thread. [[fail|In short, both games were delayed]].

Genius: The Transgression

2019-02-23T06:05:43Z

2601:1C0:5C80:28EF:A927:E20D:2B68:140B:

{{Game Infobox
|name = Genius: The Transgression
|type = [[Role-playing game]]
|system = [[Storyteller System]] (nWoD)
|authors = Kyle Marquis
|year = 2010
|books = Genius: The Transgression
}}
{{Topquote|The more we do to you, the less you seem to believe we are doing it.|Dr. Joseph Mengele}}
{{Topquote|Maxim 14: "Mad Science" means never stopping to ask "what's the worst thing that could happen?"|The Seventy Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries}}

'''Genius: The Transgression''' is pretty much [[Mage: The Ascension|Sons of Ether: The Game]]. A fanmade game set in the [[New World of Darkness]], it is about mad scientists inventing gizmos and fighting somewhat madder scientists while trying to avoid becoming solipsistic, uncaring madmen. It runs quite a bit like [[Mage: The Ascension]], but has enough fluff to make it feel distinct as long as you can go along with it.

==Being a Genius==
Creating a Genius is very much like creating a regular nWoD character: you come up with your stats, note them down and apply the Genius Template. Aside from adding a point to one of your mental stats (can't go above 5), there are of course the game-specific advantages:

===Inspiration===
Genius' power stat. It is your Blood Potency, your Primal Urge: it determines how powerful your Wonders can be and how powerful you personally can be. As usual it runs on a 1-10 scale and determines the power resource ''du jour'', Mania, how much of it you can spend per turn and how inhuman you become the higher your stat is.

Your inhumanity this time around is represented by Jabir: the inability to communicate with mortals on matters of science. This is represented by a -1 at 1+, -2 at 5+ and -3 at 8+ Inspiration.

On top of that there is the state of Unmada. If a Genius overreaches themselves with scientific effort they run the risk of entering the state of Unmada if they fail an Unmada check. During this a Genius loses their free one point of Mania upon waking up. They also extrude a field much like [[Promethean: The Created|the Disquiet of a Promethean]], except it's SCIENCE! In this field things that clash with the Unmada' worldview start to change or vanish while Manes (things created by Mania) that fit within the Unmada's worldview flock to the Genius to serve and fawn over them. It is possible to escape the state through the use of Willpower-powered rolls, but Manes don't like this and will try to stop the Unmada from becoming a regular Genius again.

If an Unmada triggers an Unmada check they are at risk of becoming Illuminated. Illuminated are essentially the classic amoral enemies that the regular characters of a World of Darkness game try to avoid becoming. Failing this roll allows the Genius to avoid becoming an Illuminated by spending a Willpower point and reducing their Obligation by one: if they hit 0 they automatically become Illuminated. A Dramatic Failure will turn them Illuminated immediately. Success will hold off the change.

===Mania===
The core resource of the game. Mania is that which grants the Genius their ideas and powers their madness. Nobody knows exactly what Mania is, only what it does. Mania can manifest physically in ways of SCIENCE: arcs of lightning between devices, a glow in a test tube, the whine that is paired with the physical strain upon a machine and more. Aside from powering one's Wonders by spending Mania for every use or per day active Mania can be used for the following:

*Enhance Mental Attributes for a +1 bonus per turn. Directors and Navigators can also enhance their Social and Physical Attributes this way, respectively.
*Power mundane technology. Even for all their super-science Geniuses will still need lights, computers, vehicles and so on. By channeling Mania into mundane technology it can function without fuel or power for some amount of time, going from one day (lights in a single room) to 10 minutes (computers, heavy machinery).
*Get a +1 bonus to using mundane technology for one turn. All 10s rolled damage the object for one-quarter of its Structure points, meaning that four 10s will destroy the object in question.
*Understand a piece of technology, both mundane and wondrous items. This allows a Genius to learn what a particular object is for and what it does, but not any hidden functions or who made it. This does not allow the Genius to operate the object if it would require a skill that they do not have, though.
*Dismantle a technological object. By spending a point of Mania and rolling Dexterity + Crafts (Medicine in case of an organic device) a Genius can deal that much Bashing or Lethal damage that ignores durability but not Defense. With a Merit this can turn into a ranged attack.

Mania can be regained in one of six ways:

*Every morning a Genius wakes up with fresh new ideas. This is represented by the regaining of one point of Mania. Unmada however do not gain this point, for this point is spent on their Unmada Field.
*A Genius can engage in research for up to six hours per day. In these six hours they can either think really hard to regain one point of Mania per two hours, or engage with people or objects. They can talk to fellow researchers, read science magazines, tinker a bit or just scribble down notes to regain one point of Mania per hour. A Genius can opt to research for more than six hours per day, but per hour over six studied per day the Genius will have to take an Unmada check with a cumulative -1 penalty past the first.
*Ranting to a prisoner. The movie trope of telling a captured person one's evil plans before trying to kill them is immensely cathartic. This ranting can be done only once a day, takes at least 30 seconds and requires an unwilling prisoner (so no engaging in kinky foreplay for you!). This regenerates a powerful Inspiration + Presence, but comes at the cost of triggering an Unmada check and the requirement of having to kidnap someone, both of which are Obligation transgressions.
*Destroying a valuable object that disagrees with a Genius' particular worldview. Only Unmada can do this, once a day, to regain Inspiration + Resolve in Mania. This is also an Obligation transgression.
*Storing and draining. This can be a Manes, Beholden or a Capacitor (a device that any Genius can build for the specific purpose of holding Mania) that had the Mania transferred into them at an earlier date. This allows the Genius to store away Mania, rebuild their reserves over the course of days to gather a vast pool of Mania.
*Using the Calculus Vampire Merit to draw Genius from other people. If done to someone with Mania of their own this is done on a 1:1 scale based on the number of successes, while those who have not have their Mental skills targeted and drained instead, again on a 1:1 basis. This requires both physical contact and something science-y happening: hypnosis, draining fluids, mind-reading or something similar all qualify. The Technomancer Merit allows the exchange between Mania and the types of energy used by other splats like Vitae, Mana, Glamour and others, as well as converting them to and from the other type of energy. When combining the two it becomes possible to violently drain metanormal entities.

===Obligation===
With great Wonders comes great responsibility. Most Geniuses are aware of their strained link to society, so they focus on that which ties them: their Obligation. Whether this is to improve, protect, heal or punish them is irrelevant: the Obligation is there. Obligation does not allow for rationalization along the lines of "the [[greater good]]": if you violate the standards of normal humanity then you violate your Obligation. Geniuses start at Obligation 7 (as is the rough standard), but it can be bought down to 5 in exchange for 5[[XP]] per decreased point.

With Obligation 7 or higher the Genius is seen as a Paragon. This means that they are seen as a trustworthy authority by mortals and gains +1 on all Social checks when acting from this authority, and efforts to tarnish the Paragon's reputation is met with a -3 penalty. Meanwhile, the less Obligation a Genius has the more stunted their social skills are. At 3 or 4 Obligation they get a -1 penalty to all Social checks and -2 at 1 or 2 Obligation. If a Genius' Obligation hits 0 they become Illuminated and as per WoD tradition are no longer playable. Illuminated do not get the decreased rolls on Social checks, but they are next to incapable of meaningful communication anyway.

{|border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="0"
|-
| align=center | '''Obligation''' || align=center | '''Transgression'''
|-
| '''10''' || Allowing one's wonder to risk Havoc. Using wonders to accomplish a task when it could have been accomplished just as well with mundane science or skill. Experimenting on animals. (Roll five dice)
|-
| '''9''' || Allowing one's wonder to turn temporarily orphan. Altering oneself or another person with mad science, even temporarily (not including healing). Going a day without human contact. Minor selfish acts. Performing surgery. (Roll five dice)
|-
| '''8''' || Injury to another (accidental or otherwise). Failing to help a victimized innocent in need. Triggering an unmada check in oneself. Emotional manipulation. Grave-robbing, dissection, or making zombies. Allowing one's wonder to turn permanently orphan. (Roll four dice)
|-
| '''7''' || Petty theft (shoplifting). Allowing an innocent to die or be seriously injured without making effort to save the person. Making a person beholden. Mind control. Experimenting on willing human subjects (including oneself) where there is some possibility of harm. Unintentional mass property damage brought about by Inspiration. (Roll four dice)
|-
| '''6''' || Grand theft (burglary). Kidnapping. "Editing" to gather Mania. Going a week without human contact. Creating an intelligent machine (Automata 4+). Body swapping. (Roll three dice)
|-
| '''5''' || Killing an intelligent being. Intentional, mass property damage (arson, most doom cannons). Experimenting on willing human subjects (including oneself) where there is a serious possibility of death or harm. Programming permanent psychological limitations into an intelligent being. (Roll three dice)
|-
| '''4''' || Impassioned serious crime (manslaughter). Sadistic mind control (of the "forcing two friends to fight for your amusement" variety or similar acts of cruelty.) Permanently and significantly altering your physical form (adding two more arms, etc.) (Roll two dice)
|-
| '''3''' || Going a month without human contact. Planned serious crime (murder). Slavery. Experimenting on unwilling human subjects where there is a serious possibility of death or harm. Permanently and entirely altering your physical form (uploading yourself into a computer or becoming a giant caterpillar). (Roll two dice)
|-
| '''2''' || Bringing the dead back to life. Rape or sexual mind control. Serial murder. Spreading massive plague and devastation. (Roll one die)
|-
| '''1''' || Mass murder. Hideous experiments on unwilling human subjects. Scientific torture. Genocide. (Roll one die.)
|}

==Laws of Mad Science==
Much like how [[vampire]]s have a [[Vampire: The Masquerade|Masquerade]], Geniuses have a series of laws in place. This is less of the self-serving nature of not being hunted by angry mobs (though that could still happen), but more to not drive the Genius in question even more insane than they already are. The Laws are rather straightforward, and most Geniuses are content with not horribly violating them.

*'''The Law of Broken Theory''', aka ''Popper's Little Secret'', tells Geniuses to not be a dick to one another and try to disprove one another's Wonders. Doing so would result in a contest of scientific dick measuring and create an environment where nobody gets any science done.
*'''The Science is Science Law''', aka ''the Anticlark Corollary'', states that while Clarke's Third Law might have a point, it is not actual magic. Sure, it is derived from theories that circumvent or ignore physical laws, a Wonder will ''never'' ignore the laws of physics. Geniuses practice science, not magic.
*'''The Black Box Law''', aka ''Goldblum's Diatribe'', describes that while a Genius might know what their Wonders do, they do not know exactly ''how'' they do this. Some Geniuses believe that the use of Mania allows one to use the path of least resistance to get a Wonder working, but nobody really knows how their Wonders work. Because if they did they would not be practicing mad science, just regular science.
*'''The Mere Mortal Law''', aka ''Gilligan's Rule'', postulates that when a regular mortal gets their hands on a Wonder it will maim/kill/eat them. Giving a Wonder to a mortal is like giving a gun to a chimpanzee: it will go wrong sooner or later, and you should probably be very far away when that happens.
*'''The Obvious Truth Law''', aka ''Mulder's Lament'', differs Geniuses from many of the other WoD games in that there's not some great conspiracy or masquerade in place to protect everyday people. They can see and remember Wonders just fine, and unless specifically shielded in some way a Wonder will show up on camera footage just like any other physical object would. Those who do come into contact with a Wonder and don't either get killed by it or dismiss it as madness might very well become part of the next generation of Geniuses themselves.

==Catalysts==
It wouldn't be a New World of Darkness game without the omnipresent X/Y Axis [[splat]]s. In Genius the "racial" splat is the Catalyst, that which drove a normal scientist to become a Genius. The process of Catalyzation, the Breakthrough, is somewhere in between an [[Mage: The Awakening|Awakening]] and an [[Planeswalker|Ignition]]: a moment of brilliance followed by a lifetime of potential. The names of the Catalysts are all in German, while other terms pertaining to Geniuses are in Latin, Greek, English and more. Why? Because SCIENCE, that's why!

===Grimm, The Catalyst of Fury===
The Grimm take to the other meaning of "mad" when practicing their mad science. Their Breakthrough is out of anger at something or someone and now seek things like revenge, justice, retribution or just a desire to fuck shit up. This makes them rather straightforward and rarely swayed by paranoia or sentimentality, for they are filled with nothing but the will to get something done. Despite this the Grimm tend to be rather irrational, wanting to have a go at whoever or whatever caused them to have their Breakthrough without any regard for what is reasonable or sane. Their favored Axiom is Katastrofi, with which a Grimm can build some rather interesting and lethal rayguns.

===Hoffnung, The Catalyst of Vision===
The Hoffnung are men and women with a Vision. Yes, the capital-V kind. When regular thinkers and visionaries start to form their ideas they might expand their view of the world enough to have their Breakthrough. From here a Hoffnung starts to build Wonders to make their Vision a reality, and woe to those who get in the way. This makes them supremely narcissistic, feeling that they and only they are in the right and that everyone else is wrong for not sharing their vision. Their favored Axiom is Metaptropi, which changes the world much like they want to.

===Klagen, The Catalyst of Loss===
The edgy Catalyst. Klagen are fully aware of the fact that they live in the World of Darkness and what that means. They have always lost at least one person to madness, obsession or a rampaging [[Werewolf: The Forsaken|Bale Hound]]. While they mope around all day they do try and make things better though, undoing the damage that was done and healing those who were hurt. This is not out of altruistic purposes though: it's because they seek to make themselves feel better. They are prone to bouts of depression and making the misery they carry around get the better of them. Their favored Axiom is Exelixi, with which they can heal and repair done damages.

===Neid, The Catalyst of Banishment===
''They called me mad! Well, I'll show them! I'll show them all!'' That's pretty much Neid in a nutshell. They suffered before or during their Breakthrough, filling them with the desire to get even with whomever it was that wronged them. They see others as out to get them, to disprove their perfectly valid creations and mock them for it. As such the Neid want to prove their worth and the truth of their convictions, a volatile mix of insecurity, rage and paranoia. Their favored Axiom is Epikrato, which allows them to control others and ''make'' them listen.

===Staunen, The Catalyst of Curiousity===
Staunen practice mad science for the sake of mad science. Think Doc Brown taken up to 11. Staunen are always hungry for ''more''. More knowledge, more data, more records and more analysis. Staunen either seep into their Breakthrough so slowly it's difficult to tell exactly when the Breakthrough took place, or they are snapped into it by being exposed to something beyond their comprehension and want to learn more. All this curiosity can lead to fixation, an obsession with things no-one else would find interesting. Their favored Axiom is Apokalypsi, which allows them to see more and learn more than they ever could before.

==Foundations==
The other axis, the Foundations provide a Genius with the ''what'' and the ''how'' to complement the ''why'' of the Catalysts. The Foundations are groups of like-minded Geniuses who have banded together to pursue a common goal.

Together the five Foundations form the Peerage, which is more or less a scientific take on [[Mage: The Ascension|the Nine Mystic Tradition from Mage]]. Together they oppose the Baramins of Lemuria, a group of Foundations that act like a mix of [[Mage: The Ascension#The Technocratic Conventions|the Technocracy]] and [[Vampire: The Masquerade|the Sabbat]]. There are also Rogue Geniuses who are not part of a Foundation or the Peerage.

===The International Union of Artifice===
Formerly just a bunch of eccentric tinkers, the Artificers have started to make a name for themselves by building top-notch devices, objects and other Wonders. They practice the art of ''mad engineering'', and while simple tools and weapons are within their purview they greatly prefer large, complex devices. Artificiers build because that's what they do, only stopping when they need to find more resources and materials to continue building. They are a poor and loose-knit foundation, accepting anyone who can work with tools regardless of who they are or what their ancestry might be. They tend to keep out of politics as well and would much rather build stuff than engage in philosophical knifefights. Their favored Axioms are Automata and Prostasia, making them the foremost creators of robots and armor in the business.

===The Fellowship of Manifest Direction===
The Directors are the kind of fellows who sit in dimly lit rooms discussing on how to better rule the world. They are the most organized of the Foundations: they are highly regimented, from the lowest Geniuses all the way up to the Clade, a group of 44+ Directors who do the whole secret council meeting thing. They are the masters of ''mad psychology'', interacting with their fellow Geniuses to see what makes them tick. They are the least likely to break out their Wonders though, instead relying on their interpersonal skills to get what they want. Their devices are the likes of hypnosis, manipulation and control, fitting into their whole men in black shtick. Their favored Axioms are Automata and Epikrato. Directors like to be in control, which they attain by either mind control or being in charge of the individual in question to begin with.

===The Center for Circumferential Navigation===
The Navigators are the masters of ''mad physics'', they build machines that allow them to travel at incredible speeds on land, sea and air, as well as through the ground itself, lava and space. They are the most recent of the Foundations, having joined the Peerage some 50 years ago. They left Lemuria because they were sick of being treated as second class Geniuses who were forced to do the heavy lifting with their Wonders instead of being allowed to be researchers in their own right. Because they travel a lot the Navigators are disorganized lot, mostly sticking to themselves while navigating the world on their mobile Wonders. With all their traveling Navigators tend to be tough explorer types, able of dealing with the hardships of the road and the wild. Their favored Axioms are Katastrofi and Skafoi: one to travel the world with, one to defend themselves from attackers with.

===The Reformed Society of Progenitors===
The Progenitors in their current form have risen from the ashes left behind by their predecessors, the Children of the Demiurge. They were a festering wound in the Peerage, filled with Lemurians and Illuminated who were on a dangerous course. So the Peerage uprooted the Children of the Demiurge somewhere in the early 90s, but were quite surprised when something new arose: a vibrant young group of scholars of the body seeing to give evolution a helping hand. As such, the Progenitors took up the place of the Demiurges in the Peerage and went on their way. Theirs is the way of ''mad biology'': raising the dead, cloning, genetic engineering, creating and eradicating diseases and so on. They are the least worried by morals and ethics of all the Peerage, making them more likely to become Illuminated. Their favored Axioms are Automata and Exelixi, [[Simic Combine|which allows them to create and improve on life]].

===The College of Scholastic Theory===
The Scholastics are all about That What Man Was Not Meant To Know. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge: that's what they do. They practice ''mad philosophy'', looking to figure out just what Mania is, how Inspiration really works and other wonders of the world. They are often the adventurer archaeologist types, looking to uncover that which was lost and learning from them in an attempt to better understand the world. They have the most internal strife, with Scholastics constantly bickering and trying to make themselves look good. This has created several fields of study that all compete with one another, even trying to get them dissolved for their own gain. Their favored Axioms are Apokalypsi and Metaptropi, allowing them to find lost knowledge and change things according to their whims.

==Axioms==
{|align=right border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="0"
|-
| align=center colspan=2 | '''Catalysts''' || align=center colspan=3 | '''Foundations'''
|-
| '''Grimm''' || Katastrofi || '''Artificers''' || Automata || Prostasia
|-
| '''Hoffnung''' || Metaptropi || '''Directors''' || Automata || Epikrato
|-
| '''Klagen''' || Exelixi || '''Navigators''' || Katastrofi || Skafoi
|-
| '''Neid''' || Epikrato || '''Progenitors''' || Automata || Exelixi
|-
| '''Staunen''' || Apokalypsi || '''Scholastics''' || Apokalypsi || Metaptropi
|}
Axioms work much like the Spheres from [[Mage: The Ascension]]. You get a rough outline of what you can do with them, from which point on it's all up to you. Fortunately this works a lot better in practice, but building takes some effort: you have to decide what you're going to build, what your Wonder can do, how your stats align with this and so on. This is all a one-time thing though, and once you're done that raygun of yours can be used as normal.

Upon character creation you get three favored Axioms to start with. These cost less to level up and give you a +1 to all attempts to make a Wonder within those Axioms. The first favored Axiom comes from the Genius' Catalyst, the second is one of the two from their Foundation and the third can be any other Axiom. Refer to the chart for all Axioms and who favor them. Rogues get the one from their Catalyst and can pick any two others.

===Apocalypsi: The Axiom of Discovery===
Creating tools for discovery, revealing, communication and scanners. These can be mundane or natural, detecting anything from data in whatever form it may be (from being on a CD to digital to in a book), scan for supernatural creatures, grant telepathy, see across great distances, predict the future via probability and outright reveal the truth, whatever it may be in past, present and future.

===Automata: The Axiom of Independence===
Robots, artificial constructs and other things made to move: that's what Automata's all about. This Axiom uses a system of Automation Points granted from two dots in Automata onwards to upgrade your creations. At two dots these points equal to your Inspiration, while at higher levels you get your Inspiration times your dots in Automata. Additionally, Automata allows a Genuis to build factories that produces a specific kind of object (more if you take the Dynamic Factory variable): this can be anything from simple objects from wood, stone or metal to cutting edge technology, simple or complex plants, animals and even humans, with five dots allowing for the automated creation of Wonders. The actual Automata created this way have intelligence matching the levels of the factories: from only basic input/output, intelligence like a zombie/basic program, animal-like intelligence, human intelligence all the way up to transcendent, allowing them to become Geniuses in their own right.

===Epikrato: The Axiom of Control===
Control, but not just of minds. Sure, it's in there but you can do such more with Epikrato. You can drive cars, unlock a door, control a computer from across the room and so on... and that's just at one dot. Two dots grants you telekinesis, the ability to take over someone's body or just knock them the fuck out. At three it's mind control o' clock, use [[Star Wars|Jedi mind tricks]] or even drain someone's Willpower points, something rarely seen in the World of Darkness. Four dots is where things get interesting with control of probability to allow for manipulation of the stock market, control crowds, influence politics and even control the weather. Five dots is flat out alteration of one's personality or their Talents, morality, memories... or just outright remove someone's mind, turn them into a Beholden and back again, or even transfer consciousness between two things.

===Exelixi: The Axiom of Restoration===
Restoration and repair at low levels, improvement at the medium levels and outright resurrection above that. At just one dot you can restore Bashing or Lethal damage (Aggravated takes four dots), cure disease or create potent life support devices. At two and three dots you can start to mechanically and biologically upgrade yourself and others until you resemble something like a mad science version of a [[Space Marine]]. Things like exo-suits are also possible at this point. Four dots gives you the ability to regenerate, reattach severed limbs and act like a general Deadpool ripoff.

===Katastrofi: The Axiom of Destruction===
Rayguns and missiles and moon lasers, oh my. Katastrofi is the Axiom of blowing shit up for a good reason. Base damage for ''all'' weapons is 5, and only goes up from there. One dot is enough for Bashing damage through pain and shock. Two will give you razor-sharp swords, ray guns and other objects of death. At three you get plasma, lightsabers, disintegration and other such Aggravated goodness. Four gives you Vorpal weapons, and high-tech tools of destruction that rips apart the laws of the universe itself. At five you're pretty much weaponizing black holes, suns and spacetime itself. And yes, you can still do Bashing damage when hitting someone with a black hole on a stick.

===Metaptropi: The Axiom of Transformation===
Change: The Axiom. While it starts off with simple shapechanging at one dot, two can transmute matter and create illusions which can be made to move with Automata. Three dots gives you growing and shrinking rays, which can be used to add and remove health dots for a short amount of time. This can be quite effective in a fight. Four gives all sorts of fantastical transformations like giving wings, altering Attributes, turn into a dragon or a cyborg, grow armor or gain some Physical Merits. At five the real fun begins: change one's phase of matter, become invisible, phase through things or create [[Rope Trick Bunker of Doom|one's own pocket dimension]].

===Prostasia: The Axiom of Protection===
A rather straightforward Axiom, Prostasia grants protection in the form of armor or base durability, depending on what kind of Wonder it is applied to. It is the counterpart of Katastrofi, being pretty much the only thing whose toughness is not shrugged off by that Axiom. It also grants protection from atmospheric pressure, does not show up on radar, stacks with other types of armor (physical/shielding) and only costs Mania when activated. It can also be used to create tough locks, provide mental shielding, protect servers and be invisible.

===Skafoi: The Axiom of Travel===
If you want a sick motorbike that can drive up walls, cross the ocean and even go to space, then this is the Axiom for you. One dot is for ground and water vehicles, two is for those in the air, underwater and underground, three for spacecraft and super-submarines, four is for teleporters, superluminal speeds and dimensional travel. Now with free artificial gravity! At five you can distort time to essentially gain super speed, turning fifteen minutes into a second... or you can say screw that noise and build a time machine.

==Downloads==
[https://sites.google.com/site/moochava/genius Download the game here.]

{{WoD-Games}}
[[Category:Homebrew Settings]]
[[Category:Homebrew Rules]]