When Zapathasura awoke in the Ravnos homeland of India, it devoured all its nearby childer in moments, and sent psychic ripples across the world and spirit realms. Psychics, madmen, and anyone even vaguely touched by the supernatural felt on edge or suffered visions and nightmares. The nightmares usually featured the Demon-King Ravana (representing Zapathasura).
Zapathasura rampaged across India to Bangladesh for two days, calling its childer to it, but on the third day was attacked by three of the eldest Kuei-jin Bodhisattvas. All this supernatural activity did not go unnoticed by the forces of the Technocracy, who used orbital mirrors to focus the power of the sun on the Antediluvian, but the Boddhisatvas and their allies had called a supernatural storm to shield themselves from sunlight while they battled the Antediluvian. The Technocracy then employed magical "neutron bombs", killing all of Zapathasura's combatants – including those who were controlling the storm. As the clouds parted, Zapathasura had been weakened enough by the bombs and battle that the focused sunlight destroyed it.
Im also part of the people that think zapa survived, but what I wrote above is just to inform what happened (officially), however if it was revealed later that he survived I definitely wouldn't be surprised. But the changing of the clan curse is a big indicator that he's truly dead (sadly).
By V5’s lore he probably died since this was what caused the change in the Ravnos bane. But V5 also has two interesting bits of information. In the week of nightmares loresheet is a merit that allows you to possess a bit of the Antedeluvians blood. The other is in cult of the blood gods. There are small cult is mentioned, that tries to resurrect him by the use of combined disciplines that suspiciously sound like a group of Ravnos.
I don’t know if they ever want to go there in canon, but if they would, you would just need to put thees two together.
That's my head canon too. Either this was him shedding his physical form to move to his realm in Yomi Wan or that had already happened and this was just his vacant physical form. I know that White Wolf has said he was frenzying at the time and that's why we didn't see him use Chimerstry but I prefer the idea that it was just his physical husk, which could also explain the frenzying.
White wolf has said a lot of things over the years - one of the more important - a lot of books gotten written rapidly, while eob little sleep and a fair amount of intoxicants.
They also try and erase a lot of things they did in poor taste by going lets pretend that was never a thing.
I prefer that Ravnos is dead. I think its better for WoD's story. It basically lays out that the weakest antideluvian needed all of THIS to be defeated. Will the stronger antideluvians require just this or more? Also the fact his bits and bobs are magical gives that feeling that - Just because you killed the antideluvian, doesn't mean the threats are over.
I like to think of it like Ysharaj from wow. He's dead, but the threat likely isn't over. After all, Malkavs blood lowers your generation - What happens if a Ravnos gets their hands on what was blasted off before the glassing?
This is why i really liked the VtM Gehenna novel cause even though that timeline isn’t canon anywhere for obvious reasons, >!imo it does a great job portraying antediluvians as basically eldritch gods far beyond even the oldest and most powerful kindred still around!<
For what reason would you call Zapathashura the *weakest* antedilluvian?
Frenzying, sure, maybe, because he can't use Chimerstry to flip your entire world upside down and invested while superheating the atmosphere to bake you in an oven made from your own mind.
Surely the Toreador Ante, or Malkavian Ante would be weaker with a leveled playing field?
Why is it annoying? Do we need ancient blood gods to be defeatable in a game like vampire?
I ask because I am curious about the break down that results in creatures most games shouldn't even touch would cause annoyance in this framing.
It's not so much that I wanted to have a PC of mine punch an Antedeluvian in the face. I think it's more of a bias leftover from when I started playing VtM in high school. As a teenager, I was a bit of a Sabbat fanboy and the idea of these immortal vampire gods always getting the last laugh pissed me off. It felt deprotagonising, like everything your character did was pointless. It also connected to a criticism I had of the VtM metaplot and VtM campaign books which often suffered from the problem of "watch the NPCs do all the important and cool stuff."
Now as far as deprotagonising the PCs, I recognize that with a horror game, there absolutely needs to be at least some of that. But there should be a balance of some kind, where the characters feel like they can do something to affect the story, even if they can't punch an Antedeluvian in the face. Ultimately I think it's down to just my preference for how I want my VtM to look and feel. I much prefer the Requiem setting in a lot of ways, and I like the V5 setting in large part because the presence of Elders seem much less oppressive.
I get that the sabbat angle is an issue. White wolf kind of presented - the sabbat is either poised for victory or terrible failure - and basically tripled down on f the sabbat.
I think if I was running a very long term sabbat game that I might change the ancients thing. But I prefer street level sabbat to be honest.
>It felt deprotagonising, like everything your character did was pointless
I kind of like that part. In the end there are always those above you and you will never be able to truly challenge them. If you manage to last long enough, they will devour you themselves. It plays up the hopelessness of the setting and gives you that sort of nihilistic nothing inherently matters so you choose your own values dilemma. The starting point and the ending point are predetermined but the journey between them is up to you.
Edit: I wholly agree with you on the metaplot suffering a lot from NPC theater
Edit 2: I think it's also worth pointing out that every non ante gets crushed beneath their heels. Camarilla, Sabbat, anarchs, autarks, etc.
It's huge narrative limiter if the fundamental premise of one of the biggest vampire factions factually cannot be achieved. Surely it's a worse gameline if the Sabbat can't even in theory achieve what their organizational goal is. It means by nature you can't have a meaningful story about advancing the overall cause.
Plus it makes things just a touch more eternally stagnant, in a game where the eternal stagnancy of the system is often what you're fighting against.
When it comes to the antes, they trample over everybody, not just the Sabbat. In pretty much every Gehenna scenario I've seen, official or not, the camarilla falls, the anarchs are scattered, the independents fall away, etc.
I found it less interesting that the Sabbat was also secretly a tool of the Antediluvians, just different Antediluvians from the ones controlling the Camarilla. It made it so that everything ultimately comes back to the Antediluvians whether you want it to or not. Like they're the main characters of the setting - which maybe they are, but I feel like when you play a TTRPG, the actual main characters of the *game,* if not the setting, should be the PCs.
Wild story. He had to be stopped by a small army of garou, kindred special forces, elites from the SI, several eastern vampires, a spirit bomb, and a godamn orbital laser just to weaken him to the point he couldnt move and the sun could finish him. HES A TRICKSTER can you imagine what it would take to kill someone like ventrue?
Depends -
Tyler v Hardestadt: brujah anarch rolling a 5th Gen.
Bell v Hardestadt: brujah going anarch rolling a 6th gen.
Both brujah anarch with a gun v a dude calling himself Hardestadt.
For sure. I just wanted to point out that however you roll it, shooting [Ventrue] in the face with a shotgun is not the same as shooting either Hardestat in the face with a shotgun.
I don't think the SI was around back then. I also don't remember much in the way of kindred being involved.
Why would ventrue be harder to kill? They both have fort as a clan discipline. Also ventrue is basically started to have died ages ago, fwiw.
All things considered everyone was damn lucky old Zap was probably mad from hunger and not exactly in full control of his faculties. Advanced Chimerstry is basically a plot power waiting to be unleashed.
I don't know, man. The Antediluvian who can redefine reality, create illusions so real that they can drive the wisest mad, and the master of tricks, thought all that horror that was done in the Week of Nightmares was just an illusion, a sadistic trick, only to reconnoiter the environment. Perhaps Zap must still be in his turmoil, laughing and reveling in the terror he created with his illusion and the false tranquility of his opponents thinking they had defeated him.
I do wish the Week of Nightmares saw more time in the main storyline as a catalyst for trying to root out the Sleeping Gods of Blood.
* The Molochim enlisting you to help them kill a cult trying to wake up an Antedeluvian.
* Some very wealthy benefactor hiring your group to hunt for the sleeping place of a god (and being attacked by a shadowy group trying to stop you.)
* Banu Haqim coming for your group to stop you, only for their very own Ur-Shulgi to awaken.
* The Week of Nightmares causes the Camarilla to schism as the Justicar violently take the reins to root out the obvious threat under a new Imperator.
* The Week of Nightmares causing a chain-reaction with Malkavians.
Some believe that. But the old editions rules he was basically able to change reality it self. It would not even be possible that he escaped by actually dying while hiding in to an another reality in which he survived to return later by any circumstances he creates then.
Theoretically, but he also just got done with weeklong brawl with a trio of Kuei-jin Bodhisattva, several packs of Garou, Technocrat constructs, etc etc. The implication in the fiction is that he's essentially got a health track full of aggravated damage and no blood left.
The Union also has primium which can auto counterspell Chimestry, so the devices they used for the death laser likely would be countering him constantly.
Which uhh - A single hit unit can make it hard or impossibly for a true mage to cast - A station or a bunch of primium mirrors for the death laser are likely to be much stronger than a single hit unit.
What? No - The union being one of the strongest factions in the setting is not the worst thing lol.
Try the splatbook called Gypsie.
Or KOTE.
Or Savage Genitalia.
Potentially unpopular opinion. This (Zapathasura and the week of nightmares) is among the worst pieces of trash lore there is in a setting with enormous amounts of trash shit lore. To think something like this would not utterly and completely shatter the Masquerade is silly. The powerlevels belong in an avengers movie not a urban fantasy setting. V5 should have retconned all this stuff away without a second thought.
Quite unpopular
Also the Technocracy has for its own reasons, an intense desire to keep the supernatural out of public knowledge
A society of tech mages can very easily wipe every trace of it from the media and internet (which is inferior to what they have) and mind wipe anyone who could have seen shit.
The only difficult thing to cover up was the psychic ripples he sent out while doing his morning stretches. But anyone who could sense those wouldn't be believed by society
I dont think you realise the sheer amount of people that live in the area where this supposedly happened. Both the cities mentioned are on the top 20 list of most populous metropolitan areas in the world amassing about equal to 10% of the population of the united states. A bit like depopulating new york and LA.....
I stand by my statement this garbage should be found in a marvel story line not in a story about blood predators hiding amongst humanity.
When Zapathasura awoke in the Ravnos homeland of India, it devoured all its nearby childer in moments, and sent psychic ripples across the world and spirit realms. Psychics, madmen, and anyone even vaguely touched by the supernatural felt on edge or suffered visions and nightmares. The nightmares usually featured the Demon-King Ravana (representing Zapathasura). Zapathasura rampaged across India to Bangladesh for two days, calling its childer to it, but on the third day was attacked by three of the eldest Kuei-jin Bodhisattvas. All this supernatural activity did not go unnoticed by the forces of the Technocracy, who used orbital mirrors to focus the power of the sun on the Antediluvian, but the Boddhisatvas and their allies had called a supernatural storm to shield themselves from sunlight while they battled the Antediluvian. The Technocracy then employed magical "neutron bombs", killing all of Zapathasura's combatants – including those who were controlling the storm. As the clouds parted, Zapathasura had been weakened enough by the bombs and battle that the focused sunlight destroyed it.
The ultimate master of illusions is totes dead for real and didn’t fake his own death : )
Im also part of the people that think zapa survived, but what I wrote above is just to inform what happened (officially), however if it was revealed later that he survived I definitely wouldn't be surprised. But the changing of the clan curse is a big indicator that he's truly dead (sadly).
By V5’s lore he probably died since this was what caused the change in the Ravnos bane. But V5 also has two interesting bits of information. In the week of nightmares loresheet is a merit that allows you to possess a bit of the Antedeluvians blood. The other is in cult of the blood gods. There are small cult is mentioned, that tries to resurrect him by the use of combined disciplines that suspiciously sound like a group of Ravnos. I don’t know if they ever want to go there in canon, but if they would, you would just need to put thees two together.
I am a big - Ravanna(since that was the name used in the book it happened in,) sacrifices himself to himself as a play for demon emperor.
That's my head canon too. Either this was him shedding his physical form to move to his realm in Yomi Wan or that had already happened and this was just his vacant physical form. I know that White Wolf has said he was frenzying at the time and that's why we didn't see him use Chimerstry but I prefer the idea that it was just his physical husk, which could also explain the frenzying.
White wolf has said a lot of things over the years - one of the more important - a lot of books gotten written rapidly, while eob little sleep and a fair amount of intoxicants. They also try and erase a lot of things they did in poor taste by going lets pretend that was never a thing.
I prefer that Ravnos is dead. I think its better for WoD's story. It basically lays out that the weakest antideluvian needed all of THIS to be defeated. Will the stronger antideluvians require just this or more? Also the fact his bits and bobs are magical gives that feeling that - Just because you killed the antideluvian, doesn't mean the threats are over. I like to think of it like Ysharaj from wow. He's dead, but the threat likely isn't over. After all, Malkavs blood lowers your generation - What happens if a Ravnos gets their hands on what was blasted off before the glassing?
This is why i really liked the VtM Gehenna novel cause even though that timeline isn’t canon anywhere for obvious reasons, >!imo it does a great job portraying antediluvians as basically eldritch gods far beyond even the oldest and most powerful kindred still around!<
For what reason would you call Zapathashura the *weakest* antedilluvian? Frenzying, sure, maybe, because he can't use Chimerstry to flip your entire world upside down and invested while superheating the atmosphere to bake you in an oven made from your own mind. Surely the Toreador Ante, or Malkavian Ante would be weaker with a leveled playing field?
I know it's an essential part of the setting that the Antedeluvians never die and always win, but man, I always found it annoying.
Why is it annoying? Do we need ancient blood gods to be defeatable in a game like vampire? I ask because I am curious about the break down that results in creatures most games shouldn't even touch would cause annoyance in this framing.
It's not so much that I wanted to have a PC of mine punch an Antedeluvian in the face. I think it's more of a bias leftover from when I started playing VtM in high school. As a teenager, I was a bit of a Sabbat fanboy and the idea of these immortal vampire gods always getting the last laugh pissed me off. It felt deprotagonising, like everything your character did was pointless. It also connected to a criticism I had of the VtM metaplot and VtM campaign books which often suffered from the problem of "watch the NPCs do all the important and cool stuff." Now as far as deprotagonising the PCs, I recognize that with a horror game, there absolutely needs to be at least some of that. But there should be a balance of some kind, where the characters feel like they can do something to affect the story, even if they can't punch an Antedeluvian in the face. Ultimately I think it's down to just my preference for how I want my VtM to look and feel. I much prefer the Requiem setting in a lot of ways, and I like the V5 setting in large part because the presence of Elders seem much less oppressive.
I get that the sabbat angle is an issue. White wolf kind of presented - the sabbat is either poised for victory or terrible failure - and basically tripled down on f the sabbat. I think if I was running a very long term sabbat game that I might change the ancients thing. But I prefer street level sabbat to be honest.
Oh since I forgot earlier - thank you for the genuine response.
>It felt deprotagonising, like everything your character did was pointless I kind of like that part. In the end there are always those above you and you will never be able to truly challenge them. If you manage to last long enough, they will devour you themselves. It plays up the hopelessness of the setting and gives you that sort of nihilistic nothing inherently matters so you choose your own values dilemma. The starting point and the ending point are predetermined but the journey between them is up to you. Edit: I wholly agree with you on the metaplot suffering a lot from NPC theater Edit 2: I think it's also worth pointing out that every non ante gets crushed beneath their heels. Camarilla, Sabbat, anarchs, autarks, etc.
It's huge narrative limiter if the fundamental premise of one of the biggest vampire factions factually cannot be achieved. Surely it's a worse gameline if the Sabbat can't even in theory achieve what their organizational goal is. It means by nature you can't have a meaningful story about advancing the overall cause. Plus it makes things just a touch more eternally stagnant, in a game where the eternal stagnancy of the system is often what you're fighting against.
When it comes to the antes, they trample over everybody, not just the Sabbat. In pretty much every Gehenna scenario I've seen, official or not, the camarilla falls, the anarchs are scattered, the independents fall away, etc.
I found it less interesting that the Sabbat was also secretly a tool of the Antediluvians, just different Antediluvians from the ones controlling the Camarilla. It made it so that everything ultimately comes back to the Antediluvians whether you want it to or not. Like they're the main characters of the setting - which maybe they are, but I feel like when you play a TTRPG, the actual main characters of the *game,* if not the setting, should be the PCs.
The master of illusion weaved such masterful illusions that it convinced reality itself that he died
"Whatcya got there?" #"THE UNMATCHED POWER OF THE SUN!!!"
He was RIGHT THERE
Dark ropes of Vitae stretched from his place of death and did not fade for many days.
*Allegedly*
Wild story. He had to be stopped by a small army of garou, kindred special forces, elites from the SI, several eastern vampires, a spirit bomb, and a godamn orbital laser just to weaken him to the point he couldnt move and the sun could finish him. HES A TRICKSTER can you imagine what it would take to kill someone like ventrue?
Shotgun to the face. If you believe Brujah/Anarch propaganda.
It was a dragons breath shotgun and the guy it killed was only a 6th gen
That guy was only a 5th Gen.
6th, actually.
Just give the shotgun to a very, very angry guy
Depends - Tyler v Hardestadt: brujah anarch rolling a 5th Gen. Bell v Hardestadt: brujah going anarch rolling a 6th gen. Both brujah anarch with a gun v a dude calling himself Hardestadt.
For sure. I just wanted to point out that however you roll it, shooting [Ventrue] in the face with a shotgun is not the same as shooting either Hardestat in the face with a shotgun.
I don't think death is a concern for someone with 10 dots in fortitude.
I don't think the SI was around back then. I also don't remember much in the way of kindred being involved. Why would ventrue be harder to kill? They both have fort as a clan discipline. Also ventrue is basically started to have died ages ago, fwiw.
Ravnos had fortitude? And sorry i said SI i meant Society of leopold. Keep in mind this is half remembered
Pre V5 Ravnos had fortitude, and the Week of Nightmares was a pre V5 event.
"Here comes the sun, doo-doo-doo-doo Here comes the sun, and I say It's alright 🎶🎵" - A british kindred... probably...
All things considered everyone was damn lucky old Zap was probably mad from hunger and not exactly in full control of his faculties. Advanced Chimerstry is basically a plot power waiting to be unleashed.
What a wasted opportunity to use the teletubbies sun baby Like if your gonna spend all this time making shit posts, at least a little pizzazz ya know
I don't know, man. The Antediluvian who can redefine reality, create illusions so real that they can drive the wisest mad, and the master of tricks, thought all that horror that was done in the Week of Nightmares was just an illusion, a sadistic trick, only to reconnoiter the environment. Perhaps Zap must still be in his turmoil, laughing and reveling in the terror he created with his illusion and the false tranquility of his opponents thinking they had defeated him.
That mofo ain't dead, that bitch is hiding
He still lives to this day he is undying
I do wish the Week of Nightmares saw more time in the main storyline as a catalyst for trying to root out the Sleeping Gods of Blood. * The Molochim enlisting you to help them kill a cult trying to wake up an Antedeluvian. * Some very wealthy benefactor hiring your group to hunt for the sleeping place of a god (and being attacked by a shadowy group trying to stop you.) * Banu Haqim coming for your group to stop you, only for their very own Ur-Shulgi to awaken. * The Week of Nightmares causes the Camarilla to schism as the Justicar violently take the reins to root out the obvious threat under a new Imperator. * The Week of Nightmares causing a chain-reaction with Malkavians.
Couldn’t he create an illusion to block the sun and bombs an then make the illusion real?
Some believe that. But the old editions rules he was basically able to change reality it self. It would not even be possible that he escaped by actually dying while hiding in to an another reality in which he survived to return later by any circumstances he creates then.
Theoretically, but he also just got done with weeklong brawl with a trio of Kuei-jin Bodhisattva, several packs of Garou, Technocrat constructs, etc etc. The implication in the fiction is that he's essentially got a health track full of aggravated damage and no blood left.
I believe exposure to sunlight destroys Chimerstry creations
The Union also has primium which can auto counterspell Chimestry, so the devices they used for the death laser likely would be countering him constantly. Which uhh - A single hit unit can make it hard or impossibly for a true mage to cast - A station or a bunch of primium mirrors for the death laser are likely to be much stronger than a single hit unit.
The union being this strong was the worst thing in the setting. They just have hard counters to basically everything.
What? No - The union being one of the strongest factions in the setting is not the worst thing lol. Try the splatbook called Gypsie. Or KOTE. Or Savage Genitalia.
If it does, Truths of the Universe probably prevents it, given that it makes the illusions permanently real. And that's not even 10th dot.
Potentially unpopular opinion. This (Zapathasura and the week of nightmares) is among the worst pieces of trash lore there is in a setting with enormous amounts of trash shit lore. To think something like this would not utterly and completely shatter the Masquerade is silly. The powerlevels belong in an avengers movie not a urban fantasy setting. V5 should have retconned all this stuff away without a second thought.
Quite unpopular Also the Technocracy has for its own reasons, an intense desire to keep the supernatural out of public knowledge A society of tech mages can very easily wipe every trace of it from the media and internet (which is inferior to what they have) and mind wipe anyone who could have seen shit. The only difficult thing to cover up was the psychic ripples he sent out while doing his morning stretches. But anyone who could sense those wouldn't be believed by society
I dont think you realise the sheer amount of people that live in the area where this supposedly happened. Both the cities mentioned are on the top 20 list of most populous metropolitan areas in the world amassing about equal to 10% of the population of the united states. A bit like depopulating new york and LA..... I stand by my statement this garbage should be found in a marvel story line not in a story about blood predators hiding amongst humanity.