Good Eidolon

Eidolon · Good Eidolon

Hello, Guys RL I'm Tony and I'm wanting to be an Eidolon for the next event (likely native).

Iv'e gone through the previous threads already but would appreciate and hints and tips you could give me.

I would also like to know what people think makes a good/bad player and a great/crap Eidolon.

Thanks guys

Tony

Bacon

Hi Tony! Welcome to the boards.

In answer to your question, I think the best eidolons have a clearly defined purpose. I don't think it's enough to just be an Angel/Demon/Spirit, I think you really need to know what you're going to be the Spirit of, and what you intend to do with yourself. A lot of players tend to ignore or disparage eidolons, so it helps if you have a good excuse to be hard to ignore.

It can also help if you write a short background for PD, and tell them what you want your 'original mission' to be. This gives you one mission that will always be available for you to carry out, and ensures that you always have something to do that you know you will enjoy, even if nothing else is going to plan.

Distinctive kit is useful for getting yourself noticed, but bear in mind that being noticed often diminshes an Eidolon's combat effectiveness, and since you can never count on getting blessings or skills, you will need every hard skill advantage you can get. It is much harder to play an Eidolon than it is to play any other type of character, but it is also a lot more fun Very Happy

Hammerhydra · My two pfecks

I tend to wax lyrical (i.e. talk bollocks) about Eidoloning, but if I cut out my own crap I have two main suggestions:

Be An Eidolon. Read through your briefing and think hard about how it will effect your character. You are something pretty damn special in the game world - don't be afraid to let rip where you might otherwise be cautious.

Don't Just Be An Eidolon. Eidolons are all individuals, with a heck of a lot of history and personality to shape them. What's your character's style? Why are they like that? How have they developed? What makes you you?

Requiem

Get To Know The Mortals, Fast. Get to know all likely targets for your imperatives, so when the gods throw you a curveball you know how you're going to spin this one to the mortals. Turning up with an irrelevant message is worse than turning up without one.

Get To Know The Imperatives. Mortals will ask you what the will of the Gods is. It's fairly easy to construct a picture of what the will of the Gods is from what the imperatives are. In my opinion this is very worth doing, it makes you sound more knowledgeable and holy.

Have A Plan, a concept - but don't be afraid to change it when you hit play. Auriel is nearly unrecognisable from his original concept. I suspect the same can be said of Mardocai. Then again, Lies is a good example of a strong initial concept well followed through.

Be Recognised. Your look is far more important than your concept in terms of how good people will think you are. I'd go so far as to say - do not play a squigglehead (that is, minimum necessary physrep), because people will not recognise you, you will not stand out from the crowd.

Don't Back Down. You're immortal, you're literally God's gift to mortalkind. There is no excuse for bottling out. Eidolons are supposed to be shit-stirrers.

Act as if you deserve respect, for the above reason. People will respect you if by your every action you are sending nonverbal signals of "Respect me!"

A good player will not expect people to react to them with respect and reverence, and will therefore be endlessly happily surprised. A good player will not use all the knowledge that they cannot help but gather OOC due to the amount we spend walking around 'not there'. A good player will not bring the exact wording of their divine missions to the mortals (this point is not immediately obvious, but it makes the game more fun for everyone if it is followed). A bad player will bitch and whine rather than react IC to something. A bad player will exploit their status as 'allowed to wander around invisible'.

A great eidolon will be one whose name everyone knows. Who is included in every prayer - that of your friends, as a commendation, and that of your enemies, as a plea for aid. Who has an entire camp on edge by walking in. Who understands that their weapons are there almost entirely for show, and that fighting is done to make a point and that alone. Whose appearance is individual, iconic, recognisable and widely known.

A crap eidolon will be one who is 'an immortal member of $group', who ignores their imperatives not because of good reasons but because they want to sit and drink with their mates, who turns up to help someone without any idea of how they can do this, who doesn't play nicely with the other eidolons.

Justice

Boohoohoo *sniff *sniff - Im such a bad player Sad

Cry* boohooohoo...

I will add you can be a squiggle head... it just means your character has to be remembered for their deeds and actions and not their costume...

However as fallen we play a very very different game...

*Crys, im so bad Sad

Requiem

Persephon

I'll try to add a smidgen of my own distilled wisdom.

Image is everything.

It's been said before, but bears repeating endlessly. As an eidolon, your power and influence are directly proportional to the strength of your image. Do anything to further your repute and reinforce your concept, even in the face of apparent adversity; you have as long as you like to nurture your long term goals, so don't sacrifice them in favour of short-term convenience.

Play to your OC strengths.

Eidolons lack the comforting embrace of blessings, skills and other IC coddles, at least to begin with; as such, to establish yourself you should play to your OC abilities, or 'hard skills'.

You might be a capable debater, combatant, manipulator, carouser, buffoon, infiltrator, inimidator, inspirer, or simply good fun to be around. Eidolons have established a tradition of 'narrow psyche' to mirror the angels, spirits and demons of myth; use this to capitalise on the style of play you find accessible and rewarding, and ignore others.

I will go so far as to consider your appearance, also; matters of stature and form can make a big difference to your image. For example, I'm 5'8" and eight stone. I simply couldn't nurture the same imposing visage as the likes of Auriel! Instead, I've gone for an alternative aesthetic that I hope is just as effective.

Complement, don't compete.

There's only so much conceptual space in a player's head, and eidolons do their best to fill it - embodying different aspects of their nature to become clearly recognisable concepts.

Dont live in the shadow of existing 'celebrities'. Attempting to portray the 'rational monster' better than Flail, the 'inspiring enigma' better than Riddle or the 'gung-ho playboy' better than Primus is making life hard for yourself! Instead, find an interesting take on your patron (or Fallen nature), and run with it.

Don't get intimidated.

Playing an eidolon, if you're able to relax into the role and avoid unreasonable expectations, is far easier than most people think. This is, perhaps, the real Great Eidolon Conspiracy.

Skaven Dave

All of the above and then some.

I'd suggest thinking of a three word 'Archetype' to describe your character. Then play around with costume, prosthetics and make-up until you feel you represent that description, expand on it, or find something better!

It doesn't need to be expensive kit to look good, but do ensure that, to the best of your abilities and available costume, you pull off something of the 'Divine', or 'Monter' somehow. There are plenty of inspirational ideas out there in world mythlore and fantasy art.

Expanding on Persephon's 'Don't compete with the big guns' and the other advice above, find your own niche.

There are plenty out there undiscovered waiting for the right Eidolon player to fill. There are probably vacancies and untapped player groups we don't recognize yet

There may be a perception that there are too many Eidolons of a particular Deity out there. It's true that some are heavily subscribed (Jaguar and Weaver for example), yet somehow most of the Eidolons are not tripping over each other all the time, and if the character is strong enough, it will make its own vacancy.

Charisma and Presence are your greatest assets.

Certainty and Resolve are your greatest weapons.

Fanor

My suggestion would be this: be the creation of a god. You are there to be that gods arm upon the lands, act like it. Take directives. Do what your god or gods would want you to do, and do it in your way.

And be not a mortal.

Stuff that the mortals can do for themselves, they can do for themselves. You are there to do that which they can't - inspire, awe, terrorise, bless. Where they must tread carefully and fearfully, you can leap boldly. Use that.

As a general rule, I'd agree with the posts above. But at the moment, I'm not following quite a few of them - after initialy going with a very strong image, he's now far more restrained. Why not? Because my character sees that as the best way to serve his god, at the moment. That's his way of doing things, other people work in their ways.

And I'd also agree with the whole 'finding your niche' thing. What can you do that no-one else is doing, what is it that makes you 'special'.

Skaven Dave

Great Eidolons -

A summing up in one word. Impact.

A Great Eidolon should leave no character encountering it any doubt as to the fact they have come into contact with a Divine Messenger, and that their life has been changed in some way (for the better, worse or more interesting)

There are of course, inverses of the above who are also Great Eidolons, because they are secretive, covert, subtle and quiet and get whatever they need done by cunning and guile and and never let on to their true nature. (We don't see very much of them for some reason...)

Sho

My advice: Ignore all of the above.

Find something YOU are comfortable playing,
An ethos YOU can support and back up,
A costume that YOU can feel comfortable with.
An Eidolon is a one shot deal do not get railroaded into other peoples preconceptions, Stand firm, stand tall and remember this is YOUR character make it special to You and it will become special to others.

Eidolon

Thanks guys! really helpful.

If anyone else can think of anything else still appreciated.

Nath

- Have a very strong obvious concept. Being two dimensional may actually be a good thing - it makes you seem less 'human.' Looking at gods and spirits from mythology for inspiration may be useful.

- On the costume front, if you want to stand out strong colour coding is quite effective. We've had the white eidolon (mordecai), the black eidolon (legion) and the red eidolon (lies) for example. Of course, you might also decide to play a undercover eidolon posing as a mortal.

- If loyal, think about your opinion the gods and their imperatives. Eidolons have free will (the new rulebook says so), but how and when you choose to use it varies massively across different eidolons. I'm not advising you on which way you should go here -just consider beforehand your view on this. Related to this are questions such as how honest with the faithful you are - do you think a divine messenger should ever withhold god's plan from his followers, or ever actively decieve them?

- If favoured of one god, think about how and when you became favoured. What did you do that won your god's favour? Is it something that still echoes across time?

- If fallen, think about when and why you fell? What motivated you to withhhold and enshrine a soul? power? curiousity? love? If you didn't enshrine but got damned, think about who did this and why?

- Consider in which culture / time period your character was most active (if nothing else, you get the briefing sheet for the culture you pick). How do you relate to your 'pet' culture? Think about how much culture shock you may suffer entering the 'modern' world for the first time ('last time I was out, I was teaching mortals how to rub flint to make fire. Now they have developed flinklock guns')

Illithidbix

Alot of stuff I'd say has already been said above.

Just to reiterate a few points.

If nothing else, sit down and think about your eidolon character. Read the brief thoughrally. Whilst in many ways eidolons are angels and demons, in many ways they are something quite different from the classical interpreation, eidolons in maelstrom have a unique flavour.

Be prepeared for how things operate in play to be against what you expect.
Don't go in expecting instant respect, be prepared to have to earn it.

Try and create a character who will be fun for you to play, irrespective of the attention you may or may not receive.

Be prepared for a hell of a challenge, but one that is none the less very very rewarding.

ChessyPig

Something you might not have considered is - think how complicated you want to make your soul symbol.

If you can find a simple, unique, striking soul symbol, people will remember it and mention it in their prayers, and they will be able to recognise you in a range of forms.

However, if you don't want to be recognised whatever form you wear, go for some intricate and complicated character with few memorable features, and everyone will just glaze over (or make entertainingly furious efforts to properly transcribe it, depending on how much you irritated them).

Requiem

AAaaaaaargh, yes, Flayl's old soul symbol. Didn't you have a stamp for it or something? I remember memorising it so I could sketch it in the dirt for people.

><

Justice

Yes the old symbol was a stamp Smile

although Aestar actually used to scribe it on her head... Crazy creative lady she is Smile

Fanor

Hammerhydra

If nothing else, choosing a symmetrical symbol does avoid the wonderful Sunday morning "which bloody way round does it go?" introspection.

Richard

I don't know, on Sunday morning I cannae tell which way round mine goes, and it is symmetrical.

Requiem

I had a stencil, but I lost it in the Maelstrom tent. It looked like a piece of rubbish so was probably thrown away.

Still, I have to poke myself in the eyebrows in order to remember which way round my deliberately asymmetric symbol goes.

huwa

Beware of the consequences of having too simple a soul symbol.
Many people shout "hey, equals sign!" at me.
But it gets you known...
There are many motivations for playing an immortal character that gets spoonfed plot, and i agree that you should try to find your own. Things are never as simple as they appear.
There are some fantastic archetypes out there, but most of them are not the same as they started. As with any character, the eidolon develops over the first few times it is played, and the best way to find a niche is to have a squinny.
We have the ability to change how we manifest, so don't worry to much about the kit thing. If you decide after playing that you'd rather have wings and horns, grow them! Personality is rather different, but still flexible.
And have fun. There is bugger all point in playing a character that you don't enjoy.

William Burke

If you're going to use a stencil, why not simply write 90T on the top of it? Wink

Eidolon

Good Eidolon

My two pfecks