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I'm preparing to run the story in the Orpheus books and I was wondering what would be the impact of allowing the players to use some rules found in later books early on.

The one that bugs me most are the new shades: phantasm and marrow. For phantasm, there are vague mentions that the story might need to be adjusted to acknowledge that Orpheus should have known about them early, but not much else.

Here's my revised selections. Those with emphasis are those rules that I will wait for their role in the story to introduce, and are listed here for completeness. Normal is used for those rules I think won't have much of an impact. The rules in bold are the ones I look to know the potential impact of being brought in earlier.

  • Crusades of Ashes
    • Merits and Flaws
    • Crucible Merits
    • Artifacts
  • Shades of Gray
    • Phantasm
    • Third-Tier Horrors
    • New roles
    • New backgrounds
  • Shadow Games
    • New functions of spite
    • New stains
  • The Orphans Grinder
    • Crucible Horror
    • Orphan-Grinder Shade
  • End Game
    • Marrow
    • Fourth-tier Horror
    • Vitality emblem
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It is acceptable to answer your own question - would it not be better to split off your details here to an answer? – YogoZuno Dec 13 '12 at 22:44

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up vote 2 down vote accepted

I did precisely what you're describing. I didn't run into any problems handling things as you describe. As you suggest, third- and fourth-tier horrors and vitality emblems are best left until they come up as appropriate in the plot -- or at least they worked well for me as surprises.

I did not have any PCs use Marrow; I did have a PC who used Phantasm. That character was not unbalanced with respect to the group.

(I'm afraid this was several years ago and I don't have any specific advice, other than what I said above.)

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Did you allow Crucible Merits ? I feel that the groups must earn them, after doing stuff together in the first book ? – MalaeDezeld Dec 19 '12 at 1:50
I'm pretty sure that's how I ran it - they didn't start with any, but they were permitted to buy them as we went (and I let them review the options for them). – Jim Kiley Dec 19 '12 at 2:17

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