Arc Philosophy & Knowledge: Part 16 Homicidalism

Homicidalism is one of the “secret” Philosophies in that it is unlocked not via the usual method of Collective Cognition and instead through an alternative; in this case it is gained from the new Settlement Event Murder card. That makes this the best place for us to start our journey, so let us look at the original next to the new version.

Murder in itself is an incredibly thematic and traumatic event that adds a lot to the feel of the game; it is also a situationally frustrating and disengaging occurrence because of how poorly it interacts with the most delicate part of settlement development – Weapon Masteries. While the event does not strictly aim at Weapon Proficiency levels and instead is focused at killing the oldest (most hunt XP) survivor, it turns out that the two tracks tend to be linked, especially early on in a campaign. It is that “accidental” collateral damage that creates the bad feels underpinning what is otherwise an intriguing story beat. If Murder compensated the loss with some replacement ranks in Weapon Proficiency elsewhere then the issues with the card would dissolve overnight.

To highlight what I mean by this; consider if this was additional text on the card.

“The Settlement copes with the fear by investing more time into protection. Choose up to 4 survivors with a weapon proficiency, each gains 1 rank in their chosen weapon proficiency.”

Now the wording would need to be tightened up of course; but the gist of it is that if you are at the point you have weapon proficiencies on survivors, you will have lost one of them, which hurts, however you get some compensation via progress on other survivors.

Without that kind of compensation, various “Murder Bait” strategies tend to be employed instead; this is gaming the system by creating a disposable survivor that has more hunt XP than any others. The classic tool for this is via Saviors because they gain XP faster than anyone else. You'll take one out, get it to just shy of max XP and then leave it in the settlement to be murdered if that happens.

The alternative Murder Bait strategy is to have a survivor who goes out on every hunt but either plays a non-attacking Support style (which has benefits because it disables part of the Monster's scaling against the hunt party due to not interacting with the HL Deck at all) or works on a weapon proficiency that doesn't matter so much (like Twilight Sword for example).

Regardless of what method is chosen, they all create a play style of gaming the system which is both convoluted and lacking in thematic joy. I really dislike gaming the system this way, but the other options are to either cheat (meh) or hope that Murder doesn't turn up before Family has been innovated.

The original Murder has some interesting additional thematic elements in that what happens to the murdering survivor depends entirely on the type of society that has been formed. I really like this design a lot, it is both thematic and provides variation from one campaign to the next.

In short, Murder's original form is a thematic but frustrating form of variation in a campaign which has a very punishing impact early on and can especially discourage newer players who have not yet become invested in the game. This is part of the reason why it can get curated out of the Settlement Event deck for the early portion of learning/teaching campaigns.

The new version of Murder does not remove this friction with Weapon Proficiency, instead seeking to provide compensation via the unlocking of the Homicidalism philosophy and the murderer gaining it. In order to understand how good this is; we'll be taking a dive into the ranks here and the knowledges next time.

Gaining Homicidalism

When Homicidalism is gained, it is the survivor with the highest Insanity who adopts this (unless they already have Marrowism, in which case tough luck, no compensation for you). That means their previous philosophies, tenet and neurosis will be overwritten and any progress gained there is lost. That is a variable price that will depend on what the survivor with the highest insanity looks like. It also adds a second wrinkle to “gaming the system”; in that the “optimal” play now is to create two Murder Bait survivors, one with high hunt XP and the second with the highest Insanity. Not a situation I'm particularly excited about (and like all gaming the system plays, it is highly personal choice with no right answer that works for all).

There is also an additional cost in that gaining knowledges from the Forum costs +1 Lumi; this is a thematic rather than balancing cost, which is fine.

Hunt XP Ranks & Neurosis

The Hunt XP Table is another one of the slow developing ones, with ranks at 2, 6, 10 and 14 and as it turns out, this is a good thing because these ranks contain a lower cost/benefit ratio than is normal for a Philosophy. I'll touch on this later in the Summary section.

The Neurosis of Murderer is an interesting one to navigate; it requires a bit of interpretation as to what 'alone' represents, but that is the norm for dungeon crawling games as they tend to have a heavy roleplaying influence to their design. Does the monster count if you're checking for 'alone'? Etc etc. Now I'm not going to answer all those questions, I've reached the point where if it is not in the FAQ, Rulebook or Glossary I stick to 'choose what feels right until an official answer is posted on the website'. Which has been a huge improvement for my engagement with the game (it's something Arkham Horror LCG content creators have also adopted).

Still, once you have chosen your consistent definition; this is a neurosis that can be navigated fairly well, though it is ultimately hard to control. The larger negative here is the Body Count, which is recorded each time you kill a survivor via this neurosis. That becomes something you have to roll against each time the homicidalist ranks up and if they roll 1d10-body count < 1 then they are killed for their sins.

Rank 1 – The Beat

I was going to write about the link between Music and Homicidalism in the opening section, but there was not a spot where it would fit. So instead I'd like to briefly highlight it here; there's a bunch of spots where the game refers to the “Devil's Symphony” in a number of places. This is not just a reference to the song by Scooter, it's also a part of the general way that throughout human history the Devil has been associated with music. Lucifer does not much care for music himself, but does employ it by influencing humans into making/listening to tunes that will cause them to give into their darker urges. Blues music is another place where this association was employed, because it has deep links to African American songs, and the way these songs highlight suffering and adversity for an entire people (ones that continue to this date) clashed with the Protestant Christian values of America. We've seen this again later on with the descendants of Blues music in Rock & Roll and Heavy Metal (which lent into and embraced this outrage).

In the world of Kingdom Death; a place where Satan literally exists in the forms of Stan & Stanley (the Satan Twins) and their combined form The Ivory Dragon (Mega Stan). This narrative continues, which is unsurprising given that KDM is a game with heavy American Christian influences baked into its lore. Music in Kingdom Death has weight beyond just being a form of artistic and cultural expression; there are tunes that tie into darker things and Homicidalism explores one of these. You can see this in things like the Memetic Symphony strain (which unlocks Infernal Rhythm) and it describes the tune as 'malefic' on top of calling the Strain Fighting Art “Infernal”.

Another great reference is the Devil's Melody [L] Smog Singers AI card, which uses words like 'Evil' and 'Danger' to describe what the Smog Singers are employing in this move. The singers as a whole explore the links between savage violence and music in this world.

Our Rank 1 table gives +1 lumi and the d10 table has a gain of [D] Rageholic for a 1 or 2. Rageholic is a very thematic disorder in that it gives has the survivor suffer the Frenzy brain trauma when they suffer a severe injury. That builds well into the personality traits that a person who embraces a philosophy where they value their own urges above the lives of others. It's a really thematic demonstration of the character weakness this type of personality has.

The 3 to 8 roll gives us -1 population (on top of the population loss from Murder if Homicidalism has just been gained) in exchange for +1 strength and [K] Psychopathy. In addition if the settlement has embraced [P] Cannibalize then the Murderer gets +1 Strength from devouring the body of their victim.

9 to 10 also has -1 population, but the Murderer now gets +1 luck, which is a really good exchange; especially because these -1 population results are player's choice, so the rejects and the plebs can be lost instead of valuable survivors (of course, a settlement with low overall population due to poor population management or bad fortune can't absorb such losses, but I can't ever overstress that the number one job of the settlement phase endeavours is to keep population levels healthy). At CC18 the Murderer also gains a knowledge of your choice from the settlement, scamming knowledges (gaining them without paying the lumi cost) is always strong, even more so here as you also have a 'tutor' to pick the perfect knowledge for your survivor's needs.

Rank 2 – Signal and Noise

-1 population, +3 insanity, +1 lumi and a roll on the table this time. A 1 to 5 here is an additional -1 population in exchange for +1 Strength and a +1 evasion token on the Murderer's next departure. The 6 to 10 roll is just +1 strength, with [K] Razor's Edge being gained at CC23. In addition with CC12 the Cruel Cleaver Pattern is unlocked, and that means it is time to look at a piece of gear!

Cruel Cleaver

Cost: 2x Lumi, 1x Iron, -1 population

This is an expensive card due to that Iron cost, it's also synergistic with survivors who can track a Body Count, which is pretty much only Homicidalism survivors because Body Count is given by the Neurosis.
Without a Murderer, this weapon is a moderate strength mid game weapon with two decent weapon types, cleaver in particular has become extra fun because of its new weapon proficiency in the Killenium Butcher vignette. However, the stats on this weapon in the hands of a normal survivor are not sufficient to justify its existence, especially with that Sentient drawback.

Instead the goal here is to use this weapon with a survivor who can record Body Count increases, and there are risks involved with that due to being executed when ranking up.

Overall the Cruel Cleaver is a fine enough weapon, and I appreciate the Bone keyword for the synergies it provides elsewhere, but on the whole this is a weapon I often found myself leaving in the settlement storage because stronger weapons could be found elsewhere. It is a vanilla weapon in that it only provides stats scaling with kills and we have seen better versions of this weapon in the past.

In the post GCE world, fine doesn't cut it.

Rank 3 – Cacophony

The -1 population this time is the survivor with the highest understanding, +1 lumi is still gained and then the table results in deaf on a 1-2, +1 evasion on a 3, +1 evasion and one of the victim's knowledges on a 4 to 7 and on the 8 to 10 result the murderer gains +1 speed, +1 strength and +10 insanity at the cost of disabling Song of the Brave during the next hunt phase (something that can harm the Homicidalist directly)

This table is somewhat decent overall, though the costs are really high with the death of a useful survivor and each Rank up also carries with it that risk of the survivor being discovered and executed. Rolling Deaf here though is a heck of a kick in the teeth.

Rank 4 - Symphony

Our final rank has us nominating the survivor with highest insanity. If the settlement has [I] Partnership then the table will be Shared Psychosis, otherwise it is Destroy the Prodigal. Then +1 lumi is gained and a d10 is rolled

Shared Psychosis has the following outcomes; a 1-3 is death of both survivors and +2 endeavours for the settlement (in addition to Death principles). At CC19 one of the Murderer's knowledges is added to the settlement forum this year (hint, pick Dark Impulse). At the 4-10 result, two innocent survivors are instead slain (-2 population) and the Murderer plus Nominee become partners. The nominated survivor even gets Homicidalism and if they are below rank 1, they gain hunt XP to set them at the first milestone. This probably eliminates a more useful and powerful philosophy in the process.

With Destroy the Prodigal then the 1-3 result is death of the nominated survivor and a gain of one knowledge and disorder from the deceased target. At 4 to 10 the Murderer gains +1 accuracy, +1 evasion and one of the dead survivor's knowledges along with all their observations in that knowledge. This is a reasonable trade, especially if a retired survivor is slain, but as this rank targets the most insane survivor there is less control for the players here.

Summary

Before we get into the mechanics, I would briefly like to note just how well done the artwork in this booklet is. I viscerally hate every single piece and the Murderer as a character as expressed in this is (and always has been) a detestable little coward. Perfect work as a piece of art because it provokes that emotional reaction from me, no notes.

When we get to the mechanics however, ranking up a Homicidalist is a pretty inefficient and I would even go as far as calling it worthless for some settlements. This is because all of the value and power in Homicidalism is gained at Rank 1 through Dark Impulse, and also because (as we'll discuss next time) the core tenet of Homicidalism is better on any other kind of survivor over a Homicidalist (who is relatively balanced when they have it). This is kind of a massive problem at the heart of the design in this philosophy. The Philosophy itself when played in a fair fashion offers great power, but with a large drawback. That would be interesting, and the black mark here is this negative can be sidestepped very easily. Once you do that the game is broken in a way that ends up unengaging and on my list of outstanding design errors that need to be addressed.

Homicidalism has some obscene power located in it, the issue is all that power is concentrated into Dark Impulse and the elements located on the various rank up tables are weak in comparison. I'll get into that more next time, but the recommendation based on the tables here is to maybe unlock rank 2 and then stick your homicidalist onto a stone nose as a sacrifice and not bother ranking this philosophy up much (if at all).