I love playing games with factions. I just… generally dislike most of the faction rules in games. A lot of them solely focus on the faction as a collection of points or ranks, which… basically misses out on the fun part; the politics, the social angling. And all of that comes from specific NPCs and personalities.
How this works
For any character who is a major player in the faction in your game, you’re going to roll 1 or 2 traits from the lists below to get an idea on how they operate within their faction, and when it comes time to figuring how a faction reacts to anything, just consider the personalities involved and how they go about things.
Traits are defined as either Detrimental, Neutral or Favorable to the faction, which is mostly viewed from how in alignment it is to the faction. Detrimental traits can stick around due to hierarchy, nepotism, individuals with specific abilities or resources being gatekeepers, or a general culture of corruption in the faction.
Character Type & Traits
A Real POS – 2 Detrimental Generally Crappy – 1 Detrimental, 1 Neutral Flawed – 1 Detrimental, 1 Favorable Generally Competent – 1 Favorable, 1 Neutral Wildcard – 2 Neutral A Pillar – 2 Favorable A Flunky/Side character – 1 Trait from any type
Detrimental
Lax/Heedless – lazy, doesn’t follow procedure or pay attention.
It took me quite a while to get into Chainsaw Man; it was difficult to get past the first part since I found the author’s focus on having the protagonist constantly lust after women gross. (I know, I know, shonen has this problem in general, I just found his constant “let’s make a bargain, can I touch a boob?” extra gross). Anyway, the world building is top notch, and the new arc is really fascinating as far as playing up “awkward teenage romance while holding secret identities in a dystopic monster ridden world”. And really I don’t think there’s been a shonen manga/anime better suited to Sorcerer.
I’m not going to stat out every character or try to make sure the stats I give are “exactly” correct. What I want to do is lay out the basic structure to run a game set in the Chainsaw Man world, via Sorcerer.
Humanity
First, we’re going to use the Plural Humanity rules from Sex & Sorcery.
1 – Empathy for others (including Devils)
2 – Recognizing one’s own needs and desires, boundaries, etc.
We can see various characters go through it in terms of trading one for the other, constantly. Denji offering his body to Pochita not for power, but as a “I’m not going to get to live out my dreams, you might as well live out yours” would be the prime example of a Humanity Gain under Empathy for Others. (Followed by rebinding Pochita as a new parasite demon).
At Humanity 0 you are basically consumed by a Devil; either the one(s) you are contracted with, or basically prime target in the next scene one appears.
Necromancy
The Necromancy rules from Sorcerer & Sword apply here, particularly for offering oneself to a Devil as one is dying. The Humanity bonus goes towards a Binding as well. We can see Denji (who generally runs at at high Humanity) got a big bonus when he became Chainsaw Man, which seems to be applied specifically to killing Devils. In the current arc, Asa is also operating under a similar logic, but it hasn’t really been shown yet what her focus would be thematically.
Devils
Type
The Devils in Chainsaw Man run the full range of Demon Types as far as the game mechanics are concerned. Unless they are currently in Hell, they do not need to be magically summoned into the world, though there may be a trick or something to summon them to the specific area you’re in. The most interesting thing is that they can change types, often depending on how you bind or rebind them – Pochita turning from a Passing Demon to a Parasite Demon would be the clearest example.
Need
There’s a full range of Needs in various contracts, which, funny enough, aren’t necessarily 1:1 to the powers the Devil offers. For example Fox Devil gives Aki a much better deal and access to her powers than many others, and it’s been said she favors attractive men. For cases where it’s a one time price paid, like Himeno’s eye, simply make it a Price the character suffers, and as a rules hack – a character might suffer many Prices depending on the deals they make.
Desire
Every Devil is built off a fear humans have; so it has a built in Desire. Generally, though, it’s also interesting to see where on that scale they align with or against, humans or coexistence and how they go about it. Calculating, cautious, ruthless, rash, etc. Future Devil’s delight in cruelty, for example is a calculating way but also one that doesn’t work against humans (for now). Although many are intelligent and capable of longer term planning, it’s clear many devils have aspects which are childish or immature to their personalities, and a lot of the interesting stories have come from this issue.
Also it’s pretty clear a lot of the Devils have cross relationships with each other; friendships, romance, rivalries, hatred. This figures into their quirks and choices a lot as well.
Power Levels
Most Devils in the story seem to run at mid to high power levels; 5 or 6 at the bottom tier and much higher in the 9-10 range shows up a lot too.
Sorcery
Well, many of the Devils do not need to be Summoned if they’re not currently in Hell. Their desire to make contracts with humans varies but it’s clear in theory any of them COULD. While default Sorcerer rules states all demons want to be bound, in Chainsaw Man’s setting, enough Devils are getting the mayhem they want that being bound needs to present them with an opportunity or their own bend of personality to incline them towards taking it up.
For the Binding, “Appropriate Score” to use depends on what you’re doing; giving up a piece of your body- Stamina, giving up memories/emotions – Will, giving up something abstract or indeterminate like your future lifespan – Lore. If the Devil is one of the ones that regularly contracts with Public Safety’s Devil Hunters, get +1 on the roll.
As the GM, you should look to any Binding attempt and automatically give the Devil some kind of insight on what they would MOST WANT from a given person in either a way that causes suffering (to the sorcerer, or humans in general) or furthers their goals. While presumably there’s a good number of Devil Hunters with relatively “manageable” prices being paid, protagonists get dramatic prices, so go for that.
Chainsaw Man
Parasite Demon / Need: Blood / Desire: Combat, killing Devils / Telltale: Pullcord hanging from Denji’s chest Power 9 / Stamina 8 / Will 9 / Lore 6
Abilities:
Armor, Vitality
Fast, Travel (running fast, super jumps, wall climbing) (only while transformed)
Special Damage: Lethal (chainsaws, biting) (only while transformed)
Special Damage: Lethal (consuming a Devil)
Special Note: the consuming a Devil power is counted separate since it has the special ability to stop Devils from respawning, so I figured it deserved it’s own ability.
Denji
Telltale: Pull cord hanging from his chest / Price: Not raised by humans – 1 to social rolls that aren’t intimidation Kicker: Dying in a dumpster, surrounded by Devils, makes a final deal with Pochita Stamina 5 / Will 4 / Lore 1 / Descriptors: Scrapper, Zest for Life, Thrown to the dogs (Naif).
Cover: Homeless Kid (later; Broke High School student) Humanity: 7 (this is a guess but I figure he stays pretty high on his Humanity) Necromancy Token: (own body, Pochita as his heart) +7 to Killing Devils
Deeper in the Game 