Status Updates From Nagah: the Kings Under the ...

the appendix about snakes was as boring as before, and since they have these nagah so unserpetine why bother with data on snakes anywhere? I would introduce this book with "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, behold the biggest idiots in the world of darkness.

So now Vinata is a kind of victim after all? Then why refuse to state her name?
and this old guy here also has unexplained methods to keep an eye out for soon to be nagah, but at least he fits what I expected before: Do something wrong and he will horribly punish you. For such a bunch of idiots as these nagah, that is a necessity to keep existing an functioning.

How did these two keep watch on him to find him immediately after the first change? Most spirits will not help nagah so who was monitoring the guy all this time?

was that woman with the soon to be nagah a vampire or a magician or what is that spirit serpent infecting the men supposed to mean? The text claims human, but then what was that serpent? It dissappeared the moment the nagah killed her. And the stalker later comes across like a serial killer, because I am sure he gave that woman lethal pills.

Using a drum to summon a target to someone is one of the better ideas of this book. but then the flood dust is another dumb idea. and the venom arrow gift might be the dumbest of them all. Why a gift for that?

an infrared vision merit but not gift, and this Mnesis merit pointing to a Mokole connection would at least make sense when you consider that the Nagah might be an offshot of the mokole, because they sure as hell don't come across like a thought out serpentine and water related breed. They come across like something that was pushed into the water connection or who ursurped that role.

why can the nagah walk across water after solidifying it? What use does this have? for the most part the assassin related gifts are at least decent but the snake and water gifts are dumb, a child would have come up with that, the rites later are no smarter either, they aren't even worth remembering.

The whole thing about snakes shedding skin and rejuvination is a mythological thing but snakes are not "often considered to be manifestations of time", not at all. Where did they get some of this stuff? The hydra warrior gift of the next page at least has some mythological truth to it. Albeit the way they introduce snake and water gifts is rather a hodgepodge than anything else.

A gift to double the strike distance of a snake? Why? Just give it spitting venom!! They had venomous vapor after all. It is weird how the book has at once useless stuff like this but then smart stuff like a gift to hide inside the belly of a human. It is similar to the finally history section, I always wondered whether the nagah were intentionally written as such idiots or whether it is just bad writing.

what on earth would controlling the tides be good for? They seem to have including this gift only because nagah allegedly were stated to cause floods and droughts in indian legend, but it has no function here and no prior water related gifts and the turn into a storm has the same problems. the gift to force someone to go into water at least has some assassination purpose. But still, not thought out well.

Growing barbs and breathing poisonous vapor have their uses but wouldn't it be better to give a nagah the gift to spit poison like some cobras can? And sure, making a nagah coldblooded would have some effect for infrared but it would not protect you from heatstroke, unless you are literally emiting coldness. These gifts so far don't seem well thought out.

This gift of making someone misremember an encounter with a wereserpent surely has some merit, but would that be enough to protect from clairvoyance etc and wouldn't this misremembering as a serpentine wyrm creature, shapeshifting vampire or spirit not heighten mistrust even more by associating the snake with the wyrm and so make the Nagah even more of a target?

ok, this dragon king eyes gift has some merit by granting sight, albeit dragon eyes are not associated with that, a cursing or paralyzing effect would fit better. Perhaps it is this forced dragon connection again. And the gift of masquerading as a mokole doesn't seem quite useful, as most mokole are not considered friendly either. More diversity would be better.

if their metis are so vulnerable to water pollution I hope they have some gifts or rites to purify water. And in what way do these Nagah have "sufficient amount of information" on the other shifters? So far they seem to have barely any actual information. And how exactly do they stay hidden when they still keep in contact with the beast courts and mages etc?

Wow, this storyteller really despises the Garou. In fact, if this is written well, this would be a hint of this hatred being necessary to cover up the failings of the Nagah, and they did fail. One of their own started the War of Rage but they take no real responsibility for it nor think of changing their ways. They claim their revealed existence would cause the garou to hunt them down, but it sounds like a lie.

What European culture ever held the serpent sacred? They keep bringing up England and Ireland over and over but I never heard anyone speak of serpents in regard to the old celtic cultures. Or even modern british culture for that matter, the closest, geographically, that I know are the house serpents of Germany. And for a book bringing up water time and again, those Nagah are surprisingly dry so far.

Of course when the book talks about slavers it only mentions western africa and how their nagah kinfolk were enslaved, never mind the eastern slave trade that lasted much longer, right? And btw. why didn't their beloved Uktena also protect the Camazotz or why did no spirit tell the shadowlords that these were not vampires? And when did this book ever claim before that Nagah were diplomats of Gaia?

it is a good question how apparently everyone in the beast courts can be trusted with knowing the existence of the Nagah, even Tengu and Nezumi, but no one else. In fact, how come nothing of the information left the beast courts? what this says about Australia is pretty much par for the course by now with this fake environmentalism and alleged wisdom of the bunyip.

why are northern china, Korea and japan essentially empty due to the efforts of the Nezumi? Why bring the Garou up anyway before? And funny, that one thai village that consists entirely of kinfolk is the only time so far Thailand was ever mentioned. Considered how prevelant naga motifs are in their temples and coat of arms, you would think the Nagah would be more present there but there is nothing.

ratkin, corax and anasasi in the cities makes total sense, but Khan? The weretigers? If they are suited for that way would the Garou be "blessedly rare?" And wild wolves are not absent from India as this here claims. Did the author make a mistake or is that how it is in India of the world of darkness? Because everyone reading jungle book knows that India at least had wolves.

what? The other shifters are supposed to learn a lesson when they find a culprit seemingly slain in the most coincidental and fitting way? They don't even know that the Nagah are doing such stuff due to this book, so who would learn about that´? If this is written deliberately as "the nagah are idiots" it is very good writing, otherwise it is bad writing. It is engaging either way.

stopping the humans in india to pollute the ganghes any further? How about caring about the yellow river? But I doubt that one was on their mind... come think about it, considering how relatively little china featured in here after all, why chose apparent chinese dragons as the patrons and give a chinese named realm for them? Why not stick with India as the starting point?

wow, now he says that most shapeshifters are just fools who cannot hold their tongue. This secrecy seems to be really idiotic.

no, there has not been the association of snakes with water since the beginning of time. That is something specific to south and southeast asia, india and Thailand to be precise. And it is ironic how the naga are stated to be children of dragons when in real life lore dragons actually originated from snakes, including the many chinese tales of snakes becoming dragons.

I really don't get why they chose dragon kings and a realm associated with storms and rain and patrons of the nagah. And I do wonder why the wrote in this snipped about humans who could take the forms of fresh water fish that were exterminated during the wars of rage. That sounds as if all this association with water would fit them better than these snakes.

now she has no idea who the wizards were that ended the battle in bangladesh and claims that they have to be punished because they interfered with the natural order of events, that the rakshasa king would kill two of the kuei-jin but the third would have prevailed. And of course the dragon kings gave them the permit to kill those wizards. Considering how much they screwed up, I doubt them.

does she not know that the Rakhasa king was a vampire? Did they even mention the term vampire so war? Even the Kuei-Jin were simply referred to as demon people. Is she deliberately written as so ignorant? If the Nagah had such a stronghold in India as claimed, how could they not know about the ravnos vampires? That King is their founder. if they are deliberately written as ignorant it would be good writing.

if she actually says that the Garou were tricked into eradicating the Bunyip by a Black Spiral Dancer and that some of the targets by the Nagah were blamed on the Bunyip says to me that they Nagah were much more involved in all of this and shows the flaw of their secrecy. Sadly, sometimes it shows what times this was written in as it later only focuses of Hiroshima and not the other destructions of cities.

wow, now the storyteller even claims that the second war of rage showed the garou to be "pathologically incapable of working with Gaia's other children." That just reeks of self-serving myths and probably ignorance as one of the reasons the garou mistook the camazotz as wyrm followers because of their blood rituals and their similarity with the european vampires.

now we even have the "great blue dragon of the east" and the dragon kings giving the nagah their laws and organization and combine this with the fact that the Wan Xian are not only blamed for the war of shame here but also the bloody conflict between the Nagah and the Nezumi (rat people) sounds like this entire story is made up to make the dragon kings look good and blame as many faults as possible on outsiders.