Null Snyper got bored of the costuming forum in short order. Egos were too fragile and meals were too easy to come by. She experimented with trolling support groups and various fandoms. She poisoned any community she touched. Emotions would run high, tempers would flare, and a once thriving forum of people coming together in common interests would end in a virtual smoking ruin with at least one person unable to endure the emotional devastation — dead by his own hands. The chaos and betrayal were delicious.
an instinctual understanding of networks. Information found online easily answered any questions she had about technology. That, combined with the ubiquity of scripts so thoughtfully provided by the world’s hacker communities, meant that there was practically no network security that she couldn’t bypass. Webcams became her eyes around the globe, microphones her ears, and like-minded internet trolls her hands. With nearly ev- ery computer, tablet, and smartphone having a built-in camera, nothing she desired to see could escape her gaze. She used this to get into the heads of targets, making them think she was right behind them when, in reality, she was half a continent away.
Recently, Null Snyper discovered the adolescent man-chil- dren that exist where gamers and men’s rights activists overlap. She felt nothing but contempt for them, but she decided to try flexing her internet muscles. Instead of driving people to suicide through direct online interaction, she whipped up an angry mob to go after her targets. Through empty rhetoric and carefully coordinated campaigns of doxing and harassment, she terror- ized players, game developers, and journalists in the industry who don’t share her trolls’ views. The first time she saw a man killed by police, live on webcam as a result of a swatting prank, ecstasy, unlike that from any other death she caused, filled her completely. She knew she was on the right track.
Now she maintains a carefully cultivated legion of follow- ers. Certain circles avidly follow Null Snyper’s exploits and celebrate her as a master troll. It only takes a word or two from her to unleash the fury of hordes of aspiring trolls longing to make a name for themselves. They’ll dox anyone or breach pri- vate accounts if it means gaining a small measure of notoriety by attaching themselves to her reputation.
Description
Null Snyper lives alone in a single-room apartment, which she rarely leaves. Thanks to the internet, she rarely needs any- thing from the outside world. The only time she dares venture out is to acquire new computer hardware to upgrade her setup. She is safe in her Den, surrounded by the glow of computer monitors and the hum of various power supplies and hard drives. Trash and old, discarded computer parts litter the floor like so many skeletons stripped of flesh.
Her physical appearance is unkempt. She dresses slovenly and never bathes. She never interacts with anyone in person, so she sees no reason to bother. For her, the physical is a pointless waste of time that shackles her, preventing her from reaching her full potential. Everything she needs is available to her through the computer. If she had some way to shed her body and exist
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entirely as information in the cloud, she would take it without a moment’s hesitation. Ironically, since she stopped caring about her appearance, she now looks more like her self-image from her youth. Her face is pimply due to her poor hygiene, and her stench reeks worse than it did even when her family tried to save money by using less water. She has an emaciated frame, bordering on skeletal, from subsisting on mere emotion without tangible flesh.
So far, she has never consciously assumed her Horrible Form. Her Insatiable visage is composed of a knotwork of inky filaments clustered together to form the silhouette of her body, which resembles that of a giant spider, with rending claws and grotesque fangs to drain the life of anyone they pierce. The skin of the strands is that of a black hole, darkening the room as she seems to pull all the light into her. Her uncountable legs extend from her body along the information byways of the internet. At their ends are ravenous maws ready to devour anything in reach.
As an Insatiable, Null Snyper is incredibly young. She hasn’t had an opportunity yet to fully explore the extent of her birthright. While her supernatural power is relatively weak, she is a creature supremely suited to the 21st century. Thanks to the reach of the internet, a reach that grows daily as smart devices proliferate and everyday items are increasingly networked together to create an internet of things, her hunting range is nearly limitless. She hunts by emotionally isolating her victims and harassing them until they are broken. Either they take their own lives to end the misery she inflicts upon them, or she engineers their demise at the hands of one of her followers. As long as she has a network connection open to them at the time of their demise, she is able to consume their despair.
Null Snyper hasn’t personally killed anyone with her own hands yet. As a result, she is constantly hungry, even by Insatiable standards. She is half starved from feeding only on nightmares and emotions without the necessary sustenance of her victims’ flesh. The prospect is tantalizing, and she fantasizes about how satisfying it would be to actually feel the life slowly extinguish from a person, how exquisite human fat and muscle would taste in her gullet. She knows she’s feeble and only growing weaker. Her meals so far, while providing a measure of nourishment, are unsustainable in the long term. She must find a way to overcome her fear of the physical world and leave the comfort and safety of her Den. She has the contact information of a target one of her rabble doxed for her. That particular harassment campaign is almost at its end and the victim will soon be dead, one way or another. Every so often, she pulls up the address and stares at it in electric anticipation.
Rumors
“Null Snyper is so active in the men’s rights activists’ forums, we’re probably looking for a socially awkward male in his teens to early 20s.”
Contrary to popular belief among those who know of her online, Null Snyper is not male. She plays the part of a disaf- fected man to ingratiate herself to the communities she currently manipulates. It’s merely one of many identities she’s worn over her life online. Still, she thinks of herself as female out of habit more than anything else. She stopped considering herself human shortly after her Moment manifested itself. She doesn’t actually care about any of the causes she pretends to champion. They’re
simply useful tools for her hunt. Her followers are nothing more than a means to an end. Should they no longer serve their pur- pose, she’ll discard this identity just like all the others.
“Every single one of Null Snyper’s victims said that he knew impossible things about them, as though he were watching their every move, but there’s no sign he was ever anywhere near the victims.”
Her intimate knowledge about her prey may seem super- natural in origin to those she hunts and anyone who investigates her, but Null Snyper gains her insight entirely through mundane means. The rapid adoption of smart devices and the growth of the internet gives her a window into the lives of anyone she cares to hunt. Anything connected to the internet will broadcast information about its usage, and even some lightbulbs can now be given an IP address. These networked devices are becom- ing ubiquitous far faster than the security included with them advances. It’s a simple matter for Null Snyper to collect their
STORY HOOKS
• A Hero has his sights set on the player characters. He always seems to know what the characters are going to do, but they know nothing about him. They need information — who is he, what is he after, and just what is his connection to the characters? After making a number of inquiries, they discover the name Null Snyper, and how to contact her online. She is happy to make a deal with the characters, but is the information worth the price she asks? • One of the local Begotten is doxed. Now, a
coordinated campaign of harassment has begun. Null Snyper had an epiphany on how to use the Primordial Dream to integrate herself more fully into the realm of information, but she needs a Beast’s Lair to enact her plan. It’s a race against time as the characters attempt to find the source of the harassment before the operation reaches its bloody conclusion.
• There is a dramatic uptick in local police violence. Null Snyper is trolling an online police support group to increase the chances of a fatality during a swat- ting prank. It has the side effect of raising tensions between the police and the local citizens. Riots are threatening to break out all over the city. It’s difficult for Beasts to satiate their Hungers in the middle of a small war zone. Can the characters discover the source of the police brutality and defuse the situation before their own hunting is compromised?
• Null Snyper discovered a solution to her dilemma. She is petrified of leaving her Den, but she must devour to survive. A chance encounter with one of the Begotten on a message board opened her eyes to the Subversion. Now she can finally live her dream. All she needs to do is find an online Beast close to one of her targets, and she will be able to feast while staying safe. Luckily for her, one of the player characters or their allies just hap- pens to fit that criteria.
information. Either she or her devoted trolls can mine the data to produce an incredibly accurate picture of her targets’ daily routine. If she needs more, she can always take over the camera inevitably attached to one of her prey’s devices.
“Insatiable must be in physical proximity to cause a Schism or use one of their Nightmares. As long as you’re not in the same room as Null Snyper, you’re safe from any supernatural attack.”
While this is normally true, being close and making eye contact with her mean something different in Null Snyper’s case. The longer she regularly resides in a forum or chatroom, a virtual Schism grows, twisting anyone else who actively participates in the online community. Likewise, eye contact is necessary for her to use her Nightmares, but she is able to use webcams as an extension of her own eyes. She doesn’t realize it, but she’s a step toward realizing her dream to slip the bonds of the physical world. Since she doesn’t have a point of reference among her kind, she doesn’t know how unusual her abilities are. Her prey must die, but unlike most Insatiable, she does not have to physically consume her victims to gain a measure of sustenance. However, the Satiety she receives is only half as fulfilling as devouring her target’s flesh.
Legend: Pitiless Life: Callous Moment: Void Hunger: Power
Mental Attributes: Intelligence 4, Wits 4, Resolve 3
Physical Attributes: Strength 1, Dexterity 3, Stamina 2 Social Attributes: Presence 4, Manipulation 3, Composure 2
Mental Skills: Academics 1, Computer (Hacking) 5, Investigation (Identify Patterns) 4, Occult 1, Politics1 Physical Skills: Larceny 2, Stealth 2
Social Skills: Expression 1, Persuasion 2, Streetwise 1, Subterfuge (Hiding Emotions) 3
Merits: Allies (Internet Trolls) 5, Area of Expertise (Hacking), Language (Spanish), Library (Computer) 3 Esurients: Terrible Form, Obedience
Nightmares: You Are Alone, You Deserve This Lair: 0 Health: 7 Willpower: 5 Satiety: 3 Size: 5 Speed: 9 Initiative: 5 Defense: 3
Notes: Null Snyper can make eye contact through webcams for the purposes of activating her Nightmares. She may cause Schisms in online communities. Finally, she may consume emotion as long as she has an open network connection with her victim at the time of death. However, without physically consuming her victim, her Satiety increases by half.