Today, the
Toronto Star's website (I don't get the Star, so I don't know if it's in the print edition) ran an article on
flattery, toadies, and sycophants in the workplace. Now, naturally, you'd want a good pull-quote for an article like this, something that captures the essence of what you're writing about neatly and concisely.
So, of course, you go to
fan-created material for
a role-playing game with relatively little market presence:
"A Sycophant's resonance is for flattery. They have the ability to know what a given person wants to hear and what the person doesn't want to hear. Given enough time, the demon may stroke a human's ego, play to his fears and slowly but inexorably isolate him from anything that might possibly contradict his increasingly incorrect view of the universe. Once a Sycophant has his hooks in a mortal, it's only a matter of time before the victim is effectively useless."
- from the fantasy game
In Nomine
(Hat tip:
cythraul.)