White Wolf's Big Announcement?

[MisterVimes]

It's Judgement Day... The World of Darkness Ends.
Check out the countdown clock on
http://www.white-wolf.com
and
http://www.timeofjudgment.com/

[MuscaDomestica]

Yep was about to write how the WoD is going to explode. Should be fun, I am only in one WoD game right now, Changling with a heavly modified universe so this will not affect the game at all. Nice to see that since Exalted is doing so well they can now take risks.

[Mutant for Hire]

I suspect sales have been declining for the WoD, and Exalted sales are doing well enough that they're going to do everything they can to clean out one last round of cash from the WoD fans.

[Vondy]

What? They're finally admitting they're a bunch of poseurs?

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by D-Man
What? They're finally admitting they're a bunch of poseurs?

Heh. We can only hope that this heralds the end of angst-gaming...

[Armitage]

Originally posted by MisterVimes
Heh. We can only hope that this heralds the end of angst-gaming...

Nope.
From the end of the White Wolf press release:
"An all-new World of Darkness launches in August of 2004."

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by Armitage
Nope.
From the end of the White Wolf press release:
"An all-new World of Darkness launches in August of 2004."

Ah. A new generation of boys named "Byron" pretending to be dead... how exciting.

[RadeFox]

I guess White Wolf is doing the same as Wizards of the Coast. Killing off their entire game world, so they can re-introduce new titles for the same games and sell more books. Look for the new titles shortly after the last Judgement title is published and sold.

My guesses?
Black Genesis- Vampire ReEmbraced
From the Ashes- Mage Reborn
Beyond the Veil- Werewolf ReDone
After the Storm- Wratih ReFormed

[Killer Shrike]

WW is still in business? Seriously though, its about time they packed that whole mess in. Maybe when they relaunch the product line they'll achieve escape velocity and plummet directly into the sun.....

[Blue]

I'll never quite get this. Never, never never.

Why would someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a superhero, and someone who plays a game where they pretend to be an elf have a tedency to bash someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a vampire.

I get flashbacks to high school. "So, you on the football team? What! You play D&D after school instead? What a geek!"

Is that any different from. "So, wanna play Champions after school? You'd rather be a bloodsucking freak? You're so gay!"

I enjoy Vampire. I enjoy Hero. I even enjoy some D&D from time to time. Widen your perceptions, let go yer hate.

[MisterVimes]

deleted by author

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Blue
I'll never quite get this. Never, never never.

Why would someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a superhero, and someone who plays a game where they pretend to be an elf have a tedency to bash someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a vampire.

I get flashbacks to high school. "So, you on the football team? What! You play D&D after school instead? What a geek!"

Is that any different from. "So, wanna play Champions after school? You'd rather be a bloodsucking freak? You're so gay!"

I enjoy Vampire. I enjoy Hero. I even enjoy some D&D from time to time. Widen your perceptions, let go yer hate.

Personally, I don't think it has much to do with the fact that people are playing vampires. I don't care about that. I've run games where people played vampires before. I've even run vampire the masquerade before.

I think it has to do with the fact that WW is a bunch of effete poseurs in traditional gaming terms and caters to a narrow, angsty neo-goth counter-culture element that doesn't have a terribly broad appeal to the vast majority of people old enough to run for congress. You know. Grown ups.

Their general idea and concept was good - at first - but they've come to take themselves way too seriously and franky, everything I've seen from them (after the first year or so) has the same canned-horror taffeta-lined coffin, throw-a-dummy-out-of-the-closet chinsy-horror feel I get from watching John Carpenter movies. Oh, wait, those don't take themselves seriously so their fun to watch.

I wasn't aware vampires walked around in cheap rented formal wear talking in cheesy euro-trash accents trying to... oh, wait, that's 4 in 5 of the vampire players I've met. I mean really. If I see one more picture of an effeminate half dressed vampire in BDSM bondage wear with tribal tattoos and body piercings whose flashing his fangs and wearing a cross because its so deeply ironic and taboo I'm going to be physically ill.

I think the campy dracula in edwardian formal wear and the huge great-cloak/cape is more original, and less done, than the canned "aren't we angsty and sophisticated" stuff the poseurs at WW are churning out. Go read the toreador book. It notes there are Artists and Posers. An artist maintains his novelty, a poseur....

Its not the vampires I have a problem with. Its the whole over-done, out-of date counter-culture vampires I have a problem with. I mean, really, of you were a bloodsucking creature of the night trying to maintain a veil of secrecy would you do everything possible to act like an attention starved teenager having an identity crisis or would you try to blend?

I'd run a vampire game, but it wouldn't be in the world of counter-culture darkness.

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by D-Man
Personally, I don't think it has much to do with the fact that people are playing vampires. I don't care about that. I've run games where people played vampires before. I've even run vampire the masquerade before.

I think it has to do with the fact that WW is a bunch of effete poseurs in traditional gaming terms and caters to a narrow, angsty neo-goth counter-culture element that doesn't have a terribly broad appeal to the vast majority of people old enough to run for congress. You know. Grown ups.

Their general idea and concept was good - at first - but they've come to take themselves way too seriously and franky, everything I've seen from them (after the first year or so) has the same canned-horror taffeta-lined coffin, throw-a-dummy-out-of-the-closet chinsy-horror feel I get from watching John Carpenter movies. Oh, wait, those don't take themselves seriously so their fun to watch.

I wasn't aware vampires walked around in cheap rented formal wear talking in cheesy euro-trash accents trying to... oh, wait, that's 4 in 5 of the vampire players I've met. I mean really. If I see one more picture of an effeminate half dressed vampire in BDSM bondage wear with tribal tattoos and body piercings whose flashing his fangs and wearing a cross because its so deeply ironic and taboo I'm going to be physically ill.

I think the campy dracula in edwardian formal wear and the huge great-cloak/cape is more original, and less done, than the canned "aren't we angsty and sophisticated" stuff the poseurs at WW are churning out. Go read the toreador book. It notes there are Artists and Posers. An artist maintains his novelty, a poseur....

Its not the vampires I have a problem with. Its the whole over-done, out-of date counter-culture vampires I have a problem with. I mean, really, of you were a bloodsucking creature of the night trying to maintain a veil of secrecy would you do everything possible to act like an attention starved teenager having an identity crisis or would you try to blend?

I'd run a vampire game, but it wouldn't be in the world of counter-culture darkness.

Yeah... what he said :D

[BlackSword]

Well said D-Man, much better than I could have managed it.

I told my friends about this, "White Wolf's big announcment, they are going to get more money from their players." Actually, I can't complain about this, White Wolf is a business and ultimately their goal is to make money. For the authors it so happens that they are able to make money doing something they enjoy and working in a hobby they enjoy.

However I think they may be taking themselves way too seriously when they have this big announcement they keep under wraps and its simply, "we are going to scrap the WoD so we can re-release six months later with new covers."

[Hermit]

My problem with White Wolf is the treatment some of them give their games' customers and fans.

[C_Zeree]

Maybe they have decided modern campaign worlds full of angst and degenerate society doesn't sell as well as it once did. Maybe the renovation will leave the intriguing gems, minus the imperfection. YMMV, of course.

Never found a world I liked totally. That's what our own works/campaigns are for. :)

I feel it will be intriguing to see the aftermath. For once I'm not that interested in the path taken, but the destination.

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by C_Zeree
Maybe they have decided modern campaign worlds full of angst and degenerate society doesn't sell as well as it once did. Maybe the renovation will leave the intriguing gems, minus the imperfection. YMMV, of course.

Never found a world I liked totally. That's what our own works/campaigns are for. :)

I feel it will be intriguing to see the aftermath. For once I'm not that interested in the path taken, but the destination.

The best result would be that Exhalted is the aftermath of WOD

[Armitage]

Originally posted by Hermit
My problem with White Wolf is the treatment some of them give their games' customers and fans.

I used to own the Pentex: Subsidiaries sourcebook (before I sold it on eBay) and one of the chapters is about Black Dog Games, their self parody.
One paragraph talks about the WoD version of Abberrant, I don't remember what name they gave it.
Paraphrased:
(Game) was intended to be a thought-provoking examination of modern society and cause players to introspectively ask themselves the question "What would you do with the power of a god?". But it turns out that what most players would do is put on tights and a cape and beat the crap out of each other because that's what super-beings have always done. And God forbid they should have to actually think for a change.

Pretentious much? :D

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by Armitage
I used to own the Pentex: Subsidiaries sourcebook (before I sold it on eBay) and one of the chapters is about Black Dog Games, their self parody.
One paragraph talks about the WoD version of Abberrant, I don't remember what name they gave it.
Paraphrased:
(Game) was intended to be a thought-provoking examination of modern society and cause players to introspectively ask themselves the question "What would you do with the power of a god?". But it turns out that what most players would do is put on tights and a cape and beat the crap out of each other because that's what super-beings have always done. And God forbid they should have to actually think for a change.

Pretentious much? :D

I live in Atlanta and used to live about 2 blocks from WW. I knew quite a few of their employees (not so much now) and they're all actually nice people... except Mark... he's pretentious.

[Killer Shrike]

Originally posted by Blue
I'll never quite get this. Never, never never.

Why would someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a superhero, and someone who plays a game where they pretend to be an elf have a tedency to bash someone who plays a game where they pretend to be a vampire.

I get flashbacks to high school. "So, you on the football team? What! You play D&D after school instead? What a geek!"

Is that any different from. "So, wanna play Champions after school? You'd rather be a bloodsucking freak? You're so gay!"

I enjoy Vampire. I enjoy Hero. I even enjoy some D&D from time to time. Widen your perceptions, let go yer hate. I dont have a problem with people playing Vampire tM or what have you in the least. I started playing Vampire the very first week it came out all those years ago, and played it for several years thereafter. Also, Mage the Ascension 2nd Ed was one of my favorite games of all time.

What I dont like is WW the game company and WoD the game system and 99% of all the LARPers Ive ever met. Its got nothing to do with the hobby and everything to do with the personalities, pretentiousness, and perspectives.

They took a game and turned it into a cult of personality, which they all seem to take VERY SERIOUSLY. The whole thing turned into a social clique. The rules system is terribly arbitrary and broken, and the company is almost uniformly cavalier and patronizing towards its player base.

Ive still got a shelf of just WW product, mostly MtA followed by VtM behind me as I sit. I still flip thru the Mage stuff on occasion for fun. But I wouldnt shed a tear if WW the company got staked in the heart, decapitated, and finally burned von Hellsing style. :D

[Blue]

Now see, I've never seen this. But then I'm not the convention-attending type. All I have for reference are my current gaming group, my former gaming group, and all of the people I've met at the game store. Never come across this whole "were better because we're into vampire" thing. Maybe that's why I don't get the WoD bashing.

Not sure I'll do anything with their new product whenever it comes out. But it's a sign not to buy anything they sell until after they do their wipe-out of the line. I know I won't buy anything from the ToJ line when it's out. "Let's buy a product that makes itself obsolete".

[starblaze]

Since we are sort of WW bashing I just wanted to add that I never liked their combat system. I mean if you are not someone with either celerity or lots of rage you will be going so slow compared to those who do that combat become very unbalanced.

It usually goes like this
Storyteller: OK, the Fomori attacks you, roll your dice pool for initiative
Player One: OK, I get three successes out of five so I go on three.
Player Two: Ok, I spend four rage points and split my dice pool and roll, I go 24,12, and 6 then I double those actionS
Player One: $%#%$^&%&^%#%$&^%&^%!

Or something like that, you get the idea.

[RadeFox]

Hmm, Celerity and Rage were quite balanced in game. They were both limited in their way. With Celerity you went through your blood pretty fast. With Rage, it was different, ALL garou had it, and it was easy to get back, so nix the inbalance thing there. :p

With Celerity, yah, the Vamps with it went more, till they got low on blood, but guess what, I could name 20 scenes for every combat one, where another discipline rocked and celerity was useless. So in the end, it was the application of power and not the powers themselves that gave you the advantage.

WW did an overall fantastic job. Their system is easy to grasp, easy to run, and minimal mechanics DO help the story flow easier and dont detract from the story either. ;)

[DocMan]

Judging from the remarks I've read here, the problem with Vampire the Masquerde isn't the game, or the system. It's the LARPers.

Think about it. You don't see ANYONE making fun of people sitting around a table roleplaying Vampire as a tabletop game. The jokes are all about the LARPers who take the game too seriously.

Personally, I've never tried a Vampire LARP. I've looked at the rules for LARPing, but I don't like them as they lack the flavor and drama of the regular game.

Doc

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by DocMan
Judging from the remarks I've read here, the problem with Vampire the Masquerde isn't the game, or the system. It's the LARPers.

Think about it. You don't see ANYONE making fun of people sitting around a table roleplaying Vampire as a tabletop game. The jokes are all about the LARPers who take the game too seriously.

Personally, I've never tried a Vampire LARP. I've looked at the rules for LARPing, but I don't like them as they lack the flavor and drama of the regular game.

Doc

I've LARPed... but the two LARP groups I did were Boffer (pipe and foam) and Live (blunted) steel.

Then I went to a WOD Larp... and a guy who was one eighth my size did stone/scissors/paper and told that he slammed me against a wall...

I laughed all the way to the car.

[GreyGuardian]

Games are only as good as the game master, players, and the story. I dislike larps because generally the few I played were weak in all categories. Oddly the one good larp I played was written and run by a friend who threw an annual gaming party. It was great. Then again I only play larps when dragged to them... which is fortunately not very often.

[Agent X]

Originally posted by D-Man
Personally, I don't think it has much to do with the fact that people are playing vampires. I don't care about that. I've run games where people played vampires before. I've even run vampire the masquerade before.

I think it has to do with the fact that WW is a bunch of effete poseurs in traditional gaming terms and caters to a narrow, angsty neo-goth counter-culture element that doesn't have a terribly broad appeal to the vast majority of people old enough to run for congress. You know. Grown ups.

Their general idea and concept was good - at first - but they've come to take themselves way too seriously and franky, everything I've seen from them (after the first year or so) has the same canned-horror taffeta-lined coffin, throw-a-dummy-out-of-the-closet chinsy-horror feel I get from watching John Carpenter movies. Oh, wait, those don't take themselves seriously so their fun to watch.

I wasn't aware vampires walked around in cheap rented formal wear talking in cheesy euro-trash accents trying to... oh, wait, that's 4 in 5 of the vampire players I've met. I mean really. If I see one more picture of an effeminate half dressed vampire in BDSM bondage wear with tribal tattoos and body piercings whose flashing his fangs and wearing a cross because its so deeply ironic and taboo I'm going to be physically ill.

I think the campy dracula in edwardian formal wear and the huge great-cloak/cape is more original, and less done, than the canned "aren't we angsty and sophisticated" stuff the poseurs at WW are churning out. Go read the toreador book. It notes there are Artists and Posers. An artist maintains his novelty, a poseur....

Its not the vampires I have a problem with. Its the whole over-done, out-of date counter-culture vampires I have a problem with. I mean, really, of you were a bloodsucking creature of the night trying to maintain a veil of secrecy would you do everything possible to act like an attention starved teenager having an identity crisis or would you try to blend?

I'd run a vampire game, but it wouldn't be in the world of counter-culture darkness. ROFLMOL - You nailed it.:)

[Vondy]

Originally posted by DocMan
Judging from the remarks I've read here, the problem with Vampire the Masquerde isn't the game, or the system. It's the LARPers.

Think about it. You don't see ANYONE making fun of people sitting around a table roleplaying Vampire as a tabletop game. The jokes are all about the LARPers who take the game too seriously.

Personally, I've never tried a Vampire LARP. I've looked at the rules for LARPing, but I don't like them as they lack the flavor and drama of the regular game.

Doc

You get who you market to...

[James Gillen]

Originally posted by MisterVimes
I've LARPed... but the two LARP groups I did were Boffer (pipe and foam) and Live (blunted) steel.

Then I went to a WOD Larp... and a guy who was one eighth my size did stone/scissors/paper and told that he slammed me against a wall...

I laughed all the way to the car.

"Rock Paper Scissors" kinda kills the necessary aura for me too. :p

JG

[BlackSword]

I think my biggest problem with this is that I don't like meta-plots wielded like big clubs. I read through the press release more closely and saw that they are planning to use their fiction books in a lot more detail. I understand that with WoD is supposed to have sort of the CoC lite approach to each individual means nothing compared to the whole of the earth. But on the other hand, when I play in a game I like to play a hero. I want to be a person who can make some difference. Instead everyone who plays the game is being pulled around like some walk-on while the staff at WW tells the story they want to tell. I think its interesting that in every single GM tips lists, one of the top rules is "Don't railroad your players." Well, WW staff is setting the final nail in a long set of tracks.

[starblaze]

Originally posted by RadeFox
Hmm, Celerity and Rage were quite balanced in game. They were both limited in their way. With Celerity you went through your blood pretty fast. With Rage, it was different, ALL garou had it, and it was easy to get back, so nix the inbalance thing there. :p

With Celerity, yah, the Vamps with it went more, till they got low on blood, but guess what, I could name 20 scenes for every combat one, where another discipline rocked and celerity was useless. So in the end, it was the application of power and not the powers themselves that gave you the advantage.

WW did an overall fantastic job. Their system is easy to grasp, easy to run, and minimal mechanics DO help the story flow easier and dont detract from the story either. ;)

Maybe your experience was different than mine. But then maybe that wasn't a very well run game, although the GM is a friend of mine. I guess my problem was that I would never quite make the appropriate character for a game. My first vampire game was very politically minded and I ended up playing a more combat style Gangrel which kept me out of the loop alot. The next game I decided to play a more appropriate character and tried out a Nosferatu vampire who not very combat capable and ended up with some rules rapist who created a couple of killing machine Vampires.

So maybe it was just bad luck.

Another thing though that kind of got me about WOD was that if you read enough tribe/clan books you come the realize that good ol' humans like you and me are useless without supernatural help. I mean every single important character from history that was influential in any way was either a supernatural being of some sort or related to one. It was like we can't to do anything without help from someone, yet this world is supposed to belong to us.

Rant off.

[Nightshade]

My problem with the WoD is actually two-fold:

1) The tragedy of the situation (the personal horror, savage horror, etc.) fell flat after about 3 gaming sessions. You can only have those types of sessions for a short time. Then you better be able to go out and do something. Eventually, the humanity/paradox/oblivion thing was either represented as whining or ignored completely.

2) Once you want to actually do something, you can't. Read the books, the whole world is already set, you can't change it, or even really interact with it. You'll never be powerful enough to fight the Technocracy toe to toe. The elders are so much more powerful than the young vampires that they would never stand a chance in any type of conflict, physical or otherwise. The Weaver/Wyrm are two forces of nature vs. the Wyld who has basically already lost. You have no chance to win, you can only hope to survive. That is the best you can hope for. I have enough problem with GM's who do this, but when the game setting is set up like this, it really makes me wonder.

I would say that the metaplot and the setting may have been all right if they hadn't made it so, shall we say, immutable. I could not find a good way to make the setting mine, and that always rubs me wrong.

Nightshade

[RadeFox]

Nothing is immutable in the hand of the GM! I dont know any GM's who run the WW world as canon. We all took the bits we liked, made up bits we like better, and stole the bits we loved from others. :) All our games had a lot of the elements of the WW meta-plot, but none of them had them all, and by no means was anything set in stone. A GM idea or players actions in game always overwrote what may have been written on page 36 of some sourcebook. Truth be told, we have some very vibrant and believable vamp/garou inhabited town we ran in, and it was a blast. :cool:

[Evil Steve]

Originally posted by Nightshade
My problem with the WoD is actually two-fold:
2) Once you want to actually do something, you can't. Read the books, the whole world is already set, you can't change it, or even really interact with it. You'll never be powerful enough to fight the Technocracy toe to toe. The elders are so much more powerful than the young vampires that they would never stand a chance in any type of conflict, physical or otherwise. The Weaver/Wyrm are two forces of nature vs. the Wyld who has basically already lost. You have no chance to win, you can only hope to survive. That is the best you can hope for. I have enough problem with GM's who do this, but when the game setting is set up like this, it really makes me wonder.
Nightshade

That was actually the point they were seeking. The Wolves can't win, the Technocracy has already won, the Neonates cannot challenge the Elders. Survive. In your own personal hell.

That being said. I've read a great deal of VtM and WtA. Vamp started out as something original and mature. And it went downhill from there. Each suppliment pandered more to the powergamer and supplied less innovative info. Their encouragment of 'thought' was hampered by their inaccessable ideals. Most people had not encountered games of personal horror. Few had played in a world of rigid social code where they are at the bottom. How does one campaign this? I'm not requesting Modules, but more of the Essays that the main book had. A little thought from on top. What's happening in your own games Mr Rein-Hagen? You've got the needle in our arms, now give a little push so we can see what it feels like.

Werewolf went the opposite. It started out as the pop-claws-and-kill-stuff-game and became a wonderful statement on doomed heroism, failed heros, and Environmentalism (both good and bad aspects). The game matured and brought in aspects of spiritualism that is rarely reproduced in fiction, let alone gaming.

I think their greatest mistake, though, was Inphobia. Their attempt to make a gaming mag more appealing to a wider audience, rather than making a gaming mag that had more to it than just raw gaming info. It died a mercifully quick death. Though I do miss Chris W. McCubbins articles.

[Vondy]

I think this link hits the nail on the head...

http://bob.bob.bofh.org/~cube/dark/gothrpg.html

[Killer Shrike]

Whats a goth? Isnt that like a Germanic tribe of "barbarians" that whipped the Romans and burned Rome?


;)

jk -- funny site.

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
Whats a goth? Isnt that like a Germanic tribe of "barbarians" that whipped the Romans and burned Rome?


There is a Tee-shirt on my "To Buy" list that says:
A REAL Goth would be sacking rome.

[Vondy]

Originally posted by Killer Shrike
Whats a goth? Isnt that like a Germanic tribe of "barbarians" that whipped the Romans and burned Rome?


;)

jk -- funny site.

The Goths were the Gaulic tribes of central and southeastern Europe. The Visagoth's (a particular Gaulic tribe) sacked Rome.

[Rene]

Agree with you guys. What I find odious about some WW gamers is that they seem to believe that somber and angsty are synonymous with deep and sophisticated.

Nonetheless, I think both Vampire and Mage were really cool games if you ignored the "attitude" of some of their fans and took some liberties with the games.

[James Gillen]

"Nonetheless, I think both Vampire and Mage were really cool games if you ignored the "attitude" of some of their fans and took some liberties with the games."

Like the rules, and the setting?

JG

[OddHat]

Even Aberrant, which had a heck of a lot going for it (nice background story, great production values, very interesting take on superheroes) suffered from the three classic White Wolf flaws:

1) Lowest of the low syndrome. The PCs will never, ever be as powerful as the NPCs under the rules, lest they upset the sacred Meta-Plot. I still remember the first Aberrant module, where the frickin' bartender was in Champions terms a 1200 point character.

2) Talking head syndrome. The early Aberrant material went out of its way to encourage a style of adventure devoted to endless talking head politics and no actual action whatsoever; the only powers that would have seen any use were the Super Social powers some characters had, and go back to rule one to see why you couldn't use those on anyone important.

3) Conspiracy theorists syndrome. As in all white wolf games, everything, but everything, was part of a grand conspiracy that your characters were helpless to even interact with let alone unravel.

Most of this nonsense was played down in later supplements (the Adventure! pulp follow up to Aberant is almost free of it), but it cast a pall over what would otherwise have been a very cool game world. Of course the GM can just toss most of the rules out the window, ignore the aspects of the setting and metaplot he dislikes, and generally rebuild the game into something playable, but at that point you might as well just use the game as a source of ideas for GURPS or Hero...which is what I ended up doing.
;)

[Rene]

Originally posted by James Gillen
"Nonetheless, I think both Vampire and Mage were really cool games if you ignored the "attitude" of some of their fans and took some liberties with the games."

Like the rules, and the setting?

JG

No, not as bad as that. :) I think the rules are serviceable enough, in the spirit of a rules-light system, even though you have some weirdness, like some Disciplines that are more effective than others.

As for the setting, that takes a little more work, but not as much as many people think. I GMed and played in some sucessful WW campaigns. You only have to make some little fixes:

1) Make the unstoppable descent into inhumanity a little less unstoppable. If you want to play a good guy vampire or a good guy mage in my game, I will not contrive situations to turn you into a monster. That road is open to those interested, but it's never mandatory.

2) Ignore most of the supplements. Stick with the main books. You save money and you save trouble. The main books offer very fine basic directions about the setting, more than enough to give you a good idea of what it's like, without forcing you into a meta-plot straightjacket. It allows you to make the setting your own.

3) Related to Item 2. The main books don't have stats for mega-powerful NPCs. Stick to the main books, ignore the supplements, stat them yourself. Make them beatable. Allow the PCs to have victories. Don't use the "Boston by Night" supplement if you want to play in Boston, make your own version of the city.

4) Relax a bit the "you have all this power but you can't use it" syndrome. The simplest way is to relax the "Masquerade" or whatever it's called in each WW book. That is a problem in Ars Magica too. Don't make the PCs life difficult just because they once used a power in front of one or two normals.

That is it, mostly. And I'm talking just about Vampire and Mage. I don't really know the other games in the WoD line.

And yes, there is still some absurds in the games. Like the overuse of the conspiracy theory idea. But what the hell. It's not like other genres don't have their absurd bits. I'm a superhero fan myself. Some things you either accept or you don't.


Now, Aberrant is a sadder case. I really wanted to like Aberrant, as I am a fan of the deconstruction subgenre of the superhero from the 80s. Still, many of the WW copyrighted flaws were hardwired in Aberrant even deeper than the World of Darkness games, to wit:

1) Wildly unbalanced rules. In Aberrant you *had* to buy lots of Mega-Attributes and just a single point in several powers to make an effective character. Any other path of character construction left you with a hopeless wimp.

2) Weird combat. Aberrant reminded me of the thrice-damned GURPS Supers in that. When two superhumans fought, they either killed each other with one shot, or they could't even scratch each other. This may or may not be realistic, but it's undramatic as hell.

3) Mega-plot hardwired into the setting. The mega-plot here was in the main book and you couldn't get rid of it without a major rewrite of the setting.

4) "You have all this power, but you can't use it" syndrome is at it's worst here. This time you have no "Masquerade" (that can easily be relaxed without much fuss), you have something worse: "Project Utopia". Utopia already solved all the world's problems. Now it only exists to watchdog all Novas. Another thing you can't change without a major rewrite.

5) For someone with the power of a god, all your options were sucky. You could join Utopia and be a dupe or a willing participant in this corrupt feel-goody conspiracy. You could join the Teragen and be a psycho. You could join the Aberrants and live a life of endless persecution. Most Aberrant players I saw just became independent Novas, all the other options were horrible.

6) What is up with WW's politics? Is Aberrant a liberal wet dream or what? The so-called good guys were really fascists, the bad guys were just misunderstood, and the rebels were the real good guys. That is *exactly* how liberals see the world. Scary. The only novelty in this approach was that the UN was the evil hypocryte now, not the USA. (Though the US has fallen from power in Aberrant, just like in all the liberal wet dream settings).

All in all, I really wanted to like Aberrant, when I first read it, I loved all the "Watchmen/Wild Cards" qualities of the game. But the more I played, the more I became frustrated with it. The only moderately good Aberrant games I had were those that the GM kept the basic idea and radically changed most of the setting.

[Blue]

I've never read the MAGE rules, so tell me if this is a true criticism (This is what a couple of the other players in my group told me about the game): It doesn't matter what kind of mage you are, you can pretty much all achieve the same effect.

I'm sure there's a better way of phrasing that, but like I said, I've never read the game (and therefore don't know the terminology).

[Rene]

More or less. Mage's magic system is a lot more open-ended than most other games. It's more a honest-to-god reality-manipulation power than the more low-key skill-like take on magics from GURPS or the fire-and-forget laundry list from D&D. It's a lot like HERO's Variable Power Pools.

Still, there is variation between different mages. You buy points in different spheres, so the individual mages will be more powerful in certain areas. It's like every mage had different amounts of points in different VPPs, to use HERO-speak.

There is also the "special effect" thing, that is a bit like HERO. Different kinds of mages have different fetishes, but they can achieve similar game effects, if they want to.

[Killer Shrike]

In Mage there were many ways to accomplish similar ends (much like the HERO System), but no, they werent all the same.

My favored Mage character, Marcus, was an Adept at matter, meaning he had 4 'dots' in matter, with 3 dots in Prime, 3 dots in Forces, 5 Arete (raw power -- determines the dice pool available for working magic), Sphere Ineptitude: Spirit, and 5 dots in Sanctum Sanctorum (defined as a semi truck and trailer) had a completely different feel and capabilities than another player's Mage of equivalent power, Michael, who had 3 Life, 3 Forces, 3 Prime, 2 Spirit, 1 Mind, and 1 Time and 3 Arete or another player's Mage of equivalent power who had 3 Time, 3 Correspondence, 3 Life, 3 Mind, and 4 Arete.

Very different indeed.

"True Magick" was broken down into 9 Spheres, with each Sphere representing a facet of reality, and each Sphere combinable with any other that you had mastery of to form composite effects.

Its been a few years, but lets test the old memory. The 9 Spheres were:

Prime: the actual stuff of reality, and therefore Magick itself. In Ars Magica, this was called Vim. Prime was needed to make anything permanent or long lasting without requiring constant maintenance.

Forces: all energy and motive force.

Matter: all inorganic substances

Life: all organic substances

Mind: all mental activities and thought

Spirit: ability to perceive, manipulate, and move thru the spirit world; mess around with peoples souls....that sort of thing [took on major significance in WW bcs the Umbra is essentially the Spirit world, and the Deep Umbra is basically alternate dimentional space -- thus Spirit was a big deal)

Time: the flow of sequential events

Correspondence: relationships between space [one of the hardest speheres to understand in real life, it posited the concept of a universal correspondence point, so that all things and places touch all other things and places]

Entropy: probability, manipulation of change, and attrition.

Some Spheres varied, but for each of the Spheres 1 dot = awareness, and sometimes minor personal-level adjustments, 2 dots = simple manipulation, 3 dots = simple creation and manipulation, 4 dots = complex manipulation, and 5 dots = complex creation.

Each dot was exponential was the key thing, unlike the other WW games where each dot was just another flat ability. A Mage rolling 4 dice could warp reality in significant fashion.

Becoming an Adept in any Sphere was an accomplishment, and becoming a Master was really significant. After an entire chronicle (aka campaign) of scraping and saving all my XP I had managed to make Adept in Matter and was a couple of points away from Master in Matter when the Chronicle ground to a halt. None of the other characters went for Adept in any of their Spheres, primarily bcs the players hadnt realized the significance of Arete and hadnt dumped everything in it at startup like I had; none of your Spheres could exceed your Arete in rank, and Arete was difficult to raise. If by some chance or GM leniency you managed to get a 6th dot in anything you couldnt survive in the normal world anymore; your very existance violated reality and you would rack up Paradox just by living -- it was off to the Deep Umbra or a pocket realm for you.

To twist reality in certain ways would require combining various Spheres together at different ranks. Some effects were documented or established by utility; these were called Rotes -- the published power effects were all rotes. However, you could deviate from those at will, based upon your Storytellers interpretation of the Sphere rankings.

Correspondence was the most useful 'helper' Sphere, as it allowed you to use your other Spheres much more effectively across distance and positioning. Prime was also very useful for making longer lasting effects. Time was similar to Correspondence as a helper as it allowed you to do things beyond the now. All of the physical Spheres, Matter, Forces, Life had immediate and obvious uses, Mind and Spirit were very effective, and so on. Entropy was fabulous both by itself and as a combiner with other Spheres for "Anti" effects. And so on. All of the Spheres had their pros and cons, and there were some very cool combinations possible that made Mages with even just 1 dot of difference have different capabilities.


Keep in mind this was all 2nd Ed Mage. I dont know what tom foolery WW may have gotten up to in later editions. I got the impression they took some liberties.

[Captain Obvious]

I don't know exactly what went on in Mage 3rd Ed, but from what I gather, they weakened mages considerably. Seeing how they dropped Wraith altogether (which was my favorite of all their games), and yet continually increase the power of Vampires with no end in sight, it would seem that White Wolf is definitely playing favorites....

Don't go to WW if you're looking for game balance. No way. Better to use some of their background material, and build everything in Hero.

[starblaze]

Originally posted by Rene
No, not as bad as that. :) I think the rules are serviceable enough, in the spirit of a rules-light system, even though you have some weirdness, like some Disciplines that are more effective than others.

As for the setting, that takes a little more work, but not as much as many people think. I GMed and played in some sucessful WW campaigns. You only have to make some little fixes:

1) Make the unstoppable descent into inhumanity a little less unstoppable. If you want to play a good guy vampire or a good guy mage in my game, I will not contrive situations to turn you into a monster. That road is open to those interested, but it's never mandatory.

2) Ignore most of the supplements. Stick with the main books. You save money and you save trouble. The main books offer very fine basic directions about the setting, more than enough to give you a good idea of what it's like, without forcing you into a meta-plot straightjacket. It allows you to make the setting your own.

3) Related to Item 2. The main books don't have stats for mega-powerful NPCs. Stick to the main books, ignore the supplements, stat them yourself. Make them beatable. Allow the PCs to have victories. Don't use the "Boston by Night" supplement if you want to play in Boston, make your own version of the city.

4) Relax a bit the "you have all this power but you can't use it" syndrome. The simplest way is to relax the "Masquerade" or whatever it's called in each WW book. That is a problem in Ars Magica too. Don't make the PCs life difficult just because they once used a power in front of one or two normals.

That is it, mostly. And I'm talking just about Vampire and Mage. I don't really know the other games in the WoD line.

And yes, there is still some absurds in the games. Like the overuse of the conspiracy theory idea. But what the hell. It's not like other genres don't have their absurd bits. I'm a superhero fan myself. Some things you either accept or you don't.


Now, Aberrant is a sadder case. I really wanted to like Aberrant, as I am a fan of the deconstruction subgenre of the superhero from the 80s. Still, many of the WW copyrighted flaws were hardwired in Aberrant even deeper than the World of Darkness games, to wit:

1) Wildly unbalanced rules. In Aberrant you *had* to buy lots of Mega-Attributes and just a single point in several powers to make an effective character. Any other path of character construction left you with a hopeless wimp.

2) Weird combat. Aberrant reminded me of the thrice-damned GURPS Supers in that. When two superhumans fought, they either killed each other with one shot, or they could't even scratch each other. This may or may not be realistic, but it's undramatic as hell.

3) Mega-plot hardwired into the setting. The mega-plot here was in the main book and you couldn't get rid of it without a major rewrite of the setting.

4) "You have all this power, but you can't use it" syndrome is at it's worst here. This time you have no "Masquerade" (that can easily be relaxed without much fuss), you have something worse: "Project Utopia". Utopia already solved all the world's problems. Now it only exists to watchdog all Novas. Another thing you can't change without a major rewrite.

5) For someone with the power of a god, all your options were sucky. You could join Utopia and be a dupe or a willing participant in this corrupt feel-goody conspiracy. You could join the Teragen and be a psycho. You could join the Aberrants and live a life of endless persecution. Most Aberrant players I saw just became independent Novas, all the other options were horrible.

6) What is up with WW's politics? Is Aberrant a liberal wet dream or what? The so-called good guys were really fascists, the bad guys were just misunderstood, and the rebels were the real good guys. That is *exactly* how liberals see the world. Scary. The only novelty in this approach was that the UN was the evil hypocryte now, not the USA. (Though the US has fallen from power in Aberrant, just like in all the liberal wet dream settings).

All in all, I really wanted to like Aberrant, when I first read it, I loved all the "Watchmen/Wild Cards" qualities of the game. But the more I played, the more I became frustrated with it. The only moderately good Aberrant games I had were those that the GM kept the basic idea and radically changed most of the setting.

I agree, Aberrant was like a superhero game without superheroes. In fact just being a friendly neighborhood anything just seemed stupid to them.

[OddHat]

Originally posted by Captain Obvious
Don't go to WW if you're looking for game balance. No way. Better to use some of their background material, and build everything in Hero.

Strongly agreed.

Even better to go to the source material and develop something on your own that actually makes some kind of sense. ;)

[CrosshairCollie]

I agree with darn near everything I've seen on this thread. I HATED the fact that every single important person in history was a supernatural being. I HATED the fact that hope was nonexistant, and a happy ending was impossible. I HATED the system, which had no balance. I HATED the fact that they went out of their way to make it next to impossible for characters of different 'types' (vampire/werewolf/mage) to interact on a friendly basis, because everybody hated everybody else.

[Nightshade]

Here's something that I was always confused about.

They have gone so far as to say that the ENTIRE World of Darkness setting is not set up for the different races (vampires, mages, etc.) shouldn't interact. There should never be a game with vampires, changelings, and mages in it. I have heard people go so far as to say that these are entirely different games and they have nothing to do with each other.

Then, you get to the metaplot and there are interactions all over the place. Mages and Vampires competing for influence in the same group. Hell, Ravnos was killed by the Technocracy!

But then try to play different races at the same time and the people at White Wolf would look at you funny and say "Why would you do that?"

Nightshade

[Blue]

I've never heard any mention that werewolves, vampires, etc. did not all interact in the same world and same game, I've just seen them say that they shouldn't be on the same team (A werewolf, a vampire, a wraith, a mage, a changeling and a hunter team up to fight something). And just because they all pretty much hate each other I'd agree. But a clever GM could come up with a way to force them to work together ;)

[Killer Shrike]

Werewolves & Mages are a powerful combination (or were in 2e) -- the Werewolves would Crinos, driving all the norms crazy, and then the Mages could cut loose with more vulgar magick than they normally could get away with bcs there were no sane normals around to see it. Botches still sucked however ;)

[OddHat]

Ever play or hear of an awesome but underated little game called Nightlife? It came out in 1990, a few GenCons before Vampire, published by Stellar Games. The rules system was a a bit like a very simplified cross between D&D and GURPS, and the world setting was in many ways the World of Darkness done right. Billed itself as a Splatterpunk game; The Kin (Vampyres, Werewolves, Ghosts, Wyghts, Daemons, Animates, and Sorcerors, and a dozen minor species) interacted with each-other in a hidden sub-culture in near-future NY and other cities. You formed a group of mixed Kin and fought street gangs (human and/or Kin), crimelords, cults, Chtuloid monsters, witches, true hellborn demons (the PC Daemons had been on earth for centuries and had assimilated), elementals, cyborgs and basically every b-movie sci-fi or horror creature out there. Fantastic setting. I still break out the game now and then. Other cool compatable games included "It Came from the Late Late Show" (roleplaying in the world of B Movies, and the first game I saw where you could call for your stuntman or try to renegotiate your contract during the game), Ace Agents (roleplaying in a comedy GI Joe style universe), and Super Ace Agents (their comedy superhero game).

I still remember going up to Bradley McDevitt (Night Life's main artist and writer) the day Vampire came out and showing him basically the same setting but done in dead serious style and with far higher production values. One look at Bradstreet's art answered the question of which game company was going to come out on top in that contest. :(

[Lupus]

The main difficulty I found with crossing over between different WW games was that the system in each game didn't take other games into account. How many vampmire disciplines have Humanity as a target? How many Werewolf gifts allow Gnosis to be used as a defence? No guides on what to do when using it against people who don't have those stats.

I think there were some conversion docs (official) that came out, that suggested using Willpower in place of any stat the target didn't possess. That just seemed... weak to me. Especially as mages, who were rolling at most 5 dice, would often end up with well over 5 dice (willpower) defending against their magick. It was nice to have conversion docs, but it was a pity they were worthless. :)

And yes, some people will say 'the rules are just there to be guidelines. They shouldn't get in the way of roleplaying.' However, WW put in enough of a system that you couldn't mess with it too much without creating changes in other areas. And not enough of a system to describe everything you wanted. It was stuck in an unfortunate middle ground that was caused more by 'we couldn't be bothered coming up with something decent, so we'll just tell you to put in the effort yourself.'

Whew, got a bit off-topic, there... sorry.

[James Gillen]

Originally posted by OddHat
Ever play or hear of an awesome but underated little game called Nightlife? It came out in 1990, a few GenCons before Vampire, published by Stellar Games. The rules system was a a bit like a very simplified cross between D&D and GURPS, and the world setting was in many ways the World of Darkness done right. Billed itself as a Splatterpunk game; The Kin (Vampyres, Werewolves, Ghosts, Wyghts, Daemons, Animates, and Sorcerors, and a dozen minor species) interacted with each-other in a hidden sub-culture in near-future NY and other cities. You formed a group of mixed Kin and fought street gangs (human and/or Kin), crimelords, cults, Chtuloid monsters, witches, true hellborn demons (the PC Daemons had been on earth for centuries and had assimilated), elementals, cyborgs and basically every b-movie sci-fi or horror creature out there. Fantastic setting. I still break out the game now and then. Other cool compatable games included "It Came from the Late Late Show" (roleplaying in the world of B Movies, and the first game I saw where you could call for your stuntman or try to renegotiate your contract during the game), Ace Agents (roleplaying in a comedy GI Joe style universe), and Super Ace Agents (their comedy superhero game).

I still remember going up to Bradley McDevitt the day Vampire came out and showing him basically the same setting but done in dead serious style and with far higher production values. One look at Bradstreet's art answered the question of which game company was going to come out on top in that contest. :(

Yeah, I do remember Nightlife. And yeah, in retrospect it does seem like the WoD done 'right.'

JG

[Nightshade]

A friend of mine once summed up White Wolf's system perfectly:

"White Wolf has the worst system out there that is still functional."

When InQuest rated the HERO system as the number one roleplaying game of all time, they rated White Wolf number two. According to them, if the system were better done, they may have put it as number one.

Nightshade

[SCUBA Hero]

Originally posted by Nightshade
When InQuest rated the HERO system as the number one roleplaying game of all time, they rated White Wolf number two. According to them, if the system were better done, they may have put it as number one.
What do you expect from a magazine that's essentially an excuse to use the word 'buttweasel' as many times as possible? :rolleyes:

[SCUBA Hero]

Originally posted by Nightshade
InQuest rated the HERO system as the number one roleplaying game of all time
Well, at least they got that part right. . . :D

[DocMan]

Originally posted by CrosshairCollie
I HATED the fact that every single important person in history was a supernatural being.

Not WAS a supernatural being, was CLAIMED TO BE a supernatural being. One of the running jokes in the WoD is looking through the Clanbooks and seeing how many Clans claimed Rasputin was one of their own.

When you're looking at background info in the WoD you have to remember that you're looking at revisionist history written to "prove" someone's personal prejudices. So OF COURSE every important historical figure either was a supernatural being, was a puppet of a supernatural being, later became a supernatural being, or is being impersonated by a supernatural being and no one knows if it's really an impostor or not.

Par for the course.


I HATED the fact that hope was nonexistant, and a happy ending was impossible.

Last I checked, the entire WoD is labeled "Game of Personal Horror". One doesn't play Paranoia expecting to eventually fix The Computer. Why would you expect to find a happy ending in the WoD?


I HATED the system, which had no balance. I HATED the fact that they went out of their way to make it next to impossible for characters of different 'types' (vampire/werewolf/mage) to interact on a friendly basis, because everybody hated everybody else.

I think this was done to preserve the whole Personal Horror angle. Basicly, in each game you have to fight a megalithic but vagely defined enemy without attracting it's attention (or at least being perceived of as a threat). That's the challenge of each game.

Yet, if you constructed a party of Vampires, Werewolves, and Mages all working together, who could stand against you? That kind of unbridled success would kill the game world setting and end the game.

Ironicly, there are some vampires who do associate with Werewolves. And others who associate with Mages.

Werewolves occiasionally find a vampire or two whose taint is small enough that they refrain from shredding them on sight. Or make a temporary truce with some mages to protect a grove.

Mages love a chance to get Tass from a Vampire. They're just very tricky unless you're sure you've got the upper hand. Or you're Euthanatos and you understand where they're coming from. And werewolves aren't so bad if they'll just refrain from rending you limb from limb long enough for you to explain what you're doing there.

It's really not that bad as long as you accept it for the kind of game it was designed to be. Yes, the metaplots are a cynical trick to separate honest gamers from their hard earned dollars. Yes, the "dark" aspects of the game do tend to attract personalities that are more than a little broken so that they can use the game framework to make sense of their wasted lives. But the same can be said of most RPGs to some degree or other.

Doc

[James Gillen]

Originally posted by DocMan

When you're looking at background info in the WoD you have to remember that you're looking at revisionist history written to "prove" someone's personal prejudices. So OF COURSE every important historical figure either was a supernatural being, was a puppet of a supernatural being, later became a supernatural being, or is being impersonated by a supernatural being and no one knows if it's really an impostor or not.

Par for the course.

That's part of the rampant subjectivism within White Wolf (WoD in particular). For instance, how does the myth of Caine as First Vampire square with the existence of vampire groups (like the Kuei-jin) that have no Cainite/Biblical connection? How does the explicitly Biblical DEMON square with the eco-pagan WEREWOLF? If reality IS subjective, then Mages should be able to perform magic without Paradox. If reality is not subjective, magic and Paradox would not be possible at all.

Stuff like that.

JG

[Killer Shrike]

Originally posted by James Gillen
That's part of the rampant subjectivism within White Wolf (WoD in particular). For instance, how does the myth of Caine as First Vampire square with the existence of vampire groups (like the Kuei-jin) that have no Cainite/Biblical connection? How does the explicitly Biblical DEMON square with the eco-pagan WEREWOLF? If reality IS subjective, then Mages should be able to perform magic without Paradox. If reality is not subjective, magic and Paradox would not be possible at all.

Stuff like that.

JG

Damn...I hate to have to defend WW, but to be fair, according to the 1st two editions of MAGE, Reality IS subjective BUT the existing paradigm at a given place has a basic rigidity that must be surpassed first. The Technocracy essentially won the Reality War as such and via media manipulation and directed effort, they have reenforced the rigidity of the modern techno-science oriented paradigm. In the WoD, Ars Magica was Mythic Europe, and that past was brought forward and inculcated into mage in the modern era -- the Order of Hermes presented in Ars Magica and the Order of Hermes presented in Mage is the same organization, altered by several hundred years of being on the loosing end of the war with the Technocracy.

So the idea is, before the paradigm of reality was deliberately manipulated in a regimented fashion by the Technocracy, reality did shift quite a bit, and belief in things supernatural enabled supernatural things to exist.


As an aside to all that, the Kindred of the East was basically the last straw for me. After that came out originally I bought a copy. Reading thru it later as time permitted I lost all hope for WW and basically all interest in following the back storys or the progression of the various game lines. That travesty was so poorly handled and non-sensical that I lost all vestiges of respect for the company (which had been taking a beating regardless for several years).