Author Topic: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?  (Read 19415 times)

Offline Libertad

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For the times you want to play hot vampires without worrying about level adjustment and healing spells. And hot werewolves maybe, if that's your thing. I won't judge.

I first got into White Wolf stuff many years ago, but only started playing recently. Masquerade, specifically, although I own mostly New/Chronicles of Darkness books.

For those not in the know, to prevent confusion White Wolf (now known as Onyx Path Publishing) decided to rename the New World of Darkness series the Chronicles of Darkness. This was to better distinguish it from its Old World equivalents, as the newer games evolved into their own things.

In recent times the Classic/Old World books are being revamped with 20th Anniversary products, which collect a shitload of material across the game lines and metaplot to compile into big codexes. This is how I first got into Masquerade: via its 20th Anniversary book.

I'm also a big fan of Mage (New) and Hunter (New).

This is more a feeling out thread at first to see if Min-Maxers here are interested in such a thread. I figured a big generic thread would be best for this site, which is more or less 3.5/D20 focused. If anyone has conversation topics to start, we can do that.

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #1 on: June 07, 2016, 06:32:00 PM »
Well, I play it when I can. That's about my contribution to an empty thread. :P

Offline Unbeliever

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #2 on: June 07, 2016, 08:15:13 PM »
Fan of the Old World's fluff, although I find their mechanics frustrating.  Vampire (Masquerade and Dark Ages) and Mage were my favorites, but I played them all and ran most of them.  Changeling the Dreaming irked me pretty regularly.  In some ways I enjoyed larp more:  the rules were lighter and more evocative, but it only really works for vampires since their abilities mostly involve social powers. 

Insert obligatory comment about Libertad being a whippersnapper given that he got into VtM with the V20 book ...

A lot of my massive fuckups as a GM -- and most of my GMing advice is based on said fuckups, I know what works only by a process of elimination it seems -- comes from running White Wolf games.  Although, the one thing I will say in my defense is that the games make absolutely no effort to make them runnable. 

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #3 on: June 07, 2016, 08:27:05 PM »
Yeah, the rules are a total mess. XP encourages dumping as many points into as few skills as possible at chargen and they still haven't fixed that.

Flaws are actually balanced if everyone takes them (and the GM remembers the 7-pt limit) and nobody is suicidal enough to pick Dark Fate or something, though. That's always weird.

Offline Libertad

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #4 on: June 07, 2016, 09:07:59 PM »
1: Yeah, the rules are a total mess. XP encourages dumping as many points into as few skills as possible at chargen and they still haven't fixed that.

2: Flaws are actually balanced if everyone takes them (and the GM remembers the 7-pt limit) and nobody is suicidal enough to pick Dark Fate or something, though. That's always weird.

1: They did in Chronicles of Darkness! :P And they have a good dice system, too!

Which reminds me, there are Translation Guides for each of the 3 major game lines (Vampire, Werewolf, Mage) if you want to run Old World of Darkness elements in Chronicles and vice versa. A dude I played with about a year ago had a big "Masquerade with Requiem" document based off of this. I'll see later if I still have access to it.

2: A lot of flaws are role-playing based but given static point values. For example, Infertile Vitae might not be a flaw at all if you uphold the Traditions and not create a childe. Also, starting play as a Caitiff (14th/15th Generation) hugely under-priced at -2 and -4 points. For those not in the know, Caitiff are the least powerful generations of vampires, and in addition to having trouble progressing Disciplines (special vampire powers) they are villified among the Camarilla. So you have personal flaws of power progression and social stigma to go with it. Joy.

Also, there's a certain particular Flaw which I get the feeling was immensely popular for reasons I hope are obvious:

Quote
Glowing Eyes (3pt. Flaw) You have the stereotypical glowing eyes of vampire legend, which gives you a -1 difficulty on Intimidation rolls when you’re dealing with mortals. However, the tradeoffs are many; you must constantly disguise your condition (no, contacts don’t cut it); the glow impairs your vision and puts you at +1 difficulty on all sightbased rolls (including the use of ranged weapons); and the radiance emanating from your eye sockets makes it difficult to hide (+2 difficulty to Stealth rolls) in the dark.
« Last Edit: June 07, 2016, 09:11:02 PM by Libertad »

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #5 on: June 07, 2016, 09:21:54 PM »
If roleplaying flaws aren't being a problem, then you're not being cruel enough. The whole system is built around very roleplay heavy stuff (and why later games got stunts), so things like Glowing Eyes should be a problem. FFS, even attracting someone to nom on is easily made harder because ANY remotely sane person will be on edge from that. So many ways to take Herd out of the question, too...

Offline Libertad

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #6 on: June 07, 2016, 09:43:33 PM »
Such stuff should be important, but I tend to prefer systems where your flaws grant an in-game benefit when they come into play, like the granting of a Bennie/Hero Point/etc.

Static point values indicate a linear, objective sense of hindrance. Take the No Reflection flaw for 1 point; in a huge metropolis it would come up all the time; the taxi driver looking through his hanging window, the rear view mirror of a car, and so on. But in a much more rural, or pre-industrial setting it won't show up as much.

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #7 on: June 07, 2016, 09:51:13 PM »
Such stuff should be important, but I tend to prefer systems where your flaws grant an in-game benefit when they come into play, like the granting of a Bennie/Hero Point/etc.

Well, it's the same as 3.5. Take a penalty, get a char-creation bonus. Then the game system actually prods you to roleplay it. Works well enough.

[qupte]Static point values indicate a linear, objective sense of hindrance. Take the No Reflection flaw for 1 point; in a huge metropolis it would come up all the time; the taxi driver looking through his hanging window, the rear view mirror of a car, and so on. But in a much more rural, or pre-industrial setting it won't show up as much.
[/quote]

Not... really? A low-point flaw is worth a lot less than a large one because it's easily circumvented. Seven one-point flaws are a lot less problematic than one seven-point (basically a one-point is equivalent to a clan weakness) because that last one would be a huge weakpoint to hand over to the GM. Much like the value of a feat in 3.5, the freebie points will become less and less relevant as a game continues, and these are meant for loooooong games.

You're basically picking lots of tiny things that can be used against you or one or two big things that are a free bullseye.

Still balance out if you get everyone using flaws, though. Intelligent flaw-choice is a great way to build characters and since there's so many, especially when you dig into multiple gamelines... :D

Offline Unbeliever

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #8 on: June 07, 2016, 09:57:36 PM »
1: Yeah, the rules are a total mess. XP encourages dumping as many points into as few skills as possible at chargen and they still haven't fixed that.
...

1: They did in Chronicles of Darkness! :P And they have a good dice system, too!
If it takes you over 20 years to fix something this obvious nobody gets to brag about it.  NOBODY.

I'm fine with flaws.  Basically, I assume everyone's going to take their 7 points, and a few of them will give me a license to fuck with them.  So, it's fine.

Also, baseline White Wolf characters suck so hard, I'm happy to power them up wherever they could be.  Vampire was the worst in this regard, I think, it wasn't so bad with Werewolf or Mage. 

I haven't looked at God Machine since it was in playtest.  Which I think was like 3 iterations ago.  I know some people liked it, so that's a plus.  I was utterly unimpressed with Requiem's rules, a position shared by many many people.  They suck.  Maybe they suck less than Masquerade.  But, even that's debatable.  I could fill this thread with my annoyances and disappointments with nWoD's ruleset.  At least the oWoD one had an excuse ... it was well, old. 

By the by, you underestimate the firepower that Caitiff's discipline flexibility can give them.  Not that I've played many of them, the Clans were among my favorite part of the game (although again, in concept, not implementation ... if I wanted character classes I could play D&D ...), but they can be quite powerful.  They get to cherrypick amongst the broken ass powers, many of which are quite low level. 


EDIT:  bitching about the balance of Flaws is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.  There are huge issues with the mechanics, like how it is rocket tag times 9000 (you'd think they'd never heard of a saving throw), let the poor players enjoy their Flaws.
« Last Edit: June 07, 2016, 10:00:39 PM by Unbeliever »

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #9 on: June 07, 2016, 10:21:35 PM »
As I said, I like flaws. Given how fucked up the mechanics are, may as well let in the absurdity that screams random weaknesses or builds on character ideas.

Max flaws = one discipline dot. One. Not a big deal, really, except for rounding out things.

Offline Amechra

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #10 on: June 08, 2016, 12:13:38 AM »
So... what about everyone's favorite gameline, Mummy?

No, not the nWoD Mummy, the other Mummy. The one that lets you play non-Egyptian mummies, and doesn't have a ridiculous amount of obfuscating details covering the whole thing.

It also has "I have no schlong" as a flaw, so...



Fun fact: The World/Chronicles of Darkness had their own kinda dndtools: http://rp.thesubnet.com/

It's a pity that it got taken down and totally isn't on the wayback machine in complete and functional form.  ;)
"There is happiness for those who accept their fate, there is glory for those that defy it."

"Now that everyone's so happy, this is probably a good time to tell you I ate your parents."

Offline Libertad

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #11 on: June 08, 2016, 01:08:14 AM »
It also has "I have no schlong" as a flaw, so...

It's only a flaw if you're using Strange, Dead Love. ;)

So anyway, I noticed that V20 (Vampire 20th Anniversary) has more than a few supplements. As Masquerade got an awful lot of supplements over its time, does anyone know what sourcebooks are covered/invalidated by the V20 books? Or are they new books entirely?

Ghouls & Revenants, Anarchs Unbound, Lore of the Clans, etc.

Offline bhu

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #12 on: June 08, 2016, 01:22:22 AM »
So... what about everyone's favorite gameline, Mummy?

No, not the nWoD Mummy, the other Mummy. The one that lets you play non-Egyptian mummies, and doesn't have a ridiculous amount of obfuscating details covering the whole thing.

It also has "I have no schlong" as a flaw, so...



Fun fact: The World/Chronicles of Darkness had their own kinda dndtools: http://rp.thesubnet.com/

It's a pity that it got taken down and totally isn't on the wayback machine in complete and functional form.  ;)

I'm mostly familiar with Werewolf since almost everyone where I lived played it.  I wasn't always popular cause I rarely played garou, and that required DM's looking up additional rules.  My personal favorite being the Mokele whose rules were absolutely batshit.  "There's BSD's comin', were gonna shift to Crinos so try not to freak out" *becomes 8 foot tall wolfman*

"I should say the same to you."*becomes 80 foot tall armor plated godzilla monster*

Offline Libertad

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #13 on: June 08, 2016, 01:36:14 AM »
So, how many Werewolf groups contain furries? I heard that it's a really popular game among that demographic, but I don't know how big their presence is as players.

Offline bhu

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #14 on: June 08, 2016, 02:34:49 AM »
Furies were unknown to 95% of ohios population at the time I was playing.  They were into Werewolf as a "SWEET JESUS WE GET TO KILL THINGS NOW!!!" form of stress relief.

Offline Argent Fatalis

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #15 on: June 08, 2016, 03:02:42 AM »
Interesting that this topic has more or less taken off, as for quite some time I have had several Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse books sitting around for years. I only just ran into them because I needed reading material to have while stuck in a place with virtually no Internet and opted for something new and different.

Needless to say, these things are fascinating.

As for the melding of furries and Werewolf, I am not surprised in the slightest. Even before I acquired these books I had encountered that combination before, but many of them are not what I would say would be your "iconic furry". Not to say that's good or bad, but that's my experience as someone who has only seen it from an outside perspective of those involved and the game itself, as well as now viewing it in retrospect and from the position of someone who has played several zoanthropes, awakened and anthropomorphic beasts. I am of course biased towards the Bastet, but the Garou and Kindred are interesting enough on their own.

I guess that makes my introduction even more late to this game's series.

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #16 on: June 08, 2016, 07:47:25 AM »
ALL HAIL THE WERE-SHARK.

Offline Unbeliever

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #17 on: June 08, 2016, 10:53:32 AM »
So, how many Werewolf groups contain furries? I heard that it's a really popular game among that demographic, but I don't know how big their presence is as players.
I played Werewolf with numerous people and it was not apparent to me that any of them were sexually into the animal thing at all.  They certainly might have been, but it never remotely came up.  It could be that the Venn Diagram goes the other way.  But, honestly, this mostly strikes me as something derogatory to say about fans of the game.  The game has its issues, not just mechanically as it has a heavily dated noble savage vibe to it, but this has never struck me as one of them.  It strikes me as the sort of thing that smug VtM players say to look down on people who liked Werewolf.

I have a love/hate thing with the Were-Whatevers.  I absolutely love the Rokea (the Weresharks, referenced above), and am fond of the Gurahl (bears) and Mokele (crocodiles, technically, but all sorts of lizard types).  The Bastet (cats) and the Naga (snakes) can go fuck themselves, though. 

The problem is, and this is sort of pervasive in White Wolf which is why I bother typing it is that it really detracts from the core game.  In many of the White Wolf games, especially Vampire and Werewolf, the most interesting thing is the social structure.  The combat mechanics are frustrating and shitty, so you're not just there for the action.  But, the social maneuvering, the playing of a pack (i.e., a dysfunctional family unit), and so on is the fun stuff.  Once you throw in the undeniably cool "Others" you've kind of thrown that out the window.  It's no longer the focus. 

(Heretically, I'm even pretty lukewarm towards the Sabbat overall, although I do like some of the elements.  A Kindred shadow war could be an interesting campaign, especially with an emphasis on the "shadow" part, but (i) I'm not sure what the Sabbat is buying you there that Anarchs didn't already, and (ii) part of the Sabbat's raison d'etre is to throw the shadow part out the window.)

The Others, like the other werecreatures, also have a huge "I'm just better than you" problem.  One of the Auspices (3 of the main character decisions you get to make) is devoted to being a trickster.  The werecoyotes render them superfluous, and odds are just plain outclass them, although I can't quite remember. 
« Last Edit: June 08, 2016, 10:55:22 AM by Unbeliever »

Offline Raineh Daze

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #18 on: June 08, 2016, 11:02:46 AM »
The Sabbat have a pretty nice internal structure and religious cult thing going on, so what they have over the Anarchs is some level of coherence, which is fun. The Anarchs are just a plain mess. :lmao

Offline Amechra

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Re: Can we get a World/Chronicles of Darkness Thread up in here?
« Reply #19 on: June 08, 2016, 11:05:47 AM »
Kitsune are broken fuckers. Stupid things can learn any gift and have special fox magic - and are written as insufferable Mary Sues.

On a lighter topic, here's a thread on RPG.net where a guy goes through and reads V20... with the caveat that the only other WW game he's ever played or read was Vampire 1st edition.
"There is happiness for those who accept their fate, there is glory for those that defy it."

"Now that everyone's so happy, this is probably a good time to tell you I ate your parents."