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Covok posted:Hey, is Leviathan any good? Somebody pimped it in F&F when we were talking about Beast and it got me interested. Ehhhhhhh. It's probably the best, most fleshed out high-profile fansplat there is, but that's not exactly a hard bar to limbo under.
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Apr 12, 2016 04:29
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So apparently I'm blind to the faults of Geist: Sin Eaters, thanks to not having played it but plotting out a party interlocked character that I'm still bummed I didn't get to run. So what are they?
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Apr 12, 2016 05:32
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Nomadic Scholar posted:So apparently I'm blind to the faults of Geist: Sin Eaters, thanks to not having played it but plotting out a party interlocked character that I'm still bummed I didn't get to run. So what are they? Mostly, the condition of being a Bound doesn't really create that much drama unless you actively seek it out. You can see ghosts, and that's really the only thing you have to do. Also, unlike every other game, you don't actually play the creature in the title, so it's difficult to talk about the protagonists because they aren't geists and they aren't always sin-eaters.
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Apr 12, 2016 05:50
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There's no gothic horror element, no sense that you are the monster or have the "Burden of knowledge" in Mage and Hunter. Your Geist can't influence your actions, you don't repel your family or friends, unless your workplace is haunted there's nothing interfering with having a job, etc. Geist feels like it was denied necessary play-testing and development because of the recession, and is desperately in need of a 2nd Edition.
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Apr 12, 2016 06:08
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Daeren posted:Ehhhhhhh. So, better than some official books, but worse than others? Also, I've just started playing Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines. How accurate is that game to an actual game of Vampire?
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Apr 12, 2016 06:12
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A CRPG and a tabletop RPG are two very different things. CRPGs are more rigid (this can be good or bad) and are typically much more combat-heavy than tabletop, and that's the case with VtMB. That said, Bloodlines nails the WoD atmosphere (which makes me want to play WoD) and vampiric politics (which makes me not want to play Vampire) better than it has any right to. It's also just a really loving good CRPG with three incredibly variant branches (Nosferatu, Malkavian, and all the other clans). Exceptionally well-plotted, too. That said you will become unable to be satisfied by anything less than a stellar Malkavian player in a tabletop game. Basic Chunnel fucked around with this message at 06:31 on Apr 12, 2016 |
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Apr 12, 2016 06:25
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Nomadic Scholar posted:So apparently I'm blind to the faults of Geist: Sin Eaters, thanks to not having played it but plotting out a party interlocked character that I'm still bummed I didn't get to run. So what are they? Geist would have been a better game for a number of reasons. For one, there's no inherent conflict (no obvious Bad Guy). I think the game wanted you to play a possessed person burdened by the desires of an alien creature but instead there's really no downside to being a Sin Eater; your Geist is present and there's even a game trait that's supposed to relate how closely aligned the two minds are (Synergy) but it doesn't actually do that when you read the rules. This would probably be forgivable on its own but the various powers Sin Eaters have access to vary from the gamebreakingly hilarious to the near-useless to a degree that is hard to salvage. It is a very neat idea with some cool mechanics simmering under the surface. But it's mired by a lack of direction and conflict.
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Apr 12, 2016 06:30
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Basic Chunnel posted:A CRPG and a tabletop RPG are two very different things. CRPGs are more rigid (this can be good or bad) and are typically much more combat-heavy than tabletop, and that's the case with VtMB. That said, Bloodlines nails the WoD atmosphere (which makes me want to play WoD) and vampiric politics (which makes me not want to play Vampire) better than it has any right to. It's also just a really loving good CRPG with three incredibly variant branches (Nosferatu, Malkavian, and all the other clans). Exceptionally well-plotted, too. Great voice acting and great NPCs. I stole Gary for my short-lived New Wave Requiem game set in LA. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfT7Bj0Zk7w
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Apr 12, 2016 06:56
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Bloodlines is basically Masquerade in its ideal state. Discovering a weird, horrific world as someone who never asked to be part of it and despite being seemingly insignificant, being pulled in a thousand and one directions at once by everyone with any seniority over you. Also, the PC in Bloodlines actually gets poo poo done and has plenty of agency, despite the feeling of being a pawn.
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Apr 12, 2016 06:59
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it's oWoD as hell in the sense that basically everything in the game is preordained It's rough to be a person who gets really into the notion of RPGs through video games and then moves to tabletop. They even call it the "Storyteller System", which is misleading - it implies a level of control that you won't have, if the game is any good. Woe betide the nerds who play Bloodlines, come up with their own slow-building dread mystery, and try to produce make it happen with their friends. The game either ends up differently than you envisioned, or it ends up boring. Basic Chunnel fucked around with this message at 07:08 on Apr 12, 2016 |
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Apr 12, 2016 07:04
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Wait you weren't supposed to make a geist that could be perceived as a historical horror amalgamation to others and auditory hallucinations to yourself? Whoops.
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Apr 12, 2016 07:54
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The handful of times I've run Geist, I replaced all the 'use your powers' rolls with a straight Synergy roll, since it's not really your powers that you're using. I also made a point of having Weird Underworld poo poo seek them out for various things - one of the campaigns that actually finished involved the manipulations of the Deathlords First and Forsaken Lion, trying to get them to start a war between the Diamond Orders and the local vampire court that would have ended with the entire city being turned into a shadowland, and the Boddhisatva Drowned in Dark Waters, whose plan involved them setting up a death cult franchise in their local city to achieve the same result, albeit a bit less explosively. (For those familiar with White Wolf's Exalted line, this isn't an accident - that campaign was a follow-up to an Exalted campaign that ended with the PCs trying to destroy the Neverborn by reworking their 'anchor' - all of reality - into a vastly different configuration, i.e, the New World of Darkness. The God-Machine also made an appearance as the sickly, dying Autocthon desperately trying to siphon off enough Essence from this new reality to survive.) The Geists in this campaign were what the Abyssal Exaltations became, now that nobody was cleaning them off properly between incarnations - they started to develop distinct 'personalities' and were an active force in the campaign. I also cribbed from Wraith for this one, in that each PC had a geist played by another player at the table, chosen at chargen.
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Apr 12, 2016 08:49
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Rand Brittain posted:Mostly, the condition of being a Bound doesn't really create that much drama unless you actively seek it out. You can see ghosts, and that's really the only thing you have to do. Well, Stand users are drawn together by fate, so there's your conflict right there.
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Apr 12, 2016 09:06
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Geist tends to be my go-to-game for "This could be a hunter pitch, but it's really ghost focused so let's do a Sin-eater thing with it instead." Like "There's a secret circle of Tim Powers "Fault Lines trilogy" -style Ghost Huffers keeping themselves young by inhaling ghosts trapped in bottles." could be a Hunter or a Sin-eater antagonist, but Sin-eaters have a much stronger motive to go after people literally eating ghosts to stay young forever. Edit: Also it seems like half the "Immortals" blue book would be natural Sin-eater antagonists given the whole vague "Sin-eaters go after Abmortals" thing. Blood Bathers and Body thieves, especially. unseenlibrarian fucked around with this message at 10:47 on Apr 12, 2016 |
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Apr 12, 2016 10:18
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Sin-eater powers are also wildly variant in power, but usually quite high on the scale, and the chargen rules are littered across a chapter and a half - did you know that all sin-eaters automatically get like a three-dot version of one of their power-boosting relics free? It's in the rules...a chapter away from the rest of chargen.
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Apr 12, 2016 11:49
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Basic Chunnel posted:A CRPG and a tabletop RPG are two very different things. CRPGs are more rigid (this can be good or bad) and are typically much more combat-heavy than tabletop, and that's the case with VtMB. That said, Bloodlines nails the WoD atmosphere (which makes me want to play WoD) and vampiric politics (which makes me not want to play Vampire) better than it has any right to. It's also just a really loving good CRPG with three incredibly variant branches (Nosferatu, Malkavian, and all the other clans). Exceptionally well-plotted, too. Is Nosferatu really all that different? I've taken one as far as Hollywood, and the only thing that really jumped out at me was that not being able to go close to pedestrians gets real annoying real fast. Flavorful, but annoying. Well, that and the lady at the diner who faints when you try to talk to her, but mostly the difference is just every conversation starting with "WHOA! You are UGLY!" and then the game continues as normal. Then again, i suppose that's only one or two steps removed from the Malkavian experience. Pretty much all these differences are cosmetic, anyhow; Bloodlines is, as you implied, very good at creating the illusion of choice without actually giving you any. That's not a bad thing, mind. It's actually a very good way to make a game with a small budget and limited scope feel huge and expansive. Man, Malkavians though. Somebody once told me "I think you could pull off a Malkavian", and that's probably the nicest backhanded compliment I ever got. I've been wanting to put that assertion to the test for years, but none of my friends were ever into WoD and I only discovered the concept of playing with strangers like last month.
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Apr 12, 2016 13:10
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Covok posted:So, better than some official books, but worse than others?
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Apr 12, 2016 16:08
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Rohan Kishibe posted:Well, Stand users are drawn together by fate, so there's your conflict right there. You could also go the Persona route, using the Krewe system to make the Velvet Room.
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Apr 12, 2016 16:55
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MonsieurChoc posted:You could also go the Persona route, using the Krewe system to make the Velvet Room. Why not both?
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Apr 12, 2016 17:05
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I've gone into my Geist Problems at length before but at the end of the day I feel like it boils down to two things: 1. Almost any story you can tell with Geist you can tell with any other game (struggling with an inner monster = Vampire, Werewolf, Promethean to an extent, even Hunter if you're being figurative instead of literal; isolation as a condition of being not-right-anymore = Changeling especially but any of them kinda; the aforementioned "could be a hunter pitch, with ghosts" situation). 2. If I start thinking about mechanical impact for the Geist itself for any length of time I start thinking about reworking/reflavoring Better Angels and/or Monsters and Other Childish Things instead and at that point I just want to play a different system instead of trying to shoehorn it into the Storyteller(ing?) mechanical framework.
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Apr 12, 2016 17:10
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Yawgmoth posted:Better than Beast, possibly better than Geist depending on what you're comparing, but I wouldn't put it above anything else. What's wrong with it, exactly? It's one of those things where I like the concept so much I become blind to the problems in the execution.
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Apr 12, 2016 17:46
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paradoxGentleman posted:What's wrong with it, exactly? It's one of those things where I like the concept so much I become blind to the problems in the execution.
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Apr 12, 2016 18:12
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Basic Chunnel posted:A CRPG and a tabletop RPG are two very different things. CRPGs are more rigid (this can be good or bad) and are typically much more combat-heavy than tabletop, and that's the case with VtMB. That said, Bloodlines nails the WoD atmosphere (which makes me want to play WoD) and vampiric politics (which makes me not want to play Vampire) better than it has any right to. It's also just a really loving good CRPG with three incredibly variant branches (Nosferatu, Malkavian, and all the other clans). Exceptionally well-plotted, too. Huh, my first run from a long time ago I never played was Nosferatu (having to hide got annoying) and my current is Malkavian. Both as a result of that personality test. Anyway, Basic Chunnel posted:it's oWoD as hell in the sense that basically everything in the game is preordained I've been in the trpg scene for a while so I know how quazy players get and how planning is a fool's effort. So, I know not to think it will work exactly like the game, but I was just wondering if the trpg rules are actually good at reinforcing that experience. My IRL friend makes a lot of jokes that, for a horror system, you can easily use it for superheroes (obviously, an exaggeration) and many have commented that it's too focused on simulating reality that it doesn't do a good enough job simulating the meta-narrative of its genre. I have only ever played one session of core Chronicles of Darkness (then, New World of Darkness) in a no supernatural character's game, but it got zany fast due to the other players so it might not be the best introduction. Not that I'm a spoil sport over being wacky, but it doesn't seem like this is the system for that. Anyway, to summarize the rant, do the rules encourage the kind of gameplay seen in bloodlines or is it a mishmash, ignoring players? Yawgmoth posted:Better than Beast, possibly better than Geist depending on what you're comparing, but I wouldn't put it above anything else. Gotcha. Assuming it's only being compared to CoD here.
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Apr 12, 2016 23:00
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Terrorforge posted:Is Nosferatu really all that different? I've taken one as far as Hollywood, and the only thing that really jumped out at me was that not being able to go close to pedestrians gets real annoying real fast. Flavorful, but annoying. Well, that and the lady at the diner who faints when you try to talk to her, but mostly the difference is just every conversation starting with "WHOA! You are UGLY!" and then the game continues as normal. Covok posted:Anyway, to summarize the rant, do the rules encourage the kind of gameplay seen in bloodlines or is it a mishmash, ignoring players? WoD as a rule is typically focused on making you feel insignificant (such that, in Lovecraftian fashion, the protagonists snatch costly victories from the jaws of defeat, and even then the victories don't really matter much), and more importantly, make power a significant burden (if you're not murdered before you gain it, which is highly likely) - it makes you a bigger target for big and small fish alike, you need more fuel and resources to maintain yourself, and with the WoD being fundamentally corrupt, you end up losing your sense of self if you survive. In that respect, no, the rules don't encourage Bloodlines gameplay. It's not impossible, though. Even if the typical Vampire game's players are the mooks who stake and capture the Childe rather than the Childe herself, there's no reason a GM can't disregard the themes of the universe even more than Bloodlines does (it doesn't look like a typical Vampire game, but it draws inside the lines.). Most aspects of the setting are meant to discourage balls-out, risky power gaming as there are forces both within and without monstrous society who will swiftly crush anyone who's the least bit cavalier (this includes most kinds of overt violence). The game tends to encourage the consideration of consequences beyond Bloodlines' "five strikes" Masquerade bar. You can't dig yourself out of the WoD, you only dig deeper and get more lost. Basic Chunnel fucked around with this message at 23:54 on Apr 12, 2016 |
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Apr 12, 2016 23:52
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So, basically, normal World and Chronicles of Darkness play is a lot more nihilistic than Bloodlines. Outside of WoD/CoD Vampire and Werewolf, and CoD Changeling, what are the other good WoD and CoD game lines?
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Apr 13, 2016 07:07
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Mage: the Awakening is the best gameline.
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Apr 13, 2016 07:42
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Berkshire Hunts posted:Mage: the Awakening is the best gameline. That WoD or CoD?
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Apr 13, 2016 07:50
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Demon the Descent is hands down my favorite line. It also helps that it was one of the few books where I'd read it and not "OH GOD I HAVE TO FIX ALL THIS" like I do with most other books.Covok posted:That WoD or CoD? That's CoD. Ascension if WoD.
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Apr 13, 2016 07:53
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Berkshire Hunts posted:Mage: the Awakening is the best gameline. I would argue for base nWoD/Hunter as up there too.
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Apr 13, 2016 07:58
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Covok posted:So, basically, normal World and Chronicles of Darkness play is a lot more nihilistic than Bloodlines. That's the idea, certainly, but different playgroups adhere to that premise with different amounts of fidelity. Some people go all-in on personal horror, some people eat the gonzo poo poo up, and most games are going to have some of both. We all played Bloodlines too.
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Apr 13, 2016 12:54
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I'm not sure nihilistic is the right word to use. Sure, you (by default) probably aren't going to defeat all evil, destroy the God-Machine, unmake the Exarchs, destroy all vampires and so on. But you absolutely can make life better for those you know, or even for humanity at large. And in many ways, that's really what the WoD cares about. I would say it's more existentialist than nihilistic, in that sense. Sure, there's no overarching purpose to everything. Sure, you can't solve every problem. Sure, there's no great power watching out for humanity, for your friends or for you. So you do that yourself, and make life a little better.
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Apr 13, 2016 13:17
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Also, no matter what else you do, take the Huge perk, the Second rank of Striking Looks and wrestling/brawling. If you're not making Zangiefesque characters regardless of gameline you're missing out. Nothing says serious politicking like the ripped pecs guy in Elysium who nobody ever asks to put on a shirt/muscle wizard/pretty-boy Frankenstein. Basically, if you want to make a Jojo game, give your players Striking Looks and Huge for free.
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Apr 13, 2016 13:47
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Oh poo poo, Leonard "Lenny Boy" Boyarski just jumped ship as art director of Blizzard to join Obsidian. For those who don't know, Obsidian employs Tim Cain, who was one of the three principals behind Bloodlines, along with Cain. Obsidian has a strong relationship with Paradox, who now own White Wolf outright. http://www.pcgamesn.com/vampire-the-masquerade-bloodlines/sequel-bloodlines-2
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Apr 13, 2016 14:05
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It's more than that- Boyarsky, Cain, and Jason Anderson were Black Isle employees who founded Troika (makers of Bloodlines) together when Black Isle was closed. Boyarsky himself was heavily involved in Bloodlines. Jason Anderson's (the third Troika guy) at Turtle Rock, and Brian Mitsoda's still at DoubleBear.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:17
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Mitsoda was at Obsidian too for a short while, but his work never directly made it into a shipped product afaik. I don't think he has fond memories.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:21
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I somehow missed the fact that Troika consisted of ex-Black Isle people. Bloodlines 2 or not I'm pretty psyched, because it seems like everything those people touch turns to gold. Buggy, buggy gold. Also, this discussion reminded me that White Wolf's new offices are pretty close to me and I saw a job posting for an editor a while back so I went looking for it. I found Paradox's career plaza, which included brief bios of the three current head honchos at White Wolf; the CEO, the Chief Editor and the Lead Storyteller. The Lead Storyteller looks like this: 
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Apr 13, 2016 14:30
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To be fair, that's him posing as dracula for OPP.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:47
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Terrorforge posted:The Lead Storyteller looks like this:
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Apr 13, 2016 14:50
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That's actually kind of disappointing. I was hoping they'd hired a full-time Goth Rasputin to be in charge of the story because frankly, "is Goth Rasputin" seems like exactly the kind of qualification you want to see on a WoD developer's CV.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:54
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Keep in mind that his hair looks like that all the time, he just had to put on a costume. I mean, there's a reason they picked that dude to pose for Dracula, and he's a longtime LARPer.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:57
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