Quote from: Skywalker;711600There's none.

Interesting! So do they approach it in a Harn-esque "all games begin at X arbitrary point in the setting; where you go from there is up to you" style?

Quote from: Géza Echs;711601Interesting! So do they approach it in a Harn-esque "all games begin at X arbitrary point in the setting; where you go from there is up to you" style?

The setting detail is less cohesive than oWoD, so it's all there to hang off your campaign, rather than as a place to put your campaign in.

Quote from: Géza Echs;711314Actually, that raises a secondary question: How versatile is the straight World of Darkness line for gaming?

Once you fix the silly business of weapons and armour adding dice to your combat pools (rather than being factored in afterwards) and simplify damage ratings for weapons (to 1-3L or 1-6B for all), it gets a lot better.

nWoD is a very versatile system, especially away from horror. We've had extremely good mileage with a Mass Effect hack for it.

Quote from: Kiero;711604Once you fix the silly business of weapons and armour adding dice to your combat pools (rather than being factored in afterwards) and simplify damage ratings for weapons (to 1-3L or 1-6B for all), it gets a lot better.

nWoD is a very versatile system, especially away from horror. We've had extremely good mileage with a Mass Effect hack for it.

Oh yeah, I fixed that too. I factor them afterwards too. To be honest, I preferred the oWoD system.

I'm seriously considering a Solomon Kane-ish swashbuckling monster hunter game using nWoD.

Quote from: Skywalker;711602The setting detail is less cohesive than oWoD, so it's all there to hang off your campaign, rather than as a place to put your campaign in.

In contrast to the old metaplot, the nWoD books adopted a "toolbox" approach where the GMs were encouraged to pick and choose the supplementary material to suit their own campaigns. One consequence of this is that the supplements have typically tended to refer back only to the cores, not each other, and sometimes reprint any necessary earlier information in sidebars instead. For example, an NPC from Supplement B won't be statted out with powers from Supplement A, and a piece of background lore from Supplement C won't explicitly build up on events already mentioned in Supplement B.

However, in some cases you can speculate at what "the bigger picture" adds up to, while reading for instance the Vampire clan books, and the various fiction snippets from the Changeling line often feature a recurring cast of characters from the Miami freehold.

Hmm. I would have hoped that the approach they took wasn't totally that of a toolbox. I like the idea of having at least a partially unified vision of the WoD; even if it isn't the top-heavy metaplot of the oWoD I'd like the nWoD to have at least a minor vision of how the setting is constructed and how it operates. Like I said, the Harn-esque way of doing things - give the GMs a detailed map of the world at a particular point, then leave the ways it develops from there up to them.

On another note, I started reading HtV last night. Didn't get very far, since it was quite late, but I like it already. In fact, it seems like it might be exactly what I wanted HtR to be. If it is, that's fantastic; I almost broke from oWoD entirely over the letdown I felt at having HtR be all about yet another supernatural faction rather than humans taking back the night.

I think I'm going to read through HtV and its recommended supplements first. Is there a particular order to the supplements that I should use (like, release date, or quality, or what-have-you)? Or can I just dive into the ones that immediately catch my interest - like Slashers or Block by Bloody Block?


Man, I wish I knew a group of RPG players down here. Everybody I meet only plays CCGs or LCGs (which is cool, don't mistake me). I've got the itch to play some WoD, but all the RPG players I know are three-thousand miles away.

Quote from: Géza Echs;711758I think I'm going to read through HtV and its recommended supplements first. Is there a particular order to the supplements that I should use (like, release date, or quality, or what-have-you)? Or can I just dive into the ones that immediately catch my interest - like Slashers or Block by Bloody Block?

I would dive into what interests you as they are all chunky and cool.

IIRC the Mage one is good and the Werewolf one less so.

Quote from: Géza Echs;711758Man, I wish I knew a group of RPG players down here. Everybody I meet only plays CCGs or LCGs (which is cool, don't mistake me). I've got the itch to play some WoD, but all the RPG players I know are three-thousand miles away.

Define "down here"?

Also you might check G+.  It has an openness to it that when combined with the search ability makes it eqsy to find people to ask.

Quote from: mcbobbo;711763Define "down here"?

Tampa, Florida. I moved here from Winnipeg, Canada about a year and a half ago to get married.

QuoteAlso you might check G+.  It has an openness to it that when combined with the search ability makes it eqsy to find people to ask.

That's not a bad idea. I've been ghosting Reddit for gamer meet-ups (there's been a few - I haven't had time to attend, sadly), but now that I'm back on G+ (kind of mandatory after I bought a Nexus 7 tablet) I should check there too.

All this talk and no mention of the God Machine books? For shame.

God Machine Chronicle is a blue book - i.e. one for normal mortals - which updates the setting and the mechanical system. The setting update does provide a kind of vague plot and antagonist, in dealing with the God Machine itself, an alien and mechanical entity that fiddles with the world for unknowable reasons. The mechanic updates change a number of factors to the game, including merits and flaws, morality and weapons.

Forthcoming books for Vampire, Werewolf and Mage are supposed to provide similar kind of vague plot and antagonist. For example, in Vampire is it the Strix Chronicle, about spirit owl creatures which like to fuck with vampires.

In any case, the God Machine Chronicle is a solid book and worth checking out.

Quote from: Géza Echs;711758I like the idea of having at least a partially unified vision of the WoD; even if it isn't the top-heavy metaplot of the oWoD I'd like the nWoD to have at least a minor vision of how the setting is constructed and how it operates.

Well, the cosmology of the setting fits together relatively neatly, although that too explicitly leaves many details up to the GM's discretion, and there aren't even supposed to be clearly spelled-out objective answers to everything. Especially Mage fans seem keen on speculating about a Grand Unified Theory of WoD, of course with the mages at the top.

Quote from: GrumpyReviews;711821All this talk and no mention of the God Machine books? For shame.

God Machine Chronicle is a blue book - i.e. one for normal mortals - which updates the setting and the mechanical system. The setting update does provide a kind of vague plot and antagonist, in dealing with the God Machine itself, an alien and mechanical entity that fiddles with the world for unknowable reasons. The mechanic updates change a number of factors to the game, including merits and flaws, morality and weapons.

Forthcoming books for Vampire, Werewolf and Mage are supposed to provide similar kind of vague plot and antagonist. For example, in Vampire is it the Strix Chronicle, about spirit owl creatures which like to fuck with vampires.

In any case, the God Machine Chronicle is a solid book and worth checking out.

If you like God-Machine, try Demon: The Descent.  You can download a copy of the rules off the Kickstarter page, and I played in a demo run by the developer at GenCon.  It's basically fallen servants of the God Machine playing The Invisibles.  It's strange, and easy to blow off at first, but if you actually play it, it's incredible.

I like the God Machine mythology because it provides a solid source of cosmic, inhuman horror without ever going near HP Lovecraft territory.

Quote from: The Butcher;711607Oh yeah, I fixed that too. I factor them afterwards too. To be honest, I preferred the oWoD system.

I'm seriously considering a Solomon Kane-ish swashbuckling monster hunter game using nWoD.

I didn't prefer the oWoD system (one of the worst I've ever played), but it seems anyone who's spent any time with nWoD made that change.

Quote from: GrumpyReviews;711821All this talk and no mention of the God Machine books? For shame.

God Machine Chronicle is a blue book - i.e. one for normal mortals - which updates the setting and the mechanical system. The setting update does provide a kind of vague plot and antagonist, in dealing with the God Machine itself, an alien and mechanical entity that fiddles with the world for unknowable reasons. The mechanic updates change a number of factors to the game, including merits and flaws, morality and weapons.

Forthcoming books for Vampire, Werewolf and Mage are supposed to provide similar kind of vague plot and antagonist. For example, in Vampire is it the Strix Chronicle, about spirit owl creatures which like to fuck with vampires.

In any case, the God Machine Chronicle is a solid book and worth checking out.

Sorry, but GMC looks pretty much worthless from my perspective. I couldn't care less about the setting/plot of nWoD and the mechanics changes feature one good thing we were already doing (factoring in weapons/armour after the roll) and a shit-load of pointless bloat.

Quote from: Kiero;711873I couldn't care less about the setting/plot of nWoD ...

Just to clarify, the GMC is not a nWoD metaplot book. Its a campaign toolkit for creating a series of adventures.

Quote from: Skywalker;711952Just to clarify, the GMC is not a nWoD metaplot book. Its a campaign toolkit for creating a series of adventures.

It is indeed a tool kit, but while not a full metaplot the God Machine itself does provide a singular focus and potential momentum to mortal games. Strix Chronicle will apparently do the same thing for V:tR.