Oh cool, I didn't know that.

Quote from: Itachi;1067513Don't forget one of the biggest things in VtM is the ideology-based character splats, and that has nothing to do with the movie. It was such a success that even spilled back in D&D (see Planescape). So it's safe to say that it had it's share of merits.


This.

Planescape ultimately failed commercially and Wizards never brought it back except as part of the implied setting used by the books that were not explicitly Forgotten Realms or Eberron. FR is the only setting that receives much attention in the present. Everything else is consigned to the DM's Guild.

So having a dozen high school cliques is by no means a recipe for success. Also, most of those cliques are based on specific vampire movies as I stated earlier. Those not based on existing vampire movies were generally caricatures.

Well, I didn't say ideological splats were guaranteed success. Just that it worked so well for Vampire (and WoD in general) that even D&D tried to copy it.

Quote from: Itachi;1067614Well, I didn't say ideological splats were guaranteed success. Just that it worked so well for Vampire (and WoD in general) that even D&D tried to copy it.

Most recently in Ravnica. I was getting attracted to the setting for a short while (about a week or two) before I realized that the various guilds are like WW splats and that PC groups with multiple guilds are bound to make the same kind of crap situations that I disliked from WW.

Quote from: Itachi;1067513Don't forget one of the biggest things in VtM is the ideology-based character splats, and that has nothing to do with the movie. It was such a success that even spilled back in D&D (see Planescape). So it's safe to say that it had it's share of merits.

This.

The splats are cool and have attitude. The were something new and different at the time. The game has style. You hardly ever see an RPG with art that oozes so much atmosphere as the old WoD and has such a unique style. I can only think of Shadows of Esteren or Streets of Bedlam in terms of mood and style.

As much as I love the style of the games I really don't like the practical use of it. Bad crossover (even in the new WoD), all the rules are spread out over a ridiculous amount of books, badly organised, not that easy to hack and change it to your taste, throwing buckets of dice, a bit handwavy sometimes. And that is just the system. The writing style is horrendous for non-native speakers, the pretention goes through the roof, a lot (and I mean a lot) of padding, the stacking of metaphor, not providing a lot of practical advice that you actually use, the worst gamemaster advice ever about how to run a campaign or quest with it's focus writing a theme, mood and story-arc in advance.

In short I love the style, but I dislike the substance. For me a near perfect game is something like Covert Ops or Silent Legions.

The only place where ideology-based groups worked for me was Gamma World.

Quote from: RPGPundit;1068681The only place where ideology-based groups worked for me was Gamma World.

And why is that?

Quote from: jan paparazzi;1068761And why is that?

Probably because it was all done with a strong dose of the absurd.

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri remains the best game for me where players choose between ideology-based factions.

Quote from: Itachi;1069413Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri remains the best game for me where players choose between ideology-based factions.

I've heard it's good, but I'm not a computer gamer.