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The Gentleman Speaks- Beckett’s Jyhad Diary Interview

Recently we published a review of the book, Beckett’s Jyhad Diary. This book takes the Vampire: The Masquerade meta-plot and updates it and looks at it through a V20 lens. From a design perspective though, it is something drastically different than most books on the market for most RPGs. This book focuses on plot and provides very little in the way of crunch or mechanics to play around with. We’ve seen some comments around the internet about the whys of this book. Why was it designed the way it was? Why does it present the hooks that it does? Why don’t we have some character stats? (Ok, that last one is purely on me)

To help us answer those questions we spoke with Matthew Dawkins, the developer of the book, to get an idea of what drove some of the decisions behind Beckett’s Jyhad Diary.

Mr. Dawkins, thank you for doing this interview. Do you mind telling our readers a little bit about your background and what brings you to your current place in the RPG industry?

Always a pleasure, Josh.

Until the start of this year I was working in the RPG industry in my spare time. My full-time role was as a trainer on a variety of subjects, and previous to that a team manager in an office. While those roles were tangential to writing and developing RPGs, what they did do was provide me with the skills to manage projects, handle people, and maintain a professional persona in whatever industry I moved to next.

It so happens that around the middle of last year I started working for Paradox Interactive on an unannounced (and sadly cancelled as of January 2018) video game while I continued working as a trainer and writer / developer of tabletop RPGs. That was relevant for me as it showed that I could organize various tasks around having a family, still get out to play, and earn a living doing what I love: working on games.

I’ve freelanced for Onyx Path Publishing since 2013 (and worked with other RPG and board / party games companies since that time as well, such as Chaosium, Green Ronin, Cubicle 7, Helmgast, Lark & Clam, White Wolf, etc.) but last year I was offered a full-time in-house developer role with them to start in January 2018, which I accepted.

My role is now to develop books, manage game lines, help our freelance staff, train up new developers, and troubleshoot any books caught in a development jam. I’m relatively new to this industry, but I’ve been roleplaying for well over a decade. It’s a real joy to work in this industry as my primary form of income.

What was the main design goal of Beckett’s Diary? How did you determine which elements of the vast Vampire meta-plot you were going to update? If you had one thing that you’d direct every reader to in this book what would it be?

The main design goal was to make a book that revisited, explored, and expanded the metaplot for Vampire: The Masquerade. It wasn’t initially conceived as a bridge to V5 or even necessarily the capstone to V20 (bear in mind that it was planned before the new White Wolf came to be), but it nicely fit that role later in development.

We threw a lot of ideas around about the book’s content, how much of it would be artifact-based, which parts of the metaplot to step over, and so on. In the end, the developers with the greatest Masquerade knowledge proposed the chapters they would like to see, and honestly, I can’t think of one (until stretch goal chapters) that wasn’t implemented.

If I was to direct every reader to a single chapter in this book, it would egotistically be Shadows Coalesce (driven by ego because I wrote it). It’s not my favorite chapter in the book (though I love all of them, naturally), but it is one of the best for a mixture of mortal level horror (a cop investigates Kindred activity and has their life ruined), humor (Beckett browsing the book selection in a brothel), political brinkmanship (Vitel’s plan of making a Libertarian-esque Kindred city), and Jyhad (Camarilla vs. Sabbat, hidden puppet masters, and so on).

Can you tell us a little more about The Drowned Legacies? These are a group of Vampires(maybe) from S. America who offer compelling potential for deeper exploration. What drove you (or others in the process) to create them and will we see more of them in the future?

I’m a big fan of the Caine mythos being just one of many origin stories for vampires. It just so happens that with the rise of Abrahamic faiths, the Caine legend took hold and never let go, rising to the prominence it now has. I’m also a big fan of Kindred of the Ebony Kingdom, the Ashirra, and the idea put forth that there may be more creatures out there that don’t want to be found. This is a World of Darkness, after all. If a South and Central American strain of vampires exists and are in small enough numbers, why would anyone know, or be believed when they tell their coterie or pack?

In World of Darkness 2^nd Edition, I believe there’s a throwaway line about unidentified lineages in South America. There are also several Methuselahs and elders introduced in other books, lacking a clear bloodline or being placed into a clan due to Discipline use, when the likelihood of a Gangrel (for instance) crossing the Atlantic or Pacific prior to the second millennium C.E. was incredibly slim.

So I spoke with some of my friends and former colleagues of Central and South American heritage, many of whom live there to this day, about their own myths, ghost stories, legends, and campfire tales. What do they have that could resemble a vampire elsewhere in the world? South America is hardly cut off from the world, of course. I wanted to avoid exoticism, and instead go for the reality. Just as the major clans of Masquerade reflect our common vampire myths (the mind-controllers, the beasts, the seducers, the monsters, etc.) I wanted authenticity, but from a South and Central American perspective.

So that’s how we ended up with the Lostundo, Cipactli, Unhudo, Titlacauan, Kalku, and Karai Pyhare. The Cipactli and Titlacauan are the easiest to trace back to well-known Aztec religion and myth (along with that of their cultural predecessors), the Karai Pyhare are connected to the Guaraní myths surrounding the Pombéro, the Kalku originate in Mapuche culture and legend, while the Unhudo and Lostundo are more colloquial, but with a bit of research I’m sure you could find stories relating to them online or in history books.

Now, just because the Drowned Legacies exist, does not mean they suddenly overpower the clans we know and love and “take back America.” Their culture and personal motivations are by no means homogenous. Most of the Drowned Legacies willingly threw their mortal herds under the bus and clamped on to the settlers from Spain, Portugal, and elsewhere. These creatures are parasites, and parasites go for the greatest source of blood. As their forebears died out, they simply clung to the newcomers, adapting with the sudden spread of Catholicism, hiding from the main clans or masquerading as them, until they found it appropriate to make themselves known. Their Cultura is not one of pride but survival. They don’t need to take thrones to feel powerful. Now, with the Beckoning calling Cainites east, South America may become theirs simply due to absence of powerful Kindred elders.

So what is in store for the Drowned Legacies? We will have to see how they’re received by the fans, and whether they make even a fleeting appearance in V5. I hope they do, because I could see some excellent tales being told involving these creatures.

Throughout this book you’ve done a good job of collecting characters from the entire breadth and width of Vampire: The Masquerade media. I don’t remember seeing any references to Kindred: The Embraced though. Did I miss that? Or were you not allowed to touch on that property?

That’s a funny thing, because we scoured everywhere for little hooks, nods, and obscure references, but I don’t remember us once mentioning Kindred: The Embraced. We all know of it of course, but honestly, if someone put a reference in it wasn’t under my direction and it passed me by. I quite like that though. I’ve re-read the book and found references I missed the first time. I’m sure I’ll find that again when I read it in another couple of months.

This concept of the cyclical Gehenna is one of the core plots that ties this book together. On the surface, quickly, this is the idea that vampire power rises and falls, and that the view the Kindred have about Generation is one of many cycles which vampires (as a whole) have experienced. This appears to do two things; it allows the main conceit of Vampire to continue past ‘the inevitable end’ which was a concern in the original run of the game and it allows for more depth in extending the VtM mythos outside of the Judeo-Christian model on which the game was initially based. Of course, all of that is my pontification on the concept. What was your design philosophy behind cyclical Gehenna?

You’ve pretty much hit the nail on the head. Gehenna should still have bite though, which is why we allude to great sacrifice being required in order to stave it off. It’s still an end of the world scenario that brings changes whenever it occurs, but if Cainites play (or resist) the Jyhad and make whatever sacrifice is required (and it gets bigger every time Gehenna rolls around), they may give themselves another couple of centuries. It’s a little like global warming or the coming ice age. We know it’ll kill us all one day, but if we work together as a species, we may be able to stop it.

Funnily enough, I imagine there’s more chance of the Kindred working together to stop Gehenna than humans putting aside differences to heal the world, make it a better a place, for you and for…(etc.)

Michael Jackson is not a vampire.

Can you comment on how BJD might impact V5, are there certain things we might see more of in the future?

Without spoiling too much (and because I’m under NDA) I was asked as part of my writing job on V5 to propose plot threads from Beckett’s Jyhad Diary that could have an impact on V5. There are definitely some elements introduced in this book that will be furthered in V5. There are also some elements that will be left as they are.

I think one of the best things about BJD is that at the end of each chapter, you have a bunch of “what if?” plot hooks that could take a chronicle in any number of directions. We’re picking up some of those and running with them. The ones we’re leaving untouched won’t ruin anyone’s chronicle if you decide to pursue them with your group. There should still be room for whatever metaplot threads you decide to follow.

I enjoyed the book immensely, but I have one frustration I’ve voiced- I hope politely. Why don’t we have character statistic or at least references to where we might be able to find such things for the characters presented in these books?

A boring answer, sadly, but the main reason is page count, and having to weigh up whether we write more setting content or spend words on stat blocks. I would certainly like to see a Children of the Night book for V20 (maybe someone could make it for the Storytellers Vault) that stats up characters from Beckett’s Jyhad Diary. Of course, another way to maybe get something like this made is rally your fans and get them to email Onyx Path and / or White Wolf to express a desire for such a book. We do listen to what people want, and if there’s a market for it, we will consider pursuing it.

White Wolf has talked about expanding the World of Darkness to a truly global perspective, and having people ‘write what they know.’ This blog and our projects focus on inclusivity. How do you try and create a more inclusive gaming society in your work and actions?

To use the Drowned Legacies as an example, I consult experts on the respective subject matter, whether by dint of their profession or cultural heritage. I hire a diverse mix of writers for my books, across a range of spectrums. Frankly, RPGs read better (to me) when they have a diverse cast of authors. If I want someone to write for the experience of being pregnant, I will try to hire someone who’s had a child. If I want someone to write about suffering racial prejudice, I’ll aim to get someone on board who has lived that life.

I think it’s fair to say I do not tolerate intolerance. I’m by no means the loudest activist, but at my home and club level, if I even gain an inkling that someone is being abused for their ethnicity, their gender, or whatever, the abuser is educated. If they will not listen, they no longer play with us. Once upon a time, some segments of our hobby had this idea that “it’s better to have these people in the hobby and tolerate their bigotry than kick them out and have fewer people playing.” I disagree with that view, and our industry seems to feel the same way. No gaming is better than bad gaming, and no bigots is better than some bigots.

In terms of playing my games, my city thankfully has a number of roleplaying venues. I’ve always encouraged people from all walks of life to join in and play games. In a sense, games are one of those great levelers of society. Everyone abides by the rules to get the best game, every player at the table is equal (even when the characters are not), and everyone is there to have a good time. When you pitch it like that, it cuts away a lot of apprehension surrounding white males dominating our hobby. Every year, I see more and more diverse crowds at our conventions, and that’s just fantastic.

Please join us in thanking Mr. Dawkins for his time and for answering these questions for us. He is currently developing They Came From Beneath The Sea for Onyx Path Publishing. He is also a lead writer for Vampire: The Masquerade 5^th Edition, and has dozens for products he’s developed or wrote for OPP. If you are interested in reading more of his work you can find it here.

Why We Game

I have a friend of mine who games because he’s a born storyteller. He’s one of the smartest people I know and while he’s sadly fallen into the trap of many smart people, the need to be right or at least never appear wrong, he’s at all times an insightful and thoughtful human being. He inspires me to think.

I have a friend of mine who games because it’s a world he controls. He’s been given the short stick his entire life; his body betrays him, his parents were demanding and never supportive, and he’s struggled for everything he’s got with never a complaint. He inspires me to endure.

I have a friend of mine who games because he wishes he were an anime character. He dismisses his body and thinks little of tradition of any kind. He wishes to live in a world of wacky comedic situations, resilient heros, big eye ladies, and the rule of cool. He inspires me to find my joy.

They, and we, all game for so many different reasons; we’re complicated creatures, we humans. Why? Why is gaming something that’s become not just a release and a community for those who don’t quite fit elsewhere but a mainstream product? The ever increasing popularity of all types and kinds of gaming, from classic board games to hundred million dollar video games begs the question. Why? Are we humans pre-programmed for games? Are we so in love with our evolutionary advantages of planning, foresight, insight, and reason that we must create additional worlds to exercise them?

My own experiences make me think the low hanging fruit of escapism gaming comes from mental health needs, the change of our society from struggle to ease, and the dissatisfaction of humanity in this age of refined higher education requiring frontiers.

Dungeons and Dragons was developed in the mid-60’s during a time of changing attitudes and life-styles. I know, I know, the same could be said of just about any decade or era in American history. But let’s break down some numbers? Yeah, you love numbers. The 1950’s and 60’s were a time of rapid infrastructure construction and massive population boom. Immigration saw over 36 million immigrants enter the country during those two decades and a birth rate that started at 22+ per thousand in 1950; the immigration numbers wouldn’t be matched again until the mid-90’s through the late 2000’s while the birth rate has never been matched since. However, by the end of 1970 immigration had dropped off by ~20% and births per thousand had dropped to 16. The exhaustive construction continued on into the late 70’s and created an infrastructure and population support that lasted well into the 2000’s before upgrades became a necessity; also, they are still needed but, you know, politics, am I right? We transition from the loud car with a family of seven covered in dust trekking across the midwest to a population of city dwellers purchasing food at the market and sitting at home watching television.

That, in my opinion, is when the Itch started. You know the Itch. It’s the thing that makes you want to scream at your boss when they say conference calls are really important to the success of the company and your personal phone call about your kid getting into a fight at school should take a back seat. It’s the feeling that there’s a horizon to explore, a frontier to conquer, even though you can’t find one. The Itch is the response of a primarily primitive lizard and monkey descended neural chemistry reacting to a living standard so high no human being in history could comprehend it. Maybe royalty. Yes, you live like an ancient king, even in your crappy apartment with your two cats, you enjoy a quality of life they simply lacked the mental tools to conceive of.

The Itch, albeit in a undeveloped state at the time, combined with his own love of games lead Gary Gygax to write that first draft of Dungeons and Dragons. As the Itch has grown in complexity with our own increasingly domesticated lifestyles so too has our own need for escapism, for that feel of new horizons, of adventure, and most importantly, that feeling that a person can make their own destiny, build it with their own hands that frankly is sorely lacking in modern society; the feeling of achievement. Ever wonder why Microsoft called them Achievements? They’re not dumb and they didn’t pick it at random. They want you to feel exactly that, achievement, when that shiny little icon appears on your screen accompanied by the happy little tone. What better way to get players to feel what you want them to then to tell them what the feeling they need to feel is?

We wear masks, different masks for different people. It’s a survival mechanism that every human uses but only those of us treading darkness have become it’s masters. We switch between the lying faces and the lying mouths from one social group to another like a dashing squirrel. We leap through the front door, land, taking in the environment, the people, pull up the right face for them. Then we skitter from room to room, switching between always on the move to avoid long conversation to hiding in the shadows, behind a cluster of people, or in a difficult to reach corner of the room.

We’re home, cold coffee sits on the desk, the steam long since passing up into the air and gone into memory. We hear the door open and put on a face, a mask, that at least gives the impression that you’re engaged with what’s around you. That you haven’t been staring at the screen, sitting in your chair, maybe your hand is actually on the mouse of the keyboard but you haven’t clicked or typed in tens of minutes. It isn’t until you hear the keys in the door that you rouse yourself and open something, anything, just to look like you’re engaged with what is there. You choose this, instead of engaging with the whirlwind in your mind, the endless spin cycle of terrible thoughts, worries, and choices.

You don’t hate your family at the holiday party, you don’t even dislike them. You just can’t seem to really understand why they’re so happy about a new suit your uncle bought. Everyone looks at you expecting a similar response and you give them what they expect. The disingenuous words coming easily after all this time. A master of faking happy, of faking “ok”, has made you and me an expert at tricking the normal people into thinking that we really are, maybe not as much as they, but close enough.

These moments are becoming increasingly common and until we have a method, an ethic, a lifestyle in the real world that compensates for the disappearing horizon we will ever turn to escapism and all the wonder, imagination, and stories that come with such a life. Gaming isn’t a cure for the veil of depression that seems to be spreading across the land but it is a treatment and like all treatments for all ailments we need to watch it, support it, and be aware of the impact and role that gaming plays in our world. Don’t dismiss this hobby out of turn, it can and has lifted up many from a dark well. I include myself in that category. This past year saw me diagnosed with depression with manic tendencies and anxiety centered around attention and crowds. Gaming became both the distraction it’s always been but also a life line. A light in my darkness that saw me through another bad day.

Good luck and good night.

World Building in 500ish Words: Genre

Welcome to the second installment of World Building in 500-ish words! This post will be looking at genre selection. A lot of people when designing their game worlds simply think “Oh yeah, it’s a fantasy world.” and promptly leave it at that. In reality, the genre, or collection of genres, of fantasy that you choose is going to have a great effect on you game world’s feel, magic, monsters, peoples, and tone. Now, many reading this will have had the experience of a sudden tonal shift in a game, that immersion breaking moment when it snaps to something completely outside the realm of its usual feel. By carefully selecting and building your genre, you can avoid that, and craft a better experience for yourself and others.

“Fantasy” is an insanely broad genre, encompassing dozens of subgenres, and with crossovers with a number of other genres like horror (Vampire: Dark Ages), romance (Blue Rose), and even science fiction (Shadowrun). So picking your subgenres and crossovers (if any) at the point of creation is key. Broadly, most fantasy RPG worlds fall into three categories:

Low Fantasy: these are gritty worlds with gritty themes. These worlds tend to be very close to the real world in flavour, with little magic, few monsters (and those that exist are truly terrifying), and non-human races are bordering on legendary. These are also often the realm of historical mythology inspired adventures and worlds. Think Beowulf, Usagi Yojimbo, or Game of Thrones.
“Standard” Fantasy: in many ways, this has become the default for what people think about “fantasy gaming”. Monsters are common(ish), magic is known but not necessarily common, and seeing non-human races isn’t an unusual experience. Think Record of Lodoss Wars, Rat Queens, or Dragon Age.
High Fantasy: this is buckle up and get your cowboy hat territory. Worlds in this genre are about as far from “real world” as you can get. Floating castles, magitech mecha, and airships are just another day on these worlds. Monsters are everywhere, your neighbours proably aren’t human, and magic is ubiquitous (replacing technological development even!). Think Final Fantasy, Overlord, or World of Warcraft.

Now, crossing over with these are what I call (in this case), the “flavour genres” for fantasy. These are things like horror, exploration, dark, grim dark, romance, science fiction, mystery, drama, and so on. These are going to act later as your plot development bases, and help guide the players when they’re making their characters and coming up with their backgrounds. By selecting one or more, you also refine your own idea, taking it from its raw state to something more workable.

It’s a key thing at this point, especially if you’re developing a world for play, to communicate the kind of world it is to the people who will be playing in it. This also ties in with the next post, which will be looking at tone as a feature of world development. I’ve already mentioned it a few times here, but it deserves its own complete examination. So stay tuned for the next installment of world building in 500ish words!

Graeme is a long-time gamer who has been writing critically about gaming since 2013 at his blog, POCGamer. He and his family live in the North Okanagan area of British Columbia. When not at work, writing, or gaming, Graeme can be found reading, scuba diving, or watching too much YouTube. In addition to his regular life, Graeme is a veteran of three overseas tours as a reservist with the Canadian Armed Forces. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and see his original and ongoing posts at bis blog, POCGamer. Contact him here.

Plot To V5: Review of Beckett’s Diary

Anyone with a passing familiarity with this blog knows we write largely positive reviews. Mostly this is because I get motivated to write reviews for things I like, this tends to be true of the people who write for the site as well. We want to exalt the books we love, and allow others to focus on the negative if they so choose. That said, there are a few critiques we have of Beckett’s Jyhad Diary and I’d like to be upfront with those. The critiques are not about the writing though, the writing in this book is top notch. Matthew Dawkins and Neal Raemonn Price developed the book and their stellar ability to steer a ship into awesome territory holds true here. Written by: Alan Alexander, Matthew Dawkins, Steffie de Vaan, Joshua Doetsch, Renee Knipe, Matthew McFarland*, Neall Raemonn Price, Myranda Sarro, Malcolm Sheppard, and Monica Valentinelli, Additional Writing: Eddy Web. You all did really well here. We’ll get back to those elements soon.

This review is based on the backer PDF of the book. We will add some details on the physical book once it’s in our hands. As of this writing the POD and PDF is available on DriveThruRPG

What is this book?

Beckett’s Jhyad Diary is an in-character collection of the stories of the title character, Beckett. He is a Gangrel scholar that has appeared frequently throughout White Wolf books, including fiction and game supplements. Beckett acts as a narrator for an update to virtually every major plot location featured over the last 25+ years. In this case, Jhyad refers to the eternal vampiric struggle between childer and their elders. Beckett is an interesting character and he has relationships with many of the other meta-plot characters created over the years.

Critiques

Size

This book is immense. At 549 pages it is going to be larger than the V20 book itself. It took me almost a month to make my way through and that made it all a little overwhelming. There is a good side to the size of the book, but upfront I would rather have had several smaller journals. Of course, there are pros and cons either way, but my preference would have been to steer toward smaller texts.

Font

Most of the journal are faux transcriptions of recordings that Beckett has created. At times though, the book includes fonts designed to resemble handwriting. Beckett’s own handwritten segments are not difficult to read. This is not true for several side characters. Thankfully these handwritten asides or additions are short overall, but I found it frustrating to try and decipher something that was clearly engaging information. The worst segment for this is one of the later chapters, The Drowning of Rasputin.

Who is This and Where are They From?

As should be expected there are references to characters and plotlines from hundreds of books. Over the last year, I’ve read most of the Vampire: The Masquerade supplement books. Because of this, I feel like I knew where to reference the plots that were being updated. However, there were several instances where a character was being referenced and I couldn’t place them. Some of these characters, like Strohmann, are from the Vampire card game, The Eternal Struggle (also called, Jyhad). There were also references to many characters from the Vampire video games. I liked this, but I really felt like I needed some form of reference chart. The Vampire Wiki is a decent resource to use alongside this book, but I would kill for a full list of where I can learn more about these characters. I also respect this is a hard ask and might take a ton of work, but it would make this book much more valuable.

For example, where would you find Aisling Sturbridge if you wanted to use her in a game? New York By Night.

How about The Stone Man? Outcasts: A Players Guide to Pariahs.

Hesha Ruhadze? Followers of Set Revised, Gehenna, various novels.

The first two I knew off the top of my head, the last I had to check the Wiki. Of course, the Wiki isn’t perfectly accurate so it has limits as a resource. An E-Resource or PDF index of the World of Darkness would be amazing to have. This could be an updated version of Encyclopaedia Vampirica and I wouldn’t complain.

Character Details?

On a similar note, I would love to have character statistics for the characters described in this book. If I want to use Strohmann (a possible progenitor of the Samedi) and an Archbishop in Berlin, I’ve got to make up a sheet. That’s not the end of the world, but it would be awesome to have these details on hand. Like the above critique, this would be a fantastic digital product to have. I’d pay for it, and I’m sure a lot of fans would. I could then choose which NPCs to use, fire up their entry in V20 Encyclopaedia Vampirica (You can steal this name, OPP and White Wolf), and then I could print them out when I need to use them. Or pull them up on my tablet at the table.

What is Amazing About This Book?

Writers Gunna Write

This book is literally packed with meta-plot. If there was a plotline, story hook, or idea generated in any of the various media products created for Vampire: The Masquerade by White Wolf and Onyx Path over the years, it gets some love in this book. Almost all of the chapters in the book made me want to run a chronicle with the material provided. The writing is top notch, the plot hooks could fill a tackle box, and this book was really enjoyable to read. That last point isn’t emphasized enough in most RPG supplements. One of the best things about Vampire books over the years is that they have been interesting to read. Becket’s Diary is a fantastic new book in that vein. I can see myself re-reading sections of this book on a regular basis.

What Can We Expect in V5?

White Wolf has previously stated that they want to see Beckett’s Jyhad Diary as the link between V20 (and earlier editions) and the next edition of Vampire. There are dozens of little hints of that material here. There are references to the Gehenna War, the Keening, and several expansions of the Vampire: The Masquerade mythos. There are references to both Kindred of The East, and Kindred of the Ebony Kingdom in this book as well. Some of the characters from early books are now tied into those supplements. That sort of meta-plot integration is needed to create a truly world-spanning vampiric conspiracy. It appears as if Kindred are no longer going to be tied solely to the Judeo-Christian model we found in previous editions. We don’t know exactly what this is going to look like at this time. What we do know is that the V5 world looks like it is going to be much more integrated. Options for vampiric origin stories have existed previously but haven’t really held much weight. The rules made the Caine myth the default for various reasons.

Cyclical Gehenna

This is one of the more interesting plot points filtered throughout Beckett’s Diary. Gehenna is something that has come before and will come again. There are constant endings and beginnings to the Kindred. Further, there is an interesting story seed about the possibility of Diablerie being a positive thing. The African legacies reference the potential for sharing powerful blood with neonates. Are they right? Are the antediluvians jealous beasts for guarding their powerful blood? Are all of the Cainite elders? What does this mean for Vampire: The Masquerade? I think this is an interesting plot hook and I’m curious to see how and if it continues on in V5.

More than Plot?

Most of the book is plot, story, and there are also a few rules updates and expansions that are peppered throughout. There are new rules for 16th Generation vampires. This is explained by a ‘settling’ of the blood that happens when a new vampire is embraced. There are also details on new Kindred bloodlines or clans that are based in South America. At this time, these new groups of vampires are given very short bloodline descriptions and now explicit rules, but this expansion of the Cainite mythos has a ton of potential. Tying into the concepts of powerful elders and neonates, and the cycle of Vampirism presented, this offers some cool hooks too.

My Favorite Stories

This is hard because there were a lot of stories in here. Thirty to be exact. I think my favorite stories were in the middle of the book starting with Transvaal Nights and ending with Carthargo Delenda Est. This whole section was top-notch. There were a few stories in the Diary that were less solid than others, but overall the quality throughout was high. A Brief History of Beckett wasn’t bad, but it felt out of place and kind of tacked onto everything else. The Drowning of Rasputin would have been better a little sooner in the book. It was not a bad story, but it was the story that had the most Font issues. It also included the South American vampire elements that I thought were fascinating, so it was a bit of a rollercoaster chapter.

Conclusion

Should you buy this book? That depends, honestly. Do you like the meta-plot in Vampire? If so, then yes. Do you like to create your own plots and ignore meta-plot? Then, maybe? There are a ton of plot hooks here that make this book interesting for the ST that wants to strike out and design their own World of Darkness. Do you need this to get ready for V5? Also, maybe. I don’t know how useful this book will actually be for V5 until we get those actual books. There are some weaknesses, but overall I am happy I backed the book.

Buy the Book

Credits
Written by: Alan Alexander, Matthew Dawkins,
Steffie de Vaan, Joshua Doetsch, Renee Knipe,
Matthew McFarland*, Neall Raemonn Price,
Myranda Sarro, Malcolm Sheppard, and Monica
Valentinelli

Additional Writing: Eddy Webb

Developed by: Matthew Dawkins and Neall
Raemonn Price

Line Developer: Eddy Webb

Editor: Dixie Cochran

Art Director: Michael Chaney

Interior Art: Sam Araya, Mark Kelly, Michael
Gaydos, Ken Meyer Jr., Drew Tucker

*A victim has come forward with allegations of sexual assault against this writer. We believe the victim and don’t want our review of this product to be viewed as support for this writer’s actions. At this time we plan to refrain from reviewing any products where he is the principal writer or developer. Mr. McFarland is no longer working on any on-going products for Onyx Path Publishing

Josh is the administrator of the Inclusive Gaming Network, and the owner of this site.

*Note, all opinions are the opinions of their respective Authors and may not represent the opinion of the Editor or any other Author of Keep On the Heathlands

Creative World Building In 500-ish Words

D&D is famous for its campaign settings, the detailed, premade, adventure worlds it has produced over its tenure as the most well-known fantasy RPG. The 1990s were by far the greatest heyday of this, with groundbreaking settings like Dark Sun, Birthright, and Planescape joining more traditional settings like Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk in the minds of gamers across the world. But D&D is equally famous for its homebrew, the rules and things created at game tables by DMs and players alike using the D&D framework. The most famous, and infamous, of these creations are homebrew campaign settings.

Homebrew campaign settings have a mixed reputation in the gamer community because of the very spotty nature of their quality of world building, ranging from light modifications or reskins of existing campaign settings to nightmarish making it up as they go things to kludged together affairs with poor internal consistency to publishing ready affairs. This means that gamers have inconsistent experiences, resulting in the hugely differing opinions on the topic. To me, the issue is that worldbuilding is not a skillset that most have, and when combined with the biases and influences we have about “fantasy”, fantasy worlds, and cultures that inspire us, the results can be disastrous.

So, the goal of the upcoming collection of serial blogs is to explore how to build a quality campaign setting that you and your players will love. One of my biggest lessons learned as a DM is that presenting a solid, internally consistent, developed campaign setting to your players is a huge step towards getting them not only immersed in the game, but also to getting them to commit to the game. At least half the effort of being a DM is in the world building, and it sets a foundation to build the rest (plots, encounters, treasure etc…) from.

World Building Is Important

So what makes a good campaign setting?

Solid planning. It’s possible to “do it live” and make it up as you go along, but only a handful of truly herculean DMs I’ve met can keep track of it all and make it make sense. Planning out your world makes things much easier in the long run.
Internal consistency. When a world doesn’t make sense within its own rules, players get frustrated and lose interest in banging their heads against the walls of random and arbitrary DM decisions.
Interest blending. Good worldbuilding combines the familiar with the new; the former sets a comfortable baseline that the players will recognize, and the latter draws their interest and inspires action.
Nuanced cultures. D&D has a history of taking an uneven approach to developing the cultures and peoples of their worlds, relying on the player and DM “knowing” how things are. Approach each culture from the ground up, avoid tropes and stereotypes, and your players will love it.
You can make the best campaign setting ever, but if your players can’t read it, it’s just a collection of notes. There needs to be a player’s guide to get your ideas out there.

Now, with all that said, please join me as I go through the processes of building different kinds of campaign settings to meet the needs of different playstyles and levels of creativity.

Session Zero and Character Creation in The Burning Wheel

This is our second article in our series on The Burning Wheel, find the first here.

Character Burner

The Big Picture and the current situation

Before characters are created and the game officially begins, you need to discuss content and expectations. This discussion goes back to a part of the social contract. This will help your group create thematically appropriate characters and allow all player voices to be heard.

What is The Big Picture and what do we mean by “the current situation”? Let’s look at LoTR as an example.

The Big Picture could be: “An evil necromancer is building an army to take over the world.” The current situation could be stated like this: “The Necromancer’s Favored Ring has come into possession of the party. You must take the ring to the Necromancer’s Forge and destroy it.” These two things allow for easier player buy-in. Which, as I have stated in my Social Contract series, is very important to any game.

This a purpose of session zero; to iron out such details and help the GM and the players understand what type of game they will be playing. For the GM it also allows them to tailor the world to their PC’s. It also allows PCs to temper their understanding of the type of game being run. That’s a lot of jargon, so let’s break this down step by step.

These steps are where (I think) Burning Wheel feels heavy to new players. I will not sugar coat it, it is heavy and involved and will take a full session. There will be many flips throughout the book for reference and looking things up. I will tell you this as well: It. Is. Worth. It. I mean it.

The other big portion of session zero is character creation. Through character creation, you will be discussing plot and what you want out of the story being told. Also, within character creation, you will learn the basic mechanics of the game. In a well run Burning Wheel session zero all players are engaged at all times. A great Burning Wheel GM will ensure that this carries on once the game starts.

Burning Wheel has a character burning workbook that you can use. In fact I highly recommend you do so. I have played in three Burning Wheel chronicles and I use it every time.

Lifepaths

When burning a character your decision points are called Lifepaths. A typical Burning Wheel game will have around 4 Lifepaths. The main book includes the following Lifepaths:

Lifepaths of Dwarves
Lifepaths of Elves
Lifepaths of Men
Lifepaths of Orcs

Each includes multiple settings. For example, The Lifepaths of Man includes the noble court setting, peasant setting, sailor setting and many more. Each provides stats, including any prerequisites for taking that path, how many years your character spent in character doing that path, the skills taught to those on that path, and lead-outs to other paths, among other things.

Conclusion

This is only the surface of what Burning Wheel offers as a game. These are my experiences, but I’m sold by the game.

Pros:

Cheap. All you need is the Burning Wheel Gold which costs $35. In fact here is a link to order it directly from the Burning Wheel HQ. Burning Wheel webstore.
Uses d6’s. No other dice needed.
Very active community on both Reddit and elsewhere on the interwebs.

Cons:

Is heavy on the front end and can take some time to fully grasp certain game concepts.
Is tailored to the fantasy genre. Tolkien-esque fantasy. While I don’t see that as a con, some might.
No PDF’s. The books are not in PDF form. Buy the physical product. With the exception of the character workbook, character sheet, reference chats and some pre-made scenarios, no full copy of the book has been made available by Luke and none is ever planned.

Give Burning Wheel a chance. It is my favorite fantasy setting – hands down. As always please leave feedback or questions. Thanks for reading. If you’d like to learn more, let us know and we can plan more articles.

Scott is a true analog gamer doing everything from pen and paper RPG’s to board games and everything in-between. He started out with Advanced D&D 2nd edition at the age of 10. From there he likes all genres and types, from the well known big names to smaller indie print publishers. Scott is Vice-President of The Wrecking Crew

*Note, all opinions are the opinions of their respective Authors and may not represent the opinion of the Editor or any other Author of Keep On the Heathlands.

Looking for a Jumpstart for your Vampire: The Masquerade Game? Check Out Dark New England: Five Chronicle Jumpstarts on the Storytellers Vault!

Blood and Betrayal Chronicle – Interview with Jason Carl

Recent news from By Night Studios has raised a lot of eyebrows, and caught a lot of attention. By Night Studios is the company that creates officially licensed Mind’s Eye Theater products for the classic World of Darkness. They are a licensee of White Wolf Entertainment AB, based in Sweden. By Night Studios released some details on their new business venture, Blood & Betrayal Chronicle, a global LARP story for troupes and individuals. People paid attention, because this is a new method of connecting individual troupes to a larger story. Jason Carl was graciously willing to answer some questions we had about this new endeavor.

Jason, can you start by introducing yourself?

Hello! I’m Jason Carl, CEO of By Night Studios. I’ve been working in and with games most of my adult life, at Wizards of the Coast (Magic The Gathering organized play, Dungeons & Dragons 3^rd Edition), Xbox Game Studios, and Wunderman Seattle (Xbox marketing), and also as a freelance RPG writer (White Wolf). Today I’m also the Producer for Vampire The Masquerade 5^th Edition for White Wolf.

How does this differ from the B&B and R&R games you’ve been running?

By Night Studios has run large-scale Mind’s Eye Theatre LARPs annually at World of Darkness fan conventions including The Grand Masquerade in New Orleans, Las Vegas by Night, and Los Angeles by Night. We called these LARPs ‘Blood & Betrayal’ for Vampire the Masquerade and ‘Rage & Retribution’ for Werewolf the Apocalypse. Hundreds of players enjoyed these games—there were over 400 players from many different countries at last year’s Blood & Betrayal—and each was a one-night event with a connected story that players could affect. So, what player characters decided and did at Blood & Betrayal Las Vegas affected the events of Blood & Betrayal New Orleans, for example.

Now we are offering the chance to participate in a global LARP chronicle that builds on the story from our convention games and continues forward.

You are planning to use the new www.worldofdarkness.com functionality to help facilitate this Chronicle, can you tell us a little about why and what that site will do?

We’re very excited about this! The website launched at GenCon 2017 and included basic Mind’s Eye Theatre character and troupe management tools. We’re adding new features continually, and soon Storytellers will have access to powerful online tools that will help them focus more on telling great collaborative stories and less on bookkeeping.

In this way, Blood & Betrayal troupes that use different rules for their LARPs can still, if they want to, interact globally by standardizing the way they handle downtime procedures.

A great example of this is the Vampiri No?ne Kronike in Zagreb, Croatia—they’re using a very Nordic-style rules system for resolving the challenges in their Vampire the Masquerade live games, but their Storytellers use the Mind’s Eye Theatre rules in the background to manage Experience Points, character downtimes, influences, and other actions that are difficult to simulate physically at a live game. Mind’s Eye Theatre is the almost-invisible engine that the game runs on. We’re seeing more chronicles do this, and we want to support this option for global play.

This seems like it might overlap with some of what the fan community already does, through organizations like Mind’s Eye Society, Underground Theater, etc. How does it differ?

We can understand how it might seem that way, but that’s not our intention, and we don’t foresee much overlap. Fan clubs like Mind’s Eye Society provide not only a LARP story that links dozens or hundreds of local games that all play by the same LARP rules, but also a complete administrative structure for club officers to help them run smoothly. Many players really enjoy and prefer this kind of consistency: it allows them to travel more easily between games that participate in the same fan club, knowing that everything is standardized no matter where you go.

What we discovered is that many games also want the fun and benefits of a linked global chronicle, but prefer to maintain their local LARP rules and independent administrative structures. The Blood & Betrayal chronicle is intended to address this need.

Most networked fan clubs seem happy with how they are doing things currently and we anticipate that they won’t be very interested in what we are offering. But…

Is it possible for a fan club to join and have all of their games sync with the larger chronicle?

…any fan club or individual game or chapter within a fan club that is interested is more than welcome to join the chronicle.

Talk to us a little about the philosophy behind being rules agnostic for local games. Are games allowed to interact with one another outside of convention games?

They’re allowed, and even encouraged to interact outside of convention games. Players will be able to travel between local games—but they must respect the local rules and policies when they visit other games. We foresee that some Blood & Betrayal games will interact frequently by virtue of their close proximity, where others may interact only online or at conventions, but they’re all free to share the story to the limit of their preferences.

Would you describe what you are doing as global meta-plot integration? If so, how do you hope to tie this into the trans-media experience that White Wolf has talked about previously?

First let me say a bit about transmedia. The simplest explanation is: a story told through multiple mediums. Consider Star Wars, Star Trek, the Marvel Universe, Game of Thrones…these connected stories are told in books, television, films, video games, graphic novels, board games, and more. Some transmedia stories are more connected than others (consider how Marvel links its cinematic universe to its television shows and video games). Others are more loosely connected.

Now let me say that it’s important to note that this is a By Night Studios project. We’re a White Wolf licensee. If White Wolf decides to incorporate the Blood & Betrayal chronicle into a transmedia effort, that would be awesome, but it’s not something that is planned currently. White Wolf is very focused on developing the 5^th edition of the World of Darkness games at this time.

Fees: Tell us a little bit about what you envision the membership fee providing a player or troupe?

We would like share everything! But we are still working on the fee structure with our licensee and the website developer, so unfortunately we can’t offer any additional details until we get closer to launch.

Where do you see the Blood and Betrayal Chronicle going in the future?

How does this help create a more inclusive atmosphere in LARP moving forward?

I’m going to combine my answers to these last two questions because I see them as interrelated, exactly like our World of Darkness LARP community. We hope to grow Blood & Betrayal into a fun LARP experience shared around the world by players living in many different countries and who bring many different traditions of play with them. We envision players who come from Nordic, freestyle, JEEP-form, Mind’s Eye Theatre, minimalist, competitive, blockbuster, and even boffer traditions all being able to share in a Vampire: The Masquerade story that spans the globe, and communicating as they do—sharing ideas and experiences in ways that help break down barriers to inclusiveness. We know that this is a very ambitious goal, but we feel it is very important to try.

Looking for a Jumpstart for your Vampire: The Masquerade Game? Check Out Dark New England: Five Chronicle Jumpstarts on the Storytellers Vault!

Burning Wheel: The Intimidating Game That is Not Actually Intimidating

Introduction

Hello there, please come in and sit. I understand your teacher has found time for you to learn the secrets of the Wheel. Don’t let this large tomb scare you. I promise it’s not as intimidating as it looks. Please pull up a seat, grab your paper, ink, and quill and I shall educate you all about the Burning Wheel.

We shall begin at the beginning as a history of a subject helps us understand it and makes us less likely to repeat past transgressions. From there we shall take a short walk around the Hub of the Wheel which will explain the draw of this tomb. Then we shall pack our faithful steeds and travel the lands and see the different types of characters one can meet.

You don’t have a faithful steed? No worries, I can supply one.

Huge Discounts on your Favorite RPGs @ DriveThruRPG.com “

Along the path you will see the many styles and Paths that Life can take for the denizens of our world. Along with this will be the List of Traits and Skills that these different people use in their daily lives.

Past these areas, we will arrive at the Rim of the Wheel. This is where lesser known and utilized knowledge can be found. It is still good to know and have an understanding of, even if one may never have need of it.

Finally, upon returning here, we will conclude our journey with a celebratory toast and good food. After all traveling and learning can make one hungry, can they not?

History

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Created by Luke Crane, The Burning Wheel is held in high esteem within many RPG circles. The Burning Wheel was first released in 2002 as two volumes: The Burning Wheel Fantasy Roleplaying System and The Burning Wheel Character burner. At the time, its approach to fantasy fiction in a pen and paper RPG setting was fresh. It put character at the forefront of the story in ways that hadn’t been done before. Through the Beliefs and Intents System players are constantly working toward goals and experience challenges to overcome along the way. Such a mechanic has shown up in numerous other games since, from Apocalypse world with the History stat, to Onyx Path’s Storyteller System and its Aspirations mechanic.

Later these two volumes were published with a crisper system in the Burning Wheel Gold Edition book.

The Burning Wheel is inspired by the settings and themes from fantasy fiction’s biggest names, Tolkien, Ursula K. Le Guinn, and Stephen Donaldson. As mentioned in the beginning of the Gold edition, the game is also heavily influenced by the historical accounts of Barbara Tuchman and Desmond Seward. This helps to create a vibrant, yet dirty and complicated world. A world that is not listed in the rulebook, per se.

The “world” is created via interaction between the GM and her players. Be this law, beliefs, or otherwise, the world is developed through GM and player discussion. This was intentional. Players and GM’s are treated with a high level of respect out the gate by clearly stating that any world the authors could create and put into the book would pale in comparison to what the players can generate.

Getting things done: Dice, Difficulty, and Obstacle

Like any RPG, Burning Wheel uses dice as a resolution mechanic. Nothing new there. It uses standard six-sided dice. Again nothing too foreign. It’s approach to how the dice are used and the way tests are marked is a bit different. So let’s look at that.

The Spokes of the Wheel

One of the most important concepts to The Burning Wheel is an idea called ‘Intent and Task’. When a player wants to accomplish an action, the GM should ask directly, “What is your Intent? What do you want to see happen?” Based on the player’s response, the task should become clear. “I kill him” is an appropriate intent. The GM then needs to pull out a little more information to get to the task. “I strangle him with my bare hands” or “I stab him with my knife” would imply a brawling or knife test.

As the above examples show once a character’s intent has been stated, the GM can apply the proper task. Along with determining the difficulty of the task known as the obstacle, this sets up the ability to roll the dice and determine the outcome of the role. Let’s look at an example.

Here is how a skill could appear on your character sheet:

Inconspicuous B3

Let’s break this down. The first part is the skill name: Inconspicuous. The second: the shade of the skill. Skills are broken down into three different shades. These are Black, Grey, and White. The shade of your skill determines what number on a d6 is a success.

Black: 4 and up

Grey: 3 and up

White: 2 and up

It should be noted, that grey and white shades are advanced aspects and come into play rarely.

Finally, the number 3 tells us how many dice to roll.

Determining the number of successes we need depends on the task and is decided by the GM. The difficulty is referred to as The Obstacle, often shortened to ob. The higher the obstable, the more difficult the task. So let’s look at an example.

I want to sneak up and take out a guard. Not kill them, just get past them unnoticed and out of the city walls. (note the intent here: sneak up and take out a guard, but not kill them.)

Credit to ryanmcguire on PIXABAY

The GM decides this is a risky act, which is considered an obstacle 4 task So ze announces that getting passed the guard unnoticed would be an ob 4 Inconspicuous test. We would roll 3d6 and be looking for 4-6 on the dice. If we get 4 successes then we succeed.

But how can we get 4 successes if we only have 3 dice? There are three answers to that question:

You get help from other players. Each player can assist with one applicable skill agreed on by the GM. When they do you receive 1 additional die to your roll.
You can spend Artha. Artha is made of three pools. Fate and Persona can be spent to assist rolls and are used for different purposes. Fate can be spent after a roll has been made. When spending a point of Fate any die that comes up as a 6 can be re-rolled to get more successes, which are called open-ended rolls.

Persona allows you to add 1 die to your roll for each point you spend.

You don’t. You fail, which is a good thing.

Now, why would you CHOOSE to fail? Because in Burning Wheel you have to accrue a certain number of tests to increase your statistics. There are three different types of tests that help to increase a stat. These are routine, difficult, and challenging. To increase your number from b3 to b4 requires a certain number of each type of tests. The test type (routine, difficult, or challenging) depends on how many dice you are rolling. At some point, if you want to advance, you HAVE to attempt an action that will fail.

This is part of why I love Burning Wheel. The system rewards failure. In fact, you HAVE to fail in order to progress and improve your skills and stats. Now, I know failure(, in most games,) is not fun and most of the time that uncertainty is scary. That’s fine because the GM must tell you what will happen if you fail BEFORE you roll the dice. That way you can decide if you want to actually do the task. So let’s look back at our example:

GM: In order to sneak past the guard will be an ob 4 test as the guard is attentive and alert. If you pass you tell me how you sneak past them unnoticed. If you fail the guard will stop you and will send you to the dungeon.

You now know exactly what will happen. No surprises. No guesswork. If you pass you get to narrate the action as you see it unfold. If you fail the GM has told you EXACTLY what will happen. This is player agency at its finest. It allows the players to shape the story in their own words because know the effect that their actions will have on the story. At my table, we embrace failure because failure gives way to interesting situations, which gives way to plot.

Burning Wheel stresses another important thing to remember: don’t always roll dice. You only roll dice when there is an unsure element in a scene. In fact, there is a rule: “Say yes or roll the dice.” Conflict in Burning Wheel is multi-faceted.There can be fighting, duels of wits, and many other forms of conflict. (Much like life.) However, if an action is not important or inconsequential to the story simply say yes and get back on track.

In our Next Article, We’ll Discuss Session Zero and Character Creation in The Burning Wheel

*Note, all opinions are the opinions of their respective Authors and may not represent the opinion of the Editor or any other Author of Keep On the Heathlands.

The Banality of Evil: Vampire: The Masquerade

A casual reader of this blog will note the large majority of the content is focused on the World of Darkness or other White Wolf derived games. This is because I, your humble editor-in-chief, am a long-term fan of the IP and the various games that were created under the auspices of White Wolf, Onyx Path Publishing, and By Night Studios. It’s also because I have played these games with a growing sense of awareness of one of the core benefits of playing in this dark reflection of our own world. We can hold a mirror to ourselves, and see truth. By playing in Vampire: The Masquerade and other WoD games, we become the Malkavians holding the broken looking glass, we can see the cracks in the façade of our own lives. We can see how our prejudices become actionable, we can witness privilege and power dynamics, and we can create ways to fight against the systemic oppression we see throughout our world.

In theory.

Darker Days Radio had a recent interview with Tobias Sjögren and Martin Ericsson (White Wolf Entertainment), and Martin was discussing his vision for self-reflection and monstrosity in the new games they are creating. He described the visceral sort of evil that Vampires are supposed to represent, the exploitative leeching of humanity. This was supposed to be a core element of Vampire: The Masquerade when Mark Rein – Hagen first conceptualized the game. Yet, players and storytellers have often pulled away from these elements. Even the game creators themselves have spent more time creating cool powers, bloodlines, and detailing locations than they have with fostering realistic and difficult moral quandaries. We’ve talked about humanity before here.

The question is, why? If one of the core goals of Vampire was to encourage deep introspection and find ways to combat the status quo, what happened?

“I believe that there is such a thing as Evil, I do not believe it is anything so cut and dried. It certainly doesn’t exist in simple dichotomy with good. I believe Evil is natural to the world, is intrinsic to the human condition, and that the recognition of Evil is, in fact, crucial to the attainment of happiness.” – Mark Rein-Hagen, Vampire: The Masquerade First Edition

In 1963, Hannah Arendt published Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. In this work, she outlines the trial of Adolf Eichmann, and details his life through the philosopher’s lens. Arendt hoped to find a monster in Eichmann, but instead, she found a boring bureaucrat focused on following the law, performing his duty, and adhering to the orders given to him. This was a man that had little to no moral quandary about his actions. What moral outrage could exist in his mind? He was following his interpretation of the Kantian principle of duty. Eichmann grossly misinterpreted this principal, but how many other people in the world grossly misinterpret the difficult writings of theologians, philosophers, and anyone that puts finger to keyboard?

Eichmann was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people during the Holocaust.

Eichmann during his 1963 trial in Jerusalem

The humanity system in Vampire is flawed. It encourages players to uphold a uniquely Judeo-Christian version of morality. Even so, it is flawed in that it isn’t central to anything mechanical. Players and storytellers can ignore the humanity/path system in the game without any concern that it would be detrimental to their long-term play. How do I know? I’ve run hundreds of Vampire games and rarely have players wanted to explore the nuances of the system surrounding humanity, except as it pertains to them leaving the Path of Humanity and adhering to a Path of Enlightenment.

White Wolf is working on ensuring humanity, morality, and the impact of violence and harm are central to their new mechanics in Vampire 5^th Edition. They need to be central. If they are not mechanically bonded to the rest of the systems in the game, then players will shuffle them to the side. Morality is challenging. Self-reflection is difficult, it often isn’t fun. Challenging one’s own actions requires a comfort with facing inward, and asking oneself to change, or at the very least, being willing to try and change. The Banality of Evil in the World of Darkness is the lack of desire to have this personal conversation. The story is cool, the clans are interesting, the non-player characters and the meta-plot are interesting enough that people still read the books as story books without ever having played the game. There is a darkness here that tempts people, that engages the senses, but there is also a fear of holding up the mirror to oneself.

This will be the source of the next Vampire edition war. Players and storytellers that have become comfortable with being monsters in previous editions will rail against any mechanic that encourages or requires self-reflection. They have accepted the monstrous. These are the orders they have been given. Feeding is ancillary to the story, blood is simply a circle on a piece of paper, humanity isn’t important. Kindred or Cainite politics are central to the night’s events, challenges, and stories. Monsters and monstrous acts have become Banal. They are paperwork, they are marks on a sheet. And of course, this supposes that monstrous acts are only the behaviors of the serial killer, the predator, the abuser, which are reflected in the behavior of vampires.

Evil is rarely monstrous in our real world. Evil is insidious, it lives within us, creeping slowly to the surface. It isn’t a raving beast seeking escape. It’s a slow acceptance of the status quo. It’s a meandering disconnection from the world around us. It’s a self-absorption, it’s a comfort with death, destruction, and pain. Evil doesn’t require activity, often it shows itself through inactivity, through a suffusion of ennui.

The Beast, in Vampire, IS HUMANITY, in my opinion. The Beast is the active self-obsessed element of our minds, our souls, our very essence. Humanity is the monster for the Vampire. The Beast isn’t evil. It is active, it is trying to destroy the body, it wants to seek oblivion. The Beast is the animal urges that humans hide under our skins, under our morality, under our religions, and our philosophies. What is evil in Vampire? It is the active actions of the Kindred to seek control over humans so that they may prey upon them. It is the banal acceptance of their plight. It is the theft of life from others without their consent. Evil to the Cainite is the internalization that they are a monster, and such monstrosity isn’t noteworthy any longer. Humans can be beacons of light, good, hope, and joy. We can also be spiteful, harmful, and vicious with no purpose. We are neither born evil or good, nor tabula rasa. We a mix of nurture, nature, and a balance of good and evil.

Vampires have forgone this balance. To seek goodness in Vampire is supposed to be difficult, to impossible. It requires seeking things we should strive for in our day to day lives at all turns. We must seek consent, support, and love. If a Vampire can ask for blood, and be given it willingly, they are less evil. If they can find a family to hold them close and feed them, and support them, and build them up and help them strive toward a life that helps others, they may find peace. But, immortality steals these supports from the Kindred. The vampire outlives all those who might sustain them. The ravages of time steal their hope, and acts like ghouling or the embrace only perpetuate the cycle of harm and abuse. The V5 developers are aware of this, which is why they’ve integrated Touchstones (elements that keep the Kindred grounded and connected to hope). The question will be, is this enough and is it interesting to players? Will they accept the necessity of introspection into their games?

If we are to portray evil, we must not allow it to become Banal. When it does, we are no longer challenging ourselves by staring into the darkness. Instead, we are accepting the darkness into our souls. We are allowing evil to become normalized, amusing, and destructive. We must be willing to ask one another, “Why are we playing this game? What does it teach us? What can we do tomorrow to shuffle off the evil that pervades us and our world? Can we fight against it? Do we have the power to face evil and condemn it when we discover its origin is us?”

I’m not sure, but we must be aware of the Banality of Evil, for without our awareness of it, A Beast We Will Become.

Full disclosure, I’m no angel here either. I’ve written several things about Vampire for the Storyteller’s vault, and I’m not sure I’ve been much better.

This article was written by Joshua Heath and represents his opinions and only his opinion and may not reflect the opinion of any other contributors of this blog. He prefers he, him, and his pronouns. You can also find his work over at www.highlevelgames.ca

Storytelling to the Back and the Front of the Room

Storytelling is hard.

The purpose of this article is to both communicate my personal storytelling style and refine it. I want to explore, with you, how I want to do things and why I should be doing them. I hope that you can find something in them that helps you too. I know that talking to, and roleplaying with, others over the years has helped to improve my storytelling and roleplaying. These will be written from the perspective of a World of Darkness larper, but many of these ideas should apply to other tabletop and larp games.

I want to talk about the difficulty in storytelling to the back and the front of the room. In theater it is important that the play read not just to the close seats, but to all the way in the back row. The actors must not only be able to be heard, but must emote in a way that everyone can understand. There are many ways that theater accomplishes this. Everything from the shape of the stage, to the costumes and props are meant to tell a story to the whole theater. We have to do the same things when running game. We have to reach the back of the room.

For my purposes I divide players into four different categories. Many players will fall into more than one and will change over times. These are not meant to be groundbreaking or all inclusive, but I find them convenient. These categories are indicative of how players find their fun in a game.

Storytellers can address all of these player types by running an inclusive game. Inclusive games are founded with the idea that every player deserves a moment to shine and to have a chance to be part of the story. When writing plots the staff should create situations that have a theme and purpose that fits within the genre of your game and engages character driven by different things. These plots should require a variety of skills to complete or understand them and encourage players to recruit outside of their cliques for help.

Internally Driven

Sir Laurence, as Hamlet, Tragedy Embodied

These players self generate personal plots through history and roleplay. They tend to enter play with a goal that they wish to accomplish. That goal can drive inter-character conflict, like the quest to be Prince of a city or it can be driven by NPC interaction, like the drive to gain Pillar Status for your clan. These players enjoy working toward the goals they have set and like to feel as if they could accomplish them.

Seek to support their personal stories by integrating it into the plot of the game as much as you can. Let them climb their mountains, but do not give them easy success. If they succeed, it should be in spite of the trials and difficulties. Ensure that success and setback comes in turn. They want to feel a sense of accomplishment that is worthy of recognition. Give them both hope and the potential for failure.

Externally Driven

These players prefer Storyteller generated plot. They will create their characters with this in mind and will frequently seek to be very good in one or two areas of the game. Some of them will be focused on combat or investigation, but they could just as easily be experts in lore or influence. Players that are driven by plot like to complete missions and solve mysteries in game.

Support these players with interesting and engaging plot. It does not need to be complex to intrigue them, but it does need solid themes and story that fits within the genre of the game that is being run. Give them opportunities to use their skills to move plot along, but write plot that is not simple to bulldoze through. A solid foundation will allow you to improvise along with player action and ideas.

Experience Driven

Convention of Thorns 1 – Experience LARP

These players are seeking to have a “Moment”. They want to experience real emotions and drama. Their characters will have great histories and cool costumes and they will use those to pursue scenes where these moments can happen. Experience driven players prefer to stay in character and encourage others to do so as well. They are at game for the roleplay itself.

Storytellers can support them by involving them in divisive and difficult situations. Even if, and sometimes especially if, they have great setbacks and failures these players embrace the roller coaster of feeling. Allow them to play out these situations, but do not allow it to go so far as to detract from the rest of the players. When you are planning games, look for opportunities to include moral and ethical choices. This not only gives them a place to roleplay, but also creates depth for everyone.

Undriven

These players frequently struggling with either the rules, setting, or roleplay in general. They enjoy being involved and spending time with their friends. Sometimes, they are just uninterested in the game, but want to hang out. Everyone falls into this category at times. There are nights when you are too tired or burnt out to really engage plot. It is not always a bad thing. Taking a step back and allowing everyone else to shine can be refreshing for yourself and healthy for the game.

Engaging Undriven characters can be difficult, but the first step is education. When a player looks excluded, pay attention to them. If it is because they do not understand what is going on or how the rules work, then either you, or a designated helper, sit down with them and teach them the basics. Knowing the setting and rules will get them to the point where they know how they can interact, however learning to effectively roleplay helps even more. I like to attach them to an a divisive character or NPC in game. It gives them a goal and something to do. By throwing them in the deep end, they get to become immediately involved. If they still seek to stay on the periphery, give them space. Some players are satisfied with just being at game.

Conclusion

Players are more important than game, characters are more important than plot. Drive everything around creating an experience for your players. This does not mean that you hold back from negative consequences or even character death, just that you ensure they are meaningful. Meaning is the greatest thing you can give to a player’s actions. If you give their failure or death a cool story, they will remember it forever. Do not be afraid of a little boredom or breathing space. This gives players time to relax and characters time to reflect and plot their next move.

Player action and character agency is difficult to deal with at times, but your plot is not as important as player enjoyment and engagement. If the plot is not working or if the players have a better plan, let it go. Allow their solution to work if it makes sense and fits into the game setting. Be willing to script or storyboard scenes that have gotten bogged down or are uninteresting. If a mass combat has reached the point where it is just a series of bland challenges and it is no longer challenging or entertaining, then script the rest of it. Players are willing to negotiate appropriate consequences for a victory, if they feel that is fits with what is happening.

Ultimately, the way to reach every player in your game is to be interested in them. Give everyone, individually, a moment in the spotlight. Take the time to get to know them and to learn why they come to game. Watch yourself when you are writing stories and running NPCs that you do not get too caught up playing to the front. Those players deserve attention, they drive your plots and are usually the social leadership of your game. However, do not forget the back. Those players are at game to enjoy themselves too. Be interested in all the characters in your game and seek to integrate everyone into the larger story.