Vampire - The Masquerade

Oh, I know, it's just also a lot of level resources that are more for one clan than any other on top of a looooooot of other resources that are also clan specific. It's why the whole "Malkavians would be so much work" argument I see about why they won't be included makes no sense to me... I just think with the gaming world being quite what it is now and things like Google being so much more prevalent, that fishmalk Malks would be so spoilery that no one would be able to contain themselves... thus a great 2nd run character and how do you better guarantee that than by having them be the first bit of free DLC.

Gangrels, yeah, I cooooould see them working for Seattle (hell, last we knew, Seattle was deep werewolf territory)... but with the very bloody scene already claimed by the Brujah reveal, they really don't fit into any of the other preview images left up now, and with a Season of the Wolf DLC package... yeah that COULD be werewolves, but I'm more willing to bet on a fakeout there and say that that's going to be a heavy Gangrel DLC and they'll be playable as a clan as either a part of it or right before.

The Malkavians are my favorite clan. They could be done in the guise of their insanity.

I'm just hoping we get a little less fishmalk and maybe a more interesting portrayal of Malkavian mental health. It's possible to play a Malkavian who is just really OCD, sociopathic (one of the Clanbook Malks is doctor who studies the vampire condition with kind of a mixture of OCD and sociopathy, caring very little about the pains he inflicts on others to study the condition, but you'd never hear him say anything like what the Malkavians do as the PC in Bloodlines 1), depressed, or any other current mental health problem.

The V5 rules basically require you to have some kind of mental health issue and that's it, it's entirely the player's choice. "Insane" is possible but should usually be called out as really not all that specific. How are you insane? Auditory hallucinations that occasionally offer insight? Sinesthesia that occasionally lights things up in a way that gives you answers you shouldn't have?

Demosthenes wrote:

I'm just hoping we get a little less fishmalk and maybe a more interesting portrayal of Malkavian mental health. It's possible to play a Malkavian who is just really OCD, sociopathic (one of the Clanbook Malks is doctor who studies the vampire condition with kind of a mixture of OCD and sociopathy, caring very little about the pains he inflicts on others to study the condition, but you'd never hear him say anything like what the Malkavians do as the PC in Bloodlines 1), depressed, or any other current mental health problem.

The V5 rules basically require you to have some kind of mental health issue and that's it, it's entirely the player's choice. "Insane" is possible but should usually be called out as really not all that specific. How are you insane? Auditory hallucinations that occasionally offer insight? Sinesthesia that occasionally lights things up in a way that gives you answers you shouldn't have?

I once played a Maklavian that fed off of the torment of souls and not blood. (I would black out and feed on my patients, but as a clinical psychologist, I kept open mason jars in the room that collected my patients anxiety and fears and then I ‘fed’ on them later.

As the primogeniture, I ran the hospitals, the free health care clinics for the poor and the ambulance and fire service. It was a really fun character to play.

Reveal Day tomorrow!

As a reminder, our options are...
-Corporate Office - Probably Ventrue
-Fireplace with Wine - Probably Toreador, but maybe a subtle Malkavian therapy session
-Weird Hallway that may be a few system for Nosferatu or just a shadowy hallway where one other streamer for VtM I like has noted she thinks it might be the Lasombra.

Reveal day for our newest clan for Bloodlines 2 is... surprising no one... Toreador!

Interesting power set. They also have Celerity (the go fast power set) with the same skills and upgrades, from the look of things, but then they also have Presence, which... seems to be something of a Social stealth power set? Curious to see how humanity plays out if you enthrall a crowd and someone else kills them when you put them in harm's way.

Whelp, script is done, had a few VtM player veterans review the initial version, then modified a few bits of it. If anyone else here is interested in reading it, script is linked here.

Toreador! Ok NOW I'm preordering.

Budo wrote:

Toreador! Ok NOW I'm preordering.

I've said it in a few other sites, but man did they capture (where sadly, the original really doesn't) just how... creepy the Toreadors really can be.

Almost hitting a kind of Galadriel note for that brief moment before she rejects the ring... but way more subtly because that's kind of the point here.

One interesting theory I saw was that we MAY be getting previews of a story point here... as noted, we very likely gotta diablerize SOMEONE to join a clan... and we may very well be seeing the offending members of each clan in these previews. The Camarilla has some pretty decent ties (per the Toreador page on Bloodlines2.com) in the city... so the Brujah lady attacking the Prince or his minions is a good way to be the target of a Blood Hunt. The Tremere Dude may have just performed Blood Sorcery in an open lab with witnesses and a victim, so Masquerade breaker like that would be another good target for a Blood Hunt... and now we've got a Toreador who makes videos of her kills to capture the beauty of death, and if that video should fall into the wrong hands... another Masquerade breaching kindred who needs to be put down.

Why does clan choice in these games always for me come down to either beating up people or being liked?

Why does every internet hiccup for me always result in double posts?

Rat Boy wrote:

Why does clan choice in these games always for me come down to either beating up people or being liked?

To be fair, it kind of sounds like powers are largely going to be traversal type things or combat, and you don't HAVE to level them if you would prefer to play a different way.. Attributes and skills are apparently still going to be a thing.

If you want to make a sort of Philosopher Brujah, you could choose to ignore Potence, focus on Celerity for traversal options and dump all of your experience into persuasion, intimidate, etc... though they have noted during the live streams that there will be some encounters that require combat and as such, you should have at least some form of combat available to your character to use... but with Celerity high enough up, you could still go like Bullet Time gunslinger for combat and who needs Potence then?

(reads current topic)
- Boy, that Ocean House Hotel sure was creepy!

Seriously, looking forward to my return to Seattle in the year 2022 or whenever this goes on sale (unless they humblebundle it early on)

I wonder if you could do a thin blood run.

JohnKillo wrote:

I wonder if you could do a thin blood run.

Asked and answered already by the devs during a live stream Q&A, nope. You need to join a clan to progress the story.

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

Ventrue:

Ventrue, Toreador, Brujah, Tremere, any predictions on the last one? I know thinblood is listed, but I thought that's how you start, not a clan to be revealed.

I don't think going to be Gangrel. The season pass is called Season of the Wolf, so that screams Gangrel DLC to me. Or werewolves at least.

I would love it if it were Nosferatu, but for some reason I'm leaning towards Malkavian. Wouldn't be surprised if it was neither since both could require some difficult gameplay challenges.

I imagine Nosferatu or Malkavian would make sense if you want a stealthier approach to the game. And I imagine they might want them upfront, rather than trying to figure out how to slot both in later and change the level/plot design around some of their quirks.

Malkavian seems like it has a distinct mark in the game series, though part of me wonders if it's better to hold as DLC so that some of the meta-commentary their playthrough has can make more sense to people who come back to the game when they're released.

TheHarpoMarxist wrote:

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

The whole "voyeurism-as-a-game-mechanic" feels a bit creepy to me.

Aeazel wrote:

I imagine Nosferatu or Malkavian would make sense if you want a stealthier approach to the game. And I imagine they might want them upfront, rather than trying to figure out how to slot both in later and change the level/plot design around some of their quirks.

Malkavian seems like it has a distinct mark in the game series, though part of me wonders if it's better to hold as DLC so that some of the meta-commentary their playthrough has can make more sense to people who come back to the game when they're released.

Please be Malkavian. Please. Please.

Rat Boy wrote:
TheHarpoMarxist wrote:

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

The whole "voyeurism-as-a-game-mechanic" feels a bit creepy to me.

But the whole being a undead creature of evil who lives off the blood of humans and uses their inherent powers to manipulate and dominate others, that's ok?

I'm in the Malk as DLC camp. From a business point of view it makes more sense as I would go a full playthrough probably Ventrue. and a Malk DLC would get me back in after a few months.

SpyNavy wrote:
Rat Boy wrote:
TheHarpoMarxist wrote:

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

The whole "voyeurism-as-a-game-mechanic" feels a bit creepy to me.

But the whole being a undead creature of evil who lives off the blood of humans and uses their inherent powers to manipulate and dominate others, that's ok?

The "drink from someone in a certain mood to advance a particular skill tree" is also creepy.

Rat Boy wrote:
SpyNavy wrote:
Rat Boy wrote:
TheHarpoMarxist wrote:

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

The whole "voyeurism-as-a-game-mechanic" feels a bit creepy to me.

But the whole being a undead creature of evil who lives off the blood of humans and uses their inherent powers to manipulate and dominate others, that's ok?

The "drink from someone in a certain mood to advance a particular skill tree" is also creepy.

...and one is real world problems while the other is... not so much

Last reveal left to go... and yeah, some folks are saying Nosferatu, but during either the Toreador or Ventrue "live" stream (they were pre-recorded because the dude who always dresses up for this was out of town)... they mentioned something, specifically not to assume all the clans will be previously playable clans. Thaaaaaaaaat... makes me think that the shadowy hallway may be Lasombra instead of Nosferatu.

For reference, the Lasombra playstyle would certainly be SIMILAR. Lasombra are stealthy, but heavily shadow reliant, compared to Nosferatu who are generally more focused on their Obfuscation. As a Lasombra, you can basically sort of teleport between shadows.

The Lasombra, though, have kind of half and half split on the Sabbat. A lot of them did not follow everyone else on their way to Gehenna in the Middle East. I could also see them being a hilarious stealth option... but also having some issues similar to Malkavian/Nosferatu... specifically that their clan "weakness" is that they cast no images for recording in ANY way. This use to only be with mirrors... thus creating THAT myth around all vampires. But in the modern nights, it's a little more extensive... they cannot be captured on video at all, film or digitally. Their voices cannot be recorded. At best, all you'll see or hear is a faint distortion of them... a ghostly person in frame where someone should be. You'll still see their effects on their surroundings. If they're standing in the rain, you will see the "rain shadow" under them... though weirdly their effect extends to their clothes, personal belongings, etc...

This thread is a painful reminder of 1- how much the idea of "vampire clans" is my jam and tragically relatedly 2- how terrible my intro to Masquerade was (a con-LARP room that I think got swarmed by...some overleveled Brujah? But they were dressed too goth/proto-steam, so I'm not sure what they were. I just know they resolved disputes I couldn't follow with paper rock scissors, and after 5 minutes I thought "I think I hate this."). I've heard whispers of how legendary the original Bloodlines was, so I might be psyched for this one.

Yeah, that is a pity. My first tabletop experience was a university roleplaying group that introduced me to Vampire and it was pretty great. It was very informal though.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

This thread is a painful reminder of 1- how much the idea of "vampire clans" is my jam and tragically relatedly 2- how terrible my intro to Masquerade was (a con-LARP room that I think got swarmed by...some overleveled Brujah? But they were dressed too goth/proto-steam, so I'm not sure what they were. I just know they resolved disputes I couldn't follow with paper rock scissors, and after 5 minutes I thought "I think I hate this."). I've heard whispers of how legendary the original Bloodlines was, so I might be psyched for this one.

I've got a different issue in that most of the "seeking members" type TTRPG groups in Cinci are like comprised of at least some of the same like 10ish dudes... all of whom are sh*tmongering toxic exclusionary gate-keeping asshats.

For reference though, if you're interested in what a better intro might be...

Rat Boy wrote:
TheHarpoMarxist wrote:

Polygon has a neat feature talking to the writing leads.

The whole "voyeurism-as-a-game-mechanic" feels a bit creepy to me.

If you get to Chapter 8 of LA By Night, you'll see... what I think is a very interesting take on that particular idea. Jasper is a Nosferatu. As a result, Jasper's old life was "over". It's never mentioned who "she" is, but Jasper... left someone behind in that Embrace. His choice was to not put her through anything other than his "death".

Jasper, in talking with Annabelle, a newly turned kindred who is still living with her significant others... talks about how he knows "she", whoever she is... is still alive, still watches her occasionally a night. A reminder of who he used to be, and making sure that she is alright.

Don't get me wrong, stalking is a horrible f*cking thing... but seeing something like "voyeurism" as a mechanic of... solitary creatures of the night, cut off from their old lives... sounds like the writing team have found a good way of getting into a few bits they missed with Bloodlines 1. I am supremely curious to see where they go with this.

Rat Boy wrote:

The "drink from someone in a certain mood to advance a particular skill tree" is also creepy.

Not an unreasonable reaction, though I do like the idea of certain moods causing differences in feeding. I'd be curious to see if this all ties into the humanity system.