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If I were to slap a Forgeist label on CofD / nWoD, it would be Simulationist, not Narrativist, despite the "storytelling" name. They're really not mechanically light *at all*, but the mechanical load is in service of making the thematic push of the game. Conditions aren't a FATE-esque narrative control for the player, they're one of countless examples in Storytelling (the CofD/nWoD ruleset, as opposed to Storyteller for the oWoD) of bribing players into having their characters act like they "should".

So whether it's a player being given XP for their character acting like a horror-movie protagonist against the character's own best interest, the fact that fights have a Willpower cap on progressing beyond a beatdown in an alley, the way Mage's spellcasting is designed to double-dog-dare players into risking paradox, the Vitae economy in Vampire, the milestones of Pilgramage mapping out a Promethean's self-actualisation or whatever, the mechanics are in service to that simulation-of-horror-fiction goal. Playing an nWoD game is the art of deliberately getting your own character into trouble, and if your group resists that the system starts to fail.
 
Storyteller games are "incoherent" according to Forgist theory, because they mix Simulationist, Narrativist, and Gamist goals, so it's not possible to assign them to one of the three categories.

Because Forge theory assumes that games should focus on one of these goals above the others.

Which is one of many reasons Forge theory is a nonsensical drivel which has no connection to reality.
 
Well I gave the example from Changeling the lost. The thought of having to keep track of the various conditions, betas, tilts, clarity breaks etc. Pretty much killed the game for me.
Likewise I wanted to like Fate. I thought Fate was going to be 'the game' for me, but there is so much stuff to keep track of, different wound tracks, Players aspects, aspects given to situations etc.

It's like the core of the game isn't enough, that people feel the need to add all these extra subsystems in to make the game feel 'more'. Only in doing so they move away from playing a character and interacting with the game world to achieve your goals and instead it becomes about manipulating game systems to gain the same outcome.

Everyone raves about Spirit of the Century, but I'll stick my early noughties copy of Adventure! Because even with the meta rule of dramatic editing, it makes sense in the spirit of the game and doesn't rely on a handful of other subsystems to work.
I found Fate Core too fiddly as well but Fate Condensed and some other Fate games strip it back enough for me to appreciate as I tend to prefer lighter systems.
 
They are so crunchy.

I found Fate Core too fiddly as well but Fate Condensed and some other Fate games strip it back enough for me to appreciate as I tend to prefer lighter systems.
I'd much rather a game had a single, or at least a few different, mechanics that fuelled the various systems than overwhelming the gm and players with a wealth of different things to track. I looked at the various versions of Fate but I think what I struggled with there was the ad hoc use of aspects beyond the characters and that runs through every iteration.
I much preferred the use of Aspects in Houses of the Blooded. They do one thing - gain dice - and relate solely to the character.
Its like Storyteller, you've Attribute+Ability vs Difficulty which forms90% of the game then there might be a pool system (Rage, Blood, Willpower etc.) which can impact upon it and maybe another - Magic for Mage or Mega attributes or Taint for Aberrant. But these are really just variations on A+A or the pool.
Getting my fingers burnt with Changeling 2nd ed has put me off of getting into the CoD which is a shame because Deviant sounds like it would be right up my street.
 
I much preferred the use of Aspects in Houses of the Blooded. They do one thing - gain dice - and relate solely to the character.
Its like Storyteller, you've Attribute+Ability vs Difficulty which forms90% of the game then there might be a pool system (Rage, Blood, Willpower etc.) which can impact upon it and maybe another - Magic for Mage or Mega attributes or Taint for Aberrant. But these are really just variations on A+A or the pool.
Agreed. I really wish there was a fate variant that doubled down on this.
 
And whilst CoD 2nd Ed might be nothing like Fate, I make that correlation because they both give player systems to affect the game and the world that lie outside of the character.
Well I gave the example from Changeling the lost.
But... that example basically amounts to "when you hit a person, they don't like it".

That seems like a pretty low bar to pass for what counts as being able to affect the world outside of the character.

Which I don't quite understand as something objectionable. What is a player supposed to be doing besides stating what their character is doing in the world?
 
In the sense usually meant I wouldn't say that the CoD games are narrativist at all. The character types commonly have the ability to mentally affect NPCs and they can even edit the world, but that's all aspects of their in-world powers. CoD is just crunchier than NWoD, but it's not more narrativist really.

Which I don't quite understand as something objectionable. What is a player supposed to be doing besides stating what their character is doing in the world?
You said you weren't that into the RPG scene in general, so a short explanation.

In MtAW mages can clearly retroactively edit reality, but that's a genuine power they possess in the fiction.

In games like Blades in the Dark you perform heists. In the game you can have points for triggering "flashbacks" where you describe how your character prepared for some eventuality. You don't plan it "in-character" as such. The GM might go "There's a guard at the door" and then you flashback to how your character bribed the guard the previous day so that he'd leave his shift early. It's reactive out of character retconning to simulate Ocean's 11 style stuff.
 
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But... that example basically amounts to "when you hit a person, they don't like it".

That seems like a pretty low bar to pass for what counts as being able to affect the world outside of the character.

Which I don't quite understand as something objectionable. What is a player supposed to be doing besides stating what their character is doing in the world?
Ok, it probably wasn't the best example. My problem stems from the wealth of subsystems that interplay within the game. Instead of saying "You're injured from that fight." I have to give the condition "Arm Wrack". Instead of saying "You're a Wizened, you get a bonus to (whatever Wizened get a bonus to), I have to remember what condition they can apply to the world. Like I said, mechanically there's very little difference when it comes down to it. I just find it very counter-intuitive. It feels like having rules for the sake of having more rules.
 
In games like Blades in the Dark you perform heists. In the game you can have points for triggering "flashbacks" where you describe how your character prepared for some eventuality. You don't plan it "in-character" as such. The GM might go "There's a guard at the door" and then you flashback to how your character bribed the guard the previous day so that he'd leave his shift early. It's reactive out of character retconning to simulate Ocean's 11 style stuff.
Fair enough.

That stuff is in Chronicles of Darkness as well. Offhand, werewolves have some of it, although I think it can often be found in Merits.
Ok, it probably wasn't the best example. My problem stems from the wealth of subsystems that interplay within the game. Instead of saying "You're injured from that fight." I have to give the condition "Arm Wrack". Instead of saying "You're a Wizened, you get a bonus to (whatever Wizened get a bonus to), I have to remember what condition they can apply to the world. Like I said, mechanically there's very little difference when it comes down to it. I just find it very counter-intuitive. It feels like having rules for the sake of having more rules.
I guess I can understand the obstacles of that. Although I do think there's a converse element where it's convenient to have all such modifications bundled together under a common heading rather than scattered throughout the rules set (particularly when they're also unified under the added feature of being a source of XP).

Mind, I do think there's something to summarising what a character is currently labouring under with a direct and memorably titled label that can be marked on a character sheet. There have been times in the past where I would wonder if a player might not lose track of exactly what complications are currently in play, especially if it's something they need to deal with in the long run. That awkward moment where you realise that you've been forgetting to apply the penalty for your broken arm that hasn't healed yet.

And hey, giving these things discrete names like that means that cards can be made up to be handed around as a visual reminder, same as how one scribbles in and rubs out changes to their health track or uses a turn order wheel.

Hmm, too much mechanics stuff. I really ought to pen down that idea I had for Awakening to illustrate how a Mystery can have scope and length beyond what their direct information gathering powers can resolve.
 
That stuff is in Chronicles of Darkness as well. Offhand, werewolves have some of it, although I think it can often be found in Merits.
I assume this is Werewolf Forsaken 2E? Looking through the merits I couldn't see anything that seemed out and out narrativist to me. "Strings of the Heart" came closest. I'm taking the list starting on p.105. I could have easily missed something, let me know anything that seems narrative like to you*.

Note, I'm sure there are some things that are slightly narrative somewhere in the CoD line given the huge bulk of rules. In the main though CoD games are traditional heavy crunch RPGs that simulate a metaphysically "odd" world. It's honestly as narrative as GURPS, in the sense that I'm sure in some GURPS supplement somewhere there is some advantage worded in a narrative way, but that doesn't change the bulk of how the line works.

*Just to note, I'm not disagreeing with anything you have written since you made no attempt to classify CoD along these trad/narrative lines. It's just if you want to know what "narrative" means.
 
I'm not really into the RPG scene enough to get these categories, but wouldn't rendering all of this stuff with discrete mechanical implementations that contain resolution conditions and a system of rewards be pretty gamist?

And if not, then what is a person looking for in playing these games?

I'm presuming here that this is coming from a place of "Vampire et al is cool but I don't want to play it in a narrativist style" rather than being critical of the games from the foundations because they're perceived to be narrativist.

Although... were you in favour of Ascension's Consensus Reality concept?

Consensus reality was the best way of explaining how Ascension did things but it had flaws that became obvious very quickly and likely contributed to the decision made by Awakening's developers to use a different magic concept.

JG
 
Consensus reality was the best way of explaining how Ascension did things but it had flaws that became obvious very quickly and likely contributed to the decision made by Awakening's developers to use a different magic concept.

JG
The main issue was that it didn’t mesh with the other games at all. If the Technocracy was supposed to be in the ascendence, with their rational paradigm dominant - then how on earth did the world end up with so many supernatural creatures in it?

I maintain that Mage: The Ascension works best as a premise if you keep it separate from the rest of the WoD - but obviously it is boiled in now.
 
The main issue was that it didn’t mesh with the other games at all. If the Technocracy was supposed to be in the ascendence, with their rational paradigm dominant - then how on earth did the world end up with so many supernatural creatures in it?
"I KNOW!" - Craig Ferguson
 
I maintain that Mage: The Ascension works best as a premise if you keep it separate from the rest of the WoD - but obviously it is boiled in now.
Yeah, and I'm not sure that Awakening's premise is that much more compatible with the other supernaturals.

JG
 
Since this is a general discussion for WoD, nWoD, and CoD, mind if we discuss our homebrew settings and projects for the games?
 
Go for it

Currently working on a homebrew setting for nWoD, with the main focus being on Requiem 1E

It's gonna have alternate themes, an alternate lore, and a different interpretation of the game as a whole. There will be also be a very minor change to the mechanics, but one that is nowhere near as drastic as the mechanical changes of CoD/Requiem 2E.

As for the setting proper? Well, I'm writing up a city writeup for the one and only gothic-punk shithole, the vile cesspit that is known as the "Star City of the South", the Valley of the Shadow of Death, the crude bitch of the Blue Ridge...

Roanoke, Virginia.

Prepare for "The Requiem for Roanoke"
 
Well, if we are doing campaign outlines, here is one I posted before in it’s own thread (but nobody replied!) - it is set in Chicago and makes use of the Chicago by Night sourcebook as well as the V5 core rules. The Chronicle has moved on a bit now, but if anyone is interested or wants to make suggestions, always welcome:

The characters are:

  • A Malkavian Radio host/conspiracy theorist working for the Camarilla to gaslight any legitimate theories and observations of their activities.
  • A Tremere Researcher/Historical academic, cut off from a missing Mentor, but finding a new residence in Chicago (from Boston).
  • A Lasombra Corrupt Clergyman, with a congregation in Chicago - which is undergoing an upheaval in the Camarilla set up (it now accepts Lasombra with some suspicion).
  • A Thin Blood Addict/Chemist/Outsider - inspired somewhat by Walter White from Breaking Bad.

As noted, the game is set in and around the Chicago area (mainly because I have the Chronicle book), but it may venture further out as the Chronicle continues. The narrative was going to be based on the chronicle in the book - The Sacrifice - which allows me to bring in key NPCs into the framework. However, the main thrust of that story is the introduction of the Lasombra into the Camarilla, which doesn’t really work because one of the PCs is a Lasombra already. So what I have left is a little vague and needing some work on.

I am trying to work on a premise that splices together some ideas from Children of Men and Things to Do in Denver When You Are Dead, along with the extra Clan write ups from the Vampire Companion and material from Chicago Chronicles and Let the Streets Run Red. The basic idea is this:

The characters are all outsiders in one sense or another and are of Neonate level in terms of the politics of the area - essentially independents/nobodies. They are contracted by the Camarilla establishment, as expendable mercenaries in effect, to smuggle in an ‘asset’ via the airport and to deal with the various interested parties that have got wind of this, and are trying to steal the asset for themselves. The asset is a mystery macguffin at first, but actually amounts to three cloaked individuals, of which one is of the Salubri Clan (very rare, thought to be extinct and mythical, and a political hot potato). The others are essentially captors/guards and red herrings/doppelgangers.

My intent is that the job will go disastrously wrong and the characters left with the blame - although what they don’t know is that it was a set up from the start - and become fugitives accordingly. At this point they may choose to leave Chicago and run into some dangerous side scenario - there is a good Wicker Man-esque scenario in Let the Streets Run Red, so maybe that one. At a later point again, they will be captured again by an Anarch group, who will have the asset and require to the Salubri to be transported covertly again to an external agent that wishes to perform some sort of Golconda ritual on the Salubri. This 'agent’ (a Tzmisce) will actually want to sacrifice the Salubri for some awful experiment - but no-one will know that, including the Salubri, until they get there.

I also have a mind to have a high ranking Camarilla character, or two, try to surreptitiously blood bond at least one of the characters, under instruction from the Prince, but who is secretly disloyal to the Prince himself and will create some dilemma for the character group to be able to stay loyal themselves.

Bearing in mind the characters above, and the Clans they belong to, has anybody got some ideas to help flesh this out for about 10-13 3-4 hour sessions? All scenario ideas, and possible other twists will be welcome.
 
I assume this is Werewolf Forsaken 2E? Looking through the merits I couldn't see anything that seemed out and out narrativist to me.
I was thinking about the Cahalith Auspice power. Whereas in First Edition it you just got to ask the Storyteller for prophetic dreams, in Second that part changed to the Storyteller providing them when appropriate while the player gets to retroactively declare an event that just happened to have been foretold by their dreams and gain some kind of bonus or benefit for it.

Dramatic failures also seem relevant to consider. Players get to turn regular failures into them in exchange for Beats, as a way of encouraging interesting fuck ups with more frequency but giving the players a hand in choosing them. It lets one take an inconvenient moment where the dice were against them and make it into a memorable and compelling complication, for character building purposes.
 
I think that's more a reflection on how future-fortelling powers in rpgs are inherently impossible to do diagetically; the first edition version assumes that the Storyteller is able to predict what will happen, which is in doubt because they're not the only person with agency over events in the fiction of the game. The second-edition version breaks game kayfabe in a limited and specific way to ensure that the power *in-universe* functions properly; to the character, the future was predicted in their dreams.

There was a bit of talk about Malcolm Sheppard's influence on Ascension Revised (his first book was either Akashic Brotherhood or Dragons of the East, IIRC) and Awakening, and as his friend, co-author, co-developer, and developer I see it as this - Malcolm is big on diagesis, and being clear on the divide between something that's within the fiction of the game's world and what's a mechanic. Vampire: The Masquerade, for example, has never settled on a straight answer about whether vampires even call their powers "Disciplines" or know what they are. Mage: The Ascension can't make its mind up between editions about whether mages know how their powers work. Mage: The Awakening mages know what the Arcana are, and what the dot-levels of them are (the Practices) - even their power stat is something they can measure. In order to render the Time Arcanum diagetic, nMage holds the position that the future is constantly being rewritten and Divination powers explicitly reveal the most likely scenario when cast, which the act of casting then immediately throws into doubt, with higher levels being modelled if-then analyses. But when it's one facet of one gift, nWerewolf doesn't have time or wordcount to go into that sort of thing so plumps for dragging the whole thing into the game-layer rather than the fiction layer.

Demon does it with Heist Story advice, too.

EDIT TO ADD

Aaaaaaanyway, the difference between those "I knew this was going to happen" mechanics and a properly (again, if you buy into Ron Edwards' bullshit, which I definitely don't) "Narrativist" game is that the former are rules-writing flanges brought in at last resort when there's no other succinct way to do them, and a core part of the game's engine. Storytelling has an "in this story, I want my character to learn X harsh lesson" XP system, but that's signalling what you want to the Storyteller and getting a bean if it happens in the course of a normal "I want to do this, I have X% chance of it succeeding" Simulationist session, not an assumption of GM powers by a player.

EDIT TO ALSO ADD

I could go on for ages about diagesis in games, and how it's not made explicit enough. For example, in Exalted second edition Charms are things Exalts know about, by name. In third edition they aren't. Why the difference, and what difference does it make to the setting?
 
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I think that's more a reflection on how future-fortelling powers in rpgs are inherently impossible to do diagetically; the first edition version assumes that the Storyteller is able to predict what will happen, which is in doubt because they're not the only person with agency over events in the fiction of the game. The second-edition version breaks game kayfabe in a limited and specific way to ensure that the power *in-universe* functions properly; to the character, the future was predicted in their dreams.

There was a bit of talk about Malcolm Sheppard's influence on Ascension Revised (his first book was either Akashic Brotherhood or Dragons of the East, IIRC) and Awakening, and as his friend, co-author, co-developer, and developer I see it as this - Malcolm is big on diagesis, and being clear on the divide between something that's within the fiction of the game's world and what's a mechanic. Vampire: The Masquerade, for example, has never settled on a straight answer about whether vampires even call their powers "Disciplines" or know what they are. Mage: The Ascension can't make its mind up between editions about whether mages know how their powers work. Mage: The Awakening mages know what the Arcana are, and what the dot-levels of them are (the Practices) - even their power stat is something they can measure. In order to render the Time Arcanum diagetic, nMage holds the position that the future is constantly being rewritten and Divination powers explicitly reveal the most likely scenario when cast, which the act of casting then immediately throws into doubt, with higher levels being modelled if-then analyses. But when it's one facet of one gift, nWerewolf doesn't have time or wordcount to go into that sort of thing so plumps for dragging the whole thing into the game-layer rather than the fiction layer.

Demon does it with Heist Story advice, too.
I for one hear stories about people trying to actually do the thing of coming up with plans to cover multiple contingencies or play the whole Vizzini game and it sounds exhausting and distracting and makes me a fairly big advocate of mechanics to just collapse that down to an instance of "player has limited capacity to declare that they prepared a contingency for this thing as it comes up".
I could go on for ages about diagesis in games, and how it's not made explicit enough. For example, in Exalted second edition Charms are things Exalts know about, by name. In third edition they aren't. Why the difference, and what difference does it make to the setting?
Ohhhh, I think my participation in those arguments (on the "it's preferable for the Charms to be non-diegetic" side) has managed to take a few years off the end of my life. If a thread on the subject started elsewhere, I'd need a very compelling reason to get into it again. :smile:
 
So, for context, with the Requiem for Roanoke setting, I completely disregard the whole "1 Vampire for every 100,000 Humans" rule because it's way too limiting.

If you guys want to know more about the setting, I can definitely post a writeup in this thread
 
Those ratios were always a very bad idea. I get the principle of "here's how many humans could support a vampire without that vampire being found out" but it always leads to bizarre results, when the only ratio of parasites to hosts that matters is "too many" and that's in the remit of the Storyteller for their own plot.

When it was my job to do so, I vigorously resisted coming up with one for nMage. There are as many as could be reasonably attracted by whatever weird is happening in (Location to be determined). When I was a fan, before I saw how the sausage was made, I once sat down and calculated the number of mages needed for mage society to function as described in the Order books to be just over 150, which is too damn many for a ST to design as npcs, so in my edition of the game those Order structures explicitly cover much larger areas.
 
Those ratios were always a very bad idea. I get the principle of "here's how many humans could support a vampire without that vampire being found out" but it always leads to bizarre results, when the only ratio of parasites to hosts that matters is "too many" and that's in the remit of the Storyteller for their own plot.

When it was my job to do so, I vigorously resisted coming up with one for nMage. There are as many as could be reasonably attracted by whatever weird is happening in (Location to be determined). When I was a fan, before I saw how the sausage was made, I once sat down and calculated the number of mages needed for mage society to function as described in the Order books to be just over 150, which is too damn many for a ST to design as npcs, so in my edition of the game those Order structures explicitly cover much larger areas.

Agreed completely.

Take for example my Roanoke setting. The City of Roanoke proper is around 100,000 people in terms of population, roughly speaking. But the wider metropolitan area is three or four times that size depending on what all you include.

At the very least, the Roanoke Valley area consists of the City of Roanoke, Roanoke County, the City of Salem, and the Town of Vinton, all of which are in extreme close proximity of each other and if you include the neighboring locales of Franklin County and Botetourt County (which are considered part of the Roanoke area based on the census) then it's even larger in terms of the overall population.

So while I couldn't see all five covenants having a major presence, as Storyteller, I can definitely see more than just three or four Kindred living there. I'd say there'd be at least two or three of the covenants in the area, each consisting of a single coterie.

The Prince of the Roanoke Valley is a powerful elder who allows any covenant (excluding the Brood, obviously) to set up shop in the area, provided they pay a yearly tribute and obey the basic traditions.
 
Those ratios were always a very bad idea. I get the principle of "here's how many humans could support a vampire without that vampire being found out" but it always leads to bizarre results, when the only ratio of parasites to hosts that matters is "too many" and that's in the remit of the Storyteller for their own plot.
I think that's at least one reason why Second Edition benefits from the whole principle of "vampires aren't really trying to hide on the whole as such (people can be relied upon to wilfully fail to deduce their presence), just keep the people with whom they form blood donation relationships with from ever acting too much like they realise you're a vampire".

Just hang out with enough people that the first one you feed on will be well recovered by the time you cycle back around to them.
 
I thought the 1 per 100,000 was a Camarilla diktat? (not always enforced or followed).
 
I thought the 1 per 100,000 was a Camarilla diktat? (not always enforced or followed).

I can't comment on anything written in a Vampire: the Masquerade book, but in Requiem's First Edition core (or... possibly surrounding commentary from its developer, it's been a while) the description of how many vampires there can be directly gave that as a ratio that would allow vampires to conduct themselves without things like their feeding drawing notice.
 
I can't comment on anything written in a Vampire: the Masquerade book, but in Requiem's First Edition core (or... possibly surrounding commentary from its developer, it's been a while) the description of how many vampires there can be directly gave that as a ratio that would allow vampires to conduct themselves without things like their feeding drawing notice.

IIRC, it was a holdover from Masquerade Revised that made it over to the Requiem 1E core and is one of those weird Justin Achilli hallmarks.
 
So then, Doc Sammy Doc Sammy, what are the intended themes of your Vampire game?

To be blunt, my intended themes will be a mix of action horror and political intrigue with a focus on the rivalries between the different covenants in the area as they all scheme to take over the valley for themselves and take out the Prince who stands in their way.

The core themes can best be summed up as a quest for power
 
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To be blunt, my intended themes will be a mix of action horror and political intrigue with a focus on the rivalries between the different covenants in the area as they all scheme to take over the valley for themselves and take out the Prince who stands in their way.

The core themes can best be summed up as a quest for power
So then-

Hang on a moment...

Ah. Up until right now, I had assumed you meant this game to take place in the past, in a colonial era. I see the name "Roanoke" and my mind immediately skips to the lost colony, you know?

So, a struggle for power between up to three coteries. Sounds extremely intimate. Seems to me like that's the sort of thing that can balance on a bit of a see-saw; one coterie rises to power, the other one or two don't exactly have much rivalry to distract them from scheming to take it back. Is the power in this case a sense of authority over the other vampires (playing out a bit like the feud of neighbouring families in a soap opera), over the scope of feeding rights, or is there something particular to the city's cultural, political or economic makeup that the vampires would compete over having an unimpeded hand in?

Or is it a case in which the vampires are so competitive out of a sense of little else to do? Their Danse Macabre not containing much artistic expression, but at least everybody knows the steps.

On a related note, are the members of the player coterie expected to cooperate in the acquisition and sharing of power, or might the players be intended to be in a state of tension with one another, where treachery and looking to be first up the ladder is on the table?
 
So then-

Hang on a moment...

Ah. Up until right now, I had assumed you meant this game to take place in the past, in a colonial era. I see the name "Roanoke" and my mind immediately skips to the lost colony, you know?

So, a struggle for power between up to three coteries. Sounds extremely intimate. Seems to me like that's the sort of thing that can balance on a bit of a see-saw; one coterie rises to power, the other one or two don't exactly have much rivalry to distract them from scheming to take it back. Is the power in this case a sense of authority over the other vampires (playing out a bit like the feud of neighbouring families in a soap opera), over the scope of feeding rights, or is there something particular to the city's cultural, political or economic makeup that the vampires would compete over having an unimpeded hand in?

Or is it a case in which the vampires are so competitive out of a sense of little else to do? Their Danse Macabre not containing much artistic expression, but at least everybody knows the steps.

On a related note, are the members of the player coterie expected to cooperate in the acquisition and sharing of power, or might the players be intended to be in a state of tension with one another, where treachery and looking to be first up the ladder is on the table?

The player coterie is expected to cooperate in the sharing of power at first, especially since all three coteries are mostly neonates (with an ancilla leader) and all have a common enemy in the Prince.

Feuding families or small-time street gangs is precisely what I'm aiming for with this one.
 
all three coteries are mostly neonates (with an ancilla leader) and all have a common enemy in the Prince.
Is there a particular backstory for this setup?

So if the coterie is pure Covenant, will the players be allowed to select which of the two or three they assume the role of?
 
Is there a particular backstory for this setup?

So if the coterie is pure Covenant, will the players be allowed to select which of the two or three they assume the role of?

There is a bit of backstory but it's a work in progress.

The players will be allowed to select the covenant they are part of, yes.
 
Okay, so it's First Edition Requiem... how many source books does that extend to?

I'm just wondering if the Cacophony is an element of your setting; technically still part of First Edition, even if introduced later than the core.
 
Okay, so it's First Edition Requiem... how many source books does that extend to?

I'm just wondering if the Cacophony is an element of your setting; technically still part of First Edition, even if introduced later than the core.

For now, we're going to keep it simple and stick with the corebooks but I may introduce other elements from later 1E books down the line depending on how the game plays out.
 
For now, we're going to keep it simple and stick with the corebooks but I may introduce other elements from later 1E books down the line depending on how the game plays out.

If I may say so, in the event that the intended tone of hostility between the Covenants means that they actively avoid meeting directly with one another, some of the ideas underlying the Cacophony might prove an interesting method of giving enemy vampires a sense of presence and menace even when they don't show up directly. Things like the gig posters and music schedules in one of the player character's favourite night clubs conveying a veiled threat or insult to the vampire trained to understand it, or the tags on the walls and symbols incorporated into business logos defining the territorial boundaries. And of course the players might devise their own creative methods for putting out coded messages into the night to be picked up on by their opponents.
 
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