White Wolf--The Stages Of Life

Try this on for size: When you are born, you are fresh and new, seeing the world with innocent eyes. Everything is magical and filled with wonder. This is Changeling:The Dreaming. When you get a little older, like 8 or 9, you like to hang out with your friends, run around, play in mud...get into snowball fights and generally roughhouse. This is Werewolf:The Apocolypse. When you become a teenager, everything changes. No one understands you, you feel moody and disconsolate. You are an alien from society around you. This is Vampire:The Masquerade. Now you're going to college. Everything makes sense to you know--you're learning about a larger world, learning new forms of thinking that question all your old assumptions. Everything depends on viewpoint. This is Mage:The Ascension. Finally, you're an adult. You're trapped in a job you don't like, where you need to spend most of your time. You spend too much time thinking about the past, or slaving for a living. This is Wraith:The Oblivion. Now--before everybody goes on about how clever this all is--why is it that a game about vampires, werewolves and ghosts seems to have such quick analogues to the human condition? Well, people say that the WW games are _about_ people. Okay, I'll buy that they serve as visible analogies of different stages of human development, and of issues we all face. With that accepted, doesn't it still seem pandering that humans themselves are given such short shrift in the WoD? They don't make the history. They don't fight the fights. They don't know squat. Everything we know is a lie. If the only way WW players can embody the human is by playing a monster, doesn't this imply an inabillity to understand the human? All literature and storytelling is about the triumph of the human over our darker selves, nature and civilization. I propose that teh World of Darkness pretends that it is oriented to a higher goal, but really is just an opportunity for people to play stock characters dictated by clan/clutch/whatever in whatever tribebook/clanbooks that WW has managed to sell. It is a system that thrives on munchkinism, and is in no way substantially different from playing a horde of monsters in AD+D--sure, it's the modern era and vampires lose "Humanity", but every game I've seen treats life as a joke. I'm not trying to provoke a flamewar, though thios is the place to do it...I am very concerned that the WoD perpetuates powergaming, stifles creativity and offers nothing trully unique to the gaming community. Okay: have at me. ------------------ mrmister Gaming Outpost Staff Dilletante http://www.gamingoutpost.com Mailto: mrmister@gamingoutpost.com

I definatly agree with you on powergaming in WoD. I've know a player who's entire consept of character creation is just setting up a vampire the stats to give it an unbeatable initiative and zillions of bonus action, and then just playes the character by ear, not realy caring about how he should play the character, just waiting for a fight and kicking arse. And dont stert me on Deomonic Investments. "Yes, yes I would like super powers, and no reprocutions". I know another player, who first thing he did in a new Mage Chronicle went and sold his soul for a loud or ridiculisly powered abuileties ( Arnt Tradition Mages suposed to forbid this? ). And when I asked him why he did this he replies, " Hey, their just sould points. Why cant I get power when there is a chance?"

I would say that this is more the doing of the GM, and less the doing of the game. Heck, any game can be perverted and warped. Trouble is, the World of Darkness makes this much too easy. It would seem that Rein-Hagen designed V:TM with mature GMs in mind, giving no thought to the immature ones, the ones with no life experience worth squat. They are the ones who allow munchkinism and power gamers. It's kinda hard to make a philosophical statement when your audience could give a fuck. The only answer I have for munchins and power gamers is, enforce the consequences. The idiot sells all his soul points for some gnarly power, smile sweetly, take the character sheet away, and tell him he now has to create a new character. Why? Because his gnarly dude is now the soul property of some demon, and is therefore an NPC.Give any PC with a low soul score a bestial or demonic appearance. Make the cattle react negatively to him. Give him enemies. Give him enemies with powers his gnarly power can't overcome. Make it more trouble than it's worth. When a munchkin or power gamer creates a super character, he's basically flashing his immaturity for the world to see. He doesn't want consequences, he doesn't want responsibility, he just wants to run riot and create havoc. By showing him that your game has consequences, and that he is supposed to take responsibility, at the worst you'll force him out of your game. At best he'll drop role-gaming entirely and take up cheating at cards. ------------------ It's not how you swing the sword, it's when.

I just got a horrible thought. If Changeling: The Dreaming represents the days when you were young and innocent, toddling about on your wobbly little pins, what does this make the Tele Tubbies? ------------------ It's not how you swing the sword, it's when.

You're all right. The WoD games are often completely the domain of twinks and powergamers who could care less about learning anything and just want to hurt things. And WoD is written in a way that, on the surface at least, seems to perpetuate that. However, think of it this way. I'm going to use an analogy. Art. Specifically, nude and/or erotic art. It exists, and there are thousands of people who are offended daily by it. They look at the art, and despise it because all they see is a cheap rendering of something intensely personal and private. They scream that children will be influenced badly by it, because all the children will see is the base physicality portrayed, and will get the wrong idea. They don't look deep enough to see the emotion that drove the artist to create the piece. I would submit that in many ways the WoD is the same. On the surface, it trashes humanity, offers immature players the chance to powergame, etc. However, there is a deeper level to it, /if/ you are willing to see it. By creating stereotypes and placing them in a stereotypical background, WoD, IMO, is trying to force people to /see/ the stereotypes, to acknowledge what is /wrong/ about them. When immature players get at this sort of thing, though, they can hardly be expected to see that. Sure, you might hope they would, but. I mean, how many of the twinks could look at a piece of erotic art and think anything other than "Nice t*ts!", hmm? --Cirdan

Rein*Hagen definitely planned for the WoD books to reflect human qualities...he even says so in one of the books ("By playing a monster we learn something about ourselves" or something to that effect). Vampire is a good, highly-accessible RPG and thus will attract a lot of players, good and bad. One hopes that they see the hidden themes within the game but usually it just degenerates into a bite n' slash mess. Personally, I hold the writers responsible for writing such twink-friendly trash to begin with. I've gamed with some WW people and a lot of them are super-twinks themselves...of course, WW decided to fire all the interesting people with a clue about gaming (Sam Chupp, Jen Hartshorn). And did anyone ever get a peek at Rein*Hagen's "Exile" game setting? Very cool...and of course Pink Puppy canned it...

I get tired of WoD. I own Mage: the Sorceror's Crusade, Werewolf: the Apocalypse, and Vampire: the Masquerade. Of those three, I find Werewolf the most interesting, followed by Mage, and then last Vampire. To me, a rpg NEEDS a purpose. Werewolf fits that bill - the Werewolves have a purpose. It makes for better games that way. Instead of having the group of characters hanging out at a park in the middle of night talking about lost love and "flesh", you can have them out there for a reason - a quest - a storyline. Sure, you can do that with V:tM, but there is nothing built in. There is no grand plot of good vs evil.. no epic storyline. Its just a bunch of silly rat-suckers hanging around talking about crackers and who is the darkest and most vile. I really dislike Vampire... but of course, its an easy target. I remember in a chatroom once, a Vampire chatroom, I entered and lo and behold, something to that below appeared: <Darkania_Bloodlord> Hi everyone! Hey, I am hungry.. could someone slit their wrist to give me a drink? And these people think their vampires aren't evil... sheesh...... Thanx, Nate