Not Sucking at Vampire: The Requiem

[shirak]

As the resident powergamer in my area (read: guy who's characters don't suck) I get asked for advice a lot. So a friend called an hour ago and told me he's playing a V:tR game. I told him it sucks. He told me the name of the ST. He sucks even more. And he asked for my help.

Which is a bummer cause the last time I talked with someone about nWoD I was nearly sent to jail for Anal Violation By Rulebook.

So, people, I ask for your help. Stuff I already know about the game:
1) It sucks. This bears repeating.
2) SoDs rule. What has them apart from Dominate? He says he'd like to play a Nosferatu or Gangrel but he can be persuaded otherwise.
3) If you have to fight, use explosives.
4) Be a sorcerer. Ordo Dracul is good, Lancea Sanctum is crap RP-wise. What else is there?


I think there is a thread here about this stuff but my Google-Fu failed me.

[CalibronXXX]

Here.

[Username17]

In terms of raw powergaming:

• You can't win in combat. Seriously, you just can't. No matter how hard core a axeman you are (axes and chainsaws are the only melee weapons worth a crap), there's still no way you can compete with two or three enemies of marginal skill. The benefits of teaming up on someone are strictly linear - your entire dice pool adds to theirs - and there is no way even an elder can stand up to that.
  
  
• All the physical disciplines, Protean included, blow monkey ass. Don't get them.
  
  
• Social Disciplines (Dominate, Majesty) make you automatically win at life. Dominate is better than Majesty, but Majesty has more "wow" factor.
  
  
• Spy Disciplines (Auspex, Obfuscate, Animalism) are strictly plot related. Extremely powerful if moving the plot forward is for some reason important, and basically a waste of time otherwise.

Right o. So right away we can see that Gangrel and Nosferatu fail at life, so we'll ignore them altogether. Daeva, Ventrue, and Mekhet are all quite decent, surviving within their niche (Ventrue and Daeva crushing oppoisition and Mekhet moving the plot forward). All of the factions you can join are fine from a power-play standpoint except the Circle of the Crone, who suck. This is because Theban Sorcery and the Coils of the dragon have super secret moves that turn you into a Saijin, the Carthians and Invictus give you free points, and the Circle of the Crone has shitty magic that's made out of shit.

Min/maxxing in WoD:

• Do not, under any circumstances, split your Social Merits. If you put five dots in pretty much anything you win at life and if you put 1 or two dots in you don't even care.
  
  
• Always start with one dot of a Bloodline Discipline of a Bloodline that you have no intention of joining or cannot join. Good choices are Courtoise (Invictus, a physical combat discipline that's allowed to be good because it's a Social Discipline), Gilded Cage (Bloodlines: the Hidden, it's a perfectly acceptable form of Ritual Magic that is only available to people who join a stupid bloodline or take it as one of their starting disciplines), or Sunnikuse (the Hidden again - you spend a Willpower and your next action automatically succeeds - combine with multiple target effects like Majesty for big time awesome).
  
  The good Bloodlines usually don't even give you a discipline, instead allowing you to purchase up crazy awesome Devotions - but if you take a Bloodline Discipline as your one allowed "out of clan" - then you get to have some crazy expensive discipline without taking some bullshit disadvantage for it.
  
  
• The fifth dot costs double, unless you get it for free for being a vampire in which case it doesn't.
  
  
• Trading X for Y is almost always a good deal. Being descended from any Ghoul Familiy is totally sweet regardless of what you want to do with your life. Remember that things cost triangular amunts of points later on, so if you have a 5 and a 1 it'll cost you a lot less to get to double fives than if you started at 3 and 2.
  
  
• Coils of Blood are awesome, most other coils are asstastic.
  
  
• Explosives use a completely arbitrary game mechanic where they do automatic damage. If you must get into close combat, throw hand grenades. In close combat. I'm not kidding.

-Username17

[Modesitt]

You can't win in combat. Seriously, you just can't. No matter how hard core a axeman you are (axes and chainsaws are the only melee weapons worth a crap), there's still no way you can compete with two or three enemies of marginal skill.

This only applies if you don't have access to Armory. If you DO, you have access to Combat Marksmanship and Fencing. Combat Marksmanship, Fencing, and Sniping all make one-round kills totally possible.

Always start with one dot of a Bloodline Discipline of a Bloodline that you have no intention of joining or cannot join.

You should assume your Storyteller will veto this. It's completely arguable that design intent is that you must join a bloodline to learn their discipline. See pages 256 V:tR and much more damningly, page 158 Ordo Dracul. I'm going to quote from there for convenience.

The most dreadful weakness of the [Censored] bloodline, however, is a secret kept even from many of its members: in the 1930s, [Censored] in the American Midwest discovered that the change [Censored] made to the Blood was not as dramatic as it first seemed. The mystic power of the [Unique Discipline] is not so far beyond the reach of ordinary Kindred that it can be considered truly unique. In practice, any Mekhet vampire can learn [censored] as an out-of-clan Discipline provided a [Bloodline member] is willing to teach him. If this secret were to be revealed, the [censored] bloodline would wither and die as Kindred ceased to commit their eternal Blood to the lineage to keep its unique power in practice.

[Username17]

1. You can't worry over much about the bloodlines in Ordo Dracul, there are a lot of rules problems with those groups. The Libitinarius "non-bloodline-discipline discipline" is weird crazy bullshit - and it's not even close to the only "total bullshit" bloodline rule in there.
   
   
2. The rules on getting a bloodline discipline are quite clear. You can't purchase a new bloodline discipline with XP unless you are part of that bloodline. You can begin the game with 2 dots in disciplines from your clan, and one dot in a cross clan or bloodline discipline.

Seriously, it's on page 92. You can take a bloodline discipline as your extra special bonus discipline. You should do this, because this is the last time you can take something off the bloodline lists.

---

Oh, and the ability to do one-turn kills in combat isn't terribly impressive. Yes, it can be done, but medium sized groups of enemies will still take you down in a round or two, so dropping an enemy every round isn't enough to win combat.

-Username17

[Modesitt]

The more important bit is on page 256.

"At Blood Potency 2, a character may “activate” his sire's bloodline, becoming a part of it. Doing so allows him access to that bloodline’s Discipline (which thereafter counts as a fourth “clan Discipline”) but also saddles him with that bloodline's weakness (which also complements his existing clan weakness)."

Why would they say 'access' if he already had access to it? Page 92 merely says that if you could otherwise have a bloodline discipline, you can spend dots to start with it.

[Username17]

If you activate a Bloodline, you get a fourth discipline which may be off a super-secret list and that discipline becomes a clan discipline for you. If you start with a single discipline that is not in clan you can raise it later, but it costs extra Experience to do so. That single allowed starting discipline can be off the super-secret otherwise inaccessible Bloodline lists if you want.

This is very specific, cut-and-dried, and rather obvious from reading the appropriate sections. Based on how much shit you have to go through to get a Bloodline Discipline in-clan, and how actually impossible it is to start your path on an out-of-clan Bloodline Discipline once play has begun it may sem pretty weird that you are allowed to start play with an out-of-clan Bloodline discipline. But you are. Black and white, simple language, repeated several times for emphasis even.

You can start with three discipline dots. Two of them have to come from your clan disciplines. The third can specifically be a Bloodline Discipline if you want. And since you can't be a member of a bloodline on character creation, the only thing that could possibly mean is that you can take a single dot of a bloodline discipline that you aren't part of.

-Username17

[Modesitt]

...And since you can't be a member of a bloodline on character creation...

Which is where your argument falls apart. We've spent a lot of time on page 92, so let's check out the preceding page.

"When choosing a clan, you might wish to choose a specific bloodline that deviates slightly from the norm, a subset of your vampiric family that holds to different ideals and behavioral standards."

That brings us right back to page 256 which plainly says you can join your sire's bloodline at Blood Potency 2 and that is how you get access to a bloodline discipline.

You can start with a bloodline discipline if you write into your background that your sire was a member of said bloodline.

[Username17]

Yes, on page 91 it does say that you can choose a bloodline. However, it doesn't say that you can activate that bloodline. Hek, the same page tells you that you can create a new bloodline for your character (something which requires Blood Potency 6 to actually activate).

Activating a Bloodline requires the expenditure of a Willpower dot, something that you cannot do during character generation. And without an active Bloodline, you can't purchase the first dot of a Bloodline Discipline with experience points.

But you can still select the first dot of a single bloodline discipline as one of your three starting disciplines, as outlined repeatedly on the next page.

-Username17

[Modesitt]

Activating a Bloodline requires the expenditure of a Willpower dot, something that you cannot do during character generation.

There is absolutely no rule that says you can't spend a willpower dot during char gen. There's also no mechanical problem with it. You cross off a dot of willpower and make a note on your sheet that you spent a dot of willpower before char gen. Done.

[User3]

1180465423[/unixtime]]

Activating a Bloodline requires the expenditure of a Willpower dot, something that you cannot do during character generation.

There is absolutely no rule that says you can't spend a willpower dot during char gen. There's also no mechanical problem with it. You cross off a dot of willpower and make a note on your sheet that you spent a dot of willpower before char gen. Done.

Doesn't that make it a clan discipline? Which means you could invest your two "must be clan" dots in it?

What you're missing here is that one dot is specifically 'non-clan' and can be spent on bloodline disciplines. As they can be spent on non-clan bloodline disciplines, that means it doesn't have to be an activated bloodline because then its no longer a non-clan discipline.

[Modesitt]

While looking up an answer to Guest's question - I seemed to remember that "clan discipline" was always in quotes - I found this quote on page 259.

"A bloodline has four favored Disciplines. Of them, three almost always remain the same as the parent clan’s. The fourth is either unique to the bloodline — unable to be learned by Kindred who are not of the bloodline — or is one of the "common" Disciplines practiced by vampires across clan lines."

Edit: This is repeated in an infobox on page 260.

[Username17]

While looking up an answer to Guest's question - I seemed to remember that "clan discipline" was always in quotes - I found this quote on page 259.

Not quite, but nearly. But it's not just when referring to the fourth Clan Discipline you get from your Bloodline - it's throughout the book.

You'll note from character creation and clan write-ups, presented previously in this chapter, that among each clan's three "Clan Disciplines" is one that is listed for no other clan.

Your clan disciplines are frequently referred to as your "Clan Disciplines" - that's for emphasis not for exception. So yeah, if you start play as a Bloodline, the bloodline discipline is a "Clan Discipline" and you could put all three dots in it if you wanted.

-Username17

[shirak]

Note: The following post will sound annoyed. That's because I'm fucking mad at this poor excuse of a real ST. Read on.

Today I spoke with my friend about the game. The discussion begun when I innocently inquired if the ST had any houserules or something. I learned the following timeline:
3 days ago: ST meets friend's party and invites them to V:tR game. Players agree and my friend decides to go along.
2 days ago: friend speaks to ST about character. he is told he can do anything that has ever been printed for nWoD. But, in order to build character relations, any clan, bloodline or society that is not represented by two players is banned. So, to play a Ventrue you have to get someone else to agree to play a Ventrue.
Yesterday: After a cluster fuck of epic proportions the players have finally agreed on what they will play. There's a lot of bad feelings around because everyone had to remake their characters. They show up in the preliminary character preparation meeting to be told that, no, every player must instead make a character who is unique. As in, no two players must have the same clan or society. Characters are prepared all around with the ST's assurances that this will be the best game ever because he is a rela ST who is talented.
Today: I learn that my friend got to pick last (surprisingly, the ST's best friend got first pick). So he ended up with a Gangrel Carthian (or whatever they are called)

The ST has banned explosives since the players could never someone to sell them.
They'll have maybe a weapon each.
Each and every dot on the charsheet must be explained in the backstory. The ST reserves the right to rearrange the sheet to fit your concept.
Bloodlines from the Bloodlines:The Hidden book are banned because they are supposed to be hidden and are thus not available to players (the actual explanation given).
The chronicle will focus on the machinations and intrigues of the city. The players are small fish, new to the city and thus must follow the orders of their superiors and slowly rise in the ranks. Since they will be enemies, at no point in the campaign will the characters be in the same room.
The players will get 1 XP per session plus another one if the ST thinks they have roleplayed their character well.

My advice was to invest in Obfuscate 1 and carry around the big-ass axe from Armory. This will probably be banned soon. I also suggested using Allies 5 to get his own army (which even fits the story). That will probably be banned too. Fucking ST :bash:

[Hey_I_Can_Chan]

Since they will be enemies, at no point in the campaign will the characters be in the same room.

Whoah. Ambitious.

Utterly funless and stupid, but ambitious.

[Neeek]

That sounds more like a turn-based strategy game than a RPG.

As a RPG it will probably suck donkey cock. As a strategy game, it could be fun.

[shirak]

1180481703[/unixtime]]

Whoah. Ambitious.

Utterly funless and stupid, but ambitious.

Yeah. Now if only he could actually pull it off...

That sounds more like a turn-based strategy game than a RPG.

As a RPG it will probably suck donkey cock. As a strategy game, it could be fun.

He says he did it before and it was great. Unfortunately, the reason I don't want to have known him anymore is that he once had the great idea of playing Mage with all the characters inhabiting the same body. Which would be awesome if he hadn't put his best friend in control of the body and basically made it impossible to take it back (3 point TN difference and you could only roll at "dramatic moments"). So what i predict will happen is that out of the 5 hours a week they play, the players will be sitting around doing nothing except for the one guy who gets screen time. Yeah, fun. I'd rather watch paint dry. Fucking ST

[tzor]

1180475856[/unixtime]]Since they will be enemies, at no point in the campaign will the characters be in the same room.

I can see the logical consequence of this. Since the characters are never in the same room, at no point will the players be in the same room

(Well perhaps they will be, at the local bar a block from the place where they will all complain what a stupid ST the guy is. )

[Nihlin]

1180543160[/unixtime]]

I can see the logical consequence of this. Since the characters are never in the same room, at no point will the players be in the same room

(Well perhaps they will be, at the local bar a block from the place where they will all complain what a stupid ST the guy is. )

Hmm... so, it's sort of a self-correcting problem.

[shirak]

1180548858[/unixtime]]

1180543160[/unixtime]]

I can see the logical consequence of this. Since the characters are never in the same room, at no point will the players be in the same room

(Well perhaps they will be, at the local bar a block from the place where they will all complain what a stupid ST the guy is. )

Hmm... so, it's sort of a self-correcting problem.

You know, i haven't thought of it like that. Good point. I'd prefer Death by Stabitation with Extreme Prejudice but, hey, I shouldn't confuse my job with my hobbies, right?

[JonSetanta]

Your friend is stupid and should find a new group.
If it ain't fun, don't play; preschool should have taught him that.