nWoD

[Josh]

The other missing element is politics. 

When told that oWoD was a game about politics I would say, "oh really?  Lets say I have a character, I want to do some politics, what do I roll?"  How is politics handled by the games mechanics?  How is personal horror handled by game mechanics?

A guy comes up to me who I recognize, but whose name I can't remember.  "Steve" I guess.  "Close, it's Walter."  How is Walter close to Steve?  Thats how I feel about nWoD.  It is a "better" game, but the game does not even try to do what the players are looking for:

They want a story telling game, A dramatic game based on interpersonal and intrapersonal conflict.  A game of politics and intrigue.  All of the root things they want have no bearing in the mechanics. 

[EntropicShadow]

Ok, guess I will try to tackle these as well.

First off, personal horror.  I think they try to cover personal horror with the Morality and Derangment system.  You do horrible things, you lose morality, so you don't feel bad about doing those things anymore.  So you do worse things.  Derangments are tied to this degeneration, so you get crazier at the same time. 

Note how I said "they try."  I really don't think this set of mechanics accomplishes its goal.  I am not sure if that is because they are poor mechanics or because I have only played short nWoD campaigns, not long-term chronicles.  I suspect it is the former.

I have the same issue with the good political rules as I do the good social rules.  That is, they are tucked away in a Vampire suppliment that not everyone is going to want to buy.  But come to think of it, politics is kind of a broad area.  Is there a specific aspect of politics you want to see represented, like backroom deals or uncovering political connections or something else entirely?  If you can narrow it down, I might have better answers.

As a side note, if you have seen any game mechanics that do a good job representing personal horror or politics, I would love to know what they are.  I already have to track down Burning Wheel because of what I have heard in the podcast, so finding a few more systems won't be out of my way.

[Josh]

First off, personal horror.  I think they try to cover personal horror with the Morality and Derangment system.  You do horrible things, you lose morality, so you don't feel bad about doing those things anymore.  So you do worse things.  Derangments are tied to this degeneration, so you get crazier at the same time. 

So where is the horror?  In horror reading one should become physically afraid, based on what you are reading.  Horror gaming is the same way, if you do not feel actual visceral fear, it is not horror.  And in a game the mechanics need to contribute that fear.

In Dread, if you knock the jenga tower over you die.  But in order to accomplish anything you need to pull blocks, you can also choose not to pull and in that case you fail but do not die. 

So you are trapped in a room by rabid dogs.  If you knock the tower over the dogs break in and maul you.  If you pull a brick you escape out the window.  If you refuse to pull you are stuck in the room.  Oh and your girlfriend is outside, the dogs haven't noticed her yet.  If you don't get to that roof, and then pull another brick to help her, she will die.  What do you do?  Are you really the hero?  Do you save her, at the risk of dieing? 

[EntropicShadow]

Two things first.
1) I honestly figured that after you took a look at the rules, we would both go our seperate ways with me liking the system and you disliking it.  I am suprised that this has continued.
2) Why am I the only one championing nWoD?  I know other people here like it, because they said so earlier in this thread.  But I digress...

Dread you say?  I will have to check that out as well.  nWoD (innately) lacks the more visceral horror that you just described.  I always thought that sort of thing was done more by the GM than the rules.  I honestly didn't realize someone had invented mechanics for that.

[Josh]

I have the same issue with the good political rules as I do the good social rules.  That is, they are tucked away in a Vampire suppliment that not everyone is going to want to buy.  But come to think of it, politics is kind of a broad area.  Is there a specific aspect of politics you want to see represented, like backroom deals or uncovering political connections or something else entirely?  If you can narrow it down, I might have better answers.

“Politics” is kinda like saying “combat” so lets narrow it down.

I'm playing burning wheel.  I am the leader of a small group of thieves.  I want to take over the guild operations of this city I live in.  That means ousting the current leadership.  The GM sets up the basics, there is a big boss with a number of sub bosses.

I ask, did I happen to grow up with a disgruntled second in command of one of those sub-bosses?  Based on those details I make a circles check, if this check succeeds what I ask is true.  I reconnect with my old buddy.  I help him ice his boss, my buddy advances to sub boss.

Next I say I want to poison one of the other sub bosses.  So we set it up and roll the appropriate skills.  And the sub boss dies.  My friend sets up a meeting with the big boss and I go to convince him that I should fill the dead guys spot.  We have a Duel of Wits and now I am in the organization.

Now I ask is one of the other sub bosses looking to advance himself to big boss.  I roll circles and fail.  The GM invokes the enmity clause, there is a guy, but the only person he hates more than the big boss is me.  I can work with that.

I make up some “evidence” that the big bos is planning to assassinate my new enemy.  A few rolls later my enemy is in open warfare with the big boss.  I go around and rally all the other sub bosses.  A few bribes a few favors and a few conversations and they are backing me. 

My crew and I wait until my enemy kills the old boss and then hunt him down ourselves.  Then I celebrate my victory. 

All of this is handled mechanically by the system of the game.  Aside from the vaguest initial parts the GM was not just making stuff up. 

1) I honestly figured that after you took a look at the rules, we would both go our seperate ways with me liking the system and you disliking it.  I am suprised that this has continued.

I don't dislike the rules.  My complaint is that they are essentially a lie, not presenting what the designers claim.

This is essentially a microcosm of the overall field of gaming.  Our lofty goal at BG is to improve the world of gaming.  I don't have a vendetta against WW.  I would be just as happy with them fixing their game as I would with them going out of business.  The only way this will happen is if things change.  Sometimes we hand sell one on one like this and sometimes we podcast and so forth.

I have been doing this for quite some time and experience has shown that as I feed ideas out, they eventually permeate the community and come back to me.  To you and the others who read this thread a little bug of an idea is buzzing around your head.       

One person changing from WoD to dread and BW is nothing, but 10 people a day is a movement.

[EntropicShadow]

Ok, thank you for clarifying both what you meant by politics and your position in this discussion.

I can look at your politics example and see clear comparisons for the nWoD mechanics.

- It all starts with the GM setting up the basics like you said, because all games with a GM do that.
- Circle check for growing up with a second in command?  nWoD Contacts (which can be rolled,) maybe Allies or Friend if some forethought went into it. 
- Poisoning a sub boss involves rolling skills in both systems.  Probably Stealth and Larceny for nWoD.  For the Duel of Wits, use Debate rules from Requiem for Rome. 
- Seeing if another sub boss wants to advance?  Politics or Investigation skill roll.  Failure means you have bad information, dramatic failure means this guy knows what your were up to probably doesn't like you too much now.
- Making up evidence and spreading it around?  Larceny, Steetwise, Expression and Socialize. 
Bribing?  Politics or Expression again.  Favors I see being tasks for the group to complete in either system.  Important conversations after the favors can be either Socialize or Persuasion, or even using the Debate rules again.  Depends on how hard a sell it is.
- Managing your criminal resources from your new position of power?  Barony and Primacy rules from Damnation City.

Obviously my example suffers from needing three books, while I am guessing your example uses one. 

This is essentially a microcosm of the overall field of gaming.  Our lofty goal at BG is to improve the world of gaming.  I don't have a vendetta against WW.  I would be just as happy with them fixing their game as I would with them going out of business.  The only way this will happen is if things change.  Sometimes we hand sell one on one like this and sometimes we podcast and so forth.

I have been doing this for quite some time and experience has shown that as I feed ideas out, they eventually permeate the community and come back to me.  To you and the others who read this thread a little bug of an idea is buzzing around your head.      

Ok, this I understand all to well, though on a more personal level.  My original gaming group, between games of D&D, played a lot of systems I considered truly horrendous, such as Champions, Gurps, Runequest and Rolemaster.  I wanted a supernatural game.  I found WoD, and I managed to convince them to give it a try.  WoD is simple and fast compared the systems they had been playing, and that was something they were looking for.  2 years later, I was playing as many WoD games as I was playing D&D games. 

I truly enjoy nWoD, for both its setting and its rules, and I enjoy the games that it lets me and my group play.  While I am eager to try Burning Wheel, I don't expect to be a full convert. 

[Josh]

I can look at your politics example and see clear comparisons for the nWoD mechanics.

The difference is that in WoD you are generally marching down the plot as adjudicated by the GM.  I refer to this as “Excuse to adventure” a technique that works well in action adventure games. 

In an AA game you do the steps as I outlined but that is the plot as proffered by the GM.  The adventure part is in the executions.  The “Game” of BW is what I outlined.   

It may be that WoD has executed these changes, if so they should let someone know.

WoD is simple and fast compared the systems they had been playing, and that was something they were looking for.  2 years later, I was playing as many WoD games as I was playing D&D games.   

You are absolutely correct there.  nWoD is faster than those games.  All the games I list play fast and offer a significant quality/complexity factor. 

I truly enjoy nWoD, for both its setting and its rules, and I enjoy the games that it lets me and my group play.  While I am eager to try Burning Wheel, I don't expect to be a full convert.

Hey I liked all the games that you listed, at one point in time.  I didn't expect to like BW, SW or SotC either. 

[EntropicShadow]

"Excuse to Adventure" is a pretty accurate description of most games I have played.  I try to step away from that when I am running WoD and let the players choose their own path, mostly because I think they find it more interesting.  I know I do.  If BW does that out of the box, that is certainly another point in its favor. 

On that note, I tracked down a copy of Burning Wheel at a local game store after work.  I can't read it until after I finish my final projects that are due this week, but one step at a time, right?

[emissary666]

I have alot of nWoD books (core, requiem, changling, mage, werewolf, promethious) and Orpheus which details something like oWoD (at least I think so)

From what we have seen just from reading is that nWoD and oWoD are both pretty open in being roll or role heavy. I haven't played (can't find a group) but have a theory to the game play. What I do not understand is the difference between nWoD and the Burning Wheel example Josh used.

[EntropicShadow]

What I do not understand is the difference between nWoD and the Burning Wheel example Josh used.

I have read a little bit of Burning Wheel at this point, but Josh can jump in and correct me if I am wrong on this.   In the politics in nWoD versus Burning Wheel example, I matched mechanic for mechanic.  What differs drastically is who initiates the whole thing.  Most, but not all, nWoD games are very heavy on GM control.  The GM decides the path for the chronicle, and the players make their choices within it.  Burning Wheel gives much more power to the players, so when the players decide that they want some politics, they get politics.  Its not entirely the GM's decision.

I find that nWoD games are better when players are given that sort of choice.  It is not innate to the mechanics of the game, but the GM can easily let theplayers play the game that they want to.

[Josh]

What I do not understand is the difference between nWoD and the Burning Wheel example Josh used.

I have read a little bit of Burning Wheel at this point, but Josh can jump in and correct me if I am wrong on this.   In the politics in nWoD versus Burning Wheel example, I matched mechanic for mechanic.  What differs drastically is who initiates the whole thing.  Most, but not all, nWoD games are very heavy on GM control.  The GM decides the path for the chronicle, and the players make their choices within it.  Burning Wheel gives much more power to the players, so when the players decide that they want some politics, they get politics.  Its not entirely the GM's decision.

I find that nWoD games are better when players are given that sort of choice.  It is not innate to the mechanics of the game, but the GM can easily let theplayers play the game that they want to.

Pretty much what I was indicating.

WoD is essentially a setting where the players have Skills, Fighting and Powers and they go on adventures.  You essentially do the exact same stuff as d20 just without levels.

Another subtlety that BW has is that you decide on the meanings of actions before you roll and you decide on how involved you will get.  Example, lets say you find a magic sword on a pedestal.   Two of you want it.  You roll speed vs speed, winner gets it.  Simple enough.  What if you want to call for help and I want to stop you?  Power vs Power, if you win you call for help, if I win you don't.  If you don't think that is revolutionary think about how you would adjudicate that in other games

[saintx]

@Josh:
sounds like oWoD LARP rules... rock-paper-scissors.

speaking of LARP, this is where most of my experience of WoD comes in. not to say that i dont fully grasp the mechanics behind the tabletop rules, in fact, i favor them heavily. but the politics and 'adventure' in a game with 30-50 people is quite easy to grasp without a whole lot of storyteller intervention. again, s/he established the setting... and we run with it.

[Squirrelloid]

nWoD cleaned up the mechanics a little bit from oWoD.  The problem is, at their very base those mechanics suck.  The 1/10 mechanics make me cry when I try to think about what the probability of succeeding at a given roll are.  And what the variance about the expectation is.  Hint: there's no closed-form solution for the probability as a function of # of dice and difficulty number, we (me and some math geeks from college) tried to find one and proved it didn't exist (and the end expression we were looking at was fairly nasty on top of that). 

The thing oWoD had going for it was, if you ignore WtA (which was the worst abortion of theme and concept imaginable) and Changeling, that there was enough world-awesome in it to justify putting up with the crappy mechanics (or porting it to better mechanics).  The meta-plot is why Vampire and Mage were awesome.  Now that they've done away with that in nWoD, I'm really not interested anymore.  In fact, I'd be happier if they gave up on having mechanics at all, and just published books of awesome fluff that you could use in a system of your choice.  In fact, they could have multiple 'world' storylines that get fluff updates, with each one lasting over about 5 years of publications before the major story in the world was ended.  If it was half as good as the oWoD stuff that was worth reading then I'd buy that.

[Josh]

nWoD cleaned up the mechanics a little bit from oWoD.  The problem is, at their very base those mechanics suck.  The 1/10 mechanics make me cry when I try to think about what the probability of succeeding at a given roll are.  And what the variance about the expectation is.  Hint: there's no closed-form solution for the probability as a function of # of dice and difficulty number, we (me and some math geeks from college) tried to find one and proved it didn't exist (and the end expression we were looking at was fairly nasty on top of that). 

Use Matlab and simulate it statistically.  That gives you a faster solution. 

The thing oWoD had going for it was, if you ignore WtA (which was the worst abortion of theme and concept imaginable) and Changeling, that there was enough world-awesome in it to justify putting up with the crappy mechanics (or porting it to better mechanics).  The meta-plot is why Vampire and Mage were awesome.  Now that they've done away with that in nWoD, I'm really not interested anymore.  In fact, I'd be happier if they gave up on having mechanics at all, and just published books of awesome fluff that you could use in a system of your choice.  In fact, they could have multiple 'world' storylines that get fluff updates, with each one lasting over about 5 years of publications before the major story in the world was ended.  If it was half as good as the oWoD stuff that was worth reading then I'd buy that.

You mean to tell me that you didn't like Werewolf: the Captain Planet? 

The core problems with oWoD are as follows:
1) The world is not internally consistent once you combine settings.  Vampires that people don't believe in can't exist in a world where what people believe in determines reality.

2) The world was promoted as being a new type of "storytelling game" when it was in actuality the same as any other game.

3) White Wolf seeks to do all the thinking.  Instead of letting people come up with their own ideas and organizations, WW wants to tell you about all the cool things that they made up.  Then WW wants you to play using those ideas. 
 
4) The way you are "supposed" to play was very rigid.  Clans\tribes\whatever were supposed to act in a certain way

[Squirrelloid]

nWoD cleaned up the mechanics a little bit from oWoD.  The problem is, at their very base those mechanics suck.  The 1/10 mechanics make me cry when I try to think about what the probability of succeeding at a given roll are.  And what the variance about the expectation is.  Hint: there's no closed-form solution for the probability as a function of # of dice and difficulty number, we (me and some math geeks from college) tried to find one and proved it didn't exist (and the end expression we were looking at was fairly nasty on top of that). 

Use Matlab and simulate it statistically.  That gives you a faster solution. 

Yeah, it probably would have.  See, we were hoping for something an ST could actually use at a table as a guide to setting difficulty numbers that could be made with the appropriate level of difficulty.  If the math can't be done in your head, its too complicated.

The thing oWoD had going for it was, if you ignore WtA (which was the worst abortion of theme and concept imaginable) and Changeling, that there was enough world-awesome in it to justify putting up with the crappy mechanics (or porting it to better mechanics).  The meta-plot is why Vampire and Mage were awesome.  Now that they've done away with that in nWoD, I'm really not interested anymore.  In fact, I'd be happier if they gave up on having mechanics at all, and just published books of awesome fluff that you could use in a system of your choice.  In fact, they could have multiple 'world' storylines that get fluff updates, with each one lasting over about 5 years of publications before the major story in the world was ended.  If it was half as good as the oWoD stuff that was worth reading then I'd buy that.

You mean to tell me that you didn't like Werewolf: the Captain Planet? 

*twitch twitch*

Seriously, Werewolves are supposed to be normal people who occasionally wake up in a pool of other people's blood with no idea how they got there.  That's fairly fucking scary.  Captain Planet is about as campy as Adam West's Batman - where's the personal horror again?

The core problems with oWoD are as follows:
1) The world is not internally consistent once you combine settings.  Vampires that people don't believe in can't exist in a world where what people believe in determines reality.

Mage had *internal* problems related to that.  You tag some caveats on and you can make something functional out of Mage/Vampire/Wraith.  They dropped some of the right caveats in, and it wasn't hard to do the rest.

2) The world was promoted as being a new type of "storytelling game" when it was in actuality the same as any other game.

Agreed.  I know bullshit when I see it.  I just ignored the hype.

3) White Wolf seeks to do all the thinking.  Instead of letting people come up with their own ideas and organizations, WW wants to tell you about all the cool things that they made up.  Then WW wants you to play using those ideas.

Well, the advantage to well laid-out groups/plots/etc... is that you have a great base from which to cobble some stuff together.  I'm currently STing a Gehenna/Ascension storyline of my own creation that has liberally borrowed from a large number of their ideas.  But i've combined it all into some unholy mixture and sprinkled some original ideas in too.  Its a lot easier than building the whole thing from scratch.  (We're also running fairly rules-lite, because the mechanics just make a lot of us cry.)

Also, some people just want to have the story handed to them.  Ie, prepublished adventures in D+D.  I've never used one, but its what some people want.
 

4) The way you are "supposed" to play was very rigid.  Clans\tribes\whatever were supposed to act in a certain way

Also bullshit, and summarily ignored.  Hell, they ignored it most of the time too.

[Marco]

Here is my take on oWoD LARP. I didn't play in a game owned by WW that was forced to play the way der Furer instructed you too. Our weekly game met in a bar. I got to hang out in a bar with dramatic gamer chicks who liked to wear revealing outfits because they knew that more boobs = votes for costume xp. I believe in positive reinforcement. You show me your boobs I will vote to give you an imaginary point to add to some imaginary character on a piece of paper. This is a perfect win no loose for me. Then I drink and plot to kill my friends in a way that doesn't involve any real life violence. Everyone chips in a couple of bucks and we hand it to the bartender as an additional tip on top of the tips everyone should be giving at their purchases of whatever food and drink they are getting and the bar lets the wierdo's play there each week. Does everyone have a nice healthy attitude about it? No of course not. You will never get a group of 20 - 50 people together without some douchebags, that's because humans tend towards duchebaggery. While it was fun I hung out and played. When it wasn't fun anymore I stopped playing. 

[emissary666]

3) White Wolf seeks to do all the thinking.  Instead of letting people come up with their own ideas and organizations, WW wants to tell you about all the cool things that they made up.  Then WW wants you to play using those ideas. 
 
4) The way you are "supposed" to play was very rigid.  Clans\tribes\whatever were supposed to act in a certain way

These points can be used for either party. WW sets a basic setting, and gives some ways to play your character, there is nothing to prevent a GM to change the setting.

[Arcane-surge]

I started in oWoD larp, and move on from there. That was...Wow, ten years ago. When other kids in high school were getting drunk on weekends, I was at the university pretending to be a vampire or a werewolf.

I like the Larp system for oWoD because it's simple, clean and based mostly on actual social interaction rather than rolls and tests. That is however, also its downfall. A character, any character, is only going to be as socially adept as its player, no matter how many dots of leadership they have. Tabletop is very similar, with the ideas of politics or horror mostly handwaved and put on the GM.

The setting itself, I enjoy to a point. I love tinkering with settings, and I hate end of the world plots, but what I am interested in is what happens after the world ends. My biggest issue with it, besides the fact that it was Final Nights for twenty years, is the fact that most of the overarcing plots, NPCs, and ideas were so stupid and cyclical. Werewolf: the Hippie for instance, where if you weren't a treehugger, you spent all your time getting ready for some final Ragnarok where you KNEW you were going to lose. Vampire had the same thing, but compiled it with these circular wars and feuds that went on for thousands of years, not to mention several sects with sets of ideals that were flat-out idiotic. Millennia and these vampires never wised up to the fact that it wasn't going anywhere...

I never got into nWoD partly because I got out of Larp just before it came out, and because what I've read of it makes it seem to lack the balls of oWoD. It sheds the absolutism of clans and whatnot, but that was a lot of the appeal of oWoD. If you were a vampire, you had this clan, which was basically a club that you couldn't quit, whether or not you wanted to (and whether or not THEY wanted you to), so it made breaking stereotype more interesting. Now you just hang out with whichever group of vamps you agree with most.

[Josh]

3) White Wolf seeks to do all the thinking.  Instead of letting people come up with their own ideas and organizations, WW wants to tell you about all the cool things that they made up.  Then WW wants you to play using those ideas. 
 
4) The way you are "supposed" to play was very rigid.  Clans\tribes\whatever were supposed to act in a certain way

These points can be used for either party. WW sets a basic setting, and gives some ways to play your character, there is nothing to prevent a GM to change the setting.

The Oberoni Fallacy.  Just because you can change something does not make it good in the first place.

[emissary666]

It does not make it good, but that was not the point. the point was that by setting up all of the organizations and what-not, they provide a means for a new or lazy GM to start up a game with limited difficulty. Someone familiar with their players, the rules, and the setting could change it to fit their own needs, but that would only make it subjectively good. Just because you can change it doesn't make it good, but if it can be improved, then do so. Your arguments could be applied to most settings books, they give you people, places, organizations, and so forth, and then you play. nWoD may be a bit forceful, but compare to Orpheus, where everything is on a timeline that your players cannot change/