White Wolf MMoG?

[Modern Angel]

White Wolf are also having their very own con in New Orleans soon. Maybe this weekend soon, I can't remember. Big announcements, blah, blah, blah. This one has the stench of Chaos behind the scenes but whatever. Try to convey that WW goes the way of the dodo if this bombs to pen and paper fans and it's shoutdown city.

[Lantyssa]

I only want to know if it's New or Old WoD.  Answering that will tell me all I need to know about whether I even bother to care.

[Simond]

Shitty (new) WoD.

[Modern Angel]

New WoD is fine. It's just not going to translate as well to a video game as oWoD due to it being designed with a toolkit approach in mind. oWoD really feels dated in a lot of ways, too. Very 90s.

[Lantyssa]

90s were my college years, so I'm fine with that.

[Modern Angel]

Mine, too. For me, it's hard to go back to games as 90s political polemics with katana wielding X-Files cliches.

[UnSub]

I only want to know if it's New or Old WoD.  Answering that will tell me all I need to know about whether I even bother to care.

It will (IMO) be a bastardisation of the new version developed for the video game. WW isn't going to want to go backwards, but a direct conversion probably can't happen either.

[Lakov_Sanite]

what's the difference between old wod and new?

[Velorath]

what's the difference between old wod and new?

It's a complete reboot of the setting, with a lot of changes and streamlining.

[Endie]

what's the difference between old wod and new?

I suppose that it would be unhelpful to describe it in terms like "the old WoD was an exciting, confusing setting with an overarching and definable set of themes, whereas the new WoD is a dreary mish-mash of uninspiring filler released with no more inspiring a Weltanschauung than selling lots of books"?

The new WoD gets rid of that terribly unfashionable gothic-punk feel, and replaces the eschatological theme with one of mystery.

Rules-wise, the nWoD is pretty standard across the games in the setting, which does make sense (even if I, personally, felt that it made everything quite homogenous), and the mechanics are, broadly speaking, an improvement.  But I wanted to love it but utterly failed to do so: it's drab, dreary and uninspiring.

[Modern Angel]

If I can offer what I hope to be help, the nWoD isn't drab by default. It's without a metaplot by default.

oWoD had huge, overarching themes tied to convoluted stories which were spread over multiple supplements. nWoD takes a toolkit approach, where there's no overarching metaplot created by the designers and the default assumptions are barebones in comparison to oWoD. Two different flavors. I think the nWoD has the potential for way better gaming experiences around a table. They're not as fun to read and they're certainly not as good for a video game.

[Rendakor]

Good to see I'm not the only one who didn't care for nWoD. Despite having never actually played oWoD, I own a number of the rulebooks and have read most of the fiction.

[Modern Angel]

You know how we go on and on about how some games are better "games" and some are better "worlds"? Yeah...

[Sir T]

oWOD was creaking apart at the seams with all the clans and supernatural creatures and 'cool' bollox they had introduced. They were right to end it when they did, it needed a reboot. The books where they ended owod (at least the Vampire and werewolf ones) were the best books they had written in years.

That's not to say that nWOD is necessarily better, but if they had tried the same style of setting the twink clans would have been back in months.

[Modern Angel]

They are releasing some conversion stuff for nWoD rules with oWoD setting stuff. Starting with Vampire.

[Lantyssa]

It didn't help that Achilli hated oWoD.  He said unfavorable things about it at several conventions and mentioned how he wanted to do things differently, but felt tied by the existing setting.

Really though, the beauty of the oWoD meta-plot was that GMs could take it, leave it, or twist it and you could never know which because it was all shrouded in rumors and hearsay.  Even basic clans could be twisted for any given city because a good GM would give all of the players their own goals and motivations.  No two of our campaigns were the same, even with some minor overlap of characters.

[Rendakor]

oWOD was creaking apart at the seams with all the clans and supernatural creatures and 'cool' bollox they had introduced. They were right to end it when they did, it needed a reboot. The books where they ended owod (at least the Vampire and werewolf ones) were the best books they had written in years.

That's not to say that nWOD is necessarily better, but if they had tried the same style of setting the twink clans would have been back in months.

I liked the clan novel series better than then Gehenna stuff. And the few books of nWoD I read were...bleh. I wasn't sure if the nWoD was supposed to be taking place AFTER the end of oWoD, or if it was created as a separate canon.

[Lakov_Sanite]

See, I vaguely know VtM and only from the Bloodlines PC game but...I want THAT, in an MMO. Seriously.

[Lantyssa]

Bloodlines is probably the most faithful recreation of an RPG's world and atmosphere into a video game ever done.  I played through it so many times.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Malk or GTFO 

[Nevermore]

Bloodlines is probably the most faithful recreation of an RPG's world and atmosphere into a video game ever done.  I played through it so many times.

Bloodlines is one of my favorite games ever. 

I also find the oWoD far more interesting than the new one, warts and all.  I especially like the Kindred of the East from the oWoD.  Yeah, there was a lot of unwieldy or just plan bad elements in oWoD, but the beauty of table top RPGs is you can just ignore the stuff you don't like.  The problem with the nWoD is it seems to lack any kind of heart.  From what I've seen of it, it seems bland and flat.  Downplaying the religious undercurrents of the backstory makes it very uninteresting to me.

[Modern Angel]

My objection to the oWoD isn't a matter of bland versus vibrant. It's a matter of it just not aging that well. The X-Files hasn't, either. oWoD is very much a part of its time. I had a blast. There's stuff they were trying to do mechanically that other games do better now. There's stuff they wanted to do thematically which smells a little moldy.

I'm way, way, way more concerned about the lack of information, hiring posts on their site up for ages and what seems to be a massively long development cycle. I have felt and continue to feel that EVE's success was a fluke and happened despite CCP's best efforts to fuck it up. Lightning's not going to strike twice and it's fairly obvious that most of WW's future is tied up in the MMO being a success, which it won't be.

EDIT: I'll add that in terms of quality, both mechanically and in terms of having interesting backgrounds, the peripheral nWoD games are the best stuff they've ever done. Vampire, Mage (especially Mage) and Werewolf turned out dull as dishwater but the new Hunter and Geist are amazingly good and nWoD Changeling is something you owe it to yourself to get if you ever liked any version of WoD.

[Rasix]

Bloodlines is probably the most faithful recreation of an RPG's world and atmosphere into a video game ever done.  I played through it so many times.

I'm probably due another play through.  Ahh, what a game.

[Sir T]

Malk or GTFO  

Ok, I'll be honest here. I've never met a Malk player that didn't play it as an excuse to be annoying and act like a gobshite. Anything that gets rid of that fucking clan gets a thumbs up from me. VTM:B was the one and only time I've seen Malks used well.

My objection to the oWoD isn't a matter of bland versus vibrant. It's a matter of it just not aging that well. The X-Files hasn't, either. oWoD is very much a part of its time. I had a blast. There's stuff they were trying to do mechanically that other games do better now. There's stuff they wanted to do thematically which smells a little moldy.

Thats a very good point. Hadn;t really thought of it in terms like that

Vampire, Mage (especially Mage) and Werewolf turned out dull as dishwater but the new Hunter and Geist are amazingly good and nWoD Changeling is something you owe it to yourself to get if you ever liked any version of WoD.

Now that's interesting, as oWOD Changling was a disaster that nearly finished WW, which had been on VERY shaky ground after Wraith. Both those books had people going "What?," Wraith was a game I would never in a million years want to play and Mark Rhien-Hagan publicly put his reputation on the line with Changeling, and lost.

Scion is actually pretty fun to read too, no idea what it would be like to play though.

I'm way, way, way more concerned about the lack of information, hiring posts on their site up for ages and what seems to be a massively long development cycle. I have felt and continue to feel that EVE's success was a fluke and happened despite CCP's best efforts to fuck it up. Lightning's not going to strike twice and it's fairly obvious that most of WW's future is tied up in the MMO being a success, which it won't be.

Agreed on all fronts.

[Modern Angel]

I think the Changeling will kill WW thing is pretty well overstated. It printed a zillion books, including a fairly healthy number after it moved to their small imprint. I have a nice complete set on my shelf which could put my daughter through college to the right buyer. She can suffer. Both Changeling and Wraith were fine; what they didn't do was lend themselves to a game world which was increasingly bought by people interested in telling what amounted to super hero stories. Which is fine if that's your thing but some of the WoD games just didn't work out super well.

Changeling was also stigmatized with the "that's the game about little kids" tag when it wasn't that game at all. There was that aspect to it but it was really unfair for it to be tagged that way. Wraith was just demanding psychologically of the players. The setting was loose in the beginning and it was all purely psychological, enemy within horror dealing with regret and loss. That's not going to sell to a dude who just wants to play Lestat.

[Lantyssa]

Ok, I'll be honest here. I've never met a Malk player that didn't play it as an excuse to be annoying and act like a gobshite. Anything that gets rid of that fucking clan gets a thumbs up from me. VTM:B was the one and only time I've seen Malks used well.

It's very much like someone playing Chaotic Neutral.  When done properly it's amazing.  Most people have no clue how to play it well because they can't conceive of the proper morality or psychological state, so they do their best stereotypical impersonation which is really bad.

[Nevermore]

The problem is most people play insane way too over the top, like they need to wave a big 'I'm crazy' sign just to make sure people get it.  The most effective Malks are the ones who play it subtle.  You're doing it right if the other players can sense there's something not quite right, but they aren't sure exactly how.

[Surlyboi]

Malk or GTFO  

Ok, I'll be honest here. I've never met a Malk player that didn't play it as an excuse to be annoying and act like a gobshite. Anything that gets rid of that fucking clan gets a thumbs up from me. VTM:B was the one and only time I've seen Malks used well.

Could be worse. Could be most of the dickbags that played Sabat.

"I'm an antisocial borderline psychopath, ooh these guys are right up my alley!" I had a lot of fun wiping every last bloodsucker that didn't want to play nice right the fuck out of NYC one campaign.

[Simond]

To be honest, I'd rather that the White Wolf mmog had turned out to be Exalted.

[Lantyssa]

The problem is most people play insane way too over the top, like they need to wave a big 'I'm crazy' sign just to make sure people get it.  The most effective Malks are the ones who play it subtle.  You're doing it right if the other players can sense there's something not quite right, but they aren't sure exactly how.

Oh yes.  I love when someone manages to pull them off like this.  So few people manage it.

I'm in a forum-based game right now going through the Giovanni Chronicles, as a newbie Setite.  One of the young players was concerned I was going to be some blatantly corrupt evil temptress.  I had to assure him this was not going to be the case.  Now I have the challenge of falling without the more oblivious players even realizing it.

[Falwell]

News coming in from the WW convention says the MMO will be Vampire only.

Vampire: The Masquerade that is.

[Modern Angel]

Here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5Wsf31WIdY

[Sir T]

That makes sense to be honest. I remember way back in the MUSH text only days they had all the various (well it was Vamps, wolves and mages at the time) and it was easy to spot the vamps as they were the ones that said "gotta go!" when dawn broke. It was fun but really didn't work.

The various worlds work together better when they are internally isolated and consistent.

Unless you are saying its gonna be oWOD rather than nWOD.

[Modern Angel]

It is oWoD. It is Vampire the Masquerade, not Vampire the Reckoning. All the oWoD pdfs will be up on the pdf stores and a supplement for playing Masquerade with Reckoning rules will be coming out. Beyond that they're not going to be coming out with any new books for oWoD settings.

The wailing and gnashing of teeth over this is pretty hilarious over on sites like rpg.net. For the MMO, specifically, they've completely lost the forest for the trees: namely, that it doesn't matter what Vampire world the MMO is set in because this shit is going to crash and burn, taking WW out with it at the end. They're talking 2012 at the earliest, meaning an *at least* six year development cycle. I can only imagine what their costs are going to be once this is done. Even if it ended up dirt cheap, I'll reiterate that EVE succeeds despite CCP, not because of them. There is zero chance, zero, that a 90% social sub based MMO about goths breaks 200k subs after five months.

[UnSub]

Here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5Wsf31WIdY

Why was there a PS3 Move controller in the front of the video?

EDIT: Surprised they are going with VtM, which is outdated and has lots of baggage. The next question is: at what point in time? With which sourcebooks?