The Camarilla and LARPing in General

Started by LunarSage, April 16, 2012, 08:35:17 AM

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TheGlyphstone

And sadly, this is not the forum where I have Internet Vicissitude.  ;)

LunarSage

Thanks.  Any chance you guys know of any Excel/Open Office style creators that let you buy those disciplines to advanced for a ghoul?

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TheGlyphstone

Quote from: LunarSage on April 29, 2012, 09:10:54 AM
Thanks.  Any chance you guys know of any Excel/Open Office style creators that let you buy those disciplines to advanced for a ghoul?

http://sheets.camarilla.ca/OWOD.php

The Ghouls Version 4.1 appears to follow all the most recent rules.

Silverfyre

Yes, you can use the one found in the link below that's labeled "Vampire the Masquerade - Ghouls, Version 4.1".  It allows the ghoul to purchase up to the Advanced level of his domitor's clan.

http://sheets.camarilla.ca/OWOD.php

Also, I highly recommend using Grapevine for all your OWoD needs.  It's an archaic but fantastic character and ST utility.

http://www.grapevinelarp.com/download.shtml


TheGlyphstone

Didn't see me lurking under Internet Obfuscate this time. :-)

Silverfyre

~Snickers~ My Internet Auspex sucks.

Besides, mentioning Grapevine made the post work so ha!


LunarSage


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Silverfyre



LunarSage

Have any of you heard about this proposed new rule that may be going into effect on the 1st of June (if the higher ups can stop arguing about it that is)?

QuoteHello everyone,

As the provider of a massively multiplayer role playing game, MES has
obligations to its members. Storytellers are tasked with providing content
for high MC players, for low MC players, for PvE, for PvP, for 18 year olds
and the grandparents of 18 year olds. We have a diverse membership and
Storytellers are responsible for catering to all of them. Increasing the
diversity of our players is a goal of our organization - we continue to
recruit new players, young and old, and they bring with them the wealth of
their varied experiences and a passion for the acceptance and tolerance in
our organization (except on Masq-Rules, where we are intolerant as a matter
of principle).

This places a tremendous burden on local and administrative storytellers.
Local storytellers have to show new players how to play our variant of RPS,
how to differentiate between in and out of character, and how to immerse
themselves in a setting that, despite not growing in a decade (with the
obvious exception of V20), is more complex and expansive than the majority
of other IPs out there. While acting as a mentor, the local storyteller
still has to run an entertaining game for the more experienced players.
Similarly, administrative storytellers need to help new members understand
our wealth of settings documents, rules addenda, approvals, wiki pages, and
lists.

On top of all of this, we ask our storytellers to entice new players to play
disadvantaged concepts. A starting player can play an 11th generation
vampire with 5 xp from MC and 8 xp from the character creation document.
The most experienced PCs in our game are 6th generation, with 70 xp from MC,
8 xp from the character creation document, 10 xp from project manifold,
144 xp from going to games, and 20 xp from travelling to games of the month,
conventions, and Grand Masquerade. Convincing a new player to participate
with 13 xp when they may be interacting with characters that have 182 xp is
simply not fair.

This problem isn't confined to new players. When an old player loses a PC,
they could end up losing 96 xp from games and 20 xp from overcap.
Obviously, the point of the game isn't the power that can be wielded by
characters. However, camaraderie and affection is built when a player feels
as though their character is contributing. Such wild disparities between new
and established characters are not conducive towards bringing new players to
our game.

We aren't going to strip any experience points from the characters that
already exist. However, we are going to give our new players a chance to
make a meaningful contribution to the end of this chronicle, and get them
excited about the prospects of starting with us in our new one.

1. Longevity: All new characters enter play having earned 4 xp per month
of chronicle. Chronicle started on June 1, 2010. All existing characters
with less than 100 experience points earned from attending games earn
enough experience on June 1, 2012 to bring them up to 100 experience
points
from games. This bonus experience does not count towards the experience
earned by the character in June 2012.

There are no longer xp awards for characters who die - previously called
"longevity." This should put the chronicle into perspective for many of you.
After two years of game play, we're giving new characters 2/3 of the
experience from games that the rest of us have. The challenges our
storytellers have faced have been enormous. As experienced players, we
should do what we can to encourage the growth of our club and our chronicle
by helping our storytellers mentor new players.

Apparently a lot of folks are not happy about the idea, the most popular notion being that "Neonates shouldn't have stats like that".

To them I say this.

What's the difference between a freshly made neonate coming in with Advanced Disciplines and a neonate that's been played for a year or two having those same disciplines?  PCs earn xp at rates that don't make a whole lot of sense when you look at canon.  ie, if Bill's neonate earned three or four Disciplines to Advanced in two years, why did it take Sally's Elder a thousand years to do the same?  In D&D, why does an elf, who starts at 100+ years old have to begin at level one just like everyone else?  Then the party, including the elf reach level 20 in less than an in game year.  Does it make sense?  No.  However, that's how player characters work.  In any RPG, PCs are special.  Always have been.  They can, via earned xp accomplish things that take NPC elders centuries to do.  Complaining about this is silly in my opinion.  Honestly, if there's going to be arguments against this idea, they should at the very least be (in my opinion) arguments that have weight behind them.

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TheGlyphstone

Frankly, the best argument I've seen against it is the OOC perspective, not the IC one. With the current limits on 'banking', the brand new newbie who's never even picked up a WoD book before has to figure out how to spend 90XP - even with an expert to guide them, that's a ton of XP to spend. And you need special approvals to start with out-of-clan disciplines, so pretty much every new person walking in to game will have to max out their in-clans with capped traits in every category, leaving very little room for organic growth; with a year of play left in chronicle, that's a legitimate issue.

Silverfyre

I think it is going to help promote the game to new players and let them enjoy the game with characters who aren't going to be completely useless when they enter into a two-year long running chronicle.  That's the whole reason this is being implemented and while the IC reasoning is going to be a bit of a bitch for the STs to wrangle with (thankfully, I got some plots in place that actually work with this and our Sabbat venue), it is going to draw new players and new blood into the club.  We reset in less than a year anyways. It shouldn't be that much of a bitch fest but then again, I hear it from some of the higher MC players rather than the lower end of the spectrum.  The "Old Boy Club" mentality is exhausting and I am thankful we have no problems with it locally in our domain.

While organic growth is a legitimate issue, new players are not being forced to take the experience to their characters. It is an optional measure.  They have the exp and if they feel intimidated by it, they can work with their ST chain to either ignore it or work it into a believable concept.  It can be made to work and I think the benefits of this far outweigh the negative aspects.


TheGlyphstone

Oh, I like the idea myself. But simply saying the only arguments against it are 'we want new players to be weak' isn't being fair to the genuine issues that are being brought up.

Another example, the international affiliates that were objecting, in Spain and Ireland. Their entire national chronicle is less than a year old, no one above MC2 or 3, no one higher than 11th gen. Dumping 100XP on every player's head would, according to their STs, completely destabilize the existing story, effectively forcing a hard reset on them. Just suggesting that they pretend the addendum didn't happen is more exacerbating the 'old boys club' issue more than anything, by more or less explicitly telling those new domains and affiliates 'we don't care about your game, we're doing it this way, but feel free to ignore it if you don't like it'.

Silverfyre

I am not suggesting they ignore the addendum.  I am suggesting that those new players who come in and are intimidated by so much experience have the option to ignore the extra experience points if they do not want them.  These addendum rules are not official yet and they are still in discussion from what I can gather from my RST and on up the chain.  The addendum is written by the MST staff and if the Spanish and Irish affiliations have issue with it, they need to contact the MST chain and talk to them about it.  They do listen to such suggestions and concerns, in my own experiences.


TheGlyphstone

Exactly. They put it out, people had issues and said so on the lists, they took it back for revision and examination. We're jumping at shadows right now.

Silverfyre

Shadows and Speculation.  The next new novel by George R.R. Martin!


TheGlyphstone

Followed by A Tsunami Of Third-String Character Deaths?

LunarSage

Has anyone heard anything new about the proposal?

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TheGlyphstone

There's been no further chatter on any of the global lists about it, which is where that chatter would be.

Silverfyre

Well, we will definitely know by the 1st when the revisions are released.


LunarSage

I'm personally hoping it does go through, but I may be biased as I've only been playing for 3 months now.  Feeling useless as a neonate is one thing that I think could be improved about the club, personally.

My friend who's an MC 11 thinks the rule is mainly being considered because someone important (probably MC 14 or 15) lost a character and doesn't want to start from scratch.  I'm not sure what to believe, personally.

The only downside (in my opinion) is that 100 xp pretty much guarantees that any new character is coming into the chronicle with at least one out of clan discipline after his or her in clans are maxed.  In my area, out of clan disciplines are pretty strictly watched by the STs, so this may cause an unwanted explosion in them.

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TheGlyphstone

Your friend is speaking nonsense, probably because he's never heard of longevity. By the current rules, that 'someone important' (incidentally, MC14 is the highest possible, 15 is the Board of Directors) would get more XP towards their new character than they will if they die and start over once this rule goes into effect.

LunarSage

Quote from: TheGlyphstone on May 29, 2012, 03:10:09 PM
Your friend is speaking nonsense, probably because he's never heard of longevity. By the current rules, that 'someone important' (incidentally, MC14 is the highest possible, 15 is the Board of Directors) would get more XP towards their new character than they will if they die and start over once this rule goes into effect.

I was told by more than a few people that it's possible to have an MC 15 without being on the BoD.  Rare, but possible.

As far as the other thing, how do you figure?  Longevity only gives 2 xp per month the dead character was played, and considering we've only been playing the current chronicle for 2 years (assuming the dead character was made at the very beginning of the chronicle), that's 48 longevity xp compared to 100 xp from the new proposed rule.

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TheGlyphstone

Quote from: LunarSage on May 29, 2012, 03:28:39 PM
I was told by more than a few people that it's possible to have an MC 15 without being on the BoD.  Rare, but possible.
I guess it's "possible", but I doubt any actually exist in the club. It is impossible to earn it via prestige (see here, it's only by direct special appointment by the Camarilla Council and White Wolf (likely modified to by the BoD in our new organization).

Quote
As far as the other thing, how do you figure?  Longevity only gives 2 xp per month the dead character was played, and considering we've only been playing the current chronicle for 2 years (assuming the dead character was made at the very beginning of the chronicle), that's 48 longevity xp compared to 100 xp from the new proposed rule.

Whoops. I thought I was right, but I was mentally including MC bonus XP into that, which would be on top of the longevity. Still, that's a far cry from starting from scratch, and I just throw mental warning flags up towards any theory that seems created solely to support the idea that patronage and favoritism for high-MC players makes all the rules in the club. I've talked to some of those high-MC players, and heard the horror stories from the old days of the club - I don't doubt some still lingers, since we are human, but the current environment is unrecognizable compared to how it was a long time ago.

LunarSage

No worries, Glyph.   :-)

I totally know what you mean about the old days.  I wasn't a member back then, but I could have been (in 97).  I chose not to because of the really bad rep the club had at that point. 

I have a question though...

The Mentor Background.  Since the addendum says that you can no longer learn out of clan disciplines from an NPC Mentor, is there even a point in taking it?

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Silverfyre

Actually, there are several MC 15 members who are not on the BoD.  People have to nominate a person for it and we just had one rewarded to someone after SERE.  So, it does happen.

As far as the mentor background goes, yes it is worth taking.  For what reason?  NPC access to odd lores or abilities you are having a hard time finding a teacher for.  Also, it helps make a character's background story I think.