Behind the Lines: Changes A'Comin' (#39)

[eskemp]

Some people say that gamers are inherently conservative. Others say that people are inherently conservative, and gamers are just a subset thereof. Now, this isn't talk about politics, mind: it's a discussion of that big mess of psychology that deals with how we approach things we ran into at a formative stage and stuff that changes the material of

Comments

[phoenix_down711]

I was a big fan of the old Mage: The Ascension game. However, I never played it. Well, except for a short-lived play by post game.

I am currently storytelling a game of Mage: The Awakening. See, my gaming group typically plays D&D and it's difficult to imagine them going from such a crunchy, simple playing style with it's uncomplicated base narrative to a system which was so lofty and obtuse and difficult to grasp as Ascension. I am fairly certain my group looked at ascension a time or two and thought to themselves "I don't get this" that it pretty much killed any chance of playing it.

Awakening was far more grounded and I liked that change. Having the spell list gave them something to hold on to, and as we progress, they become more and more familiar with the system and are really enjoying themselves.

[anonymous]

I really liked the Requiem Chronicler's Guide and I wished there were more books like it. I liked how it intentionally drew away from the familiar rules and setting, but everything was clearly totally optional. That way, the players could choose how much of the old and familiar they wanted and how much of the new and novel they wanted

[earthdragon]

Have you checked out "Dreams of the First Age" for Exalted?

[anonymous]

Good reminder! Yes, i have Dreams of the First Age. I probably should have mentioned it as i really liked the way it took a big step beyond the original game. I would really like more things like it, especially if there was some sort of WoD equivalent.

[earthdragon]

It was extra neat in that it was usable as its own thing, or as something to cast shadows on the core game.

[zephrin]

Vampire: the Requiem

I was a very diehard, blow-hard, "The OWoD was so much beeeeeeeeetter!" for a long time. Let's face it, I had a quillion OWoD books memorized and ready to debate any bit of world minutae...as did a lot of gamers at that time. I cracked VtR and was like, piff, this is just old vampire but lousy.

However, as more suppliment books came out, I came to appriciate the complexity of VtR. Before, you had an ironclad metaplot...now, not so much. The covenants added a facet to the game that had been missing before; in VtM there was much more focus on clan unity, but the old Cam vs Sabbat vs (occasionally) Anarchs got old quickly. We were all just basicly sitting around and waiting for Gehenna.

At this point, I can honestly say that while I'll never get sick of running WtA and CtD (although I do LOVE Lost) as small tabletops, I can't really say I'd go back to playing VtM. Just my 2 cents.

[anonymous]

The best change to nWoD from old is Vampire the Requiem's mechanic of lessening vampires when they enter torpor. That fully enabled the move away from "finding the biggest baddest oldest vampire" that all vampire stories conceived in Hollywood degenerated into, so that the game could be about the politics, intrigue and preying on humans, which is what Vampire always did best.