oWoD vs. nWoD, and White Wolf in general

[Postmodernist]

I played oWoD back in the day and enjoyed the distinctive system and world very much. However, the Gehenna/Armageddon metaplot really served to screw long-term play group. Hey, you guys have characters your invested in with goals and hopes and interests and stuff, right? Doesn't matter because the world ends. Boom! Alternately, your goal exclusively becomes trying to prevent the inevitable end of the world.

Still, your comments about nWoD intrigue me. Perhaps I'll have to give the system ago. Great, like I have time for any of that...

[Oracle_Hunter]

Umm, Oracle? Attack roll equals Attribute + Skill + Damage + any bonuses - Defense + Armor. Ta da. Simple.

No no. I'm talking about the finicky modifiers you use.

Are you dodging? What kind of cover is there? Are you close enough for Defense to apply to Ranged rolls? What range are you at? Did you double-tap? Did you fire full auto? Are there other powers modifying this roll? What are the favorable modifiers? What are the unfavorable ones?

And heaven help you if there's a car involved

For SR, this is about the right level of granuality, but not for a Storyteller game!

[Yuki Akuma]

Attack vs. Defense is difficult...?

Changeling: the Dreaming is light-hearted wonder without the crushing despair of the other oWoD games?

...What books have you been reading?

[Lord_Gareth]

Eh, I find the combat mechanics to be pretty simple and intuitive, myself, but hey.

Awaiting your comments on my post about vampire plotting, above.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Eh, I find the combat mechanics to be pretty simple and intuitive, myself, but hey.

Awaiting your comments on my post about vampire plotting, above.

Combat is "simple and intuitive" for a wargamer or D&D player - but it is needlessly complicated for a system that purports to be for Storytelling.

I just read over your comments on Vampire Plotting and all I can say is:

I disagree.

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Vampires are long-lived beings that spend most of their time hiding from discovery. There's no reason for them to act as quickly as short-lived humans and acting while your enemy still remembers you're hunting them is a good way to get killed. The nWoD style makes little sense to me; oWoD style makes more sense.

Clans make perfect political entities due to the nature of Blood Bonds. Every childe is naturally blood-bonded to their sire - the perfect set up for a hierarchical and unified entity. Plus, each member of a Clan shares certain inhuman experiences that those outside the Clan lack: all Ventrue know the difficulty of maintaining a supply of special blood while all Brujah are used to hard wrangling with The Beast. These common experiences give them a greater connection to each other than to other random kindred.

Also, I didn't find any of the clans they "cut" to be less worthy of existence than the ones they kept. Why Nosferatu and not Toreador, for example?

In the end, it's just a matter of taste. I like my Vampires to be inhuman puppeteers with plans that take centuries to complete. Neonates may contend themselves with the petty day-to-day of Camarilla face-saving, but surely after you've (un)lived for a few centuries your perspective has to change.

[Aron Times]

Umm, Oracle? Attack roll equals Attribute + Skill + Damage + any bonuses - (Defense + Armor). Ta da. Simple.

Fixed. You don't add the defender's Armor rating to the attacker's attack roll. LOL.

[Blackfang108]

Fixed. You don't add the defender's Armor rating to the attacker's attack roll. LOL.

I was wondering about that. I'm just starting a W:tF (I LOVE that acronym) pbp and, as a newbie, I'm glad I did have it right.

[The_Admiral]

Is it possible to convert Hunter The Reckoning to NWoD

[Terraoblivion]

I on the other hand has only seen VtM played as an action game, never VtR. And frankly i find it bizarre that anybody would. While combat has been simplified immensely, all the disciplines useful for it has been nerfed tremendously and combat is still as boring as in VtM. Just not as time consuming. I think this is mostly about the people and not the game, if anything VtR presents itself as being more based on intrigue than VtM. There is no Camarilla/Sabbath conflict and no Assamites and so on. The only place i can really see action entering as a major part, without just completely deviating from assumptions, would be to focus on mainstream vampire society faced with Belial's Brood or VII. Because really, the five covenants don't normally fight each other with anything but politics. Still, i wouldn't say either game encourages playing it like an action game, but i could see why those who do play it that way would be more inclined to playing the current version. I was about to insult all teenagers by suggesting they were the only ones to play it as an action game despite not being made for it, but then i remembered that the worst guy i've met in treating either of the two versions as one was thirty when i last talked to him.

The important thing to realize about the difference between the two is the nature of the clans. In VtM the clans were the one thing that truly mattered politically and socially within either of the two sects, everything else was secondary. In VtR the clans are largely just a framework for how the curse of vampirism manifests in you, they say relatively little about who you are or what you believe in. Of course the different clans still have different talents and generally prefer to embrace different kinds of people, it's a rare academic who rushes out to embrace a member of a biker gang after all, but ultimately they are about your powers. Your covenant is what defines you politically, but even these vary quite a bit between cities. Especially if you have the books on each of them, then the Carthians stop just seeming like a bunch of anarchists, instead being everything from neo-nazis, to vampire supremacists to tweedy, liberal intellectuals. The other are a bit less extreme, but even so they differ a lot.

So looking only at the clans they are indeed quite simplified and without depth compared to the clans of VtM, but i'd say that is largely because they are a completely different beast. Whether being forced into an ancient secret society without any real choice is superior to becoming a creature of a night and having to figure out how to react to it is an open question. I personally prefer the latter though, since i always got frustrated that i could never fit my concepts properly with the disciplines the clan that otherwise fit the best had. Also the clans seemed relatively narrow in their culture and society, greatly limiting the ease with which i could think of concepts and put a character together.

And the politicking is around, just with the opportunity for a skilled or clever neonate to rise to actual influence over the course of a couple of decades. Really, i never saw much of that in VtM except when playing elders, because you were small fish in a very big pond as a standard starting character. Whereas in VtR, for me at least, the absence of the millenia old plots and immortal elders who you can never match in power, no matter how old you get, means that you can meaningfully engage in politics even without being one of the absolute leaders of the city. It also creates a more open field for the GM to prepare stories in.

Basically i prefer the fluff of VtR for two reasons. One, the one i have elaborated on, is that it gives much more freedom for players and GMs to create their own characters and stories, rather than the one WW wants them to tell. The other is that the focus is much more intimate, on fleshing out the details the makes the world come to life and makes it easier to get into the mindset of an immortal predator. And frankly, i find that a lot more useful in playing the game than knowing who plotted what against who back in Sumeria.

[Blackfang108]

Is it possible to convert Hunter The Reckoning to NWoD

There is Hunter: the Vigil in nWoD.

If you're die-hard for H:tR, I don't know how difficult it is to convert.

[Aron Times]

Well, to each his own.

I would like to point out that it is possible to have plots that span centuries if not millennia, but you can't do it on your own because of the Blood Potency mechanic, which is basically Generation in reverse. Everyone starts at BP 1, and it increases by 1 for every 50 years that a vampire is active and decreases by 1 for every 25 years the vampire spends in torpor. At BP 7 or higher, only vampire blood can sustain him, so unless he wants to be a serial diablerist or blood bound to younger vampires, he has to sleep it off to the point where he can feed on mortals again. Even if he can find a steady source of vampire blood, he still has to fight the urge to sleep. Eventually, he will fall asleep.

Grooming one's childe to succeed you is one way of making sure that your plots stay in motion. This, of course, depends on a good relationship between sire and childe. By the time the sire wakes up, his BP will be lower than his childe's, which means that the weakling he embraced a few centuries ago is now powerful enough to tear him apart singlehandedly. Eventually, the childe grows sleepy and passes the baton back to his sire, assuming they are still on good terms at this point.

One thing that's problematic in the oWoD, Masquerade in particular, is that starting characters are permanently weaker than the lower generation NPCs pulling strings from the background. Neonates are screwed, and the elders have little motivation to help them. Why help a high-gen whelp when he might one day om nom nom you and take your place in the generation ladder?

This is another way that the nWoD rewards being a good guy. A Prince can be as tyrannical as he wants when awake, but then he's screwed when he wakes up centuries later and the neonates he's been bossing around are now gods compared to him.

[Lord_Gareth]

Vampires are long-lived beings that spend most of their time hiding from discovery. There's no reason for them to act as quickly as short-lived humans and acting while your enemy still remembers you're hunting them is a good way to get killed. The nWoD style makes little sense to me; oWoD style makes more sense.

And plotting by nWoD vampires can take decades to come to fruition, but there is an impelling reason to act; torpor. The Sleep of Ages comes whether you want it to or not unless you're willing to start hunting your own kind for blood. Since this isn't a choice most vampires will make (out of sheer pragmatism if nothing else), they need to either set their plots in motion before going to sleep and pray it all works, or finish things out before they pass out for only god knows how long and all of your enemies (or just ambitious up and comers) snap up or destroy your assets.

Clans make perfect political entities due to the nature of Blood Bonds. Every childe is naturally blood-bonded to their sire - the perfect set up for a hierarchical and unified entity. Plus, each member of a Clan shares certain inhuman experiences that those outside the Clan lack: all Ventrue know the difficulty of maintaining a supply of special blood while all Brujah are used to hard wrangling with The Beast. These common experiences give them a greater connection to each other than to other random kindred.

Incorrect; in both games, the Embrace is specifically said to shatter existing Blood Bonds. Furthermore, those common experiences don't overwrite someone's mortal existence. Why are all Tzimice inhuman monsters? What about one that fled his sire and sought sanctuary elsewhere? What about a Setite who got embraced as a "second initiation" into his cult and decided that now was actually the time to get the HELL out? But no. In oWoD, clans are what they are, and if you don't follow the party line AND the family line, the ST slaps the no button and moves on.

Also, I didn't find any of the clans they "cut" to be less worthy of existence than the ones they kept. Why Nosferatu and not Toreador, for example?

The clans chosen to remain living had broad concepts that can establish many characters; Ventrue are "vampires as masterminds", but that could mean anything from a king to a talented hacker with an axe to grind. Mehkt are "vampires as shadowy stalkers" but, again, that covers a LOT. The Toreador (alive again as a bloodline) are...art patrons. And that's it. Any given Toreador is an art patron and if you're not, the ST quietly informs you that maybe another clan would fit you better. I'm not saying that these more specific concepts have no place in the game - they most definitely do - but that they should belong to a more refined concept like a bloodline or a covenant rather than over-arching vampiric majorities.

In the end, it's just a matter of taste. I like my Vampires to be inhuman puppeteers with plans that take centuries to complete. Neonates may contend themselves with the petty day-to-day of Camarilla face-saving, but surely after you've (un)lived for a few centuries your perspective has to change.

Neonates - no matter how long they live - are completely screwed in V:tM. Furthermore, how does such a creature survive all that time without going utterly and completely mad? Insanity is a hindrance to plotting that lasts a millennium or more. I dunno, I just don't like world-shattering power in my vampire stories (well, except Hellsing). It doesn't belong there.

[Pisha]

I appreciate the fact that in nWoD, having a higher score in something meant I actually have a better chance at doing it well :) I remember being very frustrated in tabletop oWoD when I realized the more dice I rolled, the more I increased my chance to fail horribly as well as succeed.

And don't even get me STARTED on the difference in the LARP systems... (if I never play Rock Paper Scissors again it will be too soon!)

Oh, make no mistake, the new Changeling is fantastic, it's just way too bleak for me, bleaker than even Wraith has ever been and I think Dreaming could have been salvaged as it was. But we got Geist instead, so I'm not complaining too much.

Changeling is what you bring to it. (We've joked that it's the game where you can play anything. Absolutely anything. Aliens? Dragons? Knights in shining armor and beautiful princesses? Superhero pirates? Refugees from old movies? Creatures that would fit better in a different venue? Hyperactive otters? They're all possible.) You can certainly make it very, very bleak, but it doesn't have to be by a long shot. It's been said that playing a Changeling is essentially like playing a rape survivor - what you've been through is unarguably awful, but the story is how you choose to respond to it and what you do with the rest of your life. A story like that can be beautiful, courageous and hopeful just as easily as it can be depressing and despairing.

[Oracle_Hunter]

And the politicking is around, just with the opportunity for a skilled or clever neonate to rise to actual influence over the course of a couple of decades. Really, i never saw much of that in VtM except when playing elders, because you were small fish in a very big pond as a standard starting character. Whereas in VtR, for me at least, the absence of the millenia old plots and immortal elders who you can never match in power, no matter how old you get, means that you can meaningfully engage in politics even without being one of the absolute leaders of the city. It also creates a more open field for the GM to prepare stories in.

This is an interesting perspective. Y'see, this very reason is why there are Anarchs.

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When a power structure is ossified and yet undefeatable, people start to move outside. Anarchs are the result of the youngbloods realizing that they don't have a chance to wield any power through the formal structure (and being too creeped out by the Sabbat to join them). They co-exist with the Camarilla, but they're not part of the system - and by and large, the Local Prince just doesn't have the free time to oppress every Anarch who decides to ignore him. Anarchs and Anarch groups can become quite influential on local level - but with influence comes attention. Does the Prince try to use them like a tool, or crush them? If he pisses them off, can he afford to risk losing them to the Sabbat?

This is the proper focus of oWoD Vampire, as taken from the fluff: neonates trying to make a way for themselves without stepping on the toes of bigger and badder foes. Who knows - perhaps these high-humanity neonates can end up being useful vassals for older and sleepier badasses? Playing as Elders misses the point, in a way - it's not about being King of the World; it's about learning to work with and around The Powers That Be to achieve your own ends.

The way nWoD Vampire has been described makes it sound like the entire world is run by neonates. Without Elders to keep the lid on them, I'm surprised that the Masquerade is even a useful fiction anymore; the pot should have boiled over long ago and spilt the violence where all can see.

But yeah, too many people play Vampire as a combat game because the combat disciplines are easy to understand and pretty badass. But playing it like that really misses the intent of the fluff and ignore a rather ingenious political dynamic that just isn't available in most other systems.

EDIT:

@Lord_Gareth - as I hope this post illustrates, we are simply going to have to agree to disagree. Aside from the "embrace shatters all blood bonds" (something I don't recall) we each just believe that an unlife should look differently.

I think you need to have different tiers of understanding with the younger generation constantly fighting amongst themselves for power while keeping the older one happy; you see it more as a continual feud that mirrors mortal existence - the older generation will "die" eventually and so it needs "sons" to carry on their legacy.

[Aron Times]

There is Hunter: the Vigil in nWoD.

If you're die-hard for H:tR, I don't know how difficult it is to convert.

Hunter: The Vigil also has a wider variety of Hunters than The Reckoning. In the oWoD, Hunters were holy warriors empowered by angels who fought supernaturals. In the nWoD, Hunters run the gamut from normal people victimized by bloodthirsty vampires to global conspiracies that use MORE DAKKA to kill the parasites feeding off of humanity. Let's compare three of them:

1. Malleus Maleficarum - The Inquisition. NOBODY EXPECTS THE MALLEUS MALEFICARUM! Amongst their weapons are surprise, ruthless efficiency, and the Wrath of God. Primarily targets vampires and demons. Vampires stupid or unlucky enough to expose themselves run the risk getting SMITE EVIL to the face.

2. Task Force Valkyrie - A secret quasimilitary organization funded by the USA. Uses bleeding edge technology to fight supernaturals, which often comes in the form of BFGs (BIG ****ING GUNS). Takes a MORE DAKKA approach to defending humanity. Thematically feels like the Technocracy from the oWoD.

3. The Lucifuge - A group of Hunters allegedly descended from the Devil, they use their infernal powers to fight evil. Ironically the nicest of the global Hunter conspiracies, proving that Dark Is Not (Always) Evil.

[Lord_Gareth]

@Oracle - Buy or borrow a copy of V:tR and read it through. You'll be pleasantly surprised. I'd pay especial attention to their example setting, New Orleans. Just ignore Katrina for the moment. It was written beforehand.

[Pisha]

The only problem I have with Hunter: the Vigil (and I'm speaking as someone who love, love, LOVES the game) is the difficulty in having a multi-faction group. First of all, the factions aren't all at the same power level. Second of all, canonically they don't all know about each other. Most importantly, they have reasons to seriously oppose one another in-game.

So either everyone has to agree to play one faction, or you get a lot of pvp conflict. (Or you get situations where the TFV guys, for instance, are saying to each other, "Y'know... unless the lieutenant specifically asks... let's just not mention that Jenkins is part demon...")

[Solarn]

Incorrect; in both games, the Embrace is specifically said to shatter existing Blood Bonds. Furthermore, those common experiences don't overwrite someone's mortal existence. Why are all Tzimice inhuman monsters? What about one that fled his sire and sought sanctuary elsewhere? What about a Setite who got embraced as a "second initiation" into his cult and decided that now was actually the time to get the HELL out? But no. In oWoD, clans are what they are, and if you don't follow the party line AND the family line, the ST slaps the no button and moves on.



The clans chosen to remain living had broad concepts that can establish many characters; Ventrue are "vampires as masterminds", but that could mean anything from a king to a talented hacker with an axe to grind. Mehkt are "vampires as shadowy stalkers" but, again, that covers a LOT. The Toreador (alive again as a bloodline) are...art patrons. And that's it. Any given Toreador is an art patron and if you're not, the ST quietly informs you that maybe another clan would fit you better. I'm not saying that these more specific concepts have no place in the game - they most definitely do - but that they should belong to a more refined concept like a bloodline or a covenant rather than over-arching vampiric majorities.

Uhh... please don't project your frustration with bad STs on the game as a whole.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Uhh... please don't project your frustration with bad STs on the game as a whole.

Although I wouldn't have phrased it so... bluntly, there may be a point here.

I don't see any reason for the oWoD fluff to forbid a Setite who is running from his Clan. He's probably an Antitribu Camarilla, hiding from the Settites who are hunting him down. Sure, it's not a great spot to be in, but the Player chose it. Likewise for the combat monster Toreador - you'll need to explain why his sire embraced him and he won't get along with his Clan, but he can be an Anarch instead.

The fluff only describes the general nature of each Clan and how it functions as a sociopolitical entity; it contemplates rebels (antitribu) and those who decided to stay out of the system entirely (anarchs). If anything, Lord Gareth's post hints at an underlying flaw of the WoD system - Tyranny of the ST - but neither oWoD nor nWoD does much to limit it.

[Terraoblivion]

Because there are still elders around Oracle_Hunter. They are just not all powerful and can be challenged if you have sufficient political skill to build a following. It won't be easy, even for Ancillae, but it is still possible if you are careful, skilled and thorough. Also i fail to see why neonates would be more inclined to break the masquerade than elders. They are infinitely squishier, they lack the resources to throw in the way of people coming after them to hurt them, while on the other hand they are much more capable of functioning in human society making it less likely they break the masquerade by accident.

And in general vampires don't solve their issues with violence in VtR. Not only do they still have social institutions that all recognize the legitimate existence of the others, even if they think they are wrong, and uphold a society with ordered rules. They are also not really all that much more capable of combat than humans. And really, neonates are the vampires least inclined to kill as they are more likely to keep the morals that say they shouldn't, as well as the least ability to get away with it. And as humans prove a society of a highly aggressive beings can stay relatively stable without people resorting to murder to settle their issues, even when most people are less than 50. Even a vampiric society not dominated by millenia old elders, would have an average population much higher than that.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Because there are still elders around Oracle_Hunter. They are just not all powerful and can be challenged if you have sufficient political skill to build a following. It won't be easy, even for Ancillae, but it is still possible if you are careful, skilled and thorough. Also i fail to see why neonates would be more inclined to break the masquerade than elders. They are infinitely squishier, they lack the resources to throw in the way of people coming after them to hurt them, while on the other hand they are much more capable of functioning in human society making it less likely they break the masquerade by accident.

From the sounds of it, nWoD Elders are very sleepy and don't expect to influence the world after a certain number of years. Or perhaps Lord Gareth misrepresented the Sleep of Ages?

Also - Neonates are more likely to break the Masquerade because they are less dependent on it. As you say, they can still blend into human society if they need to, so the Masquerade seems less important; using mind control to assemble a harem of hotties may seem more important than some silly Masquerade. Elders, on the other hand, would be picked out immediately if humanity became broadly aware of Vampires. Worse, Elders aren't as active or agile as younger vampires; sure they can kill everyone while they're awake, but once the sun rises they are essentially comatose and easy to destroy.

And in general vampires don't solve their issues with violence in VtR. Not only do they still have social institutions that all recognize the legitimate existence of the others, even if they think they are wrong, and uphold a society with ordered rules. They are also not really all that much more capable of combat than humans. And really, neonates are the vampires least inclined to kill as they are more likely to keep the morals that say they shouldn't, as well as the least ability to get away with it. And as humans prove a society of a highly aggressive beings can stay relatively stable without people resorting to murder to settle their issues, even when most people are less than 50. Even a vampiric society not dominated by millenia old elders, would have an average population much higher than that.

Well now, that sort of society sounds sensible if you ignore the fact that every Vampire is supposed to be continually warring with The Beast to keep their enhanced Evil side under control. That struggle to maintain Humanity was another feature of oWoD that I enjoyed; if The Beast is tame enough in nWoD that vampire society is so inherently stable then I'll say they've removed another valuable theme of unlife (IMHO, of course ).

[Terraoblivion]

The beast is so untamed that you have to roll for either frenzy or rötschrek every time you meet a vampire you haven't met before. However, my point is that humans are incredibly violent beings, chimps are about the only other animals as inclined to senseless violence as humans. And again, humanity is the best bulwark against the beast taking over, that makes neonates less likely to suddenly run amuck. Sure they don't have experience with the beast, but they are more likely to be terrified of it than to indulge it. Also, and perhaps most importantly, the vast majority of neonates lack the means to easily and cleanly kill their enemies. It is not like your average lawyer or construction worker is super effective at killing.

Also the immediate focus of a neonate is more on securing themselves from mortal society, such as from having to answer the door during the day or finding an income after becoming unable to keep their job, than on rubbing out rivals. That is in fact the primary way the Carthian Movement recruits members, promising help with the daily necessities of unlife. Also worth noting for you, the cases where vampiric society in a city does collapse it is typically due to the Carthians taking over and upset the established order. Incredibly low population density of vampires also means that there aren't that many causes for conflict at the level of influence a neonate operates on and those there are largely hinges on social advancement in the covenants. Which is where it would be hardest and have the worst consequences if you were to kill your rivals. As well as places where you get taught ideologies of why killing other vampires is wrong.

Also i think you overestimate the frequency of torpor. Any given elder will most likely be around as a vampire for at least three hundred years before going into torpor. That's still older than the typical leadership found in a North American city in VtM, since most of the really old elders didn't take the trip across the ocean and the amount of Native American vampires was quite low. So it is not that elders aren't around in VtR, it is that they are not unbeatable forces of nature who have everyone dancing at their whims.

[Zorzark]

This is an interesting discussion. I've heard a couple of times that oWoD had superior fluff to nWoD, and that nWod sucked the life out of the setting, but I've never heard anyone elaborate. I'm really only familiar with Vampire both ways (and have only played oWoD), and even though I've only read the revised core book and some of the Malkavian clanbook, there's a lot of fluff there that just makes me want to wall bang. One thing I've noticed is that a lot of clans get the description of "hated and feared by other clans." It really starts to stick out after a while

And then there's the old MET rules, which I don't even begin to understand. Something about betting words on a game of rock paper scissors because adjectives make you more powerful because they act like skills even though there are skills but they don't actually do anything and aaaaaaargh.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Also i think you overestimate the frequency of torpor. Any given elder will most likely be around as a vampire for at least three hundred years before going into torpor. That's still older than the typical leadership found in a North American city in VtM, since most of the really old elders didn't take the trip across the ocean and the amount of Native American vampires was quite low. So it is not that elders aren't around in VtR, it is that they are not unbeatable forces of nature who have everyone dancing at their whims.

Again, I don't see why people are trying to "beat" the Elders - they've been Vampires for longer than your total life/unlife span combined, they should be unbeatable! If a random 12th Gen Vampire is capable of taking on an Elder, then why hasn't someone else taken them down?

IMHO, an unlife where older vampires dominate younger vampires makes more "sense" than one where older vampires and younger vampires are on even power-levels. From what I'm hearing from the nWoD crowd, they prefer the latter - or at least one where toppling an Elder isn't passingly rare.

[The Glyphstone]

Again, I don't see why people are trying to "beat" the Elders - they've been Vampires for longer than your total life/unlife span combined, they should be unbeatable! If a random 12th Gen Vampire is capable of taking on an Elder, then why hasn't someone else taken them down?

IMHO, an unlife where older vampires dominate younger vampires makes more "sense" than one where older vampires and younger vampires are on even power-levels. From what I'm hearing from the nWoD crowd, they prefer the latter - or at least one where toppling an Elder isn't passingly rare.

I get the impression it's not about toppling the Elders so much as the sense of freedom that having toppling an Elder be possible would give. The more you load your setting down with unbeatable uber-NPCs and background characters who control everything, secretly or otherwise, the less space there is for the PCs to do stuff. Ultimately, a game should be about the player characters, and if the setting is so choked with NPC plots and schemes that can't be interfered with, it engenders a feeling of futility - why should they bother with their own schemes, when a background NPC is doing it bigger, better, and can't be stopped?

OWoD, as people have said, seems to have started crumpling under the weight of its own metaplot and the sheer volume of NPCs running Xanatos Gambits on each other, with the PCs as willing minions at best and heedless dupes at worst. NWoD "fixed" the problem by turning Vampire from an infinite line to an infinite loop - the Elders get old and go Torpor, weakening in sleep as the neonates take their place, and when they finally awaken again, they're effectively neonates in power where the old Neonates are the new Elders, and the cycle repeats itself.

[Oracle_Hunter]

I get the impression it's not about toppling the Elders so much as the sense of freedom that having toppling an Elder be possible would give. The more you load your setting down with unbeatable uber-NPCs and background characters who control everything, secretly or otherwise, the less space there is for the PCs to do stuff. Ultimately, a game should be about the player characters, and if the setting is so choked with NPC plots and schemes that can't be interfered with, it engenders a feeling of futility - why should they bother with their own schemes, when a background NPC is doing it bigger, better, and can't be stopped?

People seem to have a fine time with Call of Cthulhu

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Y'see, I suspect that a lot of people who favor nWoD have been burned by ST Fiat in the form of unstoppable Elders in oWoD. However, that is hardly how the setting is presented; by straight fluff, your standard low-gen member of the Prince's Court is hardly going to give you a second glance, let alone some 4th or 5th Gen Elder.

Games should feel more like SR where the PCs are characters trying to achieve their own goals against a backdrop of intrigue set in motion by The Powers That Be: nobody plays SR expecting to topple Azetchnology and nobody cries when one of Aztechnology's hit squads starts chasing you down because you unintentionally broke up one of their backroom deals on your latest run. The main difference is that in SR you're always an operative; oWoD Vampire lets you dream of grandeur in the future.

Finally, let's be clear: Player autonomy is always in the hands of the ST. Yes, the setting doesn't let PCs punch Caine in the face but there's still a lot of real power to be had; with luck, you might be able to become a trusted agent of the Prince and be allowed to command kindred in his name. With skill, you might become Prince, provided you cozy up to the right Elder. However, if your ST is willing to crush your ambitions with Fiat then it doesn't matter which edition you're playing - your autonomy is gone.

EDIT:
Ah, saw the description of the cycle in nWoD. I dislike how it mirrors mortal life - if you're going to have immortals running around, society should look different from what it currently looks like. But hey, YMMV

[The Glyphstone]

People seem to have a fine time with Call of Cthulhu
:

Thats. Er. Uh. Totally different. Because...it is. Uh-uh. *shifty eyes*


Srs: Humans vs. Unstoppable Eldritch Horrors in one case, Weak Stoppable Vampires vs. Powerful Unstoppable Vampires in the other. Both have unbeatable NPCs, but the one where "they're you, but older and better and you can't win" is different than "they are so different you can't possibly understand them or beat them". It's tone as much as genre, I think.

[BG]

I also think that nWoD does better at actually integrating its systems together. If I want to have fae in a vampire game, I don't have to work to figure out how chimerical damage affects vampires.

Secondly, I like the way that there are more suggestions for backstory, without a hardcore metaplot that limits players. Hey, you can't play Ravnos anymore! Just because we decided that's where the story is going! (Not that I actually liked most people who played Ravnos, but still). I also think that while the Gehenna/Apocalypse stuff added an initial interesting twist to the games, it wasn't something that was ultimately necessary, especially because you're putting a final timeline on your universe.

The other thing I like is the easier integration of character generated stuff. Does your vampire want to make a new bloodline? You can do that, with better guidelines of making one that's balanced. Hell, in a CtL game I ran, half the players came up with their own kiths.

[Semidi]

And don't even get me STARTED on the difference in the LARP systems... (if I never play Rock Paper Scissors again it will be too soon!)

But... But...

I have the bomb and win all ties. Wanna compare traits?



Anyway, that aside. A lot of people have been mentioning things about oWoD as negatives that I consider positives and the same for nWoD (Just in reverse).

The thing I liked about oWoD WAS that your little 13th gen nobody was completely powerless and was being crushed by the oppression of the Camarilla (and God help you if you were Sabbat). You take your little victories when you can but ultimately you're pointless and don't really matter. See, that's kind of an alien concept to bring up on a D&D forum, but it's part of the oWoD game. It's about the story of either being going with the flow (Camarilla) for a little scrap of prestige/surviving, raging against it with little victories but in the end it being pointless (Anarch), or being forced to be free and being in a wacko religious cult where you'll probably die in a crusade.

I also liked the end of the world mythology. But it's a type of thing that just kind of exists, but it never really needed to happen (or just happened really, really slowly). I feel that it just adds this looming sense of horror and dread.

I despise blood potency as a mechanic as apposed to gen. For one reason, it makes elders complete wimps, which means that there's really no reason for elders to be in power. Another is that it removes any temptation for diablorie, which also added to the setting for both neonates and elders. For example, I played a 10th gen Brujah who was a nice enough guy (as far as vampires go), but damn was the temptation to try to diablorize this elder tempting and that same elder probably was paranoid as hell that I was going to get my two blood a round.

There are also things I don't like about nWoD like the focus on covenants as apposed to clan and the lack of culture involving clan. I just don't like the similarities with regard to covenant of all the characters in it. Clan focus adds much more diversity.

That being said I still like and play nWoD, it's just that there are parts I really don't like. There are also parts of oWoD that I don't like. Like Ravnos. I hate Ravnos. Like. A lot. I also don't like pnp mechanics (despite the joke at the beginning I don't really care for LARP mechanics, but nothing sounds as cool as "I have the bomb and I win all ties. I potently punch you in the face." Well cool or dorky. One of the two.

[Solarn]

The thing I liked about oWoD WAS that your little 13th gen nobody was completely powerless and was being crushed by the oppression of the Camarilla (and God help you if you were Sabbat). You take your little victories when you can but ultimately you're pointless and don't really matter. See, that's kind of an alien concept to bring up on a D&D forum, but it's part of the oWoD game. It's about the story of either being going with the flow (Camarilla) for a little scrap of prestige/surviving, raging against it with little victories but in the end it being pointless (Anarch), or being forced to be free and being in a wacko religious cult where you'll probably die in a crusade.

So basically there's no story at all and then you die.

Yeah, great roleplaying material there.