Patching Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines on Steam

[Archpaladin Zousha]

A few years ago, I purchased Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines as part of a Steam sale, knowing its quality through word of mouth and having watched several videos of it on YouTube. I'm well aware that the game, while well-written and immersive in the World of Darkness setting, needs a good deal of work through modding and unofficial patches to be even playable, let alone shine. The problem is...I'm pretty clueless when it comes to modding and stuff, and there's so many patches and mods for VtmB out there that I've got no real clue where to start, especially since I got it through Steam. Anyone out there who knows what they're doing in regards to this stuff want to assist me in navigating this confusing stuff so I can get my money's worth and actually play the game? Thank you, in advance, for any advice or assistance.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

Use the Unofficial Patch to get a patched vanilla experience. It has an optional "Plus" patch that restores un-finished content, adding new quests, maps, weapons, items, characters, dialogue, graphics, models, sounds and music, the bones of which were all incomplete in the game. It should have installation instructions included. I would start out with JUST that. Several other mods change what tribes are available or make major gameplay or plot changes, I'd avoid those until you've played the game through at least once.

I would also recommend NOT doing a Malkavian or Nosferatu clan your first playthrough. Malkavian dialogue is almost impossible to understand if you don't already know the plot of the game, as the character makes veiled references to secrets you don't learn until later. Nosferatu you can't actually ever interact properly with mortals, so you're cut off from a lot of approaches to the game, basically only being able to use stealth and brutal combat, and you can't travel on the streets, only through the sewers, or else people will spot you and you'll cause Masquerade breaches. Ventrue might also be a little harder, because they can only feed off rich people, but are great diplomancers. Toreador, Brujah and Gangrel are all pretty good characters for combat runs. Tremere basically play as mages.

[Archpaladin Zousha]

What would I pick if I want to be able to do "everything" in the game: have access to every quest, open any lock, qualify for all the dialogue options so I can get the best endings to all the quests...that kind of thing?

[Fri]

As usual I think the answer is "A Charismatic Guy With A Lockpick"

Basically the game is separated into 3. Normal game where you play an ordinary vampire, Nosferatu game where you play ugly monstrous vampire that will be attacked on sight, it turns into a stealth game where you sneak around people in town, and Malkavian game where you play insane vampire who speak in ramblings (and lamp posts) and have completely different dialogues compared to other clans.

[Inarius]

Ventrue tends to be pretty good for conversations because one of their unique skills basically functions like force persuade in conversations. Its also fairly handy in combat situations as well but other than that there isn't anything unique other clans get that really helps with the non combat parts of the game. Of course its been 7 or 8 years so maybe I'm forgetting some other uses for other clans abilties.

[Eldan]

My first (and only) run was as a Toreador and I think I did pretty much everything. Spent the first half of the game pushing social skills and a few other problem solving abilities, then putting every point in celerity and swords when the parts which are only fights started.

Most problems in the first half of the game (the more interesting 0half) have more than one solution anyway.

[Chen]

If I recall the only content locked behind clans would be the Tremere content in the Chantry. No other clan gets as much access to the chantry. So if you want to do everything I'd play Tremere. Don't forget to turn off your blood shield when you walk outside or you'll breach the Masquerade. Also using blood magic to make someone explode, unsurprisingly, also breaks the Masquerade.

Stealth is also horribly broken in the base game. Crouch behind someone, ram a katana through them and the guy next to them won't notice, if you've maxed stealth. So maybe avoid that if you don't want the game to be too easy.

[Driderman]

Well if I remember correctly, Ventrue, Tremere and Nosferatu all get access to stuff specific to their clans, although the Ventrue is only a swanky Haven as far as I remember. Other than that, with the unofficial patches you can play whatever you want and access more or less all content in game, depending on where you put your points, although Nosferatu are probably locked out from some social stuff that I don't remember.

[Beleriphon]

I think I played through a Brujah bruiser my first play through. I'm also that guy that liked that other 3rd person Vampire game.

[Kaptin Keen]

This game can only be correctly played as Malkavian.

[Feytalist]

I played through the base game without any problem, so there's that at least (I think I recall one side quest not working correctly... I never got the quest reward, but it was hardly a gamebreaker). But the Unofficial Patch linked earlier works perfectly, helps the game immensely and isn't a chore to install/get working. So definitely use that.

Realistically, you'll probably not be able to do everything in the game in a single playthrough, but you'll be able to access most of the important stuff no matter what character you'll play. Ventrue and Malkavian characters have unique dialogue; Nosferatu and Tremere have access to unique areas; and Malkavian, Nosferatu and Tremere characters have wildly different playstyles than normal. So you'll have to replay the game to get all the extra bits (don't worry though... you'll probably want to anyway )

Talky, stealthy and fighty characters are all valid for the majority of the game; however (and here's a slight late-game spoiler if you want to know):

Spoiler

Show

The devs ran out of time/money (Troika's constant problem, unfortunately), and didn't get the chance to expand the end-game to how they wanted it. So, the last part of the game (quarter? fifth?) devolves into quite a lot of combat. A pure non-combat character will have some problems, but your Disciplines will help regardless.

It's a wonderfully atmospheric game, though. It contains one of the better "horror"-themed missions out there (Shalebridge Cradle being the other one), has great characters and cool lore. It's showing it's age a little bit, but it doesn't detract from the game much, if at all. Great music, too.

[adamzeira]

Thanks, this was a big help :)