Character Creation: Vampire 20th

I'm going to work tomorrow (yeah, summer, but I need the money so I took some work at the summer clinic), so I figure I should make a character again while I have time, spoons, and...time-spoons.

So! Vampire! There's a new edition coming, this one kinda disconnected from previous editions in terms of mechanics. There's a "pre-alpha" playtest version link floating around, which is fucking dumb because "alpha" literally means "first," but whatever. I'm not involved, and neither is anyone else on the Onyx Path side of things, as far as I know. All I know is: It's going to be a shitshow, even if nuWW manages to make an awesome game, because they kinda already started off with one foot in the shitshow.

But never mind that.

The Game: Vampire: The Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition
The Publisher: White Wolf by way of CCP, with maybe some Onyx Path, I don't remember the timing and I can't be fucked to look it up right now
Degree of Familiarity: Very yes. I worked on this edition a little (bloodlines) and I worked on the line quite a bit
Books Required: Just the one.

 
I made a character for the 2nd edition of the game some time ago. "Some time ago." That was back in 2008. Remember 2008? Obama was about to be elected, we knew Bush was on the way out. There was hope.

And here we are now, in a World of Darkness. Ah, well. (We just watched the first episode of The Handmaid's Tale, so you'll pardon me if I'm a little bleak.)

So, since my last character was a Camarilla vampire, let's go a little different this time and make a Sabbat one.

Step One: Character Concept. Leon "Franco" Franchetti was a college dropout and a bouncer. Franco was also really smart; he didn't drop out because he couldn't make the grades, but because his father died of a stroke and the money that had been supplementing his income to help with his tuition had to go to the service and then to keep the household running. Franco figured he'd get back into it at some point, but he decided he'd drop out for a while and get a job to pay the bills, and he had a cousin who ran a bar.

Franco was working one night when a group of people rolled up, cut the line, and tried to get in. Franco stepped in front of them, and one of them - a little skinny guy - tossed him out of the way. Franco rounded up the other fellas and went after these pricks, but the woman with them stared all the tough guys down and Franco was left standing there by himself.

The little skinny guy looked Franco up and down and said something in a language Franco didn't understand, and then a third guy got up, handed Franco some folded hundred-dollar-bills, and said "Sorry, man. We'll be more polite." And that was it.

Three nights later, this same group ambush Franco outside his car, and the skinny guy bit him on the neck, drained his blood, and then brought him back. He took the time to educate him, too - humanity was a joke. People were a joke. Death was an afterthought.

Franco's sire wanted him to follow him down the Path of Cathari, and Franco probably would have, but he came to the attention of another local Sabbat vampire with different ideas. Sure, sex and abandon and so on is great, but there's a higher purpose to it all...if you're strong enough to look. Franco's on the Path of Lilith now.

So: Franco's a Lasombra. His Nature is Eye of the Storm; Franco is good at staying focused when everything goes nuts. His Demeanor is Soldier. The Path of Lilith is considered heretical, so he keeps it under wraps.

Good start. So, Step Two is Attributes. I want Physical to be primary, I think. I'll put three into Strength and two each into Dexterity and Stamina (because this stupid system still uses Dex as the "to-hit" stat).

Mental secondary. Three into Intelligence, once into Wits and Perception.

And then one each into the three Social Attributes.

Step Three: Abilities. 13/9/5. SO MANY POINTS. I'll make Talents primary, and put two each into Alertness, Athletics, Awareness, Brawl, Intimidation, and Streetwise. Last point goes into Subterfuge.

Knowledges are secondary. God, these are stupid. "Finance" and "Law" really need to be separate Abilities? Yawn. Anyway, three into Academics and Occult, two into Computer, one into Investigation.

Then Skills. One each into Drive, Etiquette, and Melee, and two into Stealth. Boom.

Step Four: Advantages. I get three dots in Disciplines and five in Backgrounds, but because I'm on a Path, not Humanity, I don't get any free dots in Virtues, except Courage. So I have to spend two of my 7 for a dot in Conviction and Instincts, and then I'll put two more into Instincts and Courage and one more into Conviction.

For Disciplines, I get Obtenebration, Potence, and Dominate. Hrm. Well, I like the shadow-things, but they're all useful, so I'll take one of each.

Then Backgrounds. I'll put one into Herd (folks at the club), two into Generation, and two into Mentor (not my sire, the one who's instructing me in my Path).

I get 5 in my Path (which is as high as it gets as a starting character), three in Willpower (which I have to raise), and roll a virtual d10 for blood pool (4). And of course I get 15 freebies, and I can take Flaws, which I will. I'll take Permanent Fangs (which my mentor sees as a blessing from Lilith, and who I am to argue?). I'll take Sire's Resentment, too; Michele (my sire) kinda takes offense that I think he's a schmuck and a hedonist. And I'll take Repelled by Crosses; Franco's family is Catholic and that respect and fear runs deep.

So that gives me 22 freebies. I have to spend two to raise my Willpower to 5. I'll burn 7 to buy a second dot of Obtenebration. I'll dump some into Backgrounds: Raise Herd to 2, Mentor to 3, and pick up Status 1 and Domain 1 (his cousin's club). That's 13 spent total. I want the Iron Will Merit, so that takes me to 16. I'll blow 5 more on a dot of Manipulation, and my last one I'll put into Retainers (my cousin Paul; he owns the club).

I'll specialize Strength and Intelligence, since I can. For Strength I'll take "Buff" (Franco was something of a weightlifting enthusiast pre-Embrace), and for Intelligence I'll take "Methodical".

And that's me done. Let's go eat some babies!*

*I do not actually advocate eating babies, even when playing Sabbat.

Character Creation: Vampire: The Masquerade 2nd Edition

Vampire provided me with a lot of education about social interaction, believe it or not. And it introduced me to some pretty crazy people, but honestly, not more than any other game (the crown for quality of crazy over quantity has to go to the Mage game, but you've heard that story).

Anyway, I've written roughly 3000 words today, in addition to doing the art notes for 451, and I'm now done with that, yo (except for swapping out a section that I totally forgot I hadn't swapped out, meaning that Joe has a replacement file coming in the next day or so.

But regardless:

The Game: Vampire: The Masquerade
The publisher: White Wolf Game Studio
Degree of familiarity: Lots. I ran and played an awful lot of World of Darkness over the years, and I can't tell you how many Vampire games I ran or played in. I can tell you that I've played all of the main clans at least once
Books required: I have Vampire 2nd Ed, and the Players Guide handy, so I'll just use those. 

 
Seriously, this is going to weird me out. I haven't touched these mechanics in several years.

Wow, there are a lot of quotes in this book!

OK, it's time for Step 1: Character Concept. Now, it's been a good long while, and the temptation is to make something really ground in the OWoD. Garou kinfolk, ex-Pentex employee, Technocracy stoolie, that kind of thing. But you know what? Fuck that. Let's pretend this is my first Vampire character and I want to get into the whole roses-and-poetry thing that was so appealing before all the backstory flooded my brain.

I always liked characters whose concepts were more about their progression than their profession. So my character is a temp. He works (worked) a meaningless office job, and he refused to take his work home with him. His real life was in the clubs after work. He wasn't picky about which type of club - goth, gay, fetish, dance, karaoke, whatever. He loved the loud music, the smoke and being with lots of other people. And the sex, oh, hells yes. This guy never went home alone, and he wasn't real careful about what he did.

Let's assume that he was Embraced in the early 80s. Wedding Singer jokes aside, he lived in New York in a crappy little apartment, took the subway to and from work (and anywhere else he needed to go), and had very few real friends. His friends were club regulars, and none of them really knew him. He was the life of the party. He was almost completely invisible. And sometimes, on those rare occasions that he did go home alone, he'd wonder if anyone would miss him if he died.

When the vampire showed up at his door one night, just as he was about to leave, he had the chance to find out. The vampire's named was Bo, and he was beautiful. He asked my character (who at this point needs a name: nowadays (nights) he goes by Trick) if he wanted the club life (unlife) forever. No more stupid office job. No more donuts in the morning. No more rolling out of bed at ass o'clock for some stupid meaning. Just the clubs, the noise, the smoke, and the sex, forever.

Trick, probably not understanding what was going on, and absolutely enthralled by this beautiful person, agreed. And that was the last thing he did as a living man.

It wasn't until after Trick was Embraced that he learned the truth. Vampires can't have sex; rather, they can, but they don't really enjoy it. Now, sex was blood. Trick was furious, not because he didn't like being a vampire, but because he'd been conned. The consent wasn't informed. He told Bo to leave, and he did, one red tear on his cheek.

Trick didn't know it at the time, but he was HIV positive. Bo, a vampire of some standing and age, had watched Trick for some time, and decided that people would notice if Trick died, that the world would be poorer for his loss. Trick never found that out, and he never learned the truth of the circumstances of his Embrace.

OK, I think we've got a start. I write down "Unlife of the Party" under Concept. I think that Trick is, at heart, the Bon Vivant. He wants everyone to have a good time, and he wants them to do it with him. Under Demeanor, I write "Conformist." He's a social chameleon. For clan, I think he's a pretty archetypal Toreador, and I don't think I need to break from that.

Step 2: Choosing Attributes

The spread here is 7/5/3. Obviously, Trick's a Social character, so that's primary. It's a toss up as to what's secondary, but since he lived 20-hour days before his Embrace, I'm guessing he's got some Stamina, so we'll make Physical secondary. You know where that leaves Mental.

Man, so many dots! For Social, I put two into each, and the extra one into Charisma. Trick really is the life (unlife) of the party, and you'll notice him first.

For Physical, I'll put three dots into Stamina, and one each into Strength and Dexterity. He'll have a decent soak pool.

Holy hell. I don't miss that.

And, Mental. One each, average across the board.

Step 3: Choose Abilities

13/9/5 here, and the breakdown is Talents/Skills/Knowledges. I'm thinking Talents will be his big thing, followed by Knowledges, and then Skills.

OK, Talents. Obviously, I need good ratings in Acting, Empathy and Streetwise. That burns nine of my dots for a rating of three each. I figure he can dance, so I'll do one in Athletics, and he's a decent bullshit detector, so we'll do two in Subterfuge. Last dot goes into Alertness, because it's dumb not to.

Knowledges. Working for that nameless company gave Trick some skill to fall back on. I put two into Computer, one into Finance, one into Law, two into Bureaucracy, and one into Investigation. He gets one in Medicine because he knows what to do in case of drug overdose, and one into Occult because he's rented some vampire flicks since the Embrace.

Finally, Skills. One each into Drive, Etiquette and Music, and two into Stealth.

Step 4: Advantages

I get three Disciplines, five Backgrounds, and seven Virtues. My Disciplines have to come from Presence, Auspex and Celerity. Decisions, decisions. I'll take all three in Presence, because I really want Entrancement.

Backgrounds. I only get five, but they're dirt cheap with freebies. I like how NWoD does (almost everything, but specifically) Contacts better, because here I'd have name the Contacts and I don't feel like doing that. What I'll do instead is take three dot in Herd (various club scenes), one dot in Contacts (one of the city's Primogen, who's impressed at how smoothly Trick moves through various subcultures) and one dot in Fame (there's always someone around that knows Trick).

Virtues. Trick's not great in the self-control department, so I'll put three each into Courage and Conscience, and one into Self-Control.

Step 5: Finishing Touches

My Willpower starts equal to my Courage, so presently it's 4. My Humanity starts equal to Conscience + Self-Control, or 6 in my case. My blood pool starts at...hang on...9. Awesome. Trick got lucky last night.

And now, freebie points. You know, I rallied long and hard to include freebies in NWoD, and was ultimately voted down because if you want to make characters more customizable, you can, just add XP. But I always liked this step, and when I ran OWoD at cons, I didn't spend freebies so as to give the players some wiggle room.

Anyway, for Trick, I feel he is deficient in Willpower, so I'll spend four freebies (I always house-ruled this down to 1 freebie/dot) and raise it to 6. I'll spend two to get him Herd 5; that's six spent total. I'll spend two on a dot of Intimidation so that my pool for Dread Gaze isn't totally suck, and I'll spend five on a dot of Appearance because Trick really is a cutie. That leaves me two freebies...or does it?

Remember, I have the Players Guide handy. I can take up to 7 points in Flaws if my Storyteller isn't some Achilli-esque yob who likes restricting character options (Justin and I differed on our opinions of Merits & Flaws. Also beverage).

Well, first off, I'll take the Eat Food Merit for one point. He's a clubber, and that means knocking back shots and stuff. Helps to be able to keep it down. I'll take the Infamous Sire Flaw, too, but with a bit of twist - the dude is Infamous because of what Trick says about him. He trash-talks Bo a lot, and since Bo is kind of a cipher, it's come to reflect badly on the both of them. I'll take Deep Sleeper - Trick parties hard, and he makes a lot of demands of his undead body. One more Flaw: Selective Digestions. Trick can only take blood from people at parties or clubs. There's just something about the blood aroused by social interaction; he can't stomach the blood of the homeless, of losers, or of loners.

That means I have 5 freebies left (2-1+1+1+2=5). I spend them on a third dot of Perception. Gotta be able to notice what's going on in the room, especially with all that music blaring (and especially since I don't have Auspex).

I can choose Specialties for my Charisma, Appearance and Stamina, and since I can, I shall. For Stamina, I choose Tireless. Trick can go all night (used to go all night and then all day, but that's kinda out of the question now). For Charisma, I choose Captivating. He gets your attention and holds it. And for Appearance, I choose Sexy. Trick is sex in blue jeans (or whatever), and he knows a lot of ways to seduce.

And that's it. I think that in a chronicle, Trick would be the one to open doors that other, more martial or occult characters wouldn't be able to, but I also think that learning about the circumstances of his Embrace would really rock him. He would either lose his mind or rededicate himself (losing or gaining Humanity, respectively) depending on how he found out. I think his sire telling him right before being burned to death would be fun.