Clans and Covenants as a Matrix
by jachilli
In working on Vampire: The Requiem, one of the things I wanted to offer players was a greater pool of character relationships than was available in Masquerade. In Masquerade, your character creation option is very linear. The individual pieces are broad, but by and large, a character’s clan defines a great deal of his interaction with Kindred society. Your geography largely determines your sect (a decision made by the Storyteller, in most cases), and within that sect’s framework, you pick a clan. Sure, you can cite exceptions, but for the most part, this is how it works because this is how the setting assumes it works. You can be the one Sabbat Lasombra in a Camarilla city if you want, and if the Storyteller agrees, but the social structures assumed by the Masquerade setting regard such a thing as a rarity.
So for Requiem, I wanted to expand that a bit, but I wanted to do it in a way that didn’t paralyze the player with the paradox of choice.
If only it were actually this simple.
Practically, I built a matrix that drew upon one of the parts people really liked about Masquerade: the ideologies. The romanticized arch-traditionalism of the Camarilla and the apocalyptic libertarianism of the Sabbat both gave people fungible philosophies that they could cleave to that gave texture to their storytelling, and those of the other sects did, too. We brainstormed and went back and forth a great deal about what concepts semi-organized groups of vampires organized around — the covenants. Religion, naturally, formed the foundation of two of them. More secular politics formed two others. The third became the weird theosophy of the Ordo Dracul, which had a distinctly Gothic tilt. (These didn’t just spring into being, however. We originally had a wheel set up that opposed certain ideologies and was sympathetic with others. When it came down to giving these cogent belief structures that balanced so neatly, however, well, that didn’t work as well. I think part of this came as a result of over-structuring the social dynamic. I wish it would have worked out smoothly because I love the visual arrangement of such information, but it just didn’t result in vampire doctrines that made any sense.)
The other axis of the matrix was a no-brainer. That was where the clans went. The idea of vampire clans is so central to White Wolf’s take on Vampire that I knew I wanted it to carry over from Masquerade into requiem. (Whether that’s actually true is another discussion, but I still stand by it.)
The combination of these character-definition keystones lent themselves to good mechanisms for narrative drama. What do you think and what do you do about it? What are you “born” (clan) and what do you “choose” (covenant)? In parallel to other roleplaying games, what’s your race and class? The result is a matrix of 25 possible character archetypes instead of a subset of a spectrum of 13.
Clan x covenant = a breadth of character options.
In some ways, Requiem had too much choice. Part of what made Masquerade interesting was the oft-ignored limitation that players create “young” characters. The limitations of the spectrum meant that one needed to rely more on Nature/Demeanor to define a character than clan/sect. Sure, there was the idea that if you were artistic you’d end up in one clan, rich in anther, or outdoorsy yet another, butthe were -not- limitations of the game itself, only of the players’ and storytellers’ imaginations. Remember, Rein-Hagen developed a “game of personal horror”, something you espoused yourself in an article or two. What could be more horrific than someone of our age than being forced into the narrow, restrictive world of Elders and Ancillae in the original World of Darkness? This was addressed to a degree with “anarchs”, but this idea was abandoned when the people immediately after Mark decided that what this game needed was more powers and D&D style mechanics. Dirty Secrets? The only secrets we should have been concerned with we’re the ones our characters desperately wanted to hide: that deep down, none of the vampires of the 80s/90s cared about the ages old war between Camarilla and Sabbat any more. We were young. We were decadent. We were going to conquer the world by night if only we could find a way around those indomitable forces that were more frightening than us. Masquerade was about a never ending fall from grace. As we struggled to maintain our individuality and our humanity, we slowly found ourselves becoming that which we feared and hated. It was Alex P. Keaton discovering he was a liberal in long form, and it was glorious. Don’t get me wrong: Requiem was and is a solid product, but the range of choices from the very beginning also removes some of the horror because one can always find a good fit for any personality and any circumstance.
ehmm Mr. Michael
1) “The limitations of the spectrum meant that one needed to rely more on Nature/Demeanor to define a character than clan/sect.”
True. But think at Requiem and find the same with more much: Clan+Covenant+Virtue+Vice=infinity
2) “What could be more horrific than someone of our age than being forced into the narrow, restrictive world of Elders and Ancillae in the original World of Darkness?”
True. But think at REquiem and find the same with more “visual and conceptual styles”.. Elders of Camarilla? Ok.. so think about Elders of Invictus that see on you and, in the same time, Elders of Lancea Sanctum.. what’s about is in the same time Elders of Ordo Dracul too? So it’s a really, really horrorif immense choises…
3) “but this idea was abandoned when the people immediately after Mark decided that what this game needed was more powers and D&D style mechanics”
False. I think that Masquerade is really like to D&D style game.. the adventures vs the orcs.. the Camarilla vs the Sabbat! The world at war, ok it’s not EVER a war like D&D, with dungeons and monsters (i write “ever” because the game really write in every page about this war and the plot have so much.. bige events, like explosions, cities that burns and so.. not so much “personal horror”.. i think about this like a D&D in the modern New York with the monster Tzimisce in the sewers!).
It’s personal horror to have a faith like a Lancea Sanctum, and explore the “codex” of this church of vampires. It’s personal horror to experiment over yourself because you’re a Ordo Dracul, or you’re an Invictus and unlive with the terror of shark politics (like a Camarilla political game)..
i think that Requiem is like a Masquerade without D&D combat factions, with the same good things and with much more (think this: every things you can do in the Masquerade, you can do in the Requiem.. ).
I think that is the time.. in the ’50 we play in a way, in the ’70 we have change the way of play, in the ’90 we have change and now.. now i think that with Requiem we have a perfect game about personal horror and vampire, more about horror, not about war and monster in the sewers..
i think this.
To be engaged in a game, however, the player needs to be able to interact with systems that allow him to affect the game world as a construct. What you’re describing is true from the narrative perspective, but what distinguishes a GAME of personal horror (emphasis mine, of course) from a mutually created story of personal horror is the fact that there are mechanics to manipulate. The whole point of having rules is so that the player can make a choice, and that choice can have a fairly adjudicated effect on the environment. They allow the player to be clever and say, “Aha, I can affect the world like THIS…”
Nature and demeanor don’t really provide interesting choice. They’re a shorthand to provide a conceptual understanding of the character, but they only minimally (and only really Nature) impact the player’s decision-making process.
ehmm Mr. Michael
1) “The limitations of the spectrum meant that one needed to rely more on Nature/Demeanor to define a character than clan/sect.”
True. But think at Requiem and find the same with more much: Clan+Covenant+Virtue+Vice=infinity
2) “What could be more horrific than someone of our age than being forced into the narrow, restrictive world of Elders and Ancillae in the original World of Darkness?”
True. But think at REquiem and find the same with more “visual and conceptual styles”.. Elders of Camarilla? Ok.. so think about Elders of Invictus that see on you and, in the same time, Elders of Lancea Sanctum.. what’s about is in the same time Elders of Ordo Dracul too? So it’s a really, really horrorif immense choises…
3) “but this idea was abandoned when the people immediately after Mark decided that what this game needed was more powers and D&D style mechanics”
False. I think that Masquerade is really like to D&D style game.. the adventures vs the orcs.. the Camarilla vs the Sabbat! The world at war, ok it’s not EVER a war like D&D, with dungeons and monsters (i write “ever” because the game really write in every page about this war and the plot have so much.. bige events, like explosions, cities that burns and so.. not so much “personal horror”.. i think about this like a D&D in the modern New York with the monster Tzimisce in the sewers!).
It’s personal horror to have a faith like a Lancea Sanctum, and explore the “codex” of this church of vampires. It’s personal horror to experiment over yourself because you’re a Ordo Dracul, or you’re an Invictus and unlive with the terror of shark politics (like a Camarilla political game)..
i think that Requiem is like a Masquerade without D&D combat factions, with the same good things and with much more (think this: every things you can do in the Masquerade, you can do in the Requiem.. ).
I think that is the time.. in the ’50 we play in a way, in the ’70 we have change the way of play, in the ’90 we have change and now.. now i think that with Requiem we have a perfect game about personal horror and vampire, more about horror, not about war and monster in the sewers..
i think this.
Too bad it failed (in my eyes). The Camarilla and the Masquerade bound under the prince who was controlled by a higher institute made sure internal politics and kill plots would be set aside if something threatened the greater good. In Requiem everybody just did as he or she pleased as long as the prince did not see it.
I think that you haven’t read “The Danse Macabre”…
read this book and yoyu can see the REAL higher power in the throne :D
I love the Requiem setup. The fact that you can alliances of vampires of the same Clan, yet be from different Covenants, or the other way round, or anywhere in between. Without the Requiem setup the chronicle I have run would require a lot more modification of the default Masquerade setting to make it valid.
And think it is wrong to say Requiem has so many choices that it removes the horror. If anything it adds so many more dark doors and corridors to go down, many of which are unique to the character, chronicle and particular ST take on the setting (because of course there is no metaplot to care about).
Requiem was definitely designed to allow players to tell any kind of Vampire story they could conceive. Masquerade is designed for very specific types of Vampire stories in a very specific setting. There are strengths to each, of course, so yes, the versatility of the Requiem character creation systems are definitely part of what it aims to do. (And I’m glad to hear you use them that way ;)
I remember when Requiem came out. I was working on my Manchester setting for Masquerade and then suddenly this new version made me look at the things in the setting and say ‘Hold on a minute, this could be a lot more fun with all these other options’. And of course, what people forget, is that just because Requiem has all these options, does not mean players should be allowed to pick from them all for a particular chronicle. For what I have been running so far, Invictus characters are not valid because it would lead to a group with less cohesion.