[Crazy ideas] What would you want out of a 3ed of Requiem ?

[Ur-Than]

Everything is in the title, basically. What would you like to see in an hypothetical third edition of Requiem ? Be it lore, simple name changes for the Clans or even mechanics you think could be streamlined or something like that ?

Personally, what I think we should get is the game firmly distancing itself for V:tM by ditching the names of the Ventrue, Gangrel and Nosferatu. I don't really have an idea about what to call them, of course (but I think a Latin, old Germanic and Slavic/Romanian/Hungarian would works best respectively), as as to not render the previous editions' lore about the Clans moot, we'd jsut know that Ventrue = Latin name from now on, without discounting anything said before.

However, I think that over time, Requiem introduced Clans which could be used to replace entirely those three to make the setting more unique even if said Clans would also need some rework, of course. I'm not sure I'd like it in reality because it'd replace three out of them, but I think we could have :

• The Amari replacing the Gangrel in the hardy survivor slot, even if it'd mean perhaps losing the purely bestial element of the Savages to better highlight the desperate nature of the Amari
• The Pijavica taking the spot of the Nosferatu, I think they'd work really well with Nightmare even if they'd need some serious rework to be really successful and viable
• The Akhud stealing the Ventrue's throne; they are, after all, lords in their own way, and I think their Clan weakness in 2ed would make a great counterpoint to their tyrannic ways, because they wouldn't be able to betray each other directly but would spend their time trying to find was to do it so indirectly that they wouldn't trigger their weakness

Regardless of what they'd do with the main Clans, I'd love for the Jiang Shi to transition from possible real Clan to the youngest one. I think having them being a truly new Clan stabilizing and thus developping a new unique Discipline widely shared by its members only could be fascinating to explore. Especially if the Striges lose their shit over it.

[monteparnas]

The point with Conditions as CoD defines them is to inform long term character behavior. It is less about the bonuses and penalties that come along and more about how the Condition affects how the character navigates the story.

It is not that D&D Conditions aren't good, it's just that as Heavy Arms said, CoD calls them Tilts and have other goals for the Conditions system.

[Heavy Arms]

Even as someone that wants to see the base Conditions cut drastically... you're talking about Tilts. It's easy to do a short consistent list when you're only really focused on combat mechanics.

CofD Conditions have to address a lot more than the physical complications that action scenes might impart.

[avoloch]

i think D&D approach the conditions perfectly, is the basic things that can affect a person like:
poisoned
proned
grabbed
frightened

the basic conditions should be solid to be usefull for the DM
i thin you need some real solid basic conditions like 5-6 that can be used in any game
like ''uncontious'' and separated very few scenario specific conditions

you dont need the condition ''humbled'' for example, is too much noise

[monteparnas]

I would rather remove Conditions entirely. They were meant to lower bookkeeping, but they just add to it.

I used to play face to face and I pretty much felt like this.

The core idea of Conditions is neat. I think the basic model of "do X and discard this for beat" is a fine example of how they should really work. They should have as little hard rules on them as possible and just be flexible instead.

Powers that just look for the Name of the Condition, like the Manifestations do, also help as you only have to worry about the power rules instead of the rules from the Condition you're tracking.

But putting specific rules on every one of them? That creates a lot of bookkeeping.

[Heavy Arms]

I feel like I'm going to repeat myself here...

There should only be ~5 mundane Condition templates, with a clear guide on how each can be used for positive, mixed, or negative Conditions, how they look as normal or persistent, and what to use each template for.

One of the problem with tracking them, is that there's dozens of them, and they all work on custom rules. If your Conditions are listed: [Name] ([impact][permutation]} they're much easier to remember and use. "Swooning: Bob (mixed resistance)" as long as "mixed" and "resistance" are well defined with simple mechanics is a lot easier than just having Swooning and trying to remember what that means.

Even without me defining those terms, it's already easy to assume that "mixed resistance" with a word like Swooning means you get a bonus or a penalty to your Resistance Attributes depending on how the action triggering resistance plays off of Bob.

Then you have a lot more room for a few supernatural specific Conditions, which are also now much easier to find, for Auras, Disciplines, and so on to impart. And that's even if they really need special mechanics.

[Maina]

I would rather remove Conditions entirely. They were meant to lower bookkeeping, but they just add to it. They are difficult to track and easy to forget entirely when one runs online. I'm sure it's better for face-to-face games, but I'm somewhat curious if that is even the majority anymore these days.

[Newb95]

I disagree, Conditions are a very interesting part of CoD that can help representing the impact that the world has on the characters, I personally never felt they were out of place, I wouldn't have a problem with more conditions if done properly.

[Heavy Arms]

Eh... the game needs less Conditions, not more. Complexity needs to serve a purpose for the fun of playing the game, not just add a lot of bookwork to get to basically the same results.

[Newb95]

Touchstones are another thing I would like to be expanded upon, a more detailed system of interactions that would give bonuses depending on how the interaction goes, spending a lovely night with your mortal fiance, watching the game with your college roommate or even just taking your father's old car for a ride would all remind you of your humanity and result in a variety of positive conditions to help mitigate frenzy or detachment.

[Heavy Arms]

Steve is keeping up with his Touchstone... even Princes need to do that (even if maybe, as a Prince, Steve has moved on from one specific human to the local sports team and thus spends time watching football with other fans).

While it could use more explicit discussion, sure, the fact that vampires don't naturally recover Willpower by resting means their free time is going to mostly involve replacing rest and relaxation activities will Willpower recovering ones... which can also easily be breaks from vampire politics.

[Newb95]

The thing is, they already know.

Most people, deep down, know vampires are real. You can't live in the Chronicles of Darkness without having a sense that something is deeply wrong with the world, and that supernatural beings are part of it. No, you don't say it out loud, because A) there's a literal machine god that maintains a vicious false status quo and B) your life will be a lot better if you don't piss off the vampires who might be listening in. Why go asking for trouble? And like, they're rare, right? Probably all died out a long time ago, or they only come out on a full moon...or maybe they all just live with the homeless people, snacking on derelicts. They certainly won't come for you, with your dead bolt and your security system. Why worry about it. Why even talk about it.

The Masquerade is about who is a vampire. Steve down the hall? Definitely not a vampire. You had coffee with him that one time! And vampires don't eat, so he can't be one. Vampires don't watch football with you on Sunday (they have to sleep on Sunday, right?) They don't bring sick guac to game night (garlic! Garlic is in guac!) No. Steve is NOT a vampire.*

Does everyone know vampires are real? Well, most people know sharks are real, but we don't spend a lot of time thinking about them. However, you also know not to go swimming alone with a bloody wound, just like you never patronize that night club on 7th Street.

But shark attacks still happen, no matter who tells us to never swim alone.

* Steve is the prince.

Steve being the prince is a nice touch, now that I think of it, I wouldn't mind a little paragraph in an eventual 3rd edition describing what vamps do in their "free time", just for roleplaying purposes if anything else.

I would guess that not all vampires engages in the danse, hell anyone with a little sense would try to steer clear of it, most neonates likely won't have the choice since they need the support of the covenants to survive but I could see an ancilla or an elder saying "fuck it" and just do his own thing, a 1000 years of night had something like this when describing how a newly awakened elder would get reacquainted with the world after a long torpor but I guess what I'm looking for is a few more info into how the unaligned spend their nights and maybe some story hooks to run a chronicle this way.

[Yossarian]

If there was ever a Requiem 3rd edition, this is the setting update I'd like to see.

The masquerade falls and vampires become known to the population. It would be similiar to the True Blood TV show idea. You could still have political intigue and I think it's more inline with the zeitgest of today. It would also set itself apart from Vampire the Masquerade.

The thing is, they already know.

Most people, deep down, know vampires are real. You can't live in the Chronicles of Darkness without having a sense that something is deeply wrong with the world, and that supernatural beings are part of it. No, you don't say it out loud, because A) there's a literal machine god that maintains a vicious false status quo and B) your life will be a lot better if you don't piss off the vampires who might be listening in. Why go asking for trouble? And like, they're rare, right? Probably all died out a long time ago, or they only come out on a full moon...or maybe they all just live with the homeless people, snacking on derelicts. They certainly won't come for you, with your dead bolt and your security system. Why worry about it. Why even talk about it.

The Masquerade is about who is a vampire. Steve down the hall? Definitely not a vampire. You had coffee with him that one time! And vampires don't eat, so he can't be one. Vampires don't watch football with you on Sunday (they have to sleep on Sunday, right?) They don't bring sick guac to game night (garlic! Garlic is in guac!) No. Steve is NOT a vampire.*

Does everyone know vampires are real? Well, most people know sharks are real, but we don't spend a lot of time thinking about them. However, you also know not to go swimming alone with a bloody wound, just like you never patronize that night club on 7th Street.

But shark attacks still happen, no matter who tells us to never swim alone.

* Steve is the prince.

[Heavy Arms]

It feels like VtM assumptions about how the Masquerade works is coming into this. VtR's idea is not some giant vampire conspiracy, though vampires work towards this end, that creates the Masquerade: humans do. Humans in the CofD all, on some instinctive level, know the supernatural exists, but telling the supernatural that gets you killed (or worse). It is a "soft" Masquerade enforced by dozens of thousands of years of evolutionary pressure favoring humans that are in a perpetual state of subconscious denial about the world they truly live in.

Also things like The Lie in Mage that can further explain how humans have become more and more blind to the truth over time.

As has been noted, repeatedly, when discussing this for the CofD, there's a reason why the 2e core book's character creation section tells people playing normal humans to still come up with supernatural events their character has brushed up against.

[Newb95]

To be honest I always found the idea of a masquerade in modern times ridiculous since there is no way that something like the existence of supernaturals could remain hidden, on the other hand I have trouble imagining how something like this could be pulled off story wise, maybe by having a "soft" masquerade breach akin to what happen in V5 where only the world governments would have knowledge of the supernatural at large although, if task force valkyrie is of any indication, they kinda do already but it would be interesting to expand on this aspect for sure, on the other hand this would make the game too similar to V5, something that I'm personally against for a variety of reasons.