WoD Basic Campaigns
This podcast is exactly what I was looking for when I did an iTunes search for “gaming.” It’s perfect, and I’ll explain why very briefly:
I’m about to start running a campaign for five first-time roleplayers based on Shadowrun but using the WoD rules and tone. So like I said, it’s perfect. You’ve got to keep it up, if only for my benefit. And any of your insight into what I’m planning to do would be much appreciated.
So let’s see… I’ve always loved the Shadowrun setting for its politics and corporations and Libertarian Dystopia, “careful what you wish for, Ayn Rand” kind of setting. Corrupt power structure and disenfranchised lower classes and vindicated indigenous peoples speak very deeply to my post-Marxist, anti-jingoistic heart. But while I think the game designers did a great job of incorporating fantasy elements into the setting, dragons and trolls just really aren’t my thing. I love D&D, but I like to “keep it real” when it comes to more modern gaming and real-world settings.
WoD obviously fills that niche well. I run a lot of modern and historical WoD games using only mortal characters and NPCs. In the game I’m planning, in fact, there is absolutely nothing super-natural existent in the world.
So I was wondering what cool uses you’ve put the WoD rules to in your past games, and how do you intend to use them in the future? This can go on to cover other rules systems, obviously.
As for myself, I’ve run a religion-heavy horror story set in 1930′s Louisiana in the rural Parish of Bayougoula centered around a letter one of the PCs received from a fellow priest who claimed to have encountered the Devil himself on the side of a winding country road. A similarly religion-heavy chronicle in modern-day war-torn Iraq in which we actually had a Muslim friend play an Iraqi captive whom the other PCs (American Soldiers) had to take into custody and extract from Fallujah at the height of the fighting there. And a ghost story set in France just after the First World War involving an American MIA haunted by the spirits of his fallen unit whom he’d abandoned in his cowardice.
Does anyone else play these sorts of settings? Anyone have any good ideas for an interesting time and place that I might use in my next game? I’m leaning toward BBC journalists who crash a helicopter in Rwanda or Darfur and have to deal with child soldiers and that sort of thing as they attempt to get home.
Anyway, thanks for reading so much. Just hoping to get the ball rolling on discussions here in the forum. And Kristen and Shaun, keep up the great podcast.
Comments
Comment from goatunit
Time: December 21, 2007, 3:41 pm
Ha. It’s alright, man. I’ll speak on your behalf at the post-revolution tribunal. Actually, I’m a Civil Libertarian, like most leftists – but I’m economically quite rigid.
Re: My running Shadowrun with the WoD rules – I guess I should’ve put greater emphasis on the campaign being merely based on Shadowrun. I’ve taken some elements of Shadowrun that I really like (SINs, runs, megacorps, a bit of the timeline) and developed a futuristic setting otherwise from the ground up. It’s going to be much more dystopic and in a state of decline and decay.
Also, I have a bunch of WoD books and none on Shadowrun, so…
Have you guys run any short-term adventures or do you usually try to make a campaign out of every game? I’ve always had trouble keeping campaigns running and have found these short-run, plot-driven mini-campaigns very rewarding. I guess that’s another reason I really enjoy WoD’s more cinematic tone.
Forgive my cavalier hyphenation and rambling.
Comment from Shaun
Time: December 21, 2007, 4:31 pm
Generally, we play campaign style games. My players don’t like to have to make characters very often. I still try to come up with a definite end to it, though. I hate games that just ramble on with no resolution.
For shorter games, I try to run one-shots when one of the regular players doesn’t show up, but I’ve never gone the mini-campaign route.
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
LOL! I should probably let you know, before I respond to your post, that I am a registered Libertarian 
But you do have a great post here. Up until recently, I've never been that into drifting or re-purposing rule systems for use in other settings. There are a couple of things that I question about using the WoD system for Shadowrun, though, even if you're taking the magic out of the game. For one thing, the systems, as far as the basic dice mechanic goes, are almost identical now. The only two real differences are that succeeding at tasks in WoD isn't nearly as difficult as it can be in Shadowrun, and one is geared for d6's instead of d10's, which is contributes to the added difficulty and lethality of the system. Of course, SR4 is also significantly "crunchier" than WoD, with a far more comprehensive listing of modifiers and special rules for the world. I suppose, though, it all depends on what kind of game you're running. Cyberpunk style games like Shadowrun tend to be all about either gritty street punks who have fallen through the cracks, or flashy tech and lots of killer gun battles. At lease in my experience. When it comes to drifting SR4, I'm generally of the opinion that if it ain't broke (which, concerning SR4, is a debatable premise, according to some), don't fix it. Just take out or add to the existing system to get the game you want. I'll confess, however, that I'm pretty biased toward the Shadowrun game system.
On the other hand, WoD is a great system for a lot of different kinds of games, so long as combat or computer hacking aren't huge parts of your campaign. If you just want to get through the fights, or any of the technical stuff, it's easy to breeze through. For stories that focus on the personal journeys of the PC's, it almost can't be beat by any mainstream games. It's also really versatile. Kristin and I played an awesome WoD game at GO Con earlier this year, where we all played high-ranking members of a Mafia family, and we had to solve the mystery of who ordered a hit on our family, and, once we found out, how to go about exacting our revenge. It was great, and I can only think of a couple of games that could handle that kind of story as well as WoD can.
I also used the WoD core system to run a mercifully brief failed campaign centered around the crew of an Unsolved Mysteries style show. I think that the problem with that game was in the execution, rather than the concept. I may, at some point, try it again.
There are other systems that work well for transplanting to non-default settings. At KublaCon, we played in a fascinating Dogs in the Vineyard game set in a corporate boardroom. There was absolutely no combat, but the RP was enthralling. Right now, I'm working on a Victorian era fantasy setting for The Burning Wheel, which is going to center around territorial expansion and dirty politics (a-la the series Deadwood).
Wow, sorry to ramble so much! I'd love to hear how your World of Darkness/Cyberpunk game turns out!
Comment from goatunit
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Ha. It's alright, man. I'll speak on your behalf at the post-revolution tribunal. Actually, I'm a Civil Libertarian, like most leftists – but I'm economically quite rigid.
Re: My running Shadowrun with the WoD rules – I guess I should've put greater emphasis on the campaign being merely based on Shadowrun. I've taken some elements of Shadowrun that I really like (SINs, runs, megacorps, a bit of the timeline) and developed a futuristic setting otherwise from the ground up. It's going to be much more dystopic and in a state of decline and decay.
Also, I have a bunch of WoD books and none on Shadowrun, so…
Have you guys run any short-term adventures or do you usually try to make a campaign out of every game? I've always had trouble keeping campaigns running and have found these short-run, plot-driven mini-campaigns very rewarding. I guess that's another reason I really enjoy WoD's more cinematic tone.
Forgive my cavalier hyphenation and rambling.
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Generally, we play campaign style games. My players don't like to have to make characters very often. I still try to come up with a definite end to it, though. I hate games that just ramble on with no resolution.
For shorter games, I try to run one-shots when one of the regular players doesn't show up, but I've never gone the mini-campaign route.
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Things have been a little… hectic… around here lately. We haven't been home on a weekend to record a show, pretty much since KublaCon. We are working on it, though.
Comment from effbomber
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
that's cool…as long as everything is okay with you guys…looking forward to the next episode 
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Heh… Me too.
Comment from Babe
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Well, to be honest, that's all I've ever used, and that at a minimum. Prove me wrong kids.
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
I don't think Mage is all that difficult, really, although it's probably the most mechanics-heavy game that White Wolf makes (for the WoD, anyway). The trick to teaching players how the rules for magic work, I think, is the creative use of Rotes. That's really what they're for, anyway, teaching new Will-Workers how to use their power. Improvised spellcasting can always come later. You can use an NPC like a Mentor to teach them how it works in game. That way, they'll already have an idea about how the mechanics work, from using Rote spells, and they'll just have to adjust how they think about their magic.
Comment from catmeister
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
… introduction to WoD, and I think, overall, its my favorite because of that. I've gone on from there. Any game can seem complicated to new players, but the trick is to not focus on the mechanics and, instead, focus on the storyline and the imagry – especially with White Wolf products! As the player gets used to the world, then you can introduce the mechanics bit by bit…
Of course, this is good advice no matter what system you're playing/running. In addition, your new player should side saddle with an experienced player who can "mentor" during the game, and thus the GM can focus on the game. That was how I learned the system, and came to appreciate the fun of that game!
/Cat
"An Innocent Bystander"
Comment from Shaun
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Just call them to the table and talk to them. Maybe after your regular game. GM burnout happens, and if you have good players, they should understand that. Don't kill the game if you don't want to, but it's fine to tell them that you'd like to put it on hold for a while, and then play something new in the meantime, until you feel like picking up where you left off.
Comment from Babe
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Just kidding. Here's the way I see it:
The reason we do this is that we find it enjoyable. It is a game, one that we play, therefore it should be fun. It can be serious, your character could be getting raped in the ass by an troll, and it could still be fun. But once it looses that, starts to become boring, burdensome, and feels like a job, you've lost the reason you were playing or GM'ing in the first place. Then you need to step back and take a break.
I know that if a GM told me that they weren't enjoying the game anymore, I would want it to end even if I were still having fun. So I agree with Shaun here. I'd tell them that you still want to be involved but you want to be on the other side of the table. I think Shaun kinda burnt himself out the same way, and he's been a GM for almost two decades. So as soon as he stepped down, a friend decided to run 'All Flesh Must be Eaten' and I decided to try my hand at running a game.
And if they decide that's not acceptable, move out here and game with us. Three rules:
1. No one is allowed to arrive drunk (it's different if you leave drunk)
2. You can not hit on me at my table with Shaun GM'ing (shudder)
3. If you talk to me about crystals at three in the morning and I just want you out of my house because I have to get up in four hours and you haven't shut up about gaming since you arrived and you can't converse about life, I get to shank you.
Comment from goatunit
Time: November 29, 1999, 4:00 pm
Well, if you can't get someone else in your group to GM, you should at least take comfort in the silver lining. GMing for a GM is such a pain in the ass.
I GM exclusively. Mainly because I'm really only comfortable playing with people whom I have introduced to role playing. I just can't handle the gaming culture, with a few notable exceptions like this podcast. But in my younger days, I did the whole hanging out at the comic shop thing, and it was awful. Especially when I had to run games for a bunch of GMs who wanted to co-pilot the whole thing.
Comment from Shaun
Time: December 20, 2007, 6:20 pm
LOL! I should probably let you know, before I respond to your post, that I am a registered Libertarian
But you do have a great post here. Up until recently, I’ve never been that into drifting or re-purposing rule systems for use in other settings. There are a couple of things that I question about using the WoD system for Shadowrun, though, even if you’re taking the magic out of the game. For one thing, the systems, as far as the basic dice mechanic goes, are almost identical now. The only two real differences are that succeeding at tasks in WoD isn’t nearly as difficult as it can be in Shadowrun, and one is geared for d6′s instead of d10′s, which is contributes to the added difficulty and lethality of the system. Of course, SR4 is also significantly “crunchier” than WoD, with a far more comprehensive listing of modifiers and special rules for the world. I suppose, though, it all depends on what kind of game you’re running. Cyberpunk style games like Shadowrun tend to be all about either gritty street punks who have fallen through the cracks, or flashy tech and lots of killer gun battles. At lease in my experience. When it comes to drifting SR4, I’m generally of the opinion that if it ain’t broke (which, concerning SR4, is a debatable premise, according to some), don’t fix it. Just take out or add to the existing system to get the game you want. I’ll confess, however, that I’m pretty biased toward the Shadowrun game system.
On the other hand, WoD is a great system for a lot of different kinds of games, so long as combat or computer hacking aren’t huge parts of your campaign. If you just want to get through the fights, or any of the technical stuff, it’s easy to breeze through. For stories that focus on the personal journeys of the PC’s, it almost can’t be beat by any mainstream games. It’s also really versatile. Kristin and I played an awesome WoD game at GO Con earlier this year, where we all played high-ranking members of a Mafia family, and we had to solve the mystery of who ordered a hit on our family, and, once we found out, how to go about exacting our revenge. It was great, and I can only think of a couple of games that could handle that kind of story as well as WoD can.
I also used the WoD core system to run a mercifully brief failed campaign centered around the crew of an Unsolved Mysteries style show. I think that the problem with that game was in the execution, rather than the concept. I may, at some point, try it again.
There are other systems that work well for transplanting to non-default settings. At KublaCon, we played in a fascinating Dogs in the Vineyard game set in a corporate boardroom. There was absolutely no combat, but the RP was enthralling. Right now, I’m working on a Victorian era fantasy setting for The Burning Wheel, which is going to center around territorial expansion and dirty politics (a-la the series Deadwood).
Wow, sorry to ramble so much! I’d love to hear how your World of Darkness/Cyberpunk game turns out!