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Old World of Darkness: Difference between revisions

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* [[Kindred of the East]]
* [[Orpheus]]
[[LARP]]:
* Mind's Eye Theatre
Official [[GURPS]] Adaptations:
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* [[Blessed with Suck]]: It is ''not'' fun to be a supernatural being in many gamelines of the old WOD (in particular, in Wraith and often in Vampire, in other lines becoming a supernatural is more of a mixed blessing). In theory. Again, unless you're a Mummy.
* [[Blue and Orange Morality]]: The various alternate morality systems in Masquerade.
* [[Body Horror]]: A large part of the Tzimisces' hat in ''Vampire: the Masquerade'' is inflicting [[And I Must Scream]]-style changes on their victims.
* [[Born-Again Immortality]]: The Reborn are effectively human in every way that matters - but every time they die, they're [[Reincarnation|reincarnated]] as babies, and have to grow up all over again. As they mature, each new incarnation recalls the memories of all their previous incarnations.
* [[The Caligula]]: Plenty of princes fulfil this role. Also the actual Caligula was apparently a Setite plot, as revenge for the whole "Subjugation of Egypt" thing.
* [[Church Militant]]; The Inquisition.
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** Lampshaded in [[Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines]]: A number of other vampires you meet are convinced that their condition really is a pretty sweet deal, what with having a good chance at an eternal or at least really long life of doing whatever the hell they want.
* [[Darker and Edgier]]: Being this, by comparison with DnD and its clones, became one of the main marketing points for World of Darkness games, when they first came out in the beginning of 1990s.
** This essentially caused it to be the Tabletop version of [[Rated "M" for Money]], where people insisted the game was good on ''basis'' of being [[Darker and Edgier]], and were many fan made campaigns included blood, gore, sex, and "mature" themes for the hell of it.
* [[The Dark Side]]: Vampires in the old WOD were like this. Partially subverted, as the degeneration carries nothing but severe penalties. Other beings in the old WOD had their own ways of falling to [[The Dark Side]] - wraiths turn into spectres by giving in to their shadows (sentient embodiments of their negative emotions), mages can turn themselves into Nephandi by inverting their Avatars, werewolves can be turned against their will by forcing them into the Black Spiral Labyrinth, changelings who get particularly bent by Banality can become Dauntain, etc. ... And of course, there is good old getting drunk on power.
* [[Dark World]]: ''Several'' in both settings.
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**** Given that one of the first books of the Revised line, Time of Thin Blood, was a crazy mega-crossover that culminated in one of the big bads of one game literally NUKING one of the big bads of another game, this argument is pretty much entirely invalid. White Wolf only trotted out the 'crossovers are optional' line when people pointed out how terrible the game mechanics were. Revised actually featured MORE crossovers than the 2E line did, what with [[To TB]], Blood Treachery, The Red Sign, etc...
*** There was a full-on semi-officially sanctioned ending for all the game lines used in the official New Bremen [[Digi Chat]] online text-based game run off of the ''White Wolf'' website, since it catered to all the game lines together and crossover (while discouraged) was frequent and inevitable. In the end, the [[Abusive Precursors|Antedeluvians]] rose up to devour their vampiric progeny, werewolves had their final battle with the [[Eldritch Abomination|Wyrm]], [[Satan Is Good|Lucifer's]] Black Cathedral rose out of Los Angeles as a base from which to fight his [[Complete Monster|Earthbound]] former captains, the changelings headed off to [[Another Dimension|Arcadia]], mages found their [[Magick|powers]] overflowing now that humanity's [[Clap Your Hands If You Believe|belief in the supernatural]] was restored and either killed each other or [[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|Ascended]], ''the sun went out'', untainted humans disappeared to some unknowable reward or destination, and the [[Have You Seen My God?|Metatron]] showed up to collect all the [[Our Demons Are Different|Fallen]] who were willing to come with him to [[Utopia Justifies the Means|take another crack at this whole "Creation" thing]] before the world simply collapsed. It was, in fact, fairly epic.
**** Oh, and to expand a little bit: The final scenes for the game were for Werewolf and Demon and happened simultaneously. At the same time as the Metatron took the Fallen off to get involved in Creation, the Wyrm was released (by [[Player Character]] efforts, no less) from the Pattern Web and shattered the material universe, restoring itself and the Weaver to balance so that whole new and better creation could happen. They way that it was run left room for both groups of beings to witness the destruction of the universe at the same time, and for each to understand the very same obliteration from within their own lens. As said above, it was epic and it ended on a very bittersweet and hopeful note. Plus the good guys got to go out in [[The Last Dance|style]].
* [[Enemy Within]]: All vampires suffer from The Beast, animalistic, ID-like force with a hint of supernatural malice, that attempts to compel them into immediately satisfying their instinctive urges, such as craving for blood, fear of sunlight or anger at a slightest provocation, no matter the circumstances. The Shadow from ''Wraith: the Oblivion'', and the P'o from ''Kindred of the East'', fit this trope even better; in both cases, it is intelligent and consciously attempts to turn you to [[The Dark Side]]. (In case it's not obvious, the Shadow and P'o are the same thing.)
* [[Enlightenment Superpowers]]
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*** In ''Demon'', a True Name isn't even really a name per se. Rather, it is the metaphysical representation of something or someone: you don't have a True Name, you ''are'' your True Name. Before the Fall, when the angels still had access to the full breadth of their power, they could use True Names as the targets of any evocation or invocation, instead of having to be in the presence of the actual being or thing -- this was, in fact, the preferred/official method of relaying God's orders across the cosmos, and even of transporting oneself across the cosmos, depending on which House the angel was from (''e.g.'' if you knew Earth's True Name, you could teleport yourself from wherever you were in the whole Universe directly to Earth, by using the appropriate evocation with its True Name as the target).
* [[Immortality Immorality]]: Oh, where to ''begin'':
** Firstly, vampires. While it is possible to live by drinking the blood of animals and to only drain humans of minute amounts, Frenzy is a bitch and most vampires come out of it with a dead human or three on their hands. Killing humans while feeding is strongly frowned on by the Camarilla, for one it brings you closer to the beast and the last thing you want is a Vampire frenzying in [[Safe Zone|Elysium]], for another, there are only so many corpses you can make vanish before the Masquerade is at risk.
* [[Immune to Bullets]]: Vampires tend to take less damage from gunfire than some other forms of attack. Werewolves can easily shrug off most non-aggravated damage, including gunfire, except when faced with [[Achilles' Heel|silver bullets]]. This is part of the reason that Werewolves and Vampires do not get along, Werewolves can rip a Vampire to shreds without a lot of effort due to a combination of their aforementioned damage resistance, and the fact that they deal out Aggravated Damage with their claws.
* [[Ironic Hell]] The Demon book "Days of Fire" had three different visions of the end of the world. In the first one every Clan, Tribe and Tradition gets a unique end; Ventrue's refined tastes become so refined that they can't feed off anyone, the Black Furies are enslaved and submit to men, the Cult of Ectasy reach their perfection only to realise how futile it all was, etc.
* [[Karma Meter]]: More optimistic/more action-oriented gamelines of the old WOD, including Mage and Werewolf, avoided this.
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* [[Killed to Uphold the Masquerade]]
* [[Knight Templar]]: In ''Hunter: The Reckoning'', even normal imbued that had Zeal as a primary virtue often leaned towards this. But they paled in comparison to Waywards, who were prepared to eradicate every last supernatural on the planet - and didn't care about humans who got in their way. In ''Werewolf: The Apocalypse'' becoming a [[Knight Templar]] is a major occupational hazard, considering that werewolves were created to defend all existence from [[Cosmic Horror|Cosmic Horrors]] that are indeed every bit as cosmically horrible as werewolves believe, and also extremely good at corruption, seduction and infiltration.
** Plus Werewolves have managed to [[Knight Templar]] themselves into killing [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|three other races of shapechangers]]. This sounds pretty bad on its own, but without those three races, they've seriously hurt their chances of [[The End Of The World Has We Know It|defeating the Wyrm during the apocalypse]]. Whoops.
** Not to mention the Inquisition and the ''actual'' Knights Templar, who are a small craft of Mages.
* [[Live Action Adaptation]]: ''[[Kindred: The Embraced]]'', a short-lived 1996 series on Fox, based on ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]''.
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* [[May Contain Evil]] (Taken to insane lengths by the Pentex Corporation in ''Werewolf: The Apocalypse''.)
* [[The Men in Black]]: The Technocracy had them.
* [[Metaplot]]
* [[Mind Control]]: Almost everyone can potentially do this, but vampires and mages are particularly notorious for this.
** One of the big edges of oWoD Hunters over normal people was ''total immunity'' to mind control as long as second sight was running. A sourcebook tells of a Hunter that was once Dominated while off-guard by some mid-rank vampires (who had heard about the Imbued and wanted one as a pet), then activated second sight (or had it activated by the Messengers) eight months later, used a candlestick and the Cleave edge to dust ten vamps, and ''got away alive''.
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* [[The Missing Faction]]: Just about every game line has at least one.
* [[Monster Lord]]: Vampire elders below 7th gen.
* [[Mr. Vice Guy]]: Potentially any and every player and character.
* [[Mundane Utility]]
* [[Omnicidal Maniac]]: The Giovanni want to bring about the end of life as we know it, for reasons best described as "Poops and giggles". Setites are also working towards gehenna, though most of them don't know it, but they are doing so in the name of their god.
* [[Our Vampires Are Different]]: Thirteen clans worth of "Different". However, the differences between political views and origins are much more pronounced in the new WoD. All vampires share the same common weaknesses, but each clan has a unique new weakness.
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* [[Power Perversion Potential]]: White Wolf was willing to acknowledge it sometimes. There even was at least one supernatural power specifically aimed for this. Just please don't dwell on [[Squick|Tzimisce body-altering powers]] for too long.
* [[Red Right Hand]]: All of vampire Clan Nosferatu, Tzimisce deliberately do this to themselves.
* [[Resurrective Immortality]]: The mummies are immortals who would resurrect every time they were killed. It is possible to destroy them outright, but not particularly easy (like putting them at ground zero of a nuclear explosion).
* [[Recycled in Space]]: Every game has one or two historical supplements [the Dark Ages and often one other]. Plus, The Year of the Lotus event gave Eastern counterparts for every gameline. Some, like the [[Kindred of the East|Kuei Jin (manga)]], are a totally different type of creature but conceptually similar, while others, like the [[Werewolf: The Apocalypse|Hengeyokai]], are the same creatures as before in a different setting.
* [[Renowned Selective Mentor]]: Placing [[Point Build System|four or five dots]] into the "Mentor" Background will give one of these to your [[Player Character]].
* [[Romanticized Abuse]]: Common in the relation between vampires and their ghouls, among other things. Also, in the book ''Possessed'', you can build a character with superpowers based on one of the seven deadly sins. The "lust" ones pretty much run on this trope.
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