The Inside Scoop on Gaming

In March, White Wolf began what it described as "an epic tale," told over the course of thirteen novels, each individual book a work focusing on one of the thirteen vampire clans from their Vampire: the Masquerade game line. We were first appalled by Clan Novel: Toreador, then further dismayed by Tzimisce. Gangrel was abundant with pleasant surprises and mature storyline, and Setite blew us away. The author of Gangrel returned to give us an interesting -- even, at times, amusing -- view of vampirism in Ventrue.

Now, sixth in the line, comes one for which I'd been waiting: Clan Novel: Lasombra, written by the person who has been responsible for some of the most interesting, horrifying and playable work done by White Wolf: Richard Dansky.

Now, I'm going to state right here and now that I'm a Dansky fanboy. I love Vampire: the Dark Ages. I love Wraith: the Oblivion. I'm not sure why, but whatever Dansky touched in his time at White Wolf (so recently concluded) was invariably gold by the time it hit the shelves. I've trashed a couple of the books in this series with a vengeance. I've glowed over a couple of others. I hope this is enough proof that I'm being objective here. I'll try to restrain any fawning I might feel the urge to do, and get right into whether or not you should buy this book.

As with other reviews of this series, I'll be focusing on:

tone, or "flavor" of the novel,
characterization,
plotline, or the simple events of the story and the story itself,
and how this novel impacts the rest of the series as a whole.

Tone is something which cannot be overlooked in a novel. What separates such classics of, for example, sci-fi as Foundation or 2001: A Space Odyssey from total schlock such as any number of sci-fi novels on the shelves at your local bookseller, or 3001: The Final Odyssey, is often in large part the tone of the book. How much does the language chosen by the author insult or respect the reader's intelligence? How often does it bog them down with what's known as "purple prose," or spend too much time explaining what would best be shown in context? What brought Toreador crashing down, in my estimation, was largely the tone; it read like a bodice-ripper Danielle Steele might have written in her youth and now denied having authored. Setite, on the other hand, respected the intelligence and emotional maturity of the reader. One of Lasombra's strongest points, as in the games which Dansky has guided, is its tone. Here is a novel about vampires who used to be human and have had a few hundred years to develop a monstrous side that remembers a gentler past. Here is a novel that realizes vampires still think a convertible car is neat. Here is a book that doesn't bore me with the unrelenting tragedy of it all, but pulls no punches when tragedy happens. Here is a novel which describes the poignant facts that even a vampire can still feel afraid, and can still enjoy herself.

If you purchase two vampire novels this year, and you've got two brain cells to rub together, make one of them Lasombra.

The best way to guage the tone of a book is often by looking at its dialogue. Does it sound like something you or your friends would actually say? Is it "natural?" Here is another point where Lasombra sparkles. There's a fantastic scene in an elevator -- I won't say more, for fear of ruining it -- but suffice to say that the Sabbat pack traveling down in the elevator has a conversation that sounded real. Dansky shows the same gift for dialogue that Gherbod Fleming has shown for characterization in his work (Gangrel and Ventrue) and that Kathleen Ryan has shown for emotionally intense subject matter and the feelings people have for one another (Setite). No matter which character is speaking -- be it the centuries-old and pervertedly pious Cardinal Moncada or the brash ruffian MacEllen -- their speech flows naturally and beautifully across the page. There are scenes in this novel where the dialogue alone evokes images of some of our best movie-making, where the conversations carried the story far more than any shoot-'em-up Schwarzenegger fest ever could: Breakfast at Tiffany's, Six Degrees of Separation or Auntie Mame.

By the same token, Dansky displays a gift for action which matches his gift for dialogue. By this I don't mean plot alone, I mean simple description of action scenes. Whereas both Toreador and Tzimisce, and to a point even Gangrel, all had some difficulty describing well the action scenes, Lasombra does one of the better jobs I've seen in recent print. You get to experience the fights & chases from a variety of perspectives, each colorfully described but also clearly documented. There's no difficulty understanding what's going on when something fast-paced does happen, and in the end it comes off as very cinematic for a novel. As I've spouted previously on how I'm a "visual thinker," according to one educational theory, this was a hit with me.

Still, any story has difficulty being better than its cast of characters. I felt that, while characterization itself wasn't as strong as the strongest in the series so far (a hard-fought tie between Fleming and Ryan), it was definitely well done. The character of Lucita was interesting, understandable, and kept me interested the entire time. There were times when I wondered if she were the Lara Croft (see Tomb Raider, for a variety of game platforms) of the vampiric world, but when we do get inside her head, it's an enjoyable experience. Here's a professional assassin who could assassinate an Assamite (say that three times fast). She knows her business, and she's so good at it she's looking forward to impossible odds for the simple challenge they'll hold. She also gets a kick out of a slinky black car, and it's nice to know that vampires have that teenager with a shiny new driver's license locked away in their heads as well.

Another nice couple of brush strokes when it comes to characterization are in the forms of Vykos and Marcus Vitel. Vykos is finally (finally!) referred to as an 'it' on occasion, and Vitel finally grows a spine and uses it. The interplay-from-a-distance between these two speaks volumes about where the series might be headed, and paints portraits of two characters whose futures are growing increasingly uncomfortably intertwined. I loved what I saw, particularly of Vykos. Rather than a rabble-rousing weirdo, Vykos is the charismatic monster it was born to be. Lovely.

Another wonderful character, if understandably rare in his appearance, is that of Cardinal Moncada of Madrid. He's thoroughly unattractive and thoroughly insane, thoroughly convinced that his perversion of faith in the God of Roman Catholicism explains away any action. He counsels his agents, making them take formal confession and assigning absolutions. He rambles on (wittily) about the over-use of chess as a metaphor for political maneuverings, while playing a game of chess that's a metaphor for political maneuverings. I was terrified of him, and that made me love him.

In all honesty, though, I think the best character, and the most compelling character, wasn't the supposed "main" character: it was Talley, the guard sent by Moncada to protect the three archbishops leading the Sabbat offensive. Talley is known as The Hound to his associates, for centuries of hunting, tracking and assassinations of his own. He's old -- ancient, by Sabbat standards -- and powerful, and has a few hundred years of experience with Lucita under his belt. We get to see much more of the inside of his brain, and I found it believable and fascinating.

What is also arguably the best feature of the characterization in Lasombra is the development of "cameo" or "sideline" characters. The Nosferatu tinkerer, the Brujah anarch-turned-Camarillan in Buffalo -- these make the "side stories" all the more engaging, without sacrificing the attention paid to the "stars" of the book.

I would talk more about Camarillan portrayals here, but I'm saving that for later.

So the novel is mature and witty and sharp, and the characters are interesting, and you're never quite sure for whom you're supposed to be rooting because you like too many of them; but what about the story? Well, Dansky hits paydirt again, making this tie for best novel so far. We see a lot of action, and we see a lot of events explained. We also see some of the more interesting and subtle intrigues and shadow-plays (pardon the pun) of the Lasombra who run the Sabbat. The book finally shows the Camarilla doing something other than chatting over cocktails, and gives those of us who hold the opinion that the Sabbat isn't the end-all, be-all of coolness in the world of Vampire the opportunity to cheer once or twice. Overall, the plot also leaves no hugely gaping holes or demands that we suspend our disbelief any further than we already have.

That doesn't mean I don't have problems, though.

It's awfully nice to see the Camarilla doing something, even if that something is as simple as letting the Sabbat get a little cocky while it consolidates its resources. It's also nice to get an explanation for why the Camarilla is behaving as it is.

What I'm left wondering is why the heck the Camarilla has to hire an assassin. Yes, Lucita may be the best in the world. Yes, the Camarilla prefers to let someone else get their hands dirty if at all possible. Yes, the Camarilla's leadership has a lot to worry about, so delegating isn't a bad thing. Still, there's a part of me that was tremendously disappointed to read yet another novel in which the Camarilla was pretty ineffectual at doing anything itself. If Lucita is able to take out a dozen (easily that many, if not more) vampires on her own, in two weeks, does the Camarilla have no one of a similar power level? Why does Jan Pieterzoon, in Ventrue, someone who should by all rights be sitting on more Fortitude than he can count, nearly get eaten alive a handful of times in one night by one Sabbat pack, but Lucita manages to off vampires left and right with a minimum of effort? Has everyone in the Camarilla spent their unlife maxing out Carousing and Bureaucracy, and utterly ignored the possibility that they might have to defend themselves against another vampire at some point?

A lot of this can be explained by the game-views of the authors, I would imagine. Given the events and tones of Gangrel and Ventrue, it's not hard to imagine that Gherbod Fleming comes at the story from a perspective that tragedy happens on a grand scale: hordes of Gangrel are incapable of taking down Leopold in a fight, and the leadership of the Camarilla present in Baltimore is able to be duped by a spy in their midst. Dansky, on the other hand, seems to come at it from a perspective that tragedy and difficulty come on a much more personal level: Lucita succeeds, and the Camarilla succeeds in its plans, but the costs are often personal in nature, and each individual seems to know that with each night their immortality draws closer to its end. You can even find some support for this in Dansky's games. Wraith focuses very heavily on personal tragedy (since the PCs are dead), and Vampire: the Dark Ages focuses very heavily on the feeling of being alone in a variety of ways (civilization has largely collapsed, travel is dangerous, relatively nearby cultures and nations and even cities seem completely alien to the average native-born citizen of a municipality).

Still, the fact remains that there are some disparities of continuity. Ventrue leads us to believe that even a massively powerful elder might not be "all that." Lasombra shows us overconfident vampires who get taken down fairly easily. I mean, for Pete's sake, Lucita makes someone's head explode by blowing them a kiss (ostensibly this is some wacked out Potence). Pieterzoon, on the other hand, takes a few gunshots in Ventrue and drags himself across the next twenty pages in danger of torpor, then limps for the rest of the novel.

As for how this book impacts the series, I was left feeling unclear on what to say here. Sean Riley, a much-respected fellow StoryTeller, predicted on the public V:tM mailing list that we would see an ultimate victory for the Camarilla because each novel keeps pushing that Camarillan comeback back to the next novel. I've spent plenty of time in this space, whinging about when I'd finally see the Camarilla fight back, so I hope he's right. If nothing else, Lasombra goes a fair way towards setting up the Camarilla for an effective defense, and that alone is a step towards balancing the overall storyline, something the series is in desperate need of. This was book six of thirteen; book seven is Assamite (which just plain frightens me with the potential for its simple badness, although I gain confidence from the fact that Gherbod Fleming has been given the unenviable task of making a book about Assamites interesting), and book eight is Ravnos, written by the much-praised Kathleen Ryan. That leaves five books, four of which focus on Camarilla clans, in which to restore some balance to the "epic tale" we're being told. If it's going to happen, it has to happen fast.

Let's just hope it happens at all.

In the meantime, yes, you should buy this book. The tone is mature, the characters are engaging, and the storyline is entertaining. I found myself surprised by the climax, but most of all this book managed to make me like the Sabbat's leadership, something I fully expected never would happen in the series. Richard Dansky is a gifted game developer and a gifted novelist, especially for his first time out. As the notes in the back of the book say, we hope it's not his last.

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Clan Novel: Lasombra
Author: Richard Dansky Category: Novel Company/Publisher: White Wolf Line: Vampire: the Masquerade Cost: $5.99 Page count: 277 ISBN: 1-56504-807-5 SKU: WW11105 Playtest Review by Michael Williams on 10/14/99. Genre tags: Modern_day Horror Espionage Conspiracy Vampire Gothic Diceless	In March, White Wolf began what it described as "an epic tale," told over the course of thirteen novels, each individual book a work focusing on one of the thirteen vampire clans from their Vampire: the Masquerade game line. We were first appalled by Clan Novel: Toreador, then further dismayed by Tzimisce. Gangrel was abundant with pleasant surprises and mature storyline, and Setite blew us away. The author of Gangrel returned to give us an interesting -- even, at times, amusing -- view of vampirism in Ventrue. Now, sixth in the line, comes one for which I'd been waiting: Clan Novel: Lasombra, written by the person who has been responsible for some of the most interesting, horrifying and playable work done by White Wolf: Richard Dansky. Now, I'm going to state right here and now that I'm a Dansky fanboy. I love Vampire: the Dark Ages. I love Wraith: the Oblivion. I'm not sure why, but whatever Dansky touched in his time at White Wolf (so recently concluded) was invariably gold by the time it hit the shelves. I've trashed a couple of the books in this series with a vengeance. I've glowed over a couple of others. I hope this is enough proof that I'm being objective here. I'll try to restrain any fawning I might feel the urge to do, and get right into whether or not you should buy this book. As with other reviews of this series, I'll be focusing on: tone, or "flavor" of the novel, characterization, plotline, or the simple events of the story and the story itself, and how this novel impacts the rest of the series as a whole. Tone is something which cannot be overlooked in a novel. What separates such classics of, for example, sci-fi as Foundation or 2001: A Space Odyssey from total schlock such as any number of sci-fi novels on the shelves at your local bookseller, or 3001: The Final Odyssey, is often in large part the tone of the book. How much does the language chosen by the author insult or respect the reader's intelligence? How often does it bog them down with what's known as "purple prose," or spend too much time explaining what would best be shown in context? What brought Toreador crashing down, in my estimation, was largely the tone; it read like a bodice-ripper Danielle Steele might have written in her youth and now denied having authored. Setite, on the other hand, respected the intelligence and emotional maturity of the reader. One of Lasombra's strongest points, as in the games which Dansky has guided, is its tone. Here is a novel about vampires who used to be human and have had a few hundred years to develop a monstrous side that remembers a gentler past. Here is a novel that realizes vampires still think a convertible car is neat. Here is a book that doesn't bore me with the unrelenting tragedy of it all, but pulls no punches when tragedy happens. Here is a novel which describes the poignant facts that even a vampire can still feel afraid, and can still enjoy herself. If you purchase two vampire novels this year, and you've got two brain cells to rub together, make one of them Lasombra. The best way to guage the tone of a book is often by looking at its dialogue. Does it sound like something you or your friends would actually say? Is it "natural?" Here is another point where Lasombra sparkles. There's a fantastic scene in an elevator -- I won't say more, for fear of ruining it -- but suffice to say that the Sabbat pack traveling down in the elevator has a conversation that sounded real. Dansky shows the same gift for dialogue that Gherbod Fleming has shown for characterization in his work (Gangrel and Ventrue) and that Kathleen Ryan has shown for emotionally intense subject matter and the feelings people have for one another (Setite). No matter which character is speaking -- be it the centuries-old and pervertedly pious Cardinal Moncada or the brash ruffian MacEllen -- their speech flows naturally and beautifully across the page. There are scenes in this novel where the dialogue alone evokes images of some of our best movie-making, where the conversations carried the story far more than any shoot-'em-up Schwarzenegger fest ever could: Breakfast at Tiffany's, Six Degrees of Separation or Auntie Mame. By the same token, Dansky displays a gift for action which matches his gift for dialogue. By this I don't mean plot alone, I mean simple description of action scenes. Whereas both Toreador and Tzimisce, and to a point even Gangrel, all had some difficulty describing well the action scenes, Lasombra does one of the better jobs I've seen in recent print. You get to experience the fights & chases from a variety of perspectives, each colorfully described but also clearly documented. There's no difficulty understanding what's going on when something fast-paced does happen, and in the end it comes off as very cinematic for a novel. As I've spouted previously on how I'm a "visual thinker," according to one educational theory, this was a hit with me. Still, any story has difficulty being better than its cast of characters. I felt that, while characterization itself wasn't as strong as the strongest in the series so far (a hard-fought tie between Fleming and Ryan), it was definitely well done. The character of Lucita was interesting, understandable, and kept me interested the entire time. There were times when I wondered if she were the Lara Croft (see Tomb Raider, for a variety of game platforms) of the vampiric world, but when we do get inside her head, it's an enjoyable experience. Here's a professional assassin who could assassinate an Assamite (say that three times fast). She knows her business, and she's so good at it she's looking forward to impossible odds for the simple challenge they'll hold. She also gets a kick out of a slinky black car, and it's nice to know that vampires have that teenager with a shiny new driver's license locked away in their heads as well. Another nice couple of brush strokes when it comes to characterization are in the forms of Vykos and Marcus Vitel. Vykos is finally (finally!) referred to as an 'it' on occasion, and Vitel finally grows a spine and uses it. The interplay-from-a-distance between these two speaks volumes about where the series might be headed, and paints portraits of two characters whose futures are growing increasingly uncomfortably intertwined. I loved what I saw, particularly of Vykos. Rather than a rabble-rousing weirdo, Vykos is the charismatic monster it was born to be. Lovely. Another wonderful character, if understandably rare in his appearance, is that of Cardinal Moncada of Madrid. He's thoroughly unattractive and thoroughly insane, thoroughly convinced that his perversion of faith in the God of Roman Catholicism explains away any action. He counsels his agents, making them take formal confession and assigning absolutions. He rambles on (wittily) about the over-use of chess as a metaphor for political maneuverings, while playing a game of chess that's a metaphor for political maneuverings. I was terrified of him, and that made me love him. In all honesty, though, I think the best character, and the most compelling character, wasn't the supposed "main" character: it was Talley, the guard sent by Moncada to protect the three archbishops leading the Sabbat offensive. Talley is known as The Hound to his associates, for centuries of hunting, tracking and assassinations of his own. He's old -- ancient, by Sabbat standards -- and powerful, and has a few hundred years of experience with Lucita under his belt. We get to see much more of the inside of his brain, and I found it believable and fascinating. What is also arguably the best feature of the characterization in Lasombra is the development of "cameo" or "sideline" characters. The Nosferatu tinkerer, the Brujah anarch-turned-Camarillan in Buffalo -- these make the "side stories" all the more engaging, without sacrificing the attention paid to the "stars" of the book. I would talk more about Camarillan portrayals here, but I'm saving that for later. So the novel is mature and witty and sharp, and the characters are interesting, and you're never quite sure for whom you're supposed to be rooting because you like too many of them; but what about the story? Well, Dansky hits paydirt again, making this tie for best novel so far. We see a lot of action, and we see a lot of events explained. We also see some of the more interesting and subtle intrigues and shadow-plays (pardon the pun) of the Lasombra who run the Sabbat. The book finally shows the Camarilla doing something other than chatting over cocktails, and gives those of us who hold the opinion that the Sabbat isn't the end-all, be-all of coolness in the world of Vampire the opportunity to cheer once or twice. Overall, the plot also leaves no hugely gaping holes or demands that we suspend our disbelief any further than we already have. That doesn't mean I don't have problems, though. It's awfully nice to see the Camarilla doing something, even if that something is as simple as letting the Sabbat get a little cocky while it consolidates its resources. It's also nice to get an explanation for why the Camarilla is behaving as it is. What I'm left wondering is why the heck the Camarilla has to hire an assassin. Yes, Lucita may be the best in the world. Yes, the Camarilla prefers to let someone else get their hands dirty if at all possible. Yes, the Camarilla's leadership has a lot to worry about, so delegating isn't a bad thing. Still, there's a part of me that was tremendously disappointed to read yet another novel in which the Camarilla was pretty ineffectual at doing anything itself. If Lucita is able to take out a dozen (easily that many, if not more) vampires on her own, in two weeks, does the Camarilla have no one of a similar power level? Why does Jan Pieterzoon, in Ventrue, someone who should by all rights be sitting on more Fortitude than he can count, nearly get eaten alive a handful of times in one night by one Sabbat pack, but Lucita manages to off vampires left and right with a minimum of effort? Has everyone in the Camarilla spent their unlife maxing out Carousing and Bureaucracy, and utterly ignored the possibility that they might have to defend themselves against another vampire at some point? A lot of this can be explained by the game-views of the authors, I would imagine. Given the events and tones of Gangrel and Ventrue, it's not hard to imagine that Gherbod Fleming comes at the story from a perspective that tragedy happens on a grand scale: hordes of Gangrel are incapable of taking down Leopold in a fight, and the leadership of the Camarilla present in Baltimore is able to be duped by a spy in their midst. Dansky, on the other hand, seems to come at it from a perspective that tragedy and difficulty come on a much more personal level: Lucita succeeds, and the Camarilla succeeds in its plans, but the costs are often personal in nature, and each individual seems to know that with each night their immortality draws closer to its end. You can even find some support for this in Dansky's games. Wraith focuses very heavily on personal tragedy (since the PCs are dead), and Vampire: the Dark Ages focuses very heavily on the feeling of being alone in a variety of ways (civilization has largely collapsed, travel is dangerous, relatively nearby cultures and nations and even cities seem completely alien to the average native-born citizen of a municipality). Still, the fact remains that there are some disparities of continuity. Ventrue leads us to believe that even a massively powerful elder might not be "all that." Lasombra shows us overconfident vampires who get taken down fairly easily. I mean, for Pete's sake, Lucita makes someone's head explode by blowing them a kiss (ostensibly this is some wacked out Potence). Pieterzoon, on the other hand, takes a few gunshots in Ventrue and drags himself across the next twenty pages in danger of torpor, then limps for the rest of the novel. As for how this book impacts the series, I was left feeling unclear on what to say here. Sean Riley, a much-respected fellow StoryTeller, predicted on the public V:tM mailing list that we would see an ultimate victory for the Camarilla because each novel keeps pushing that Camarillan comeback back to the next novel. I've spent plenty of time in this space, whinging about when I'd finally see the Camarilla fight back, so I hope he's right. If nothing else, Lasombra goes a fair way towards setting up the Camarilla for an effective defense, and that alone is a step towards balancing the overall storyline, something the series is in desperate need of. This was book six of thirteen; book seven is Assamite (which just plain frightens me with the potential for its simple badness, although I gain confidence from the fact that Gherbod Fleming has been given the unenviable task of making a book about Assamites interesting), and book eight is Ravnos, written by the much-praised Kathleen Ryan. That leaves five books, four of which focus on Camarilla clans, in which to restore some balance to the "epic tale" we're being told. If it's going to happen, it has to happen fast. Let's just hope it happens at all. In the meantime, yes, you should buy this book. The tone is mature, the characters are engaging, and the storyline is entertaining. I found myself surprised by the climax, but most of all this book managed to make me like the Sabbat's leadership, something I fully expected never would happen in the series. Richard Dansky is a gifted game developer and a gifted novelist, especially for his first time out. As the notes in the back of the book say, we hope it's not his last. Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty)