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Vampire: The Masquerade is the most popular RPG system, second only to Dungeons and Dragons. However there is an awful lot of differences between the two role playing systems. Being a Vampire and feeding on people, instead of an armored hero, is one of them.
Vampire:The Masquerade (or V:tM as will be called from now on) features the Storytelling system. It created a revolution in rpg gaming when it was first introduced and White Wolf evolved it a lot since the first edition of V:tM.
V:tM's rulebook, if anything else, looks fantastic. The green marbled effect together with the image of a rose on the cover is certainly and eye-catcher. Hey, it got my attention after all.
The first thing the reader is presented with is a 16-page first person perspective story introducing us to the vampire's world, the World of Darkness as it reffered to. It is a very clever way to evoke the mood of the setting without having to resort to long dry explanations in the main text. Next, we are presented with a paragraph informing as the vampires are not myths in the World of Darkness.
World of Darkness The World of Darkness lives up to each name. It has a gothic atmosphere. The supernatural has infiltrated many facets of our life, our politics and history. Vampire live in big cities, feeding on the large groups of mortals that inhabit them. Vampires are afraid to leave the cities, because Werevolves would ambush them (Werevolves live in the wilderness and there is a separate Rulebook published about them).
Character Creation Character creation is a points based system, and as such it takes quite some time to create a character, but not as much as in event based systems like MechWarrior RPG or Twilight 2000. First players are have to come up with a concept for their character, and next to chose a clan. Choosing a clan is like picking a class in Dungeons and Dragons. The clan determines what special abilities (called disciplines) the vampire has, as well as detailing a major character flaw. The next step is deciding on the nature and demeanour of the character and choose attributes. There are 3 categories, with each one having three attributes for a total of nine. Each attribute is rated from one to five. Skills are dealt similarly. Next come virtues and backgrounds. Virtues are important to Vampire as they determine Humanity which is used to see how monstrous the character has become, which is good for role playing the character. Backgrounds all have varying effects on the character such as people they know, how much cash they have and so on.
System V:tM's system is call the Storyteller system and is a dice pool system, where each task requires a number of ten sided dice to be rolled in order to determine the success or failure of the task. Each of these that is equal to or more than the determined difficulty number is a success. With the number of successes determining how successful or otherwise an action is. It’s a simple system but it seems to work well enough. Rolling 1s is a 'blotch' and negates a one success roll. Enough of them and a critical failure occurs.
Clans Vampiric society is made up of two sects, the Sabbat and the Camarilla who are waging a war based on freedom and survival. There are some exceptions though, since there are vampires that don't belong to either sect and are independent. Of the sects the Camarilla are nominally the ‘good’ guys, but in V:tM nothing is that clear cut.
All 13 clans from the previous 2 edition are presented in the book, including The Sabbat and Independent Clans. Merits and Flaws of each clan are covered as enemies and clan's derangements. Each clan has different powers, 'Disciplines', and a different image.
Conclusion V:tM has a lot of focus, which is a good thing. Players feel like they HAVE a destiny to fulfill, they have a goal. Not like Dungeons and Dragons, where players attack castles, storm dungeons and visit a tavern or two in order to get clues for the next adventure (not that I don't like dungeons and dragons, only that is more mindless).
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