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Felix
2nd March 2006, 04:23 PM
Taking a short break from this mammoth pile of paper in the process of final proof-reading (Would it KILL you to spell check once in a while?) to bring up a very important concept that we as the beta-testers ignore all too often for cinematic reasons...

The Dark... as it is 'lovingly' refered to... is not dumb.

i.e. Has never held a seat in presidency (though many in the Senate)

Now I love a good epic of saving the world from almost certain doom as much as the next guy... but in order to run a longer, more intriguing campaign, you as the future of 7/13 games should bear in mind that this will only occur at MOST once every 12 cycles. This being stated, I would like to throw out some pointers that may be utilized in running your first campaigns... you know.. the ones where you don't kill off 99.95% of the population due to some odd strain of the flu on the first game session.
("In Colorado... it's snowing" LoL! What the HELL was I thinking???)

Views of the general public, mostly the cynics of the New World, will ALWAYS be a constant bane of the players. At times, this may prove to be more obnoxious than the Dark itself. The reasoning behind this is that the Dark will utilize the differences between the disbelieving New Worlders to shun and isolate the Old Worlders hellbent in their quest to rid areas of the Dark's influence. Allow me to provide an example:

In a classic campaign of hunting and destroying members of the dark, the persona of 'Vampire Slayer' is given about as much credit as that Goth kid you see at the coffee shop that everybody thinks is just a bit off and viewed as more of a comical caricature rather than a force to be reckoned with. This makes the inevitable need to deal with the general public in order to trade goods or find a place to bed down for the evening much more difficult. Lets also take into consideration that if the punk DID appear menacing, he might as well have the label of 'Walking Donut Shop' as far as local law enforcement are concerned.

At the first sign of trouble... characters observed by New Worlders slaughtering a vampire (which don't exist in the eyes of FNW's) are going to themselves carry the title of 'Deranged Seriel Killer.'

Many campaigns run through modern days will incorporate quite a bit of subterfuge and diplomacy in order to keep the appearance of New World while at the same time dealing with the Truth of Reality.

Or you can cop-out and take the first portal off-world to try and blend into a world that makes sense while at the same time forsaking the Ducks (FNW's) in hopes that somebody else has the stones to save your homeland.

:D

If anybody's confused, drop a line and we'll try and clear things up. Otherwise, stick around and we'll have many more pointers and more specific game angles involving 'Not the end of the world' campaigns upon initial release of the book.

Solarious
3rd March 2006, 01:16 PM
You guys somehow knew that I loved games that make marginal sense. It's like comming home.

God, you guys are the crack dealers of my imagination...

Christopher Ashe
3rd March 2006, 09:16 PM
Well while embelished quite a bit (believe me) there is a lot about CoE that comes from my personal life experience, so it's generally meant to mix fantastical horror with the reality of what i think is a universal representation of evil - not really something that "might be evil in someone's eyes" but rather raw unforgiving nasty. ;)

Domini
3rd March 2006, 10:09 PM
At the first sign of trouble... characters observed by New Worlders slaughtering a vampire (which don't exist in the eyes of FNW's) are going to themselves carry the title of 'Deranged Seriel Killer.'

So it's kind of like the Masquerade, where they have to stay hidden?

Christopher Ashe
3rd March 2006, 11:32 PM
Well the Lilim, the vampires of CoE differ greatly i think from those in the World of Darkness. The Masquerade tradition was upheld in WoD due to the need for secrecy, and the need for secrecy exists among the lilim just as it does all creatures of the Dark. However, there is no society or social castes among the Lilim, they pretty much are very territorial and loner-types (except the Children of Lyria who truly embrace the crusade of the Dark).

Pretty much any creature of the Dark who bears an appearance or aspects thought of as "monstrous" by the New World will seek to hide itself from their eyes. Since this is done fairly well, the New World disbelieves their existence altogether.

Now Church ran a campaign in which an alternate reality existed where there really was no New World and the races of CoE and all of its concepts were common knowledge...that was an interesting twist

Christopher Ashe
3rd March 2006, 11:36 PM
Now speaking of the subject matter of this post, CoE is not specifically always meant to be about the end of the world. There are many reality threatening scenarios and it's likely that many GMs will use this angle, however CoE IMHO is actually more about a constant struggle to keep the end of the world from ever coming about, or to delay it as long as possible.

But for end of the world scenarios there's Last Days (working/original title) - a Seven13 game that actually preceded the Cycle of Existence based largely on Stephen King's the Stand that is specifically about the end of the world...I wouldn't look for that book too soon as there are a lot of CoE supplements to work on, but it's definitely one i've considered making into a core book and at the very least a free supplement idea. Much of what CoE now owes itself to Last Days.

Domini
6th March 2006, 05:00 PM
Perhaps you should hold out on it for ten or so years and then bring it out like Gehenna when this topic is buried deep in the Broken Doll Studios forums and everyone has long forgotten about it.