The Ages: They Are Dark (Monday Meeting Notes)

Monday Meeting

Biggest news here is that we are all finishing up the preparation for the Deluxe V20 Dark Ages Kickstarter. Rollickin’ Rose is pulling the edited text into a single downloadable document, Mirthful Mike is finishing the last touches on the proposed V20 DA Screen design, and I’m tweaking the goals a bit still (we have several new types of Rewards, with more possible depending on how Stretch Goals go). If you haven’t heard, it goes live on Kickstarter tomorrow, Tuesday the 7th, at 12 noon Eastern US time!

I think I mentioned this before, but for those of you who missed it, or who have newly joined us, there is an important reason for why the book was named V20 Dark Ages. At the time I submitted the schedule that included the book to CCP, we didn’t know if we’d have a chance to do a full-fledged 20th Anniversary Edition like V20 or W20 or M20. But, we kept hearing from a lot of our Vampire fans that they loved The Dark Ages and needed a new version. Plus, we were looking at more books for the V20 line, rather than another whole line; we just didn’t, and still don’t, have enough bandwidth to ramp up the classic WoD titles all at once. All these factors came together to produce the idea that we would do a Dark Ages book, but it would be like the classic Vampire: The Dark Ages: a supplement to the main line that might grow into its own. (Note that the book is standalone, you don’t need V20 to play it).

Now this in no way should suggest any bias against the Dark Ages: Vampire book, or the associated DA lines, because both the setting of V20 Dark Ages and the rules have been reworked by David Hill and his amazing team of writers who know both DA:V and V:DA, and their intention was to pull the best aspects from all the editions as well as to tie the book firmly into the V20 line. Take a read through once you can get the link to the text on the V20 Dark Ages Kickstarter site tomorrow, and see how well they’ve incorporated things – and added a lot of exciting new perspectives to the cultures and characters of the times.

Which is another reason why we can’t call this a 20th Anniversary Book like V20, as this book was designed with different principles in mind. A book like V20 was designed to distill the classic experience and to lock down a lot of those gaming moments. I often said that I wanted people to feel the same way as they did when they opened their first WW book when they open a 20th Anniversary book. V20 Dark Ages, though, is an exciting new edition. Lucita and Vykos are still there somewhere in the world, but there are a whole new set of multi-cultural characters with new dark stories to follow.

And because we want everybody revved up for the KS start tomorrow, I should also mention these cool elements of the book: the thirteen vampire clans and nineteen bloodlines, including all three castes of the dying Salubri: the Warriors, the Watchers, and the Healers, drawn from every edition of Vampire, and from all over the known world. A new approach to Tzimisce Koldunic Sorcery. And also, “apocrypha of the clans” featuring fiction, lore, Roads, and alternative castes within the clans of Caine.

And for our purposes right now, here are some Dark Updates:

DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM ROLLICKING ROSE (Projects in bold have changed listings)

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)

Beast: the Primordial core book (Beast: The Primordial)

W20 Pentex Employee Indoctrination Handbook (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)

Mage: the Awakening 2nd Edition, featuring the Fallen World Chronicle (Mage: the Awakening)

Fallen World Chronicle Fiction Anthology (Mage: the Awakening)

M20 How do you DO that? (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

M20 Book of Secrets (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Cursed Necropolis: Rio (Mummy: the Curse)

Secrets of the Covenants (Vampire: The Requiem 2nd Edition)

Wraith: the Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition

V20 Black Hand: Guide to the Tal’Mahe’Ra (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

W20 Novel by Mike Lee (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)

Exalted 3rd Novel by Matt Forbeck (Exalted 3rd Edition)

W20 Shattered Dreams (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)

W20 Changing Ways (Werewolf: the Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition)

Redlines

Mummy Fiction Anthology (Mummy: the Curse)

Exalted 3rd Fiction Anthology (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Promethean: the Created 2nd Edition, featuring the Firestorm Chronicle (Promethean: the Created)

Second Draft

Idigam Chronicle Fiction Anthology (Werewolf: the Forsaken)

V20 Lore of the Clans (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

Development

Exalted 3rd Edition core book- From Holden: “We’re getting edits back and implementing them this week, while working on Arms of the Chosen”. (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Firestorm Chronicle Fiction Anthology (Promethean: the Created 2nd Edition)

V20 Red List (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

V20 Ghouls (Vampire: the Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition)

Werewolf: the Forsaken 2nd Edition, featuring the Idigam Chronicle (Werewolf: the Forsaken)

World of Darkness Dark Eras- Vampire chapter (WoD Dark Eras)

Sothis Ascends (Mummy: the Curse)

Editing

Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition core book (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Development (post-editing)

World of Darkness Dark Eras core book (WoD Dark Eras)

ART DIRECTION FROM MIRTHFUL MIKE