Clan Weaknesses

[MisterJB]

As in accordance with the tabletop game, each Clan is afflicted with a Curse set upon them by Caine himself. Unfortunately, some weaknesses are simply hard, if not impossible, to properly portray in an videogame. This is understandable; however, if you're like me, you've played this game so many times; with mods and without; it hardly holds any surprise for you. So, roleplaying a clan weakness could lead to new, exciting gameplay.

Brujah: They're done well. Brujahs frenzy easily in the original material and Brujahs frenzy easily in Bloodlines.

Gangrel: The worse of the lot, IMO. In Bloodlines, Gangrel gets an -1 Frenzy check and while Gangrels are close to their Beast, this translated into them controlling it rather than the opposite. The actual curse of Clan Gangrel is that, should they frenzy, they receive an animalistic features from claws to cow hudders that can't be removed. Remeber Beckett's red eyes and black fingers? The result of a frenzy.
My way around this is simple, if you frenzy, you can no longer put points into Charisma or Appearance. My justification is that you receivedan obvious animalistic features that makes others shun you.

Malkavian: Done poorly. "But, JB" you'll ask "how can that be? the Curse of Clan Malkavian is madness and they are certainly mad in Bloodlines."
Yes, that is true but the problem is that that "madness" only ever translated into talking funny plus humorous situations without any detriments. No one ever refused to talk to you because you're mad, you've never had the madness affect your gameplay in a negative way, etc.
The Voermans are an example of a Malkavian Character done right. Their madness is a curse, the PC's just isn't.

Nosferatu: Done right, obviously.

Toreador: This one is hard to say. Toreador have always been closer to humanity than other Kindred so, it makes sense for their Humanity shift to double; however, this is not much of a weakness since it also applies to Humanity gains.
And, even if it is appropriate, it just isn't the weakness of Clan Toreador. Their weakness is to become so enthralled in beauty that they can stand helpless for hours on end if they see something they truly find beautiful..
Honestly, I have no idea how to roleplay this weakness short of staying still and letting the Kuei-Jin go to town on you when you see one of their statues or painting.

Tremere: Done properly, actually. Clan Tremere only came about during the Dark Ages; they have no Antediluvian ancestor nor were they ever cursed by Caine. In order for the Tremere to not be the only clan without a weakness, the authors of the tabletop game saw fit to making every Tremere PC have at least one level of Blood-Bond to every member of the Pyramid upon creation.
However, the PC in Bloodlines was Sired outside of the Pyramid. Therefore, it makes sense for it not to be Blood-Bond to any Elder within it.

Ventrue: Bloodlines made the right decision limiting the Ventrue's feeding habits but I believe they did not went far enough. Upstanding humans is a subjective definition so, what I believe is a proper way of roleplaying the Ventrue Curse is to choose one type of NPC and sticking with it; and by that, I mean choosing one of the NPC models (the blonde human male, red haired female, asian, etc) and not feed from anyone else in the game. If you're in Chinatown and there simply aren't any blonde humans around, though luck, the demographics of the area simply do not support your particular tastes.
For example, I chose willingness which meant my Ventrue PC could only feed from willing humans which restricted him to clubs or Heather Poe.
You thought crawling through the sewers when you can't feed on rats is bad? Try not being able to feed on blood bags because they're simply not willing humans.

So, there are my suggestions and I would like to hear what do you think of them and if you have any of your own.

[firedog441]

1 thing that annoys me is I have played tremere all the way to the fight with ming now and still have not gotten any further with strauss than playing as gangrel. So what do I have to do to find out whats through the door at the top of the stairs.

[Wesp5]

You have to be nice to him and solve the plaguebearer and Gargoyle quests without ratting him out to Isaac.

[firedog441]

I beat both quests and dont remember talking about him to Isaak

[scintillating luminescence]

I think you also have to talk to him *before* you talk to Damsel at the Last Round. I think this is after you beat the first or second plague guy. Essentially, Strauss will get offended if you talk to the Anarchs before you talk to him.

[firedog441]

ah tht makes sense

[Rynewulf]

Isn't Beckett a werewolf, not a vampire? I presume using Beckett still demonstrates the point well (Presume, since I am relatively new to 'World of Darkness' series[?] and I presume werewolves also frenzy-and that some similar affects may be had compared to Gangrels) or have I just accidently stumbled on a plot point before finishing the game?

[Anvos]

No Beckett is a gangrel, and definantly a vampire. Gangrels do have similiarities with werewolves though, but I believe the lore says they don't get along any better than the other vampires do with werewolves, or possibly worse since I think the clan has a history of being some of the main troops when the vampires and werewolves have fought.

As for the Tremere thing, I'm fairly sure there is a way if you talk to the anarchs first, as long as you haven't advanced the quest to any major progress, also one of the requirements is you have to chose the talisman/relic as your reward as that's one of the things Strauss judges your worthiness on. Though I do think the story could have stressed Tremere's belief in one of us or eternal outcast more.

[Protag]

im going to bump this interesting thread

even though its 4 years old

[Konstantin]

Well for the original post in V20 the tremere weakness whas changed to, drinking blood from a vampire let them already start at bloudbound 2 so they have only to drink one more time from the same vampires blood to be blood bounded.

[sirericbreheny]

Originally posted by Bloodartist:

Originally posted by MisterJB:

Since the Tremere PC was sired without Strauss' say so and didn't drink said potion, he is not part of the Pyramid and thus, shouldn't actually have a clan weakness.

Tremere is one of only two clans I have not played this game through with, so I have to ask.. Strauss didn't try to bring player's tremere character into the fold afterwards? That might have been an oversight from the creators then..

It is hinted at, at the end of the official Game of VTM-Bloodlines that Maximillion Strauss will make you his sherriff if you ahhhhh give Sebastian LaCroix what he exactly deserves in getting the mummy coffin. I rather like Strauss appearing with friends and saying that LaCroix will face Camarilla Execution. I have incometax to do this week but hopefully will get to the end of China Town and see if I can find the Mummy's coffin to bring it to our Dear Sweet LaCroix and give him the "power he seeks" and from what I have seen LaCroix is on a sugar rush in believing he has given you all the perks of going on his quests. Come to find out with my Tremere I have been a studge and a pawn to him thanks to Ming Xiao's manipulations.

[BADGIRL17]

I don't think you need to go further with Ventrue. Feeding only from willing humes is a bit too much. And what is willing for a Ventrue anyway? They have domination.

[sirericbreheny]

Originally posted by Bloodartist:

Originally posted by MisterJB:

Since the Tremere PC was sired without Strauss' say so and didn't drink said potion, he is not part of the Pyramid and thus, shouldn't actually have a clan weakness.

Tremere is one of only two clans I have not played this game through with, so I have to ask.. Strauss didn't try to bring player's tremere character into the fold afterwards? That might have been an oversight from the creators then..

No Strauss sure does not try because there are a lot of instances where it is better that the Tremere Character of your Player must remain outside of Camarilla influence that Strauss's Overlord might see as "letting the one get away with a spanking, for not the rest of the chantry."

In many of the quests it is good that your character Tremere can work on his or her own that they don't have to bow down to the Tremere overlords or Prince LaCroix since in many of the quests if you fail untill your down to 3 Humanity.....it will be your head on the chopping block at the Nocturn Theater!

[sirericbreheny]

Originally posted by firedog441:

I beat both quests and dont remember talking about him to Isaak

Well in later quests and to the End Game, you do not fink on Strauss.....though I think it is common knowledge that the Gargoyle was Maximilliam Strauss's creation in China Town, I also think that Ming Xiao got to that Gargoyle and convinced it that it would be better off if it helped the Kuei Jin take over Los Angeles, though it is never specified why the Gargoyle looses faith in Strauss.

[sirericbreheny]

Originally posted by Anvos:

Thinking about Malakavian I'd say its hard to judge how adequately it was done due to the variability of their curse being any number of types of mental disorders and since some could leave you relatively high functioning.

I've always just considered that our character had the same problem as Grout (with the cryptic speach due in part to our character being less suited to deal with insanity than Grout and when we were sired), where for the first couple decades to century we'd be relatively well functioning, but our ability to filter out the prophetic part of the madness network diminishes until they begin to drown out your own thoughts.

About Miss Voerman, I wouldn't really call her multiple personality disorder a Malkavian curse as her backstory apears to suggest she had multiple personalities from early on in life due to abuse from her father.

I agree, weither you name her Therese or Jeanette of course they have a bipolar disorder but their father whom embraced one of them and discovered that the "other inside" was too rebellious and had to be "medically removed" even so trained his daughter to become a "business woman" to carry on her Daddy's business but when Daddy got lonely unfortunately the Malkavian curse fully bloomed. In my opinion VTM-Bloodlines even without a real MMORPing online game carries out it's ideas of curses that the vampires inherit, I would have liked to portray an Professor Grout in the game as a real character as you have to train other vampires in trying to medically cure the Vampiric Disease. I suppose the other curses you have to view for what you have to take as part of being a vampire character, my own Tremere Vampire is not something you take lightly. You are "CURSED" and have to play the vampire very carefully or if not you wind up with only 3 humanity points and then appear on stage and get your head cutoff for your own voyage to Hell.