Vampire: The Masquerade
Vampire: The Masquerade is a tabletop role-playing game, created by Mark Rein-Hagen and released in 1991 by White Wolf Publishing, as the first of several Storyteller System games for its World of Darkness setting line. It is set in a fictionalized "gothic-punk" version of the modern world, where players assume the role of vampires, referred to as Kindred or Cainites, who struggle against their own bestial natures, vampire hunters, and each other.
Several associated products were produced based on Vampire: The Masquerade, including live-action role-playing games, dice, collectible card games, video games, and numerous novels. In 1996, a short-lived television show loosely based on the game, Kindred: The Embraced, was produced by Aaron Spelling for the Fox Broadcasting Company.
Development
Vampire was inspired by role-playing games such as Call of Cthulhu, RuneQuest, and Nightlife, as well as the writings of Joseph Campbell and vampire films such as The Lost Boys. Rein-Hagen felt that hunting vampires would get boring as a game premise, so he came up with the idea of a game wherein the players played vampires instead of hunting them. Rein-Hagen said he purposefully did not read Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles until "very late" in the development process but admitted she was probably an influence on the vampire films that inspired the game. He wanted to go beyond what Anne Rice to create a whole secret vampire society and culture.Some of Vampires central themes of the power of belief developed out of Rein-Hagen's religious upbringing. Inspired by a comic book given to him by White Wolf business partner Stewart Wieck, Rein-Hagen developed the idea that the Biblical Cain was the original vampire. Rein-Hagen has said the idea of Cain as the progenitor of all vampires was a "big turning point." After initially "trying to shy away from religion", this encouraged him to lean into the religious themes.
Vampire was conceived as a dark urban fantasy game, with a gothic feel similar to TSR's Ravenloft. It would also be the first of a series of linked games sharing the same game world. Shannon Appelcline suggests that its visual style was considered striking at the time – its simple cover featured a photo of a rose on green marble. The game also focused on plots, intrigue, and character as opposed to more straightforward dungeon scenarios. While the RPG industry in general had been trending towards a more narrative approach, Vampire is considered one of the first mainstream games to focus on these elements. The vampires, or Kindred, were also given an extensive list of broad supernatural powers called Disciplines, which included superior strength, speed, and toughness, as well as other powers such as mystic senses, mind control, and blood magic. This helped the game appeal to fans of the superhero genre, which was more marketable at the time than horror. The 13 clans, based on vampiric archetypes, were added late in the development process, after a suggestion by Chris McDonough that players needed greater structure, similar to the character classes of other games. This system proved very popular with players and led to the popularization of the splatbook.
For the game's mechanical elements, Rein-Hagen turned to Tom Dowd, co-designer of Shadowrun. Vampires system of "comparative" dice pools drew on the mechanics innovated by Shadowrun, changing only the type of dice rolled from six-sided to ten-sided. Players rolled a number of dice determined by their skills, similar to games like Champions, but rather than adding the results of the dice together, Vampire counted the number of dice which met or exceeded a target number or difficulty. Skill levels were relatively low, ranging usually from one to five, and were represented with dots rather than numbers, which was the standard of its contemporaries. Players could quickly calculate their dice pool and roll against the assigned difficulty rating. Appelcline suggests this system aided a style of play which emphasized story over mechanics, as it was easy for new players to quickly grasp, though it sometimes produced unexpected results, such as a highly skilled character being more likely to fumble.
Publication history
The original 1991 version was superseded by a second edition in 1992 and the Revised Edition in 1998. The Vampire: The Masquerade game line was discontinued in 2004, at which point it was superseded by Vampire: The Requiem. In mid-2010, White Wolf switched exclusively to a print-on-demand model via online role playing game store DriveThruRPG, starting with a number of formerly out of print Vampire: The Masquerade books and gradually making more titles available as they were ready for print.''20th Anniversary Edition''
On March 17, 2011, White Wolf announced Vampire: The Masquerade, 20th Anniversary Edition, which was published during the Grand Masquerade event in New Orleans on September 15–17, 2011, and released to the attendees. Customers not attending The Grand Masquerade were offered a limited time preorder option. The 20th Anniversary Edition contains revisions of rules and is a compendium of information previously provided in supplemental material in the game's earlier life. V20 officially revived Vampire: The Masquerade as part of White Wolf Publishing's shift to a print-on-demand business model, and multiple new Masquerade products were subsequently announced. After White Wolf ceased publishing books directly, the licences to its tabletop roleplaying games, including Vampire, were transferred to Onyx Path Publishing, founded by former White Wolf Art Director Rich Thomas. White Wolf's live-action Mind's Eye Theatre products were published by By Night Studios.Fifth edition
In August 2015, Onyx Path Publishing announced its intention to create a fourth edition of Vampire. Two months later, Paradox Interactive purchased White Wolf and all of its intellectual properties from CCP Games. It was announced that White Wolf would move ahead with a new edition of the game instead of Onyx Path, and White Wolf would remain a subsidiary of Paradox Interactive. With game designer Kenneth Hite as lead developer, Vampire: The Masquerade, Fifth Edition was subsequently released in early 2018. It was distributed by Modiphius Entertainment, with production of supplements licensed to multiple publishers, including Modiphius and Onyx Path. After the release of the Anarch sourcebook in November 2018, Paradox Interactive announced it would no longer allow White Wolf to develop the series in-house due to references in the sourcebook to the anti-gay purges in Chechnya and other controversies surrounding White Wolf. In December 2018, Paradox announced that Modiphius Entertainment would continue the development of the series with final approval by Paradox Interactive.In November 2020, Paradox Interactive announced that Renegade Game Studios would become the publishing partner for the entire World of Darkness brand and they would release all future Vampire: The Masquerade products. The company also announced it would bring IP development back in-house under the World of Darkness team, hiring former lead developer Justin Achilli as the World of Darkness Creative Lead. In 2021, the core rulebook and several other products were revised and updated to "meet new ethical standards enforced by the team at Paradox". V5 was released on Roll20 in June 2021. In July 2021, Renegade Game Studios released the updated versions of Vampire: The Masquerade, Fifth Edition books for retail distribution. The online toolset World of Darkness Nexus, which supports Vampire: The Masquerade and other games in the series, was launched in June 2022. Nexus includes bundles of both physical and digital game products, and contains a rules and lore compendium, character creation and management tools, matchmaking, and video chat functionality.
Gameplay
Concept
The game uses the vampiric condition as a backdrop to explore themes of morality, the human condition, salvation, and personal horror. The setting is a gloomy and exaggerated version of the real world in which vampires and other monsters exist, called the World of Darkness.Storyteller System
Vampire is based on the Storyteller System. The actions taken during gameplay are expressed using ten-sided dice. The number of dice used correspond to the player's current skill level, often based on two different skills that together represent the player's ability. For example, to land a punch, the character's dexterity and brawl skill are combined. The resulting number is the number of dice rolled to perform the task. The Storyteller then sets a target number or difficulty which must be achieved on at least one die to succeed. The more dice which meet or exceed the difficulty, the more successful the action is.In addition to the general Storyteller rules, it uses a number of specific mechanics aimed towards simulating the vampiric existence. A vampire has a blood pool signifying the amount of human blood or vitae currently in their body; this blood can be spent to power abilities and perform supernatural tricks. These tricks simulate many of those portrayed in film, such as turning into animals or mist, surviving and healing from grievous injuries or having unnatural charisma and powers of hypnotic suggestion. Close to the central theme of the game is humanity. Vampires each have Humanity scores, measuring how closely in touch with human nature they are; as Humanity decreases, vampires become more susceptible to the ''Beast, the feral side of the vampiric soul that is driven entirely by rage, hunger, and fear. Inhumane actions risk lowering a vampire's Humanity score. If the individual's Humanity drops to zero, the Beast takes over and the vampire becomes a monstrous, barely sentient creature called a wight''.