nWoD player here: can you sell me on oWoD?

I've played nWoD quite a while. It's measure in years, not months, now. However, I got into WoD after nWoD already came out, so that's what I learned. I've been told that some people have been "converted" to prefer oWoD over nWoD. On the other hand, I've heard people tell me horror stories (not the kind we like) about stupid metaplot and mechanics even more broken and silly than the ones in nWoD.

What about oWoD is better, from the perspective of oWoD players, than nWoD? I'm really curious to hear what about nWoD is stupid, lame, or inferior when compared with its oWoD counterpart. If I get some good answers, I really will give some oWoD books a cover to cover read through and will try playing the game.

Now is your chance to convert an nWoD heathen! lol

I like the Mage setting better. The Werewolf setting works better for LARP. That's about it.

Well, I'll start by saying that I think that the best solution is to take the best bits from OWoD and the best bits from NWoD and combine them.  Both versions have a lot of great elements.  I consider myself an OWoD player (primarily Mage: the Ascension), but I've taken mechanical and setting ideas from Mage: the Awakening and find my game improved for the additions.  That said, here are some suggestions for things that I feel are stand-out elements for the OWoD.

OWoD works really well if you take a toolbox approach to it, just like NWoD.  In the NWoD, the toolbox angle is called out really well and continually reinforced.  OWoD did this too, but not as well.  You were told in most books "if you don't like it, don't use it", but this message sometimes got lost along the way, often because later releases built on the metaplot of earlier releases, meaning that some players felt they needed to include the metaplot or they were doing it wrong.  This is daft, of course.  Use what metaplot and setting elements you like and ditch the others.  I'm running a Mage game at the moment, for example, that has no Traditions or Technocracy.  Works great.

The OWoD setting as a whole is broader in scope and focus than NWoD.  NWoD benefits from a tight focus and well-defined setting.  OWoD's settings are vast and sprawling (sometimes too much so.)   The advantage of this is that it allows you to insert pretty much whatever kind of story you like and the game will support it.  You can, for example, use the setting from NWoD games in the OWoD.  You can use the standard OWoD setting.  You can invent your own.  Sure, some people will tell you that you're not playing real OWoD if you do this, but you can laugh at them and pelt them with d10s until they go away.

The OWoD rules are lighter and less concerned with balance and cohesion.  A bug for some, a feature for others.  I like the fact that you can easily eyeball rulings, ignore rules elements, add others, spindle, fold and mutilate to your heart's content, and the system won't fall apart.  It's simple and robust.  While NWoD has a tighter, better balanced system (no doubt about it), I find that it also has too many rules.  I prefer to take cool rules ideas from the NWoD and import them into the OWoD.  The OWoD combat system, for example, really needs streamlining.  Cut it down to one or two rolls rather than four!  I use an attack roll (attacker's dice pool reduced by defender's dodge pool) and a damage roll (damage pool reduced by defender's soak pool, if they can soak the damage type).  Makes for a much faster game and keep the probabilities intact.

To re-state, I don't think that you need to be sold on OWoD vs. NWoD.  I think you need to take a good look at both, steal what you like, and make your own WoD from the bones of both.  Just my take on things :)

There are aspects of both that are good in their way.  The clan structure and Blood Potency in nWoD is fantastic, and in some way superior to oWoD, but Generation in oWoD gives you the since of being in over your head.

The statement of “silly” meta-plot is mostly a matter of opinion, you will hear otherwise from some posters, but it is a matter of what you like better.  I like the old meta-plot for its depth and story.  Every time you got a new book, a new aspect of the story and background was reviled.  Was it real or is it the view of the writer of the book and from their view on the subject, well that’s up to the ST.  I think is a greater story telling tool to have all this knowledge and not knowing which is real and which is legend.  It gave it more depth.  But this is vampire.  I like Mage in oWoD much better.

New Mage seams shallow to me.  (Holding for the posts saying how wrong I am) Now that that’s over.

I think the magic system is easier to flow with; IE casting on the fly is easier to understand.  Also, nWoD Mages seems like a spell list with Rotes being such a large part of the system.  I don’t like spell list systems, that’s why I don’t play a caster in D&D, but like I said this is my opinion on the system.

nWoD Werewolf . . . well . . . let’s just say that I do not like it much.  At all really.  I played it several times.  5 to 10 game sessions over the course of about 5 to 6 months, and well.  I just did not get the point.  I read the background, kind of got were they were coming from and where they were wanting to go with it, I just did not feel like it was very successful in execution.  I simply did not have fun with it.  It is a very valid system and it works VERY well.  I just did not like the setting much and did not have fun with it, and in the end that’s all that really matters.

I have more fun with oWoD Mage and Werewolf then nWoD of the same.  nWoD Vampire is fun and very interesting, but it lacks certain . . . oomph.

I know that there will be several posts stating that I am wrong, or that opinion is not a valid reason to like something over something else, or at least that’s what ususaly happens, but I say try them out for yourself.  Make sure you get some people that actually have played it back in the day, most importantly the ST.

BloodKnarledFur:

Every time you got a new book, a new aspect of the story and background was reviled.

Freudian slip? :p

Hmmm...not sure anyone can really be sold on it. I mean, NWoD streamlined the system, making it better. It took me alittle bit to come to that realization tho.

Honestly, while I like NWoD for the system and the mortal stuff, I still like OWoD when it comes to Vampires and even Mages. Werewolves are kind of 'eh' to me. Wraith is cool...but Geist is just as cool a concept. Hunter is better in NWoD than OWoD in my opinion.

But, they each have their strengths and weaknesses.

Of course, one thing I do find amusing, on the Vampire front. In OWoD, you had Clans and bloodlines, and everyone used to bitch about how many bloodlines there were, and that in Requiem, that wouldn't be an issue. So, sure, Requiem only has like 5 Clans, but they like 40+ bloodlines. Way more than Masquerade ever had....so I just find that kind of amusing. Sure, Bloodlines can be optional...but they could in OWoD as well..

They lost me when a Werewolves's claws don't do Aggravated damage.

Macai:

What about oWoD is better, from the perspective of oWoD players, than nWoD?

I am paraphrasing Stephen Brust's thoughts on what makes a good novel:

Everyone sets out to write the coolest story they can think of.  How much the reader thinks it's a good story depends on how much he agrees with the author about what's cool.

Do you think vampires caught in a hierarchical jihad as they try to transcend a vampirism that is a curse upon Caine for killing Abel is cool?  Then you'll think Masquerade is a good story.  If you think it's cool that werewolves are eco-terrorists fighting a cosmic god of pollution, or that magic is the act of believing in something so hard that it comes true, then you will like Apocalypse and Ascension.

I can think of things I like about pretty much any OWoD game setting, but that doesn't really answer your question the way I understand it.  What's better about the OWoD is the stuff you think is cool.  If you think the cool outweighs the baggage (and you'll find a lot of people who'll stridently insist that even the baggage is a feature and not a bug), then the OWoD is for you.

WolfMan86:

They lost me when a Werewolves's claws don't do Aggravated damage.

Almost nothing in NWoD does that. Lethal in NWoD is what Agg was in OWoD.

Mr Gone:

WolfMan86:

They lost me when a Werewolves's claws don't do Aggravated damage.

Almost nothing in NWoD does that. Lethal in NWoD is what Agg was in OWoD.

Interesting..

I like oWoD better mostly because of the metaplot, even though I personally almost never actually used it as is. It acted as inspiration not steelbound fact. Wraith was and still is my favorite oWoD game with Mage a close second but I like and play/ST all of them.

All rpg's are merely a tool box for the ST and having a rather extensive metaplot gives a plethora of tools for ST's that you just wont get without it. Not all tools are mechanics afterall. It also gives oWoD it's overall feel.

I'm in the minority in this but I still, personally, like oWoD's system more than nWoD's but thats for everyone to decide themselves.

In the end your enjoyment has little to do with which WoD you play or even which game in it, in the end it has more to do with your ST and the rest of your troupe.

oWoD has a better feel to it, in my opinion. It's a world that was alive, inhabited by NPC's with a lot of background and interesting personalities. I never found those in the nWoD (don't shoot me). I never thought the rules where bad and I didn't care about the "balance" of the game, because it gives you a more "realistic" feel. A werewolf crushes a vampire's head in the blink of an eye, and that's just the case. When the same vampire is a 1000 years older he'll do the same to the werewolf. I actually resent the fact that they tried to balance things out in the nwod. It's the world of darkness, not the perfect world of "balanced" supernaturals.

etherial:

BloodKnarledFur:

Every time you got a new book, a new aspect of the story and background was reviled.

Freudian slip? :p

??

No, I ment to say that. 

With every book came more story.

How is that a Freudian Slip?

you said "reviled" instead of "reveiled"

Revealed and reviled are two different words, with different spellings and meanings.

Contextually, it looked like you probably meant revealed; was made known and shown to the audience.

Some folks didn't like the changes made when books were published that altered the metaplot, overall setting or moved clans, sects and characters that they had become attached to into a different direction. They reviled the new material, disliked, hated and loathed it.

Thus... a possible freudian slip, using a word that you subconsciously find more appropriate than the one you intended to use.