Vampires and Forsaken

Now, this is probably a post better placed in the Werewolf forum, but I wanted to make sure I could get answers from people who know Vampire. I do not know Vampire very well at all. I bought the book mostly for friends who were interested in the line, and for antagonist purposes. And it looks so damn pretty on the self, and Alex Maleev's art. Yes.

There is a gangrel discipline/bloodline that ascend from werewolves, and a discipline in the Book of Spirit that allows Spirit interaction

The Vampire in question used to be a friend of one of the werewolves before he was embraced. Or was the brother of one of them. A mentor. While the Uratha are pack-oriented, if they accept him as one of their own, there's no real reason why his lack of spiritual prowess would prove an obstacle. His inability to hunt in the daytime, certainly. But nothing insurmountable.

As for dealing with the Shadow, I'd either have him use Cruac rituals, give him sufficient Auspex to notice Shadowy stuff, or play up that his disciplines make him useful in ways that they aren't, as he can accomplish social things much easier than they can.

But yeah, play up that there's a personal connection between the vampire and at least one of the players.

doctor kevorkian:

There is a gangrel discipline/bloodline that ascend from werewolves, and a discipline in the Book of Spirit that allows Spirit interaction

The good doctor is talking about the Dead Wolves from Shadows of Mexico. They're bloodline discipline is designed around being able to run with a pack of wolves.

The Discipline from the Book of Spirits is Blood Tenebrous which is for dealing with spirits, seeing into twilight, and penetrating the gauntlet.

claire_miller:

What reasons would a vampire have for helping out werewolves?

If you want to avoid the "you guys are old friends" route, you could make it more a relationship of necessity. Maybe the vampires and werewolves in an area have a common goal or common threat, and their respective leaders have agreed to set aside there differences and work together for the time being. To facilitate cooperation and as a show of good faith, a vampire was sent to work with your pack, sort of as an emmissary, and maybe in return, one of your packmates was sent to work with a vampire coterie. (As weird as a supernatural exchange program sounds, it could work).

claire_miller:

What reasons would a vampire have for helping out werewolves?

In no particular order:

Overlapping interests (I'm sure both sides would want to kick some VII vamps out)
Mutual benefit (I'll use my memory-erasing powers when you need them if you'll help me with my problems)
Friendship (Sure, bro, whatcha need?)
Blackmail (It doesn't matter if you kill me, your secret will still come out; so looks like we're traveling together for a while)

Primary piece of advice: make sure you're giving the Uratha plenty of reasons to do their stuff at night. The first nWoD game I was in started with all of us as mortals. My character got ghouled shortly into the chronicle and Embraced shortly before Forsaken hit the shelves. Then the rest of the group became Uratha when W:tF came out, essentially making me the lone Kindred in a W:tF game. The fact that my character couldn't act in the day became a major problem, and eventually I dropped her for an Iron Master. I immediately started enjoying the game again.

Which is to say, be careful to keep the vampire player involved.

My first Werewolf pack had a Daeva. She was the adopted sister/lover of the Alpha. It worked pretty good and was really funny.

These are all excellent posts, thank you so much for your help!

Sparketh:

The good doctor is talking about the Dead Wolves from Shadows of Mexico. They're bloodline discipline is designed around being able to run with a pack of wolves.

Yep, I thought of this too, as both the doktor and Sparketh have beaten me to it. Shadows of Mexico's Dead Wolves (or Lobos Muertos) is what you want. Its the only Shadows of... book I own and I really love this bloodline.

As far as keeping the vamp player interacting with uratha, it would probably work best if the pack was nocturnal or did most of their patrolling at night. Or maybe the pack Totem is nocturnal,  or it manifests only at night.

JimB:

Friendship (Sure, bro, whatcha need?)

I quoted Jim because I think this is one of the best, and most often over looked motives to why supernaturals might hang together.

If I were you, before scouring into all the different books to try and figure out how to make it work as per the rules I'd start with house ruling the situation. I think it might end up saving you from some grief.

If I doing that I think one of the things I'd house rule is that Sunlight doesn't kill a vampire. Unless you think you can manage to maintain all your games at night. It would suck for your Vampire player to be stuck sleeping in a coffin during some daytime adventure. There was a show on a couple of years ago called Moonlight about a Vampire P.I. A pretty good series. Well those vampires could be in the sun for a little while. It was uncomfortable. But over time they got sicker and weaker. I thought about doing this for my vampire game. Having sunlight drain blood at a rate of 1 per every half hour with some dice penalties for perception, concentration and other roles that might be effected if you were being irritated.

The other hurdle to tackle is the spirit world. I guess the easiest way is to let Vampire's side step. Make the Hisil a communal spirit realm frequented by all the different supernaturals.

What I do when I run World of Darkness is consider that each game is in a universe by its self. Werewolf might cross over into Vampire, Mage, and Changeling no problem. But if I run Mage, I do away with Werewolf the Forsaken all together and make up shapeshifters with Changing Breeds. Mainly because of how I want to portray the setting and it makes life easier rather than trying to reconcile all of the different rules.

claire_miller:

What reasons would a vampire have for helping out werewolves?