Advice for starting a new online VTM game

As the topic says, I recently made myself a forum to run a few online rpgs on, and as VTM has always been near and dear to my heart, I know I want one of them to be a VTM game (classic world of darkness, not a big fan of the newer versions....)

I've decided to base the RPG in a real (albeit small) city in my home-state, but I'm currently torn on what format and particulars to use for this new game. In the past I've run VTM rpgs on yahoo groups (back when it was yahoo games...) and it was a very informal, mostly writing and story-based affair- players filled out a character profile of my own design rather than the standard VTM character sheet...and we didn't worry about dots and stats and certainly didn't use dice rolls (the game had a clearly defined set of rules players had to abide by, with protections in place to keep someone's character from getting stomped over and insta-killed without their players' permission and outcome of fights were worked out ahead of time before being RP'ed out on the board), there were, of course, rules to prevent Johnny come-newly player from joining, making a 5th gen and doing whatever the heck he wanted, as almost all of my games have no god-modding/anti mary-sue guidelines.

But recently I've been browsing online vampire games (so many sadly defunct it seems...) that use the VTM character sheets, dice rolls, everything. It just seems to me that an online version of VTM as opposed to a tabletop or a larp group is free to be a different kind of RPG animal...in my old games since we didn't worry about "He can't say that to me! I have 5 dots in appearance!", we were free to focus on the actual story and how the characters developed and interacted with each other.

So any tips or suggestions? I'm thinking of sticking with my old methods, because as the saying goes, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. But wanted to see what other people thought before I dive in and set the game rules up. I'm a little worried VTM purists might turn up their nose at a game that doesn't require dice rolls or the traditional character sheet...dots and all.

I have no actual experience with this, but "don't fix what isn't broken" seems like a reasonable policy to me. As long as you have likeminded palyers it should work well.

I use charactersheets, but I hide them from the players. All players only know their own sheets, and they can guess some features of other characters by observing. If they shake hands with the Brujah Primogen and that the Brujah Primogen isn't careful, well, it'll be easy to notice that the brujah primogen has a fairly good score in STR

I roll most dice rolls, because players mustn't know how well did they character do on certain stuff :p So if they see "the primogen isn't lying", it's either because he isn't lying, or because they failed their subterfuge roll.


If anything, use Fantasy Grounds or Rolisteam to play online on a "virtual table", add in Team Speak, and it's just like if you're around the same table. Except you're still in your PJs.

Remember, the ST sets everything, and you tell your players about rules, things that are accepted, things that aren't, and what books they can use to create their characters and stuff.

Hmmm....maybe I could try going with a `hybrid' approach. I could keep my character profile template (which is basically a standard, good-quality RPG form focusing on actual *character* things such as likes, personality, ect...), and then have players do a smaller, more `authentic' character sheet that actually lists what their stats in at least disciplines is...and that part of their sheet is kept hidden from the other players)

Then if it comes down to a potential fight the players involved have two options; they can either decide ahead of time who wins/what allowable injuries are, ect...or they can opt to go purely by what their hidden stats state, I do dice rolls as a neutral party, and its decided that way.

That way players more comfortable with a traditional approach could be placated, and people unfamiliar with VTM going into the game wouldn't be alienated. Heck you could do the same with what generation each character is and have the public sheet just list what clan that character is. That way if you have several characters hanging out in a bar you don't *know* what generation or how old that cranky Gangrel in the corner is, so you'd best be cautious about picking a fight.

Sorry, big paragraph was big and not separated enough :/
Can't read >_>

If you're just RPing for RPing, anything goes. I'm a Campaign ST, hence why I need to have a certain control over the situation. I've got players smart enough that they don't have benefits into killing each other : after all, it's a group game

You can read how I run the game.. in this topic, for instance : https://camarillaedition.darkbb.com/t1700-rue-judaique-62

But do as you wish ! May I join ?

Okay, it took a long time (procrastinate? me? >_>;; ), but the rpg is finally set up, if anyone's still interested in even just taking a look.

Note, I was torn between two concepts; either going with the premise that Gehenna never happened (it really WAS all just myths and paranoia), or setting it *after* Gehenna. Since Gehenna IS canon, I went with the latter. "But Margi! all vampires died during Gehenna!" Yes, but that's the fun of RP. White wolf's always followed the philosophy take what you like, discard what you don't, and I like the premise I came up with.

So City of Ashes is set 9 years after Gehenna. Gehenna as happened in the RPG was a combination of Wormwood and the scenario where several of the antediluvians were killed during the lead-up to the final scene, and the rest of them were destroyed in the last act.

Only in my premise when all the antediluvians were dead, The Withering stopped. So the oldest and most powerful Kindred were killed during Gehenna, some clans/bloodlines went extinct, but some vampires *did* survive, but they experienced changes too. (evil moderator cackle)

Anyway, the link to the game is:

http://w11.zetaboards.com/Divine_Madness/forum/3806152/