Revisiting VtM: Bloodlines

[Lhynn]

Independent is the way to go, you are powerful enough to not give a shit.

Problem is that choice is one of going alone politically and the game makes it clear that's suicidal.

Suicidal for whomever decides to cross you you mean.

 

[Excidium II]

Yeah, I'm sure the bloodlines PC can manage just fine.

 

[Lacrymas]

The problem is not whether you can survive alone, that's guaranteed because you are a very low gen vampire, but whether you can actually do something of importance. The whole spectrum of political intrigue is going to be a closed door to you. I suppose it's valid if you don't care about any of this and you want to live your unlife as far away from the politics as possible, but how is that fun?

 

[Excidium II]

What's fun about politics in a borderline dead domain like LA? There's not a hint of future for anyone that isn't Tremere. The Bloodlines PC can just restart (un)life somewhere else.

 

[Old One]

My favorite part of Chinatown has always been Mr. Ox. His quests aren't so great, but he's the best character.

 

[Lacrymas]

We don't know if that's possible, maybe the Camarilla have an information network that will explode with the information that a very powerful vampire went against it. If I was Strauss, I'd do just that, not to mention that you might want to join the Sabbat.

 

[Delterius]

What's fun about politics in a borderline dead domain like LA? There's not a hint of future for anyone that isn't Tremere. The Bloodlines PC can just restart (un)life somewhere else.

You missed something Cainbby said. The choice isn't just which side to take over LA but also your reputation. In the Lone Wolf ending you turn against every major faction of the Undead world and burn all the bridges. You kill the Camarilla Prince and the Kuei-jin leader, plus the Sabbat elder. Given that the Anarchs are nearly gone, everyone thinks you are a wild cannon. Plus, there's nobody to call off LaCroix's blood hunt on you.

 

[Excidium II]

That's true, but I still think someone as powerful as the PC could work his way into something. There's no better problem solver.

 

[Beastro]

I always felt that the Camarilla ending is the wisest. The anarchs are just a group of punks with no idea what is going on or how to keep things together

Not exactly.

Like real Leftists, they're mostly Useful Idiots drummed up on hope and idealism doing the work of their masters without realizing it.

Independent is the other choice I think is valid, but it kinda puts your character in a bad position after that and is somewhat out-of-character with the whole game (since you've been running errands this whole time).

Is it?

You get fucking vamped, wake up and almost get executed, then get spared and have to be a lackey to the one who spared you until you finally work out of the situation and have a chance to finally think about what's happened to you (in-character that is) and what you want to exactly do with your new "life", which is to put all these freaks behind you and move on from their squabbling.

Siding with the Cam is more an admission that you're stuck in this new life and better work what's on your plate knowing you're being used, but you're going to be used regardless, or worse, if you go independent.

Going Anarch is either becoming and Useful Idiot to be led around by the ideals of your old life or being cynical enough by what you've seen to want to be a leader of it and doing the manipulating yourself.

I think any sensible person would just gtfo of LA.

You do that and you've got the Cam after you, but like I said, from your characters perspective after the roller coaster you've been on, it's understandable to do so, even if it ignores that your life is trust into a situation you'll never be free of.

That's all window dressing though, the worlds going to end soon after anyway so it might actually be the best situation to try and have some time to yourself before everyone gets fucked.

The Camarilla offers order and structure, while the game doesn't show that they are somehow abusing their power or anything like that, so I think they are "clean", at least as clean as any authority figure/organization can be.

They at least understand and have a mind for what they their responsibilities are. Like real government, it's not because it's good, it's because the alternatives are worse and I'd rather have smug assholes in suits running things that kids with Che's face on their shirts thinking they know better when they know nothing.

 

[Lhynn]

You kill the Camarilla Prince and the Kuei-jin leader, plus the Sabbat elder.

So you realize how stupefyingly suicidal it sounds to go against this dude, dont you?

 

[Excidium II]

Going Anarch is either becoming and Useful Idiot to be led around by the ideals of your old life or being cynical enough by what you've seen to want to be a leader of it and doing the manipulating yourself.

Or just be someone like Isaac.

 

[Delterius]

You kill the Camarilla Prince and the Kuei-jin leader, plus the Sabbat elder.

So you realize how stupefyingly suicidal it sounds to go against this dude, dont you?

Its like SCO said once, the World of Darkness is like an onion. Concentric circles of ever more powerful assholes. Bloodlines acknowledges the PC's absurd power growth at multiple times but it still makes it clear that going completely alone is a dangerous position for them.

 

[Beastro]

Going Anarch is either becoming and Useful Idiot to be led around by the ideals of your old life or being cynical enough by what you've seen to want to be a leader of it and doing the manipulating yourself.

Or just be someone like Isaac.

True, but his position only exists because of the tension between the two factions. If the Cam wins then they'd tighten control while if the Anarchs do the more uppity would quickly hold issue with his barony.

He does seem to be one of the few working to create a little niche for himself like his old life, but I doubt it would last whether or not Gehenna happened.

 

[Excidium II]

You kill the Camarilla Prince and the Kuei-jin leader, plus the Sabbat elder.

So you realize how stupefyingly suicidal it sounds to go against this dude, dont you?

Its like SCO said once, the World of Darkness is like an onion. Concentric circles of ever more powerful assholes. Bloodlines acknowledges the PC's absurd power growth at multiple times but it still makes it clear that going completely alone is a dangerous position for them.

Any position is dangerous...

 

[ZagorTeNej]

It is very rail-roady, but it's not true that you can't play loyal to the Anarchs. You can tell the anarchs early that you want to side with them, and they tell you to be their mole in LaCroix's organisation. If you do so, then LaCroix will comment on it later on.

He'll comment on it but nothing will really change (you can even still side with him in the end as an Anarch Spy as long as you kissed his ass throughout the game as well). He'll call Blood Hunt on me after Griffith Park regardless if I played as the prince's Ventrue lapdog or an Anarch loving Brujah who flipped him off at every opportunity.

Bloodlines is a bit like Deus Ex in that regard, it has great reactivity usually manifested through dialogue but C&C itself is very limited.

It helps a lot if you bear in mind that LaCroix is not the 'Camarilla choice'. He's his own guy, willing to fuck over anyone to pursue his own aims. His whole plan is an absolute refutation of the Camarilla's laws and belief system - diablerising a fucking ancient, something a Camarilla prince isn't even supposed to believe in, and trying to take its power to leap from 'middle management' to 'major global player' by doing something (diablerie) that is the worst of the worst for transgressions against the Camarilla - instant death sentence stuff, even for a prince.

There is a Camarilla ending available, involving an older, wiser potential leader who does have his own skeletons in the closet, but is nonetheless genuinely committed to the idea that the Camarilla's various laws and structures, sensibly and mercifully enforced, is the best way of running things. Having that as being separate to the LaCroix side fo things makes it less jarring to get rail-roaded into working for LaCroix (whether as his willing stooge, as a mole, or as a double-agent).

I never thought of Lacroix as an ideal Camarilla representative and I think the game does a decent jobs of showcasing a variety of personalities on both sides (Tung and Strauss being the sensible ones regarding Camarilla).

Also, note one very deliberate thing. Remember when the Malk on the beach tells you who you can trust ('the man on the couch' = Mercurio, 'the lone wolf' = Beckett') and who is using you (every other motherfucker who utters any line of dialogue anywhere in the game). Notice that Nines is in the second category.

Not saying that Nines isn't universally acknowledged in-game (save from the aforementioned malk) a stand-up guy. But he's got a revolution to run, and there's something a little bit fucking hypocritical about him calling LaCroix's merciful sparing of you as a PR stunt (makes LaCroix look good, he gets to use you for his shitty tasks and you'll probably get yourself killed in the process anyway), when the exact same thing applies to Nines. Good anarch propaganda, they get you to do their shit-work, and that work will probably get you killed, solving their problem.

Sure, it appears that Nines also would like to help you anyway, simply because he's a decent guy. But again, that applies equally well to LaCroix - his stress and frustration with the pressures of ruling seems quite genuine, and it's clear that he wants to see himself as the kind of 'enlightened ruler' who would execute the law-breaking sire while sparing the innocent off-spring;.

Plus it does feel, on first playthrough, like the developers are pushing you toward the anarchs. But a lot of that is simply because most games train you to take quest-givers at their word. The game puts a hell of a lot of effort into showing the anti-anarch counterargument, e.g. that:
- the anarchs are failing even to control their own small territory, with vampire-born STDs, ghouls threatening the masquerade because their vamp has skipped town and no system in place for another vampire to pick up the slack, goddamn apocalypse cults setting up in the sewers...l
- For every Nines there's a Damsel who you really would not want running the place, and yet there's no clear succession strategy to ensure that doesn't happen (that sounds like bullshit theory-crafting outside the scope of the game, but remember that if you choose to side with the Anarchs it actually throws that issue at you by making it look like fucking Damsel has taken over running the anarchs until it pans out that Nines is still alive;
- the anarchs are giving leader status to absolute monarchs like the Hollywood guy, even though everything about that kind of barony should be 100% contradictory to the anarch's ideology. This seems deliberate. You hear all this great ideological stuff about how left-anarchism can work with vampires in a way that it can't with humans, fuck the man and all that. Then you go to hollywood, and the 'anarch' leader is an old-money absolute royalty who is no different to LaCroix. If that's the pragmatic compromise the anarchs need to make, then what's the point of the whole exercise - it simply proves the Camarilla's claims that top-down rule is necessary to preserve the masquerade.

That doesn't mean that the Camarilla (i.e. the wiser/older 'camarilla prince' ending, not the LaCroix side) are the 'good guys'. Just that it's a lot more balanced than 'Nines saves you twice' suggests on the surface of things.

I wasn't trying to make the case for the Anarchs as being the only logical choice, the one devs intended or something (who I side with in any gameplay is largely depended on the clan I choose). My point is that I could be playing as a Brujah that is enamored with Anarchs and their cause and I'd still have no choice but to rat on Nines, it was one of those instances where it felt jarring that I had no choice whatsoever.

Not to mention that regardless of his reasons or the bigger picture, Nines saving your life can't be easily hand-waived. Even as a staunch supporter of the Camarilla and its laws and regulations you could be morally conflicted (the protagonist is a fledgling afterall which means still having strong ties with humanity) in regards to just throwing him to the wolves.

 

[Excidium II]

(the protagonist is a fledgling afterall which means still having strong ties with humanity)

???

So what? Even in our not quite as dark world humans are p. immoral.

Plus with vampires being the way they are, the PC hasn't been in their midst for that long but it's enough to suspect that Nines didn't do anything out of altruism. He wouldn't be around for about a century if that was the case, he's just using the PC for his own ends like everyone else.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

???

So what? Even in our not quite as dark world humans are p. immoral.

Plus with vampires being the way they are, the PC hasn't been in their midst for that long but it's enough to suspect that Nines didn't do anything out of altruism. He wouldn't be around for about a century if that was the case, he's just using the PC for his own ends like everyone else.

PC is a week old fledgling, he doesn't know shit about the vampire society and still thinks very much you like your average human with all the emotions it pertains. Unless you were a sociopath before the embrace I imagine you'd feel indebted to Nines enough to omit seeing him at the scene of the crime, why would you fully disclose everything to the Prince? You don't think that should be a choice left to the player?

 

[Excidium II]

I wouldn't feel indebted to him.

He might not understand all the nuances but it's enough to realize it's a snake nest. Not much different from any mob.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

That's cool, if someone saved my life I'd try to return the favor or atleast not go out of my way to put them in a dangerous situation.

 

[Athelas]

The problem with being forced to tell LaCroix you saw Nines at Grout's mansion isn't because of any debt, it's because Nine was basically wearing a T-shirt saying 'I've been mind-controlled/glamoured/shapeshifted into'.

 

[Excidium II]

That's cool, if someone saved my life I'd try to return the favor or atleast not go out of my way to put them in a dangerous situation.

While putting yourself in a dangerous situation with the actual boss who can mess with your mind? I think that's p. dense.

Like I said the PC might not be around long enough to understand all the nuances of kindred society but he knows it's a dog eat dog world. A darker, more violent and cynical version of our world.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

While putting yourself in a dangerous situation with the actual boss who can mess with your mind? I think that's p. dense.

I wouldn't necessarily know he could mess with my mind or that it's a lie/omission I couldn't easily get away with.

 

[Excidium II]

Well if you tried to say no at least once you'd figure he can, Lacroix has zero subtlety about his dominate usage.

Regardless, I'd rather gain points with Lacroix than risk him finding out I omitted the information. Gratitude to some random stranger who antagonizes the guy giving your orders is not worth it.

 

[Seaking4]

K, progress report.

The sewers weren't anywhere near as bad as I remembered, possibly because I stumbled on a shortcut. Only had to cut my way through a bunch of those little scrabbling creepy-crawlies and two bigger guys. Shotgun worked. Also worked on the Tzimisce. The fights are still just plain not fun though.

The pace of the game is flagging at this point and there's less sense of exploration and self-driven play since I got to Hollywood; it's been more running from point A to point B to point C. Have tried talking to people but haven't gotten all that many sidequests, nowhere near as much as downtown and Santa Monica in any case.

Chinatown is atmospheric as always.

The characters are also starting to wear a bit thin. Mitnick was funny. Gary was cool but Bertram Tung was even cooler; having two Nosferatu that are so similar seems a bit redundant. There was also a touch of let-me-tell-you-about-my-mother about Gary; I didn't really need to know all about his past.

Still soldiering on but the shine is starting to come off. As is so often the case, the early part of the game is much better than the late part.

I played the game for the first time a couple of weeks ago and the sewers were the turning point for me. Up until then I found it enjoyable but it just became an absolute slog afterwards. Every place you need to go has some kind of medieval dungeon in its basement that goes down 7 floors filled with just awful combat. The combat was all right at the beginning of the game because it was sparse enough. It fell in that gray area between fun to do and wrecks the game (I think I'm paraphrasing another Codexer here). Although the stealth being completely bonkers made some of the back half of the game fun from a comedic point of view.

 

[Excidium II]

How much I hate the sewers depends a lot on what type of character I play.