Our calibration systems use formalised negotiations between players to make sure every participant of a scene is comfortable with its content, allowing careful calibration of their experience.
These tools are easy to learn and adapt in the game. They will be practised together during our pre-game workshops, so that everybody can employ them confidently.
Sometimes it can be hard to tell if someone is just a very good actor or if those are real tears, if someone is enjoying themselves playing being tortured or having a real panic attack.
This system allows you to check in with your fellow players and make sure they are okay, and getting everybody on the same page, using simple, non-verbal cues.
Hold up the thumbs-sideways sign and watch for the other party's reaction.
If they show the thumbs-up sign, you know they are doing okay and you can continue with whatever it is you are doing.
If they give you a thumbs-down, any ambivalence or no reation instead, please address them off game to ask if they need any comfort or assistance and whether you should contact a member of staff for support.
When you wish to engage in a scene of social or physical violence, discipline use, intimacy, or feeding, you need to check in with them and get their approval before you continue. Here's how to do it:
Approach the other player slowly, from the front. Never, ever jump anyone!
Clearly telegraph your intent through your portrayal of the role. This includes some exaggerated body language and keywords.
"You are a cad" denotes that you plan to go for a public dressing down, an insult or any other act of social violence.
"You are done for" signifies that you wish to engage in physical violence.
"You will truly + a discipline's trigger phrase" shows your wish to exert a supernatural influence on the other character that will change their behaviour.
"I long for your touch" indicates your intent to begin a scene of physical intimacy.
"I hunger for your blood" lets the other party know that you have a feeding scene in mind.
Watch closely for the other player's response.
This may either be "Bring it on", which is an invitation to continue with the scene.
Or it may be "Not tonight", which indicates that the other player is not comfortable with the scene and that you need to stop.
The sentences are part of the in game dialogue and the emotions with which they are conveyed can be quite different, reflecting the disposition of the character.
But the use of these specific phrases always denots the actual response from player to player off game.
As an example, someone may desperately sob "bring it on" or defiantly bellow "not tonight". They are staying in character, projecting the appropriate emotions but as far the calibration process between players is concerned, the first instance is a call to continue and the other one to stop.
The keyword replies can also be used without first being asked for to calibrate the course of a scene that is already in progress.
In general, if you hear someone say the words "bring it on" in the course of a scene, it means that they invite you to amp up the intensity and would like to create some additional drama beyond what is already happening. It is also a confirmation that they feel comfortable and confident at what's happening.
However, just because the other party might wish to escalate beyond what you have offered, you don't have to go along with it, if you're not comfortable.
Conversely, if you hear someone say the words “not tonight” in the course of a scene, it means that they are ok with staying in-character and in-scene with you but that you need to step on the brakes, and de-escalate whatever you are doing at once.
Take extra care to watch out for the other party and continue softly, at a steady pace, ready to desist completely.
If you see someone moving through in-game spaces shielding their eyes with their hand, consider this person off-game. They need to leave a scene quickly for whatever reason or get from A to B. Do not interact with them and clear the way. This signal may be used for participants to exit scenes they feel uncomfortable with without having to interrupt the flow for other participants.
Our universal safe word is "raincheck". It is always off game and means that a player feels unsafe or uncomfortable in some way and that they cannot proceed with the current scene in any way, shape or form. Cease all interaction and step away immediately!
Because it can be hard sometimes to find the right words or any words at all, when overwhelmed by a feeling, receiving a quick double tap has the same function as the safeword as a non-verbal cue.
If you hear someone shout the words "cut, cut, cut", it's a warning message to all people in the area that something has happened which requires immediate off-game attention. You need to step out of character and stay in place, listening for any further announcements or instructions.
Do not resume playing until you hear a storyteller calling out "time in".
When your character seeks to publicly call out, insult, challenge, or otherwise put another character in a spotlight where they might have to face a scene of intense scrutiny or justification, this is a critical moment that many people may not generally feel comfortable with or may simply not be prepared to deal with in the moment.
Always be aware that this sort of confrontation may play on real-life social anxieties or memories of being bullied and proceed carefully.
When insulting another character, always attack them with something that is only true within the fiction. Call them a reckless neonate, a sycophantic ancilla, a heartless elder, tell them you hate their Brujah rage or their horrifying Nosferatu mien. Call them a rude host, a boon breaker, a scofflaw, or whatever else comes to mind.
Do not attack another character via attributes or choices of their player. Their natural appearance, choice of kit, their speech, their age, gender, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, possible disabilities etc. are all absolutely off-limits.
Your character has lived for a long time. You will be inhabiting them for only a few nights. In a game with so many moving parts, it's easy to forget even your Prince's dear face or what outcome that duel with your worst enemy had. Don't stress yourself about these gaps in in-game knowledge.
Whenever you use the phrase "the Beast clouds my mind", this is an off-game instruction to your fellow players to disregard or reinterpret what they just heard or to get you up to speed on the context you are missing. In-game, the corrupting influence of the Beast is known to addle the mind of Kindred and Ghouls alike and it is considered polite to help each other out during a momentary lapse.
When you address someone as "cousin" or "cuz", it is considered a polite and a bit impersonal form of address common among the Kindred in-game. It is an off-game signal that you cannot remember the name and status of the person you are speaking to, asking them to supply such vital information in their next few lines of dialogue to bring you up to speed.
You may not under any circumstances exploit these sort of temporary lapses of another player to attack their character.
If you wish to have your character commit a faux-pas and enjoy the fall-out, by any means, act it out and don't use any of the key phrases above, which clearly indicates, you want to make a scene of it.
Just a quick reminder, because it is so very important. While characters can get injured or made helpless in the course of the game, character death can only ever happen with and must never happen without player consent.
This goes for both parties. The aggressor cannot just finish off a victim, nor can the victim just decide to die from an attack, without both parties clearly and enthusiastically agreeing to it.
Sometimes there is just no way around it. Sometimes someone has to die. This is a grand-guignol performance of a twisted love story. Blood must flow.
But if your character takes a life, it is your responsibility as a player to make sure, the victim has some sort of last opportunity to shine.
Make it worth for the other player to have their character be lost forever. Go out of your way to give their character a moving and memorable death scene. You and they are in this together. Your characters might be enemies but you are both collaborators in creating something beauteous and meaningful.
Don’t be a smug snake afterwards.
Killing another character is part of the game and just as much based on wholly fictional combat score on your character sheet as on any real life strategic planning. It’s not some crowning achievement you need to brag about. Don’t rub it in.
Be sensitive to what the player of your character’s victim needs during the game as well as after it.
You don’t want them to be a sore 'loser', so engage on a human level and be a magnanimous 'winner'.
Maybe they want to talk afterwards and ask for your help in processing the experience. Maybe they can't deal with it right now, because the bleed is too strong and they need some distance.
This is not about you. Stay with what they need. Be kind.
The Beast wants to live at all costs. But you, as a player, can make an informed choice about whether you might want to go in a different direction for a more satisfying death experience.
When your character is wounded, all alone and surrounded by 10 enemies in a room with locked doors, do you really need to go through the drag of comparing Blood Potencies? When you could die in a perfect execution scene under the scourge’s blade in front of the court, do you really need to activate your discipline to try and get out?
If you want to go down fighting, more power to you. Just remember, relenting for the sake of the scene is always an option and might ultimately be of greater benefit to your experience of your character’s death.
When your character’s time has come, use the opportunity to give everyone an awesome death scene to remember for a long time.
Scream, shout, cry, beg, twitch, moan, curse or go with unexpected dignity and grace. Make it meaningful. Make it larger-than-life. Hold nothing back. This is your finale. This is all you are going to get. Make them feel your death and in the end it will feel much better to you as well.
It’s only natural to feel some anger or resentment when someone’s character kills yours and to project that feeling onto the player behind the mask.
No matter how plausible, appropriate or even cool your avatar’s death was, deep down you feel – even if just for a short moment before your ratio and tempered, grown-up emotions kick in – that some playground bully just broke your favorite toy.
But the truth is, there’s a chance the other player will feel just as bad as you.
Maybe they feel empathy for your position because they’ve experienced the same thing. Maybe they would have liked to find another way and weren’t able to. Maybe they didn’t even have a choice because their character was not acting of their own volition. Maybe they’re friends with you in real life and are worried that now they’ve hurt you or that the two of you are in conflict.
It helps to realize that you’re in this together.
That your character’s death is not something that they did to you but that it is an experience you share.
If you encounter a death scene in progress and you have a legitimate reason to get involved, do so. But don’t enter and thus complicate a kill just because you can. Likewise don’t take away the spotlight from a character’s swan song with completely unrelated business.
Yes, your role might be an important elder completely disinterested in the fate of the neonate who is executed tonight at his majesty’s leisure, but you have the responsibility to hold back your agenda for five minutes.
No matter how appropriately in-character it might seem to you, don’t ever upstage a dying character.
This is the last time the player will ever get to play it. So, even if your character’s a total bastard, find a reason for non-interference, because that’s just common courtesy among players.
That’s your job to be there, to bear witness, to react to a scene that is going to be the last bow for a character that has been part of your shared story.
No one just dies. Cry for the fallen comrade or laugh coldly at your enemy’s downfall, swear vengeance or make a tasteless jest of the occasion to show your character’s contempt for such things.
No matter what you do, react. Show emotion. A potentially immortal life has been snuffed out. This doesn’t just happen only to pass like any other moment. It’s history in the making, maybe even the beginning of a legend.
After a game night full of violence, passion and a lot of character death, dial down the rhetoric a little bit.
Yes, we all like to talk about our characters and what awesome moments we had, and that’s absolutely alright, but please be mindful of the people who have lost their characters during the game and seem to suffer more from it than you do.
You don’t need to walk on eggshells, but when you talk to the players concerned, maybe ask them what they would like to talk about instead of launching into post-game celebratory monologues.
If you don’t want to get involved, be kind and stay away. If you get close, listen, care and be a friend.
At some point, when it feels appropriate, share a fond memory about their character with the player who has lost it. Tell them, how their portrayal of the role has impacted you in big or small ways.
This small act of connection and appreciation can go a long way.