It's kind of surreal having been a VtM fan for as long as I have and witnessing the playtest and build up to V6. My perception as a longtime fan (almost two decades now, holy shit) is that we've been through this process already more than once.
My first game was Revised, which at the time was, and still kind of is by some of the community, treated as the golden child edition, the perfect edition of Vampire at its peak. Personally there was always shit about it I didn't like.
Then V20 came out and at first it was really hated for reasons that honestly feel really granular and insignificant now because most players couldn't tell the difference between it and Revised. I think the art was a sticking point? And it being metaplot agnostic? Either way, it became popular eventually and is now, I think, tied with V5 as the most popular way to play the game. It's been my preferred edition for like a decade, though the reason for my switch was originally just that it had most of the stuff I wanted in the core rulebook instead of spread across multiple splats.
Then V5 came out, and when it first did, it was hated by almost the entire fandom. Playtest was received really poorly, people were treating it like the end of the game line, like White Wolf had personally come to each of their houses and spit in their mouths. People claiming the edition was dead on arrival and would never find fans, that the game had mutilated VtM and ruined it forever. They even compared it to being too much like DnD, even though it wasn't. Then, of course, shit calmed down, people actually played it, a decent percentage of fans came to like it, new players came in and started with it due to being new, and those that didn't stuck to their preferred edition. I didn't like V5, but I made my peace with it and its place in the fandom eventually.
Now V6 is coming out, we're at the playtest, and the reactions to it look literally the exact same to me as when V5 came out. A lot of people reacting extremely poorly to the playtest, saying VtM is ruined forever, that White Wolf hates its fans and hates them personally in particular, that they've mutilated the edition to chase trends and make the game more like DnD, even though it isn't. And I can tell you how this ends. People will actually try playing it, some will like it, some new players will come in and stick with it because it's new, and the community will move on. V5 fans will start reblogging fan art from V6 fans, just like V20 fans do with V5 fans. The fandom will heal
People forget that White Wolf actually, literally, nuked this setting while screaming that they hated the community once, and the fandom survived even that. If you hate V6? I promise you, this isn't the end of the fandom. You'll survive, the fandom will survive, you will suffer minor annoyance when a mutual references some newfangled mechanic you hate, and then you'll move on.
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