Modern Blurred Nights

actually the real risk with being companionless/covenless as a vampire isn't soul-crushing loneliness it's the fact that isolated vampires just start doing anything. four grown ass men got divorced last season and the second they live alone lestat starts a middling soundcloud career, louis starts stalking some poor waitress, daniel becomes a bowling fanatic, and armand is in fucking ohio

After playing a lot of Demon the Fallen recently I think it's really interesting how much better this system is at the whole "personal horror" aspect than Vampire is. So many of the most controversial changes to Vampire have been made ostensibly in the name of preserving the "personal horror" aspect which, in case anyone isn't aware, is the aspect that's meant to make you go "oh no I really shouldn't have drained that person in my hunger frenzy, I'm such a monster fr." I actually think this has never really been done that well in Vampire the Masquerade because it always feels to me like the game does this by either taking control away from you to make you do bad things through stuff like Frenzy rolls and Messy Criticals, or giving you chores to do that cause you to lose Humanity if you don't do them, like with protecting your Touchstones. So losing Humanity is usually due to a mechanical loss of personal control rather than a temptation to give into the monster within and feel guilty about it later. Demon, on the other hand, is set up through it's mechanics to actually tempt you into being more monstrous. Because staying low-Torment has real gameplay benefits like being able to resist True Faith and holy symbols better, appearing as an angel instead of a demon to people who see you're apocalyptic form, and being able to walk into a church without bursting into flames. But the raw combat power and destructive potential you get from taking on Torment is so tempting sometimes. In just a few sessions of Demon, I have desperately wanted my character, Ishtar, to whip out her claws or grow some extra limbs to help out with a gameplay challenge pretty much every time I sat down to play, just like I've been tempted to emotionally manipulate someone useful into becoming a Thrall just because I could really use their help and it'd be so nice if they couldn't say no. I think it also helps that Demon has a satisfying power fantasy on both ends of the spectrum. If you do well and avoid Torment you get to be an angel, which is cool, but if you give into Torment you get to be a badass powerful Demon and at least get to tear shit up. Whereas your reward for being a good little vampire and never losing Humanity is that you get to be... just kind of a nice vampire, while missing out on some of the things you might conceivably want to do when you sit down to play a vampire game, like drain some loser dry, or turn someone into a vampire.

Sometimes you’ve just got to think of your favorite character getting fucked against a wall to get through the work day.

Never let some invisibly wrinkled centuries old bloodsucker give you shit for being new bitch on the block. They think they’re sooo mighty and powerful bc they’ve survived for sooo long when like 90% of that timeframe there weren’t any guns or cameras or borders so they could kill some random defenseless lady, fuck off 1 village east, and nobody would blink an eye. Now you pop around the block for a lazy bite to eat and 8 electric eyeballs bear witness to your target pulling iron and filling your gut with 9mm rounds before activating an international manhunt on your ass. Camarilla execs haven’t ever dealt with this shit personally. Some of these dusty motherfuckers predate widespread literacy and have never budged from their Embrace city and it damn well shows. I’d like to see one of London’s mutant ass 5th gen’s go without a kine proxy for a week in the modern day. They’ll guaranteed fumble the hunt after centuries of Doordashing their drinks and get inquisitors with phosphor rounds driving them out of their safe space. Can’t drive, no ID, no credit card, no records, not a fucking drop of patience for interacting with mortals, good fucking luck starting up in a new city much less getting to it. Call me an insolent whelp again bitch i’ll run you over with my car and selfie your broke and steamrolled ass to the groupchat #GoGrampa

Sinners is what happens when directors are allowed to experiment with the genres like a horror musical that puts you in a trance and makes you question your existence while also being campy and funny but also breathtakingly beautiful but also haunting and terrifying? Yes please I literally did not want to leave the theater I wanted to just stay there and keep watching it over and over

The portrayal of white people who have been violently separated from their own culture stealing the power of black culture and music to try to get reconnected was SO literal and somehow not at ALL heavy-handed or trite. Fkn remarkable.

official vampire post

[ID: screenshot of tags that read, "#i LOVE this #vampire who's very invested in his town and spends tons of money for good parks and libraries bc 'they need enrichment!!!' #he stays up to date on milestones and birthdays bc that's his herd!!!" end ID.]

official vampire post

People be out here reinventing Vampire: The Masquerade every day