V20 Dark Ages: Introduction

Hi all,

I’ve been sharing a lot of clan, bloodline, discipline, blood magic, rules, et cetera. But today, I wanted to take a slightly different direction, and share the last thing I usually write for a book: the introduction.

I feel these sections are very important, because they set the tone for the rest of the product. In this case, I wanted to keep the introduction pretty short for a few reasons.

1) You probably already have V20. V20 goes on at length about this material, so I didn’t want to harp on it too much.

2) Chapter One addresses a lot of the basics very well. I felt it wouldn’t work if I rapid fire repeated material.

3) Page count. Every page not spent on introduction is another page that can be used for more of the Dark Medieval World.

But, this shows off a bit of our design philosophy for V20 Dark Ages, and I wanted to share it with you.

Chapter 00: The Introduction

Now, the fact of the matter is, this is the last part of the text, as I mentioned. It reflects design philosophy and presentation styles. So it’s not something that could use any fundamental changing; these bits all reflect notes and discussions that have occurred over the past year and a half. But this is more talking about our stage.

We’re very close. Rich is talking about Kickstarting after Gen Con. I’m so excited to get this book in your hands.

22 thoughts on “V20 Dark Ages: Introduction”

  1. Would V20 DARK AGES be the very next Kickstarter by Onyx Path or will there be one before it? If so, which is it?

    Very much looking forward to V20 DARK AGES. All the preview material has been awesome

    Reply
  2. For me, this is actually a very acceptable intro for the newb in me. It’s simple and to the point. Very nice subject flow. I only stopped to wonder briefly about “babies” after sex was addressed. Is that covered in V20DA or VtM20? A couple little hiccups on word-use, etc., but I assume those will be corrected before print. (“find back”/”fight back”?)

    While I’m not much into vampires, V20 DA has caught my attention and I’ll be willing to back this KS.

    Reply
    • Yeah, this hasn’t gone through editing as of the version posted.

      I don’t think we touch on babies in V20DA. But we might in supplementary material. I didn’t find a good place for it in there.

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      • Well, if the info is somewhere, then I’ll find it eventually. Am I to expect a scary bundle of joy flying around the room biting at peoples legs? Zombies aside, something like in Dead Alive springs to mind. :3

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    • On the subject of sex – it’s an excellent feeding strategy for a vampire, but hampered for all but the highest-humanity vampires by the need to expend blood in advance, in order to, ahem, rise to the occasion. Has that changed, or do Cainites still need to speculate in order to accumulate?

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        • Yes, but the Blush of Life is also about things like body temperature and heartbeat. If the point of the sex is to feed from someone who doesn’t know what you are, you need to fake basic life signs to get away with it.

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  3. About that suggestion of Terry Jones and The Crusades: It’s not a good sign when the editorial review on Amazon says ” it is pervaded with a vicious, if politically correct, anti-Catholic bigotry”. Even a four star review calls it “politically correct”. If you want something by Terry Jones about the common people, wouldn’t Terry Jones’ Medieval Lives be better for that purpose?

    Reply
    • I own it and I’ve read it several times. I can’t say I noticed any anti-Catholic bigotry. The only thing I can call to mind is one passage that compared Innocent III to Stalin, which wasn’t anti-Catholic, just anti-Innocent III. (And frankly, as far as I’m concerned, Innocent III has it coming). It’s a good book, both well-written and informative. I’d recommend it without hesitation.

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    • That, to me, is a gross mischaracterization. Jez mentions a bit about that below.

      Medieval Lives is good, but it’s also short, and television. Crusades offers a lot more anecdotes; I found it more useful for my chronicle.

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  4. Is there any place that antagonists will be cited? What you quoted from tests on possible antagonists seemed promising.

    Having said that I noticed were not mentioned in the first drafts of Chapter 1. Lords and The Monarchs. They were filed? There will be some description of Monarchies and Sects (Cainite Heresy, Inconnu, etc.)?

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    • What did I say about antagonists?

      Those groups don’t get up front treatment. But they exist. They get hints and mentions throughout.

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      • About the Antagonists, was at the time of the Ancient Forum, yet. But you said it would be addressed as a test search Kindred and one record for each creature. Changed, or continues this idea?

        Got on Sects. But on the monarchies, the Lords and Monarchs still exist? Because in chapter 1 that you let no mention of these positions and they were present in the Dark Ages Vampire.

        If the monarchies existeverem gifts, know at least how many monarchies are treated in the book area and the geographic boundaries of each (as the map of the previous edition)?

        The treated area will be even Europe, India, the Mongol Empire and Crescent?

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  5. You have a typo in this doc: “can’t find back” should read “can’t fight back”, but in general I think the intro approach is solid, and looking forwards to seeing this product too!

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  6. I’ll supported 100% DA was my favority line of CWoD. I would like that monarchies of DA 2002 stay, was a great idea.
    Do you really think that V20 or any 20 edition is for newbies? I don’t think the grande mayority will be new to the game, but it was great. You could add the question of faith & vampires as well the crossing water / superstitions
    Keep the impressive work with this proyect, i was a big fan of the 2002 line that was trying to make all games crossover. Do you plan yo take it that way?

    Reply

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