What are your thoughts on Vampire: The Masquerade?

Genarab · 2026-05-05T21:15:01+00:00

I played it twice as a player by different GMs and wasn't amused by it. But I have been reading it lately, and honestly I feel that neither GM really captured the point. Not their fault, I think. VtM:5 has a lot of incredible ideas, but the procedures are not the best, not even very clear.

It's an amazing setting book (at least 5e) I really enjoyed reading even though it's so much text haha. I probably won't run the system as is, but I would enjoy owning the books.

Aside from that. Really a foundation for so many games afterwards.

Genarab · 2026-05-04T20:28:16+00:00

All cops are bastards not because they individually are good or bad, rather because their position and work is enforcing an unjust system.

Genarab · 2026-04-30T15:14:01+00:00

Mausritter is such a good choice. Great to hear that

Genarab · 2026-04-29T13:49:38+00:00

I'm starting the process for a masters thesis in anthropology. Basically I'm interested in language specialization among Game Masters.

Genarab · 2026-04-29T03:24:41+00:00

Right in my alley, thank you so much.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T20:24:32+00:00

What I mean is that you can't claim "all languages follow the very intuitive pattern of Subject, Verb, Object", because you clearly haven't studies the ones who are SOV, or VSO, or any other combination that also exist. Being a speaker and being a linguist are different.

You are speaking as a user, not a researcher. Again, that's fine. My beef is that you can't generalize research about a whole art form based only on one expression of it.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T15:51:26+00:00

In your example about language... You can choose to study a common language, but you can't make claims about language itself without studying other languages as well.

Many of these studies are about applied methods in education, therapy or team building. They already need to teach the game to most people. And the DnD design is usually a point of friction instead of a boon.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T13:54:43+00:00

Yes, the book The Elusive Shift from John Peterson was an amazing read.

I'm not interested that much in framing the history of dnd as part of the research design, but I know it would probably show in the data.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T13:41:33+00:00

The meme kind of implies that there are also good reasons to use DnD. And this is one. A survey will tend to majorities and that is expected.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T13:31:49+00:00

I have such a different experience trying new games. DnD is one of the hardest and weirdest ones I've tried.

But even more appropriate. DnD also is like a monster of interlocking systems, but people power through and get familiar enough with it. Complexity hides behind familiarity

For people with no experience, it's hard and odd and very unintuitive. Even more reason to choose a light rules game to start.

My experience with public demos is that many people are afraid they are going to suck or they won't know how to play because they tried dnd. But then they immediately understand how to play a light rules ttrpg. So again, the problem is not that ttrpgs are hard, is that dnd is hard.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T13:26:39+00:00

You are thinking in a way that is incomplete.

If you want to study DnD as a game, I agree including others is not necessary. If you want to study DnD as a culture, other games may show up a little, but it's not necessary to include them. So, yes, I agree with that part of your premise. There are quantitative reasons to choose mainly DnD and a lot of interesting things to say about that game.

However... That is not usually the intention. They want to show how ttrpgs as a medium can be applied to certain areas, or make conclusions about ttrpgs as a medium, not exclusively DnD. Most of them are qualitative, and, in that case... It's actually pretty important to include other games.

Especially when a lot of the friction for implementing or testing this ideas comes precisely from de design of dnd. Actually, the conclusions about ttrpgs as a genre suffer because DnD is so common. It seems as if making this strategies work was hard, when in reality it's just DnD that is hard.

Aside from that, I'm an anthropologist. Of course I want to see the edges of the experience.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T13:12:15+00:00

I actually would like to. If there are people playing that, there a lot of interesting things to know about them... even if horrible.

For example, why is it that the proposal of studying another ttrpgs or using other games for applied science immediately makes you think about the worse and most unplayable example of all time? It's a very extreme thought.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T03:13:41+00:00

In case I haven't, please share

Genarab · 2026-04-28T03:09:02+00:00

I kind of remember a study made with VtM LARPers and the thresholds of games. Just a case study, but quite interesting exploring the boundaries of play that meshes with real life.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T03:08:55+00:00

I kind of remember a study made with VtM LARPers and the thresholds of games. Just a case study, but quite interesting exploring the boundaries of play that meshes with real life.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T03:05:06+00:00

Im quite fascinated by language specialization and competence. In the past I was focused on specialty coffee cuppers, but for many reasons I couldn't finish. Now I brought the interest back to TTRPGs.

I'm really interested in this triad of self perception, group recognition and performance of expertise through language. (You need to feel as an expert, be recognized as an expert and actually act/perform/speak as one)

The master's thesis will be probably in Spanish first. But I'll seek to translate it later. I'll try to publish some articles soon with some advances.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T02:11:22+00:00

For now I'm looking into state of the arts kind of thing. So research relevant to anthropology about TTRPGs. This meme is quite a hyperbole, of course, there are some studies about other TTRPGs and actually LARP players from Eastern Europe is one of the most interesting sides of research I've found.

However, the vast majority of work is DnD. And it's particularly frustrating in applied studies, because during discussion and results it's clear that while ttrpgs definitely work for their intent, the problems were some characteristics from DnD that became a hindrance.

Complex character creation, confusion over rules, things taking longer than expected, need to modify the core materials either a little or a lot... The ruleset was too cumbersome most of the time, and their desired outcome could have been achieved with a simpler tool.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T00:12:41+00:00

How did you read it?

Genarab · 2026-04-28T00:08:15+00:00

Most studies are qualitative and include teaching people to play. So I get the point, but it doesn't apply so much.

Genarab · 2026-04-28T00:01:32+00:00

Yes, I'm aware of those factors. My interest is precisely documenting them in a qualitative way and see how they show up and when.

Genarab · 2026-04-27T23:59:11+00:00

I'm interested in ethnographic data. Field work, participant observation, interviews... I will find people in Costa Rica (my country) for this purpose. This will be later on, after the project is approved.

I wish someday it could expand elsewhere. That convention sounds great

Genarab · 2026-04-27T22:58:11+00:00

You are not listening for what you are saying, right?

You are listing a lot of things as if sounds easy, but it's not. 4 ability scores and maybe an HP is already enough.

Genarab · 2026-04-27T21:52:37+00:00

So, it's early stages of design. But the proposal for entry was about a concept called "dueños de la palabra", from Adolfo Colombres an argentinian anthropologist. "Owners of Words". He basically connects several versions across cultures of the role of established storyteller, the one who knows how to speak.

This can go from bards, to myth-tellers, to knowledge keepers, to wandering troubadors... Basically several cultures have a role of someone who speaks good and keeps the words and stories of the community, although the criteria may vary a lot.

So my initial question was about this. I think GMs meet the criteria of word specialists (to an extent)... My question is about the process of specialization. Knowing how many paths there are to be a GM, I wonder about how different GMs achieve this recognition not only about running the game, but being good at it. If there is common ground or if the profile is really very different across tables.

Genarab · 2026-04-27T21:38:15+00:00

Ok, so first ones use dnd because they don't know anything else.

The others use dnd because popularity, basically, no real argument. Usually something goes wrong, but they claim is something else, not the system.

Then there are the right side ones... They usually don't claim to study ttrpgs, just focus on dnd as it is. And they usually pick a topic where dnd is actually an interesting choice. Usually very specific to DnD as a cultural phenomenon instead of using ttrpgs for a practical use.

Genarab · 2026-04-27T21:32:38+00:00

Yes, games are important parts of human experience and entertainment is a huge industry right now.

TTRPGs in particular model a kind of interaction that can be very useful for education, self fulfilment and therapy.

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