IWA: The Exit Strategy

[Mercury "Merc" Miller]

Nobody has an exit strategy for their characters. It's something I'll never get.

Let me give you an aside, to show you what I'm talking about. In soap operas, there are characters. And those characters have storylines. But you know what? It wasn't always that way. Used to be, they had angles. I like angles a lot better. You know why? Because angles intersect, and then go off in their own direction, maybe to intersect with other angles.

Storylines are just that. Lines. They never intersect, just keep chugging along.

Look, I get it. Maybe you don't feel like you fit in with the rest of the world, and in a LARP, you get to be the hulking pro-wrestler-physique you don't have IRL. Or you're more charming, or able to hack the Gibson, or any of a thousand other things we can't really do without immense effort for exceptionally little reward. And I know there are some people who just want to live out a power-fantasy, same as simulating bashing orcs and goblins by rolling d20s. I get that. Hell, I still do that in tabletop games, and there's nothing wrong with it.

But have an exit strategy. This is the essential divide between fiction and LARP (or any interactive storytelling compared with passive story-watching. I'm not saying one's better than the other; it's emotionally draining to do what we do on a Saturday night, and sometimes a movie or book can move you to tears more than a thousand shovelheads ashed in a mass combat) - create angles. Pick a win condition. When you make a character, say, "This is the thing I want to explore. This is the thing I want this character to embody, express to the game/world/myself. This is thing I want to conflict with and resolve." And then do that thing.

And it doesn't matter what it is. Here's some freebies:

• Become Prince
  
• Achieve Golconda
  
• Solve a great mystery
  
• Kill a Redlister
  
• Become a Redlister
  
• Become an elder and recede into the greater Jyhad
  

All these things mean GNC for your dude. And that's cool. Any RP'er worth the title has a thousand half-baked and a few awesome ideas kicking around, ready to go the minute their guy gets gakked. But don't play a guy forever. Don't play a guy whose only long-term goal is survival.

In Vampire specifically, there's a schism. In the fiction, in the ideal of Vampires, is eternity. Immortality. Infinity. But that leads to incredibly dull or stupid characters. If you play a character the way a Vampire would 'logically' act, you'd never have an RP session. You'd never come to leave your haven, and if you were over a decade embraced, you'd certainly know better than to come to Seattle for any reason.

But the alternative is 'stupid' Vampires. Vampires who want to be in Elysium (historically the most dangerous place in a Camarilla city), Vampires who want to be shit-stirrers, who even despite their characters advanced years are impetuous and needful. And that's because the players directing them aren't operating on the same scale of Eternity.

Werewolf neatly sidesteps this problem by aping Klingon culture and finding glory in death. But the fact is, every Vampire is stupid, because the story demands they be.

So do this, if you do nothing else: Write down on a piece of paper the following sentence:

I will stop playing ______(Character)_____ as soon as I _____ _{(accomplish this)}_____.

Just to give you some examples, here are some goals I've had for old characters:

• I will stop playing Johann Kozlov once I've gotten communism adopted by the USA (hey go big or go home)
  
• I will stop playing Connor Wight once everyone in Seattle is terrified (legit, whisper-and-point terrified) of the Nosferatu again.

Think about the story you want to tell. Don't just be an inkwell on a character sheet with nothing sustaining them but inertia. That's boring as shit.

[Webmonkey]

That was kind of beautiful...

[Mercury "Merc" Miller]

Feel free to excerpt it for the Character Creation section. We haven't had a DGA in a while...

[Shah-Khohr of Ventrue]

I totally do this. Richter has an awesome one.

[Skarr]

I will admit that it was only a few characters back that I started doing this.

Mercer's goal was to establish himself as a Vampire and become moderately respected, and then found his bloodline. (He later got jumped and taken out after coming back to town for an Event, but he was an NPC at the time so that doesn't count.)

Ralphie was supposed to butt heads with Diego over his daughter and, one way or another, reconcile with her. Sadly, he was murdered by Werewolves before that could happen, but the intent was still there.

Pickles was to gain recognition and respect within the Camarilla so he could replace his Sire as Primogen and take care of the old coot. He earned Status 4 ICly and bugged off back to San Jose.

Skarr has a great one too, BUT I'M NOT TELLING YET.

[onewingedsin]

I'm still figuring out what I want to do with Sal. As my embodiment of a "little fish in a big pond", picking an objective, playing to those ends, then moving on to the next thing is still open-ended for me.

Which is funny, because as a console gamer I do this frequently. I don't know how many times I restarted Mass Effect or Skyrim, each time thinking, "This time, I'm the ultimate good". Or, reach the the end of certain quest lines, saved with a pretty cool screenshot, then hit 'New Game'.

[The Gentleman]

While this is MY personal philosophy for characters, it's not the only one. Sometimes people like to create a personality with some drives and then just let them loose in an environment to see what happens.

One of the theories of writing is that there are architects and gardeners. Architects have goals, they think about end conditions and ways to measure success and failure. They plan.

Gardeners plant ideas and then throw stimuli at them to see what grows. It's never worked for me, as I tend to just ramble off into abstract nothingness, but it works well for some people.

[Ben Vaughan]

Oh Del, you magnficient motherf**ker.

I had one with Jones, but for the life of me I don't recall, and frankly, part of his character motiff was that he was aimless until given a purpose, part of his Monster nature.

Francis - He has plans. So many plans. And maybe plants.

[Ben Vaughan]

And Richter's (at least the one Rob mentioned) is awesome. I might co-opt part of that.

[Skir]

We should all just be brave and post our actual character exit condition. There's a certain school of thought that if everyone knew everyone's character details, we would positively metagame to create a better story for everyone. An ideal of "open secrets" where the goal is drama rather than victory. There are games, even LARPs like that. It's a kind of John Wick idea that exists in games like Houses of the Blooded. Imagine if everyone's dark secrets and flaws were tacked to their chests for anyone to look at. Yours too. The game is exactly as fair as it was, but now everyone has the opportunity to make everyone else's story better.

Zachard was my first vampire character. A Brujah punk with dyed hair and a motorcycle, he didn't understand why he was such an emotional wasteland and his goal was to find a passion so he could be a real Brujah, but nothing could move him. The game folded before that happened, but I did Frenzy one time.

Verso Giovanni's goal is to make Seattle a Giovanni city with a token Camarilla presence, create a goulag of spirits to rival the ones at the Mausoleum in Venice and the Temple of Potchli, and generate a way to complete the Endless Night ritual. That's the stated goal, but none of that is really his goal. He just wants his humanity back, and to stop being a monster on Path of Bones. He would burn everything he's built to die like a human, or to fall in love.

You guys go. Be brave!

[Shah-Khohr of Ventrue]

Heh. I suppose I've had a few characters here in EC.

Albrecht (for those of you that remember that old bastard), his goal was to die in the service of God. Or, barring that, to die in the service of the Ventrue. He just wanted to die as the rest of his world had died around him. A sad character, that.

Dante Giovanni's end game wasn't a typical Giovanni goal. He wanted magic. Like, actual magic. True, honest to god magic. All his twisted experiments and deals and lore collecting was to find a way to make himself capable of housing an Avatar and having true enlightenment.

Seven didn't stick around long enough to be given a real motivation, but his goal was to just have friends. He was highly pack-minded and just wanted to belong.

Father Augury's initial goal was to be the most excellent resource that the Camarilla could hope for in order to earn trust. Ultimately, he wanted to prove that Setites could be trusted, which would cause other, less kind Setites to benefit. But as game moved on and he was repeatedly treated as a villain, his goal become more sinister. By the end, his goal was to hold up a mirror to everyone and how them how fragile they were. To find the weakness in a thing and break it simply because it had a weakness. Not a nice fellow, that guy.

And Richter... Well, Richter wants the Anarch's to actually have a place. He feels that the Camarilla and Anarchs need each other, but they're both to proud to admit it. His end goal? Anarch Justicar. A political powerhouse that is buying into the Camarilla system but isn't tied to a clan. And his retirement goal is to BE that Justicar.

Go big or go home, right?

[Mercury "Merc" Miller]

Well, if Magic Rob is being open and honest about current characters, I might as well play too:

I want Up-Roc to get a 1xp refund.

Said differently, I want to lose the "Harmless" merit, the hard way. Up-Roc is a neonate. A real neonate, who still thinks the Kindred world should work like the real world, not like the petty fiefdom it is. It's been a decade now, and he's starting to get the hang of this "court" thing, and while he's earned his accolades and learned some hard lessons, he's still just a foppish white-noise character. But he's slowly growing cold, and he will - using politics and influence and all those dastardly behind-the-scenes tricks - utterly destroy someone someday. More completely than if they received the final death, for at least in death is the cold comfort of peace (and getting to roll a new dude for the player).

Someday, people will not say "oh fer chrissakes its Up-Roc," they will whisper "Shut your mouth and don't mention the obnoxious hair or the loud music - don't you know that's Up-Roc?"

And on that day, I'll get Harmless scratched off my sheet, and bring in a really fun character.

[David Price]

Arlo wanted to win. What this meant on any given day really depended on what things presented to him. He had umpteen million really tiny goals that all boiled down to "Find something that needs to be won. Win it." As a player my goal with him was to learn when to trust my instincts and wider perceptions.

David Price's character goal is to rehabilitate the Tremere - to make them the good guys. Broney's goal with Price is to determine how to accomplish things while still (usually) being nice about it.

[Ross]

Kenneth Ashland wanted to destroy his Sire, he being instrumental (by Ashland's perspective) in the death of his wife and child. It was likely a futile goal, Kenneth being a Neonate and his Sire being an Ancillae (if not an Elder; I never really established the Sire's age). However, Kenneth was resolved to do everything he could to surpass his Sire and eventually destroy him...suddenly becoming Harpy in his 3rd month in Seattle, and holding that spot for the better part of a year until being accepted to study with Ventrue Elders in London...yeah, that was about as much as Seattle could do for a vengeance-seeking Neonate.

At that point I went up on staff, and by the time I stepped down, it didn't make much sense that Kenneth would self-demote to returning to Seattle from London. And so I started playing

Eugene Krantz wanted a couple of things: safety and respect. But what he actually needed was struggle; if he didn't have something to complain about, he was like Sampson at a hair salon. He was a pure cynic, but cynicism requires nostalgia and hope. Holding on to his club was a struggle; dealing with his betters was a struggle; dealing with unlife was a struggle; dealing with the Toreador was entertaining.

When I brought him back for that one night after I stepped off staff the last time...well, everyone greeted him warmly; they were so glad to see him. He had his club handed back to him, most of his allies were absent/deceased, and his club had been through at least three other sets of hands. And...yeah. Stagnation imminent. He was one of the old boys, now. So he left to go fight the good fight for L.A. and the Free State. Granted, the Toreador part of him hopes the 9 Circles turns out to be his one, long-lasting work of art...

Nicholo...honestly, I'm not sure at this point. My one goal when I started him a year ago was to earn his Embrace. Got that a couple months ago. Now...I'm still figuring the guy out. Ask me again in 6 months.

-Ross