My platform for Hst

[Cefyn]

Esteemed Players of Emerald City Chronicles,

My name is Kevin Shryock, and I would like to be your new Head Storyteller. In light of Brendan stepping aside to take care of his real life priorities, I am ready to take the forward role. Many of you know me as a veteran of the last two staffs, under HST Sean and HST Brendan, and I have had the pleasure of running many of your stories.

Under HST Sean myself and Seth were designated as the Character Depth ASTs which meant that we were in charge of going through the background stories of characters and putting into play elements of the characters that rarely got play, such as social flaws like Sire’s Resentment, Enemy, or Old Flame, as well as less touched upon elements and unresolved personal stories of the characters as established in their original backstory material. While we tried to focus on characters that were less involved and less busy with other kinds of stories, many players got to benefit from this system and we were able to bring forward a lot of really amazing stories that required that level of investigation and forward planning and attention to the uniqueness of each character. (Those of you who received such stories, please, share your experiences) Making sure that everyone can get this kind of special, character-specific attention while also maintaining the needs of the main body of game is the main goal of my platform. While I, as HST, will not be able to fulfill this role as directly as I previously have, I consider it an advantage to be able to more actively organize my storytelling staff to make sure that every player has this kind of attention available to them instead of being bottlenecked to one Storyteller.

Brendan’s platform included an idea that I also believe in, and would like to see developed for play. That idea was of character creation packages for Neonate, Ancilla and Elder, characters. This would help give a better differentiation between the play-styles of playing an Elder or Neonate character, and make those designations mean more and have a more interesting and evocative impact on the experience. A similar idea has been playtested for some time in the Sabbat sphere, and is working well there. The specifics will change to some degree to be better suited to a Camarilla setting and address other implementation concerns, but I plan to work on a proposal for this to enter play and be applied to existing characters. While I believe it would be a benefit to the game, as this would affect a large change, there would certainly be a vote to implement it.

You will notice that my platform does not include otherwise large changes to gameplay, and could be considered to be a steady course on what you are familiar with. I am not in favor of a reset, and wish to preserve the integrity of the history of the game and all that it has accomplished. Under my staff, you can expect the game you are used to playing, and my pledge to do so at the highest possible quality.

While in the past I have been associated with storylines that involve some of the stranger elements of World of Darkness, and certainly enjoy telling those stories, I want to make it clear that I believe strongly in canon, and while I will gladly listen to any character concept, only characters that both fit well within canon and are of benefit to the overall atmosphere of the game will be approved. I will work with players to achieve the above, and suggest ways characters can be made to be best for the game, but I will always look most favorably on characters that contribute to great story and represent the world of darkness as presented in material.

Every member of Brendan’s staff except for Brendan himself has agreed to stay on and support me as Assistant Storytellers, so there should be very little difficulty in transition, which is a real benefit. We all share a vision to maintain ECC and make sure it is the best game it can be. I would be honored to continue to represent that goal for you, and to continue to improve upon my ability to deliver that kind of experience to you through the position of Head Storyteller.

I welcome any questions you may have, and look forward to continuing my service to ECC.

Thank you,

Kevin Shryock

[Ikon]

Thank you for stepping up.

[Jeff]

Hey Kevin,

I heard rumor that you were only running for the remainder of Brendan's term (ie, stepping down end of July. ) Is this the case, or are you planning for a full year as HST?

Thanks

Jeff

[Oberon Gault]

With, what is apparently, an increasing number of characters being played without powers native to Vampire, do you intend on changing this in one direction or another? You mentioned Sabbat, which has a very liberal character approval selection, so I'm concerned that the couple existing characters will balloon upward.

As we're, evidently, using powers and system from Mage, does this mean that characters will have powers from other systems? Or will these non-vampire-powers be house-ruled into aligning with the rest of game? Wraiths are an excellent example of this, having a large system around them that use nearly entirely vampire-native powers to represent their power spread.

[Just Evan]

Hi Kevin! As you will be keeping on a majority of the current staff, can I ask what plans are in place to ensure more reliable and timely responses to player contact? Things have been ridiculously stressful and busy (especially these last few weeks) and I certainly do not begrudge the necessity of prioritizing some matters above quick communication. However, as things calm back down to what amounts for 'normal' among our group, what are your policies going to be on the following wait times for the following:

1. Midweek player contact

2. Players who are queued up for a specific ST for more than 10 to 20 minutes at game

Thank you!

Evan

[Cefyn]

Sorry for the delay in my responses here; I have been organizing and discussing things and am settling into the interrum HST gig during a very hectic time at game.

First, Jeff:

Yes, at current my platform is to run until the end of July/beginning of August. That is the time that this staff signed on for, and the time I dedicated myself to when I stepped up. There is the possibility that at that point in time, I may have the endurance to run for another year, but that is in the future.

Blewis:

The mage powers I assume you are discussing are a merit, namely Legendary Attribute, and the Sorceror minor template that a couple players have had access to either through story or character generation pitch. Let me first answer your question about ballooning concepts: I have no intention of allowing these niche stories that are rare to become a large part of game. A lot of the story in a rare concept is its rarity. My policy on things that are considered strange is a step-by-step process.

1) How out of place is it in a Cam game?
2) How close is it to the stereotype for the clan/minor template/whatever that it is presenting?
3) Will it bring a good story to the game, or just be disruptive?

Each of these questions sets a bar that creates a difficulty to present a concept to me. Now, I'm more likely to try to work with someone to modify their sheet into the character that they want to play, but I have no fear nor compunction about saying no. I have found that I am more strict than Brendan on what I find acceptable for game.

On creating new systems to align these powers with the game, I have no intention of writing new systems for play, but should point out that when something that is completely out-of-scale for the game at hand needs rebalancing, I will endeavor to rebalance it.

Evan:

The reaction time of our staff has not been perfect due to inability to be at computers for more than once a week for our HST and a full-time job in retail; something I'm sure everyone can understand. I have the benefit of being able to respond more freely from my phone, and I hope that over the course of this month can prove that reaction time will increase considerably to email inquiries. Although nobody can promise a perfect run, I can hope that by the time elections come around, you will be able to have a good idea of my reaction speeds and do not find them wanting, and I always support bumping emails that haven't gotten responses, as well.

As far as at game time, I will hope to organize a better use of our narrators for scenes that they can handle and therefore create a more efficient use of our time. It may take a month or two to sort it out perfectly, but my hope is to create a situation in which game can get faster responses for scenarios in general. I will have a better idea for how I may be going about this after my staff meeting, in which I will do a brainstorm about ideas on how to streamline this to its fullest.

Thank you for your questions. I hope I have answered them fully.

[Just Evan]

Kevin,

Thank you for your responses. A follow up:

The current environment at game is very skewed towards high power-creep (as defined by the relative value of powers/abilities introduced more recently to those that have been in play for some years) and the characters with access to high-power abilities tend to determine the power level of game (a 13th Gen, starting dots social antagonist NPC would be melted in seconds, so staff must resort to higher power and higher stakes characters to provide challenge). This had led to the game bouncing from one emergency to another (sometimes multiple ones in a given week) IC and left little time for PC driven non-combat plots.

Is there room in your platform for social dynamic RP centered on Camarilla politics? If so, how will you and your staff work to ensure it can take center stage in a game where cities can be leveled, Werewolf armies can materialize from the Umbra and Demons can flay souls with little warning?

My intention is not to bad-mouth or nay-say the epic level plots, folks are clearly enjoying them. My question has more to do with the other half of game that tend to be less interested in that sort of thing. Is there room for us? If so, where?

Thanks!

Evan

[Cefyn]

The large-scale game with large-scale antagonists, I will admit, is a game that I tend to gravitate towards. I will press, though, that the large-scale game in the capacity it has been of late is even a bit large scale for me. I prefer a game with the occasional antagonist to test and try your skills and keep the combatives happy to play around, but the recent explosion, no pun intended, was not the initial intention of storyteller driven plots.

The story I would like to tell, given the opportunity, is absolutely one of politics, with a little bit of combat scattered around the edges. My momentum, going forward, intends to take game down a notch, play with character's backstories--as we have been, but instead focusing on smaller characters on sheets. The enemy 5, for example, present on a character's sheet can wait for some time--we just ran that kind of scenario. The Red Lister was such a story, although we expected a more personalized plot, but players and other characters were involved and cared a lot, and that's their right.

To be completely honest, I am a little tired in the same way you are. I would rather make my way down the opposite road--the one less traveled recently. I want to tell the stories on people's sheets, and pressure politics. I would like to do small things for individuals and create stories that engage people in political machinations against one another.

In the shortest of terms, your place is the same as the combative's place: at the top. I want to play a story that appeals to both crowds at different points, hopefully with small side-plots that can be given to some who want them. I understand that in dire situations, it is hard to politic, so I am hoping to steer the game into shallower waters. This doesn't mean I will stop players from playing what they want--if a character chooses to try and kick up a war, my intention is to create scenarios that make that more difficult, but I am not going to stop them from trying.

[Barnaby Cuthbert]

I'm for continuing on down this road with Kevin, mainly because I think that the power creep is helping to illustrate why that kind of story isn't ideal.

I'm able to enjoy things as they are and hope to make them better in the next election.

[Bertie]

Hey guys! I'm the other Kevin. As I mentioned before my name is on both Kevin and Joe's platforms. In my time here I've noticed that people like to divide themselves into these "liberal" and "conservative" camps as far as what they want to see in a vampire game. I am in neither camp. There are many different ways to play vampire, and all of them are equally valid. I have had fun playing in both styles and all points in between. Depending on which staff gets voted in, I plan to act differently to better reflect the wants of the playerbase as a whole.

I have been enjoying the recovery plot, and I want to see that one through to its end. No matter what you think about the events that lead to it, it has been a great vehicle for some of the most basic of vampire plotlines: blood and humans. Scarcity of resources have a great way of breeding conflict, and I always enjoy plots involving human management, especially when you vary things up outside of just masquerade breaches.

Early in Brendan's staff some of the domain tag plot got dropped, but I have been working to get that going again. There have been a series of fairly rapid domain adjustments during the storm and its aftermath, with the domains responding to both crazy underworld storms, player and mortal actions. While there have been some dedicated efforts to clean up the city, I want to keep this ball game going, whether it is new drugs on the streets or the latest efforts to hurt the Nosferatu domains.

One of my favorite books in vampire the masquerade was the Gilded Cage. In my view it wasn't about crazy powers or grand conspiracy theories but focusing on one of the most common battlegrounds of the Jihad: the mortal world. It still had the neonates versus the elders theme, and camarilla and sabbat stuff, but it discussed an avenue of conflict that I haven't seen spoken about as much in our discussions of late.  I hear a lot of talk about combat players, and politics players, but there are more options to hurt your enemies than killing them or embarrassing. Gilded Cage would suggest that you could evict them instead, and then extract a boon in exchange for finding them a place to crash during the day.

I like mortal plots.

Anyway, I also like supernatural plots, although I usually prefer to not go the full blown cross-sphere that sometimes happens.  Garnishes can be great. I've thrown changeling plots into game that nobody has yet recognized as changeling related for example. However there can be some difficulty in garnishing with supernaturals. Players aren't stupid, and their characters often aren't either. There are characters with the lore and the powers to directly deal with other supernaturals and it sucks to be plot-blocked.

So with other supernaturals I like to ask myself if the sphere is thematically compatible with vampire? Wraith usually translates pretty well: a bunch of dead people  trying to deny the darkness inside of them while they slowly slide towards their inevitable irrelevance and destruction. Werewolf I find harder to fit. When there is a conflict in that case, the werewolves are wrong.

Basically I am much more willing to violate the canon of other spheres than I am to violate the canon of vampire. And even then, some vampire canon is really dumb. Gangrel with Crinos form and ex-vampires with disciplines, and caitiff being even more likely to develop sorcery than mortals are dumb.

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On another note, I think we have been too permissive with character generation. We are not alone in that responsibility however. Contrary to rumor we haven't been going around forcing people to take 7th generation Nagaraja sorcerors with true faith. Every concept that we have approved has been one that has been asked for. Often the concepts that have been approved have been many steps toned down from what they are originally pitched as.

Some players have started to view character creation as an arms race where they are constantly slipping behind. Others have submitted strange character concepts just to prove that they could. With these attitudes in mind on Kevin's staff, I'm going to take a more skeptical reaction to all incoming character applications. In the right game there is a role for many of the stranger bloodlines, but you shouldn't be bending over backwards to justify your character dots, and you shouldn't feel pressured to either.

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Oh, I'm also going to work on the same more cookies for Toreador, Brujah and Ventrue idea I posted about in Joe's platform.