Kindred of the East

Very cool indeed! B)

In order to make it work, it should fit as smoothly into VTES as possible. As already mentioned, try to avoid Imbued-syndrome. The best approach would be to use existing disciplines where possible and create a new one for each "clan", where appropriate.

I know, that way you'd deviate from the source, but VTES is not the roleplaying game, so it has to be quite simplified to make the cards work. The more the Kindred of the East are treated like standard vampires, the better. Otherwise games might get really weird if a player plays KotE, just like with the Imbued (and no-one likes the Imbued).

Perhaps you could come up with a set of rules specifically for the Kue-jin to give them some new flavour, but they would have to be few and very straight-forward.

Btw, where did you get the Artwork for your cards from? The crypt cards look definitely awesome!

prunesquallor wrote:

This is a great effort, and is to be encouraged - in the long run this is the kind of thing that's needed to keep the game alive. I would heartily encourage VEKN to work with the authors so that if/when a fan produced set is released, it is accepted for at least some formats of competitive play.
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Hi Prunesquallor and Nick M,

Thanks both for your input and kind comments! My answers to your comments overlap a little, so I'll respond to you both at the same time.

I agree that Legacies / EK perhaps didn't offer enough to interest a non-Laibon, non-Bloodlines player, whereas sets like Lords of the Night gave us some pretty solid generic cards (Target: Vitals, to pick one at random). I must say, I didn't mind that too much - it meant more room in Legacies/EK for Laibon and Bloodline-specific toys, and i'm a sucker for that sort of thing - but I can certainly see how some people get frustrated or turned off by that.

I've tried to avoid that in these cards, although admittedly with mixed success. Many more generic effects were pushed out to Set 2 or 3 as I tried to insert more Kuei-Jin-specific effects into my opening salvo. The distribution channel changes the mix, really; if they're all 100% available and free, people can pick and choose as they see fit. If there was a cost involved (and Mike and I did approach LSJ and Oscar with this, albeit it may have been clear to them at the time that VTES didn't have a future with CCP), a player's reaction would be vastly different.

The cards - and by cards, I really mean a structured series of sets, not just the first 350-odd cards - are designed to be playable equally as Kuei-Jin versus Kuei-Jin, or Kuei-Jin versus Cainite, or (to a lesser extent) combined crypts. Mixes of Kuei-Jin and Cainite in the crypt would work much in the same way as an Imbued ‘splash’ works in a standard vampire-centric crypt, but with without as many recursion effects that make the Imbued so card-efficient. While there are cards in the opening releases that affect both Kuei-Jin and Cainite equally, my design was that we'd be at Set 2 or 3 before we'd be able to make truly competitive mixed crypts. I'd also designed themed Cainite starters to introduce the Westerners to the Orient (the first cabs off the rank being a starter each for Lasombra and Giovanni, which would explore their linkages with the Middle Kingdom). Later sets explored the Heretical Kuei-Jin of Sri Lanka and India, and there I'd provide more overlap with clans like Ravnos and Assamite. Another set had a splash of Salubri and Gangrel, as both have historical linkages to the East.

In terms of fan-produced sets, even after putting so much effort into KOTE over the years I'd still say that a Group 5 Sabbat set should probably be VEKN's first priority should they want to go down such a path. Filling in that group would create immediate benefit for playgroups and not scare off players who don't want to drift too far from known concepts and strategies.

That said, I'd think a KOTE set - or something else, like the Mage variant also featured here on VEKN - would create a real shot in the arm and really enervate playgroups that feel like they want to see something new to clearly show that VTES Phase 3 has begun. The WOTC era was short-lived but set the fundamentals of the game in place. WW/CCP, as Phase 2, gave us two 'safe' expansions before boldly treading new ground with Bloodlines. VEKN is currently in a holding pattern, and rightly so; supporting the game, but not stuffing about with the IP too much so that it remains attractive for future buyers. But if that starts to recede as an option, VEKN should choose to re-define the game as it sees fit - and more power to them for that.


cheers
Disco Stu

Amenophobis wrote:

Very cool indeed! B)

In order to make it work, it should fit as smoothly into VTES as possible. As already mentioned, try to avoid Imbued-syndrome. The best approach would be to use existing disciplines where possible and create a new one for each "clan", where appropriate.

I know, that way you'd deviate from the source, but VTES is not the roleplaying game, so it has to be quite simplified to make the cards work. The more the Kindred of the East are treated like standard vampires, the better. Otherwise games might get really weird if a player plays KotE, just like with the Imbued (and no-one likes the Imbued).

Perhaps you could come up with a set of rules specifically for the Kue-jin to give them some new flavour, but they would have to be few and very straight-forward.

Btw, where did you get the Artwork for your cards from? The crypt cards look definitely awesome!

Hi Amenophobis,

Mike Miller is the one to thank for the art. He collated hundreds, if not thousands, of images to use for these cards. Some came from L5R or Shadowfist, some from Flickr or artist websites, some as movie stills, or promotional artwork for computer games - you name it, Mike tracked it down! The background for the Dharmas were all designed by Mike too, and I've got to say that he did a truly amazing job. The Thousand Whispers has got to be my favourite so far, but literally every one I see is better than the last. I've never met or spoken to the man, despite having worked with him for years on this, but he's got a great eye for design and I can't praise his work enough. Mike also designed the Discipline icons, although a minority of them (the Shintai, really) had their own symbols already provided in the sourcebooks. I got stuck with the words while he handled the 'wow' factor

Okay, so if I take the frequently suggested approach that perhaps 25% of Kuei-Jin Disciplines should be 'new' and I try to find best-fit options amongst the existing Cainite Disciplines, we're left with the following Discipline spreads...

Devil-Tigers: Celerity Protean Valeran + **Ghost-Flame Shintai**
Resplendent Cranes: Dominate Protean Quietus + **Internalize**
Shadow Songs: Chimerstry Obfuscate Thanatosis + **Cultivation**
Thrashing Dragons: Fortitude Thaumaturgy Vicissitude + **Yang Prana**

For what it's worth, other 'normalised' Disciplines to be featured in later sets would be;
Jade Shintai ( )
Kiai ( )
Feng Shui ( )
Beast Shintai ( )
Tzu Wei ( )
Hellweaving ( )

And the following brand-new Disciplines, over many sets: Inward Way,
Equilibrium, Prayer-Eating and Smoke Shintai.

For those keeping score, that means of the 'major' (WOTC) Disciplines in VTES, we have no Animalism, Dementation, Necromancy, Obtenebration, Potence, Presence or Serpentis. Reasonably different from what to expect?

Under that take on things, one of those two sample vamps I provided earlier now looks as follows;
Chan Yu-wei:
That's not too shabby, really!

But, it does lead to some odd looking elder vampires though...
Eight Thunders Sage
[DT, 11] [Group 4]
[ + (GHOST-FLAME SHINTAI]
Quincunx Bodhisattva (i.e., 3 votes). Kuei-Jin. Eight Thunders Sage may burn 1 Chi to cancel a blood hunt. Damage from his hand strikes cannot be prevented by equipment. +1 bleed. +1 strength. Sterile.
(Kiai is more martial than Melpominee, so 8TS is going to have a bunch of political options unlocked for what had previously been a combat machine! Who knows, maybe he can use that Melpominee intercept card no-one plays with

Rising Majestically
[RC, 10] [Group 2]
[ + (INTERNALIZE)]
Quincunx. Kuei-Jin. If Rising Majestically is titled, she gains an additional vote during referendums. +2 intercept. Sterile.
(Rising Majestically only had light intercept disciplines, but replacing Feng Shui with AUS gives her a bunch more options. Perhaps I need to tone down that intercept bonus!)

Lun Meng
[TW, 8] [3]
[ + (EQUILIBRIUM)]
Quincunx. Kuei-Jin. While Lun Meng is ready you have +X hand size, where X is the number of locations controlled by your prey. +1 bleed. Sterile.
(Jade Shintai finds its closest match in the Gargoyle's clan disciplines, as it is earth- and stone-themed, but of course some of the Slave text will hamper the Discipline's usefulness. Still, it does unlock a bunch of options.)

Shout-of-Anger
[TD, 7] [Group 3]
[ + (YANG PRANA)]
Quincunx. Kuei-Jin. Cards that require Vicissitude:vic: cost Shout-of-Anger one less Chi to play. Sterile.
(FOR+VIC looks like fun to me... 'nuff said).

With all that in mind, feedback is most keenly sought about this redesign! I will continue to put up some images of various cards and effects, not to mention some Kuei-Jin specific rules, but just do some mental 'find and replace' as the Disciplines come up...

cheers all,

Disco Stu
Prince of Melbourne, Australia

Hmm, if Shadow Songs = Chimerstry Obfuscate Thanatosis ... under this proposed redesign it'd seem that Genina finally has friends to play with..!

*Really* nervous concern:
Be especially careful about giving traditionally Clan-unique Disciplines to anyone else, especially more than one at a time. I'd be worried about a Dharma with THA/VIC for example, not just because of power levels per-se but also because it devalues the uniqueness of those Disciplines. I'd try & use the more general ones a bit more, although VIC is probably your only option for Flesh/Blood Shintai. This becomes increasingly more important when playing with Bloodline Disciplines such as MEL, VAL or THA.

That aside, it seems a lot more sensible, and a non-Gargoyle option with VIS would be really quite exciting.

EDIT: As an alternative, if you wanted to exaggerate the 'exotic' nature of the Kuei-Jin, you could ignore the above and pair up things like PRO/VAL, but make the more common, traditional, 'useful' Disciplines, such as OBF, AUS, DOM or FOR extremely rare or non-existent. This would make them very different, but force players to use very odd and new strategies, which would work.

DOUBLE EDIT: If you're ever going to hand out DAI, you need to consider Infernal, to represent Akuma. Just a comment.