robinbloke | Venues and such...

Some thoughts on various venues from my own ramblings, purely in a Cam context for LRP, more from a character typecast point of way - when I don't ramble off on some random other point.

Vampire C/A
Strong characterisation and identification for the venues, probably the second strongest typecasting of any venue (after Garou). The biggest background source which WW seems to like changing although the recent developments to unify everything and bring it all towards a conceptual ideal (with the new editions of Dark Ages) is good. Organisational structure (Princes and the Cam) is the one I'm most familiar with, the venue itself is not an initially friendly one and can be hard to 'break into' with a new character which means IC cliques (aka coteries) can naturally form. Outgoing nature or something to keep your character interested - or interesting to others is important. Anarc side seems to be pushing for more development after previous incidents, has promise.

Vampire - Sabbat
Aside from my major niggle, that of a unified timeline between Sabbat and C/A - two venues whos basic purpose is to destroy the other. This granted is a part of the unifed cam world however. The other niggle seems to be calming down that of 'freak factor' that the venue is an attraction for those from C/A so they can play clans they can't normally and do stuff ("Oooo lets burn people for kicks") they can't in C/A. Seems to be establishing the fundamentals of the politics better, not following developments of this one too well myself. Same character typecast strengths as C/A - since the character type is basically the same - hence the rambling padding at the start.

Garou
Strongest character typecasting of any venue, breed, race and auspice (?) very strongly typecast characters but since there are at least three variants for any type there is a massive diversity of combinations to play meaning that the strong typecasting isn't actually that much of a problem as diversity can still work very well. This I like. What I don't like is that Garou often boils down to fights and if I want to fight something in LARP I'll smack it with a rubber sword and get myself an adrenalin rush rather than waving my fingers at someone. Simplification of the venue, granted, but thats me. That said I do approve of the system for character types, very nice.

Changeling
Strong typecasting on character types (Boggin, Troll etc) which gives a strong sense of identity between the types. The friendliest venue I've played, in that generally speaking most of the types actually get on with each other and although there is tension you're not all out to just backstab (vampire) or prove that you're better (garou) or whatever. Arts are not as strongly typecast, restrictions do exist to certain arts but fundamentals can be learnt by anyone, which is a plus and a minus.

Mage
Weakest typecasting for abilities, since (pending speciality level restriction) anyone can learn and do (fundamentally) what anyone else can do. Traditions almost seem an afterthought and apart from a few of the stronger ones really don't make that much of an impact (that I've seen) on the character type or play. Disadvantages almost seem to be an afterthought rather than a character defining trait. Little tension between types, generally, and can be considered almost the 'soap opera' of the venues.

Note these are my random rambles and observations; critique, slaps, beanies and whatnot welcomed.