Date: Wed, 13 Sep 95 13:17:46 -0500 From: the fiend Subject: Malkavians and i want that prize! The clan malkave has a long and distant past filled with many things most of which should not be believed, usually because they're true. Why should people be inspired by the idea of insane vampires to take on their guise and roleplay beings that cannot possibly be understood as they are beyond understanding? Creatures that are controlled by ideas, input and emotions that they cannot comprehend. Things of the night that want to push others until they are ready to walk in the day(even if it's just to avoid them). The simple answer to this is..... it's fun. To some people the idea of being a power hungry person just does not appeal..... power gamers and the like enjoy having characters with no flaws or if they have a flaw it's one that they can take full points for but have very little chance of being affected by it. ie intense hatred flaw taken to encompass green dragons. Hardly a day to day worry. well when you're first level anyway. These are the people who will play ventrue. Some people do not have the desire to play something with an internal rage that makes them fight for no good reason. gamers with serious have-to-kill attitudes and smash-the-state because it affronts society will take brujah Some people do not like to play beasts on the edge of civilisation who hate cities and the crowded herding of the population. These green peace loving wolverine wannabe's will play gangrel. Some people do not want to play a tortured creature of the night that no one can look upon without fear and revulsion. People who really get off on self suffering and playing a loner nobody would want to get near to would take nosferatu. Some people don't want to try and legitimize and existance as being done for art. Art-iests and people who belive that the torured soul of the artist and and the existance of the vampire are in similar.... veins(hehe) will play a toreador. Some people don't want to play a lost soul that has no idea of it's beginings and is on a lonely path to what, they don't know. people who picture vampiric life to be something of a darker version of "Highway to Heaven" will play caitiff. Then there are people who think that the vampire genre is taking itself too seriously. these people willingly rent out "buffy" "love at first bite" "once bitten" and "i was a teenage vampire" as legit vampire films. They wear buttons that read "being strange isn't enough." These people who know that being a vampire is being so far out of society that it no longer confines one to what society deems normal. These People take their flaws and revel in them for they make the character. in a roleplaying game we truly play the role, not roll for combat or moneymaking or art creation. To be able to do the things you want and not care for there is nothing to care for. To create something because you like it and destroy it when you get bored, not for art but for yourself. To go where you want, with who you want and change your mind for the merest whim. And there lies power. The playing of a malkavian can shape the story in ways to numerous to mention. I know far too many GM's who worry that a malkave in the party could take everybody to zimbawae rather than New York, or take the party hunting for Caine in the Australian outback to ask him what sort of pizza he likes rather than face the mages of London. To a malkave this is good. If he can drag the GM into a distruptive circle and bring him to the gift, then all the other characters are in for a weird time. In playing circles people groan at the mention of malkavians. "oh no a loon" they think. then they listen..... and then they laugh. sure they complain but they love us. We point out things and possibilites that they never consider, would never consider and should have considered. A malk normally does all three in one breath too. We avoid conflict by being distracted by other things. We get into conflict by taking the other passage. We start conflict because someone said that danny partridge should have been killed at birth. We are everything and we are nothing. Without us the game would not be fun. Even when i play other characters I make them..... quirky. Just so they know they're getting off light. After all.... There is a little bit of malkav in us all. the fiend and in some of us there's a lot.