The power of 5

 So, today we're reviewing The Quintessential World of Darkness, a collection of 5 novels/novellas/short stories from each of the original 5 World of Darkness games. (Well, sort of.) As such, I'll be looking at each entry as a separate paragraph or so. 

The book opens with Kevin Andrew Murphy's The Lotus of Five Petals, which centers around the Eastern Vampire courts that became their own game somewhere prior to the Revised editions of the mail line games. Interestingly enough, it's the whole reason I bought a used copy of the collection, since this one amused me more than the game ever did. (In theory, Kindred of the East had a very interesting setting and managed to reconcile the main games into one more integrated world. In practice, it tended to turn into vampires doing Jackie Chan or Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.) Anyway, this, the only piece of fiction ever published outside of the sourcebook for the setting, tells the tale of Anchalee, knocked up by Minnesota sailor Howard, who gets killed on the streets of Bangkok. She gets her Second Breath (aka becomes a vampire) and gives birth to Howard's baby, who is now a Dhampir. Lady Miao, one of the more enlightened vampires of Bangkok brings Anchalee into her court, where a prophetic game of Mah Jong suggests Howard should come back in the picture. Howard returns, along with his friends Jim and Warren. Lady Miao claims Warren (who is of Chinese decent) as her choice of playmates during the visit, while her female impersonator secretary, Phat Ho, chooses Jim, who, despite being straight, has more than a few Obviously Gay Traits. Howard gets gifted with a blessing from Kwon Yin, and it eventually resolves as best it can. It's very subversive in its humor, and I love it like candy.

The second book, The Silver Crown by Bill Bridges, I actually have as a paperback, and you can find that review here. 

Third is Mister Magick by Edo van Belkom, which concerns the world of Mage. You can tell this one was written fairly early in first edition, since nothing lines up with more detailed pictures as the line evolved. Our main character, Romano, is an Italian-Canadian who escapes Canada to become a big name Vegas magician. He has two enemies, one of whom is a jealous assistant, and another a televangelist. While Romano is supposed to be a Cult of Ecstasy mage, one gets the sense that all he has in common with the Tradition is Time magic. While it's ok, I had a hard time trying to translate the setting with the later much richer metaplot that the game had. 

Next, we come to the world of Wraiths and Rick Hautala's Beyond the Shroud. I'll be honest, Wraith has a really engrossing setting, but the few times I've played, it runs into the issue of every character actually being Psyche and Shadow, which gets confusing easily. This book does a fairly good job of illustrating this world, with David trying to save his living wife and dead daughter from another Wraith with designs on one of Jack the Ripper's blades that's conveniently in possession David's ex-wife's new boyfriend. 

Last, we have the short story The Muse by Jody Lyn Nye. In this one, a Scottish artists finds a fairy muse who wants to return to Arcadia. Nothing really happens where the narrator can see it, so we're left with a guy who loves to draw the lady doing strange things who eventually disappears on Samhaine. 

As you can tell, the fiction within is kind of a mixed bag, and not all of it particularly resembles the source material. But, if you can find a copy, or just want one of the volumes, it will entertain.

January re-read V: Last one, I swear!

OK, much like the Vampire one I wrote last, explaining the plot behind The Last Battle by Bill Bridges requires a bit of a recap of everything that came before. (Also, I promised that Gehenna would be the last re-read for a while, but I started this one on the way to the library and decided to finish it.)

Much like Vampires, Werewolves are real. Werewolf introduced the Triat, Wyld, Weaver, and Wyrm. Wyld was chaos, Weaver was order, Wyrm was balance. Somewhere way back, Weaver spun Wyrm into her webs to prevent it from destroying her beautiful creations. This drove Wyrm mad. Wyrm is less balance and now "I WILL DESTROY EVERYTHING SO I CAN GET FREE OF THESE WEBS!"

Werewolves are dying off. While not the only changing breed, they really don't get along well with others, which may have to do with them pretty much trying to kill off the rest of them back in prehistory. Werewolves divide themselves by tribes and Auspices, based on parentage and what aspect the moon was in at birth.

One whole long lot of really fun fiction later, we come to this, the time when the Prophecies play out, and the world of Werewolf: the Apocalypse ends.

We mainly center on Albrecht, Mary, and Evan, who were first introduced in the original rule book. Over time (and in the old RAGE CCG), Albrecht became Gaian King, wearing the Silver Crown of leadership of the non-Wyrm aligned tribes. Not that he doesn't have competition for this, but...

We also check in with the Silver River Pack, who's journey was the focus of the Tribe Novels; Zhyzach, the crazy wyrm aligned werewolf prophesied to kill the last Gaian King; and Antoinin Teardrop, who's following Zhyzach on her way to free the Wyrm.

Much of the werewolf population winds up in battle in the Umbra, the spiritual reflection of the universe.

The rest of the make their stand in the Womb of the World. Given this is the end, there's much noble sacrifice and death, and not really a lot of happy endings.

While I never liked playing Werewolf overly much (the mechanics were often unwieldy) the much more detailed world building behind the game was very good and quite fun to get sucked in to. Thankfully, Werewolf also made for some really engaging fiction. (The Tribe Novels made more sense than the Clan Novels, and Albrecht's pack's first novel, The Silver Crown, was wonderfully action packed.) While I wouldn't recommend this particular novel to anyone not familiar with the setting, it is a heck of a lot better than it had any right to be. It also well outdoes the game supplement that covered this same time period, that really didn't offer any satisfying conclusions.

January re-read IV: Until the world ends

OK, given the book I'm reviewing today is straight out of a table top role playing game, I feel that I should do my best to summarize the setting before actually reviewing it. Bear with me here, the world building was huge with the setting. (I kind of wish Blogger had a "cyt" command so I could hide this section rather than make people familiar with the Original World of Darkness sit through a brief summary of several years and 3 editions worth of metaplot.)

Vampire: the Masquerade 's in game history starts in Genesis, when Cain (here spelled Caine) slew his brother. God delivered a series of curses to Caine that basically made him the original vampire. Some legends say he met up with Adam's first wife, Lilith, and she gave him some powers... Caine created 3 childer, vampires like himself. (The 2nd generation) They built a city, Caine destroyed it. Those three made 13 childer, who became the 3rd Generation, who are the clan parents of the 13 clans that exist in game. (Over time, bloodlines formed, who didn't have a clan parent or really stretch back much farther than the 8th Generation.) The 3rd generation became known as the Antediluvians.

Fast forward several millennia, a few of the Antediluvians are really dead, a few no longer particularly inhabit the plane of existence where they started from (or particularly inhabit what could be considered a physical body), one was diablarized (cannibalized to the point someone drunk his soul), one was almost diablarized, but it was found out he still existed in another form. None of this particularly matters that much, since modern vampires generally think of them as legends. (Regardless that one sleeps in Vienna, and everyone knows about him.)

Ugh, anyway, there's a whole series of prophecies that concern what happens when they all wake up. Most of those pretty much say they will consume their descendants and the world will end, but again, not amny particularly believe them. (Of the major factions in the setting, the Camarilla [who were pretty much the focus of the early additions] subscribes entirely to the idea that Gehenna is myth. The Sabbat, who allegedly killed off their clan founders [ed note: they failed], believe in Gehenna like some folks believe in Revelation. The Anarchs and the independents all seem to fall in between somewhere.)

Which should be enough background to start with the review of Gehenna: The Final Night by Ari Marmell. As one could guess by the title, this book concerns what happens when the Antediluvians wake up. We spend much of the book following Beckett (of Clan Gangrel, who's major power includes shape changing and who's founder, Ennoia, essentially became one with the Earth at some point) as he tries to understand why vampires exist. He's assisted in this by Kapaneus, a much older vampire Beckett meets in the ruins of Kaymakli. (Very long story short. Cappadocius, who founded the Cappadocian clan before being mostly destroyed by the Giovanni who took over the clan towards the end of the Dark Ages, got mad that his progeny weren't following directions, so he sealed them in a cave for eternity.) Beckett manages to break Cappadocius's seal on the entrance, thus waking up a few things that weren't exactly happy to be woken up. (Mind you, at the point this all starts, it's assumed Ravnos's founder had already woken up and been destroyed in Bangladesh, which was a whole other story told elsewhere.)

We also spend time following around Lucita (of Clan Lasombra, who killed her Sire back during the Clan Novels and has since taken over his place in the Sabbat Hierarchy) and Theo Bell (Clan Brujah. Theo is one of the Camarilla's main enforcers) who wind up working together as the Withering starts. The Withering is some sort of disease that affects the eldest vampires first, and gradually works its way down towards the youngest. It weakens the vampires affected, occasionally killing them. Some of the elders figure out that these effects can be treated by diablerizing other vampires, which is more or less what drives Lucita and Theo together.

And then there's Fatima (of Clan Assamite, the assassins  out of the middle east. When the Final Nights start, the clan has had a schism caused by one of the oldest expecting the clan to worship the founder rather than Allah.) Fatima, who knew Lucita of old, basically shows up mostly to pass on vital information at key points, as does Anatole (of Clan Malkavian, who are all lunatics. Anatole died before this book, but that doesn't seem to have slowed him down much.)

We follow everyone around across most of the Western World, finding that the Tremere are all dead (Tremere was a clan formed right around the start of the Dark Ages by Hermetic wizards trying to preserve their magic. Finding vampiric society to be even worse than mage society, they basically ate their way to the top of the food chain) and the Tzimisce are all pretty much gone as well. (Clan Tzimisce came out of eastern Europe and got very involved in body crafting. Their founder is basically like the Blob, only it's resting under Manhattan and calling its descendants home for dinner.)

As everyone slowly begins to realize that indeed, the Final Nights have started, just about everyone wants to kill Beckett, and Holy Lord, what's the complete blackness that keeps swallowing the sky?!?, everything slowly resolves with most of out party meeting fates one way or another. Beckett finally gets his answers in the epilogue, not long after he figures out who Kapaneus really is.

Of the three world ending books in the trilogy, this is probably the best, followed very closely by The Last Battle by Bill Bridges. (That one concerns the end of the world for Werewolves, which is also REALLY GOOD. The last book, concerning the end of the world for Mages, Judgement Day by Bruce Baugh, is horrid. I don't even own a copy any more. Which is sad, since the actual game supplement they released for Mage was the best of all the series enders.)

While I doubt all of my readers are into Table Top gaming, the original World of Darkness was one of the best. Yes, some of the mechanics were terrible, but the focus was so much more on the story than combat. I realize the reboot fixed the mechanics quite well, but the new story line was beyond bad. The oWoD was also one of the few series where the sourcebooks were so much fun to read, since they often were written at least partially in character, making it much more like reading a story than a dry dusty tome of rules

I recommend this and the second book to anyone who enjoyed the games, and even to those few who are willing to work with contectual clues to figure out what they've missed to get into a good world ender.