Metaplots - it wasn't just TSR that did them

[the Jester]

Not specifically true. We could have just said "Welp, we're done here" and moved on to creating the nWoD when the changeover was necessitated. However, we had all these glorious apocalyptic events that had been teased from the beginning. Seemed a shame not to use them.

Dude, seriously. Can you even IMAGINE the level of protest at having two different games with the same name set in two different worlds with the same name? Do you think that would have been a good business strategy?

(And actually, it would have been two of each of a good half-dozen games with the same name. And no, tacking a different tag line after "Vampire" or "Mage" or whatever doesn't cut the mustard as far as differentiating product lines.)

IMHO that is ridiculous, but I don't run a game company, so hey.

 

[GrimGent]

Except that there would never have been a nWOD if the old one hadn't been destroyed.

Well, there's also Monte Cook's World of Darkness, which doesn't share its continuity with either of those other two settings. So several different WoDs could officially co-exist at the same time without any trouble.

 

[Barastrondo]

Dude, seriously. Can you even IMAGINE the level of protest at having two different games with the same name set in two different worlds with the same name? Do you think that would have been a good business strategy?

Perhaps I was a little unclear. When we made the decision to stop publishing material for the old World of Darkness, we then made the decision to blow it up. Those are two separate decisions. Ending publishing for a setting and publishing an end-of-the-world; one followed the other rather than them being the same idea. Similarly, there's a distinction between "we blew up the oWoD so we could make the nWoD" and "we made the nWoD so we could keep publishing a WoD when we couldn't do the oWoD any more."

I realize it looks like semantics, but it's at the core of the matter. We could have simply ceased publication of the oWoD instead of destroying it (unless you consider ceasing publication as "destruction," in which case fair point). Publishing end-of-the-world books was arguably a better decision (as it made the shift between settings clear), but it didn't have to be the only way to go. And although we did need to cease publication of the oWoD, it was for reasons above and beyond making room for the nWoD.

 

[M.L. Martin]

So, any setting that was even slightly successful--and quite a few that weren't--got a novel line, and back then it went without saying that novels meant metaplot.

With one or two exceptions.

Ravenloft, for example, was almost entirely metaplot-free from the novel side. A considerable number of novels were set in the history of the setting, others tended to have minimal impact (Heart of Midnight, for example, killed off a minor NPC from Feast of Goblyns who'd already been marked for death in an adventure seed in said product; that was typically how dramatic the metaplot impact of the novels was--minor characters or events may be effected, details would be added to background, but major elements would be left status quo.) The only major metaplot event that originated from the novels was Lord Soth's departure from the Dread Realm, and I believe that was driven by elements from the Dragonlance side of things. There's some scattered evidence that Death of a Darklord may have been intended to free Harkon Lukas from darklordship at first, but if so, they backed off by the time the novel was actually published.

Now, Ravenloft did have metaplot--too much of it, in some cases--but that metaplot was almost entirely driven by the modules.

A couple of other lines may also be exceptions. I don't believe the Basic D&D/Mystara novels had any metaplot impact, although I'm only familiar with the original Penhaligon Trilogy. Birthright I'm likewise uncertain about.

 

[wingsandsword]

Perhaps I was a little unclear. When we made the decision to stop publishing material for the old World of Darkness, we then made the decision to blow it up. Those are two separate decisions. Ending publishing for a setting and publishing an end-of-the-world; one followed the other rather than them being the same idea. Similarly, there's a distinction between "we blew up the oWoD so we could make the nWoD" and "we made the nWoD so we could keep publishing a WoD when we couldn't do the oWoD any more."

I think I understand. You wanted a total continuity reboot, a World of Darkness not encumbered by over a decade of byzantine metaplots and with more "sandbox" and "toolkit" elements, that also took advantage of lessons learned in game design (making the core book about mortals with only very minor supernatural content, and making each supernatural being a separate "setting" book that built off a common core was good)

With regards to metaplot and WoD, I thought it tended to get in the way, personally. I always hated it when a player would come to the table (or the larp) and start spewing lots and lots of esoteric metaplot references to obscure characters and automatically think they were part of that game.

Metaplot and an extremely detailed setting help build verisimilitude in settings far removed from reality (Forgotten Realms, Star Wars ect). For a setting like WoD that is supposed to be very much like the world out your front door, you already have an idea of what the world is like, you just need some things added in here and there.

However, even when you have Metaplot, it shouldn't fundamentally make prior products unusable. Advance the presumed campaign date a year or two: Okay. Make the presumed outcome of published modules an in-game fact mentioned later on: Okay. Have some minor events happen like tertiary NPCs die, or new organizations arise as responses to prior events: Okay. Have big-name NPCs die plunging the setting into total chaos and civil war and have future books assume that's the status quo: Not Okay.

 

[Aurumvorax]

Dude, seriously. Can you even IMAGINE the level of protest at having two different games with the same name set in two different worlds with the same name? Do you think that would have been a good business strategy?

(And actually, it would have been two of each of a good half-dozen games with the same name. And no, tacking a different tag line after "Vampire" or "Mage" or whatever doesn't cut the mustard as far as differentiating product lines.)

IMHO that is ridiculous, but I don't run a game company, so hey.

Hey, this is how mainstream comic books are handled. DC had a pretty big event in the late 80s when they blew up their multiple continuities and most fans hail it as the companies greatest story telling event.

I'm ambivalent towards differing time lines set within the same continuous setting. Generally I set my game wherever I damn please but I can see how it becomes confusing to the average person who just picks up a book and doesn't know where to start.

 

[Hussar]

Aurumvorax - I was thinking the exact same thing. How many times in the last twenty years has DC and Marvel rebooted their lines? More than once each anyway. The idea of these universes with fifty years of comic book continuity isn't really done anymore. They go a few years then reboot.

Then again, how many X-Men continuities are there?

 

[Merkuri]

I never really liked metaplots in settings I played in. For books and video games they were great, but not for actual games. It's one of the reasons that I've read a lot of the Forgotten Realms stuff, but never found the urge to play in the setting.

One of the big benefits to a published setting is that everyone knows the setting. You don't have to teach your players where the towns are and what the major religions are.

If a metaplot changes something in the setting you don't like, or if you had already made some change to the setting that the metaplot, sure, you could decide to just ignore the published material, but then one of the benefits of a published setting is gone. You no longer have a setting that everybody knows inside and out.

Plus, I find myself not wanting to contradict setting cannon. It's just an instinct I have. I know I can choose to do something different, but I just find it hard. If I know a supplement will be coming out soon that details a certain aspect of a setting I find myself not wanting to use that setting aspect until the supplement comes out and I've had a chance to read it because I don't want to accidentally contradict something in that supplement.

I suspect this "don't contradict cannon" instinct is not unique to me, thus the sentiments from some gamers about how metaplot ruined their game. We can ignore it, sure, but it's like too much salt in your food. It might still be edible, but you don't wanna eat it anymore.

 

[pawsplay]

Except that there would never have been a nWOD if the old one hadn't been destroyed.

That's still not a meta-plot. That's a meta-meta. No plot, no meta-plot.

 

[GrimGent]

...And after WW's "Darkness Revealed" announcement at their Grande Masquerade event, it turns out that their upcoming MMORPG will be based on the old Vampire: The Masquerade rather than the nWoD. Apparently one of the supported playstyles will be "theme park": perhaps they've turned some of that past metaplot material into overarching quests or some such?