Monte Cooks WoD is for 3.5

[Voadam]

The World of Darkness Re-Imagined {tm}
This book includes a complete setting: a new vision of the World of Darkness.
* Characters play as vampires, mages, werewolves, demons, or Awakened. They wield frightening supernatural powers against their own kind.
* The world is the one we know, but now much darker: destruction in the central US, nightmares coming to life, and beasts roaming shattered cityscapes.
* Uses the most popular roleplaying system in the world.

ISBN: 978-1-58846-467-5 || Stock #: WW51000
Retail Price: $49.99 US || Page Count: 300+ hc
Authors: Monte Cook, Luke Johnson

I will be very interested in the pdf.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

This is the description WW gave out at GTS:

Sounds nice. In addition to d20 rules for WoD, we get a third take at the concept, this time rather more different from the other two.

 

[boerngrim]

Hmm. Interesting. I haven't played any WoD since the 90's. I'd give this a look at least. I thought Monte wasn't doing any game design any more though...

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Hmm. Interesting. I haven't played any WoD since the 90's. I'd give this a look at least. I thought Monte wasn't doing any game design any more though...

This was his last project, which he described as an offer he couldn't refuse.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Actually, the cover is the only thing, that holds me back, to preorder it right now. It is so... poor. Compare it to average nWoD cover. Or even worse... compare it with D&D covers. It has this kind of technique I really dislike. One cover artist in our country paints the fantasy books covers similar way and it is the reason I don't buy them, because I seriously can't watch it. It looks somehow wrong or something.

Don't judge a book by its cover!

 

[boerngrim]

This was his last project, which he described as an offer he couldn't refuse.

Oh cool. Thanks.

 

[blargney the second]

I just had a neat thought: we're going to get a slew of variant vampires. This book isn't a setting... it's a monster manual in disguise!

 

[ShadowDenizen]

Said it before, and I'll say it here: "Not everything needs to be D20."
The WoD rules work fine for the setting, and they've had YEARS to tweak them.

Especially where (like Deadlands and CoC), WoD is (essentially) skill-based, as opposed to Level Based.

But as someone else said, I don't think I'm $50 interested.

Agreed.
It does seem a bit on the steep side for an unknown quantity. (Sure both systems are popular in their own right, but how big will the crossover audience be?)

 

[Dire Bare]

And, really, in a nutshell isn't that what Dark*Matter is hinting at? And that's pretty much the basics of the Urban Arcana d20 setting? And it also sounds like the world described when my buddy ran us through some d20 Cuthulu material. Truth be told, I'm had enough with "X-Files: The Roleplaying Game" that, despite having a great respect for Monte's work, I really have no need for this. :\

The World of Darkness (any of the three versions), Call of Cthulu (modern day), Urban Arcana, Dark Matter, X-Files, and, heck, Buffy the Vampire Slayer are all modern day dark fantastic settings.

But to say they are all simply the same thing is like saying that Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Eberron and the Forgotten Realms are all the same thing.

They are all definitely within the same genre and pull from the same tropes, but each has a unique flavor and themes that set them apart.

The main difference that sets the World of Darkness (at least the current two versions) apart from, say, Urban Arcana, is that you play the monsters. And it isn't simply playing powered up furries, but real monsters that prey upon humanity, each other, and themselves. The World of Darkness books so far have been very dark.

Some people dig it, some don't. I'm very interested in Monte's reimagining of the WoD, but it seems it will be very different than previous versions.

I'm not familiar with the current Storyteller WoD, but the original was set just before the apocalypse. Apocalypse with a capital "A" all biblical style. Monte's version seems quite post-apocalyptic. Can't wait.

 

[GreatLemur]

This is the description WW gave out at GTS:

A World in Darkness
One year ago, eldritch horrors of cosmic malevolence called the Inconnu attempted to destroy our reality. They failed, but the attempt left the world in rapidly-darkening shadow. Dead souls returned to claim living bodies, creating blood-drinking undead fiends: vampires. Bestial spirits came as well, to create werewolves, and demons formed bodies from worldly matter. Magic crashed back into the world, and mages wield its power for whatever purpose suits them. Humans called the Awakened unknowingly keep the darkness at bay. These supernatural creatures struggle against each other and clash in the shadows, most attempting to destroy the world, but some few fighting to preserve it. And over it all, the Icconu {sic} still lurk, squeezing the world like an eggshell.

The World of Darkness Re-Imagined {tm}
This book includes a complete setting: a new vision of the World of Darkness.
* Characters play as vampires, mages, werewolves, demons, or Awakened. They wield frightening supernatural powers against their own kind.
* The world is the one we know, but now much darker: destruction in the central US, nightmares coming to life, and beasts roaming shattered cityscapes.
* Uses the most popular roleplaying system in the world.

ISBN: 978-1-58846-467-5 || Stock #: WW51000
Retail Price: $49.99 US || Page Count: 300+ hc
Authors: Monte Cook, Luke Johnson

Huh. Interesting. They're talking about the Inconnu as if they're Lovecraftian monster gods, while I always thought they were just a bunch of old, powerful vampires. And it's odd that "mages" and "Awakened" are two separate things. I'm guessing that the Awakened are Monte's take on the monster-killing Hunter: The Reckoning characters.

If Monte can actually work out a d20 magic system that effectively emulates the flexibility of the Mage magic system (oWoD, prefereably) while maintaining some kind of reasonable balance, I'm pretty much sold on this book.

AFAIAC, ENPub has already published that book.

I know, I've really got to give Elements of Magic a chance, some day. But from what I've heard, it's not particularly similar to what I'm hoping to see in this WoD d20 book. Maybe it could be adapted to it, I guess, if somebody spent enough time beating the elemental theme out of it, and restructured it around the somewhat more logical Mage "spheres".