ThereseVoerman'svolunteerghoul

I see what you're saying about Jack working for/with Caine, and Nines probably not knowing. I don't see Jack as having anything to do with the emails; he can be helpful and almost protective and nice, but you certainly have to prove to him that you're worth his time and attention. He'd let you sink or swim, then decide whether he likes you or not. He's going to be sitting in that chair laughing at the explosion regardless - if anything, the sarcophagus is a sort of test, and he might respect you if you live through it. This is just speculation on my part. It's a comment that (I think) Beckett makes that causes me to see the Caine/Jack relationship more as one of servitude than collaboration - something about younger vampires being powerless to resist the will of the elders. (With Caine being the superpowerful uber-father-vampire.) Or maybe it was Jack, talking about younger vampires feeling even the bad dreams of the ancients from halfway across the world. It's ironic that Jack, who's known among the independent, rebel Anarchs for doing his own thing, seems to have his own puppet strings pulled. Caine might not have intended to directly serve the Anarchs by plotting to blow the tower, but that's about the biggest favor he could have done for them.

Thanks for the tip about the sarcophagus! - really looking forward to playing that way now. The cryptic emails aren't Jack's (blunt, rough, direct) style at all, so I ruled him out. It's possible I guess, but I tend to think it's Caine/the cab driver (the father behind the one who smiles, like the thin-blood Malkavian suggests). I'm not sure though. I thought it might be Beckett, but ruled that out after he told my character in person not to open the sarcophagus - wouldn't be necessary if he did it as the online emailing Friend. About vampire nature - doh, just looked at the Humanity score, where the vampire is described as being monstrous by nature. Learn something new every day.

I don't agree with your idea of vampire nature as inherently monstrous, especially not compared to most humans. But I'm misanthropic, and I'm also not very familiar with the World of Darkness rulebooks and official setting. I totally agree that the game is a huge success in creating that world you describe. The cities and its characters seem so alive; I keep playing because I have this feeling that anything could happen. I love watching the story play itself out - being able to watch and act from different perspectives (clan, gender, personality) makes it that much richer. I don't really have a complaint so much as a wish. The game seems to end with the sarcophagus exploding in Lacroix's penthouse no matter what; your main decision is whether to be there or not when it does. I wish that there were a few more possibilities - which isn't to say that the game isn't outstanding and complete as is, only that I'm greedy and just want more. I was bummed that after my Ventrue kissed Lacroix's ass the entire game (10 persuasion no less), alienated every Anarch, killed every Sabbat, we still got blown up. If you side with Lacroix, he screams 'no!' when he dies, instead of laughing like a madman when he dies by himself - that's the only difference. (And again, I found that out after playing through 3 times, *loving* it nearly all of the time, so it's not really a complaint.) [i haven't sided with the Kuei-jin yet (or played a Tremere), so I haven't seen if that allows for other endings.] Playing again through the early game I'm reminded of how often the Anarchs save my ass: Nines at least three times, and Jack when Lacroix throws my ignorant self out on the street in the beginning, then later when Lacroix declares open season on me towards the end. I tend to side with the Anarchs out of gratitude. Damsel lets me in to see the wounded Nines after the werewolf fight, which suggests they trust me to some extent. But that was really just to get orders to go on a suicide mission (kill all the Kuei-jin and Lacroix's people). They don't give me any warning about the sarcophagus - not even Jack, who's done so much work to set it up. I get more help from the thin blood Malkavian girl in Santa Monica ("Don't open it."), and the anonymous "Friend's" email. It hurts my feelings that, even after pledging to help and doing so much work for the Anarchs, they could just take me or leave me. *sniff* [sorry for the post length]

I thought one of the in-game hint screens mentions that the Elysium symbol denotes the abode of a vampire too powerful for you to mess with. And Lacroix refers to Mercurio as something like an "agent" of the Camarilla, so I thought he might be pulling princely strings to get someone else's ghoul to do something for him. But that doesn't mean M. isn't Lacroix's ghoul; maybe the term strikes the prince as too crass. That's right about Elysium being lifted if you decide to fight the Kuei-Jin leader and Lacroix. I was wondering if it might fit into the story in Santa Monica besides just being a game mechanic. I tend to give Mercurio a break. I did pocket his Astrolite money in a game or two (at the cost of 1xp), but he's always there at the end of the game willing to sell me stuff. I felt that my fondness for Mercurio was vindicated when the thin blood Malkavian (in E's group on the Santa Monica beach) says that he's one of the two people you can trust: "the man on the couch" and the lone wolf Becket. I sort of wish there were more vampires in the game who weren't out to screw you over or just use you as a tool. You can't really win anyone's trust or respect - the Anarchs are the closest thing, but that pretty much just gets you to run *their* errands instead of Lacroix's.

I love this game. Thanks to the people who made it for the incredible work they did. One of my few problems with it is that I have to wait until daylight to run through the haunted house, it's that creepy. Well done. I've played the game three times already (Toreador, Malkavian, Ventrue), and I've got two new characters (Gangrel, Tremere) waiting on the house doorsteps for me to build up enough courage to take them inside. By the way, would anyone happen to know which vampire lives in the same apartment building as Mercurio in Santa Monica? (Carson (IIRC) the bounty hunter also lives there, the one you need to rescue from Stan Gimble, the limb fetishist.) The building is an Elysium space, but I'm curious as to who's hiding out there. Could it be Mercurio's anonymous master?