Thread by @ReverendMalcus

Ok, I have eaten dinner, gotten water and popcorn for munchies, time to give the preview of VAMPIRE THE MAS-ANKH-UERADE 5th Ed. a read

Heaven help me

THIS SEEMS LIKE A RED FLAG #VTM5

The section titles are sloppy... and bleeding. Or maybe the pen was just shitty. #vtm5

The intro paragraph is just missing the "You are standing in a 10' X 10 corridor", I swear to SOMETHING #vtm5

...so just like the real world, then? #vtm5

So far the pitch for the new edition is essentially the same as the original Vampire but more... edgelord-y. The promise here, as written, is less "You can play a tragic monster" and more "You can be an awful piece of shit for a few hours."

Also, the preview just CUTS OFF AT THAT COMMA LIKE IT WAS A SQUIRREL THAT SAW A SHINY AND GOT BORED MID-SENTENCE JESUS CHRIST #vtm5

Ok I admit this is me being nitpicky but OH HONEY don't mix your fonts like this #vtm5

Ok the fashion thing is one full page and it has no fucking focus. It is all over the map and takes a detour straight up its own ass in the second paragraph.

Somehow the "We wear black so the blood doesn't show" is both the best and worst ting on the page. #vtm5

Also, a shoutout to whoever wrote this for making the third paragraph in this fashion section indecipherable AND backhanding the goth scene at the same time. #VTM5

Ok the photo they used as the lead-in splash page for the Brujha is actually pretty good, stereotypes be damned. #vtm5

HOWEVER I OBJECT TO SOMETHING HERE.... #vtm5

HIPSTERS would totally be Toreadors. There, I said it, and I'm not taking it back #vtm5

Now into the Brujha preview and the writing is still unfocused. And they're painting the clan as a bunch of rebellios liberal activists who... for some reason... still embrace neo-Nazis. #vtm5

The first paragraph of the Archetypes section stops mid-sentence at the bottom of page 65 and page 66 is just a splash page with eight small pictures and a FUCKTON of whitespace. text picks back up on 67.

WHO DID THIS PAGE LAYOUT, FRANK MILLER??? #vtm5

Apropos of nothing, listening to Ghost while reading this is helping. #vtm5

Wait, the Brujha aren't in the Cam anymore? WAT #vtm5

(and I know I misspelled Brujah like three times tonight, I don't even care right now)

That's it, I am getting my old Vampire book and comparing this description to the old one, I have never known less about a clan before #vtm5

I DON'T KNOW, BOOK, WHY DON'T YOU TELL ME??? #VTM5

Same core disciplines as before but... why are you describing how they use them in the most worthless manner possible. This paragraph essentially says "Use Celerity to move fast" like WE DON'T KNOW THAT'S WHAT ITS FOR

Extraneous text, get rid of it. #vtm5

Ok moving on to the Toreador section and WE HAVE TITS. Like, a photo of them. IN CHAINMAIL.

No I am not posting a picture of that. #VTM5

This picture heading into the Toreador section... a woman with artful hair standing nude except for a chain dress and some kind of bondage gloves I cannot even begin to fathom... this pictures sums up this entire PDF, and I am paralyzed by it. #vtm5

The amount of wasted space on these pages just boggles my mind. At least 50% of the first page of the Toreador section is whitespace. You could fit legions of Pokemon in this blank space. #VTM5

CRAAAAAAAAAAAWLING IIIIIIIIN MY SKIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN.... #vtm5

Suddenly at the third paragraph the text decides it's LARP time and jumps in character with NO WARNING and all the text going forward is in italics. The Brujah section did not do this.

Below is a graphic depiction of my brain right now.. #VTM5

Seriously, if this in-character bit had been FIRST, I would have no issues here, it's actually OK. But they did two paragraphs of weird edge-lord BS BEFORE the character speaks. And there is no in-character bit in the earlier clan section.

This is why editors go crazy. #VTM5

Oh god...
Page 88: White with black text, 3 columns
Page 89: The cover of Metallica's Load, B&W
Page 90: Black with white text, one column, plus a picture of the cover
Page 91: White with black text, one column, and the negative of the prev. page's picture

I'M NOT EVEN KIDDING ABOUT PAGE 89 LOOK AT THIS #vtm5

At the rate this book is wasting space, the final product will be 700 pages long and cost more than a small house in Seattle. #VTM5

Oh no. The aforementioned Red Flag has arrived.

The "Beliefs" section.

I am honestly dreading this.... #VTM5

Ok, I want to be fair to this section, it at least look like they are aware this system could cause issues and try to mitigate it. This bit is good for any game but probably doubly so here. #VTM5

They borrowed heavily from Wraith for this, right down to having a human you care about being your link to your humanity. This is the first section of the PDF where it feels like the writer actually cared. #VTM5

There is an off-hand mention of a Relationship Map as part of a chronicle...

Did they just steal the best part of the Smallville RPG??? #VTM5

I am still not fully sold on the idea of letting players make up their own moral code, especially when it has huge in-game consequences. But as a cooperative effort with a mature troop, I could see this working. At least there was THOUGHT put into it. #VTM5

WHICH IS MORE THAN I CAN SAY FOR ANYTHING IN THE FRONT HALF OF THIS PDF OMG #VTM5

OK a discipline preview next. Celerity and OH FFS that's just a D&D spell #VTM5

"If the Toreador Primogen of Seattle leaves for Tacoma at 7 PM with Dex 4 and Celerity 3, at approximately what time will she arrive? Please show all your math." #VTM5

Celerity, like so many other disciplines, is now just a spell list. Without anything else to compare it to, though, i am underwhelmed.

You can start the game with a vial of Ravnos' blood. As in, the now-dead Antediluvian. THIS SEEMS UNWISE. #VTM5

OH HAI TIM BRADSTREET ART I MISSED YOU!!!! #VTM5

OMFG have I been reading this for three hours, please murder me softly. #VTM5

The final page in the preview is numbered 395, meaning this is nearly 100 pages longer than VTM Revised. And at least 1/3 of that is FUCKING WHITE SPACE #VTM5

This may be as good a time as any to mention that I used to review White Wolf books online for a couple of web sites way back in the day, so this has been a lovely nostalgia trip for me #VTM5

Final Verdict: Who ever wrote and laid out the first half of this PDF needs to be taken out back and sacked. Deeply unpleasant to read, even harder to even just look at. My eyes may never recover...

...the back half seems to have actually been written by someone with sense and the layout was improved, if still a tad heavy on white space. Without everything in front of me I can't pass full judgement on the game system, but it at least looks like someone TRIED. #VTM5

Still.... Toreador Tits. *sigh* #VTM5

And Metallica better come looking for royalties on page 89 and NO I AM NOT OVER THAT #VTM5

Now time to relax, grab a popsicle, and wash my brain with bleach. Yeesh. Not looking forward to the finished product. #VTM5

Ok this got way more eyeballs on it than I was expecting, so I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who read, liked, and retweeted the mad ramblings of an old goth and gamer. This has warmed my heart just a bit. :)