The White Wolf LiveJournal Community - A Neat Part of the New Orleans Book

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With our new setting books, we're taking the opportunity to drop story seeds into the text here and there as sidebars. They're just small ideas that can be built into larger ones or even become the focus for whole chronicles. Here's one from the forthcoming City of the Damned: New Orleans that I really liked. The book itself doesn't focus on this -- it's just an out-there idea that really sounds like it'd make for a cool story.

In the Wake of the Storm

Should you take inspiration from the above example and actually include a hurricane in your stories, it’s probably a safe bet that New Orleans—despite the fears of its populace—survives relatively unscathed. After all, you normally won’t want to obliterate your chronicle’s setting, unless you’re looking for a dramatic end to a final chapter.

However, it might make for an interesting and unusual story to have New Orleans badly damaged, almost destroyed, by the storm. Entire sections of the city are not merely flooded but subsumed by the surroundings. Buildings are gone, and city services are hampered, if not shut down completely. Because the city is a disaster area, the governor calls in the National Guard to keep order and serve as de facto police. Crime skyrockets, the economy plummets.

Kindred lines have to be redrawn as well. Vidal no longer has nearly as much power, as the city’s politicians and police are in disarray; but then, his rivals probably cannot take advantage of that fact. Entire Kindred domains vanish, leading to a spike in poaching and conflicts over territory. Many Kindred perish in the aftermath, as their havens collapse around them or flood completely, leaving the vampires to awaken without shelter from the sun when the storm finally passes. Unlike the mortals, who can count on outside aid from the state and federal government—to say nothing of organizations such as the Red Cross—the Kindred are on their own, with no higher authority to turn to.

Sure, the result isn’t going to be a “traditional” Vampire: the Requiem chronicle. You’ll most likely find that you’ll have moved from gothic horror to a much more visceral struggle for survival. The politics and conflicts will certainly continue though, no matter what form they now take, and the result would certainly make a fascinating story.

Current Music: Lush, "Light From a Dead Star"

	From: drl909	Date: February 15th, 2005 04:01 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Damn, that's one hell of a neat spin on things -- although I don't see it as being so "untraditional" in terms of what I see as the essential thrust of the games' themes: it's all about what the character is willing to do to survive.

	From: twicedead	Date: February 15th, 2005 04:21 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Sounds like the changes to a wraith Chronicle post Maelstrom.

	From: rhandhali	Date: February 16th, 2005 01:07 am (UTC)		(Link)

I like it. What about other disasters, fire, earthquakes and the like? It's certainly a way to shake things up.

	From: ndemeter	Date: February 16th, 2005 08:41 am (UTC)		(Link)

The only problem I have with this is that it is too drastic. I am in the military and have served in disaster areas. Trust me folks, we leave no stone unturned. In the search of survivors someone is certain to open a coffin containing a happy-go-lucky Daeva. Instant fast forward to Time of Justice.

Logic dictates that if Kindred knew that a storm was coming they would pack up and move somewhere else. When the storm passes and with military crawling all over feeding would be extremely difficult and the area would not be desirable. Most Kindred would be forced to seek refuge in nearby cities. As a matter of fact, this scenario is intriguing from the neighbouring area's perspective come to think of it and not New Orleans'. It would be a way to play "Fall of Atlanta" without the Sabbat. ;)

That's just my $0.02.

	From: heatherrae	Date: February 17th, 2005 08:24 am (UTC)		(Link)

Interestingly enough, last year when a hurricane was threatening the New Orleans area, the Red Cross ordered 40,000 body bags for New Orleans in case of a direct hit.

Did you know that if a Class 5 Hurricane were to hit Louisiana (not even New Orleans directly, just Louisiana) head on, the Red Cross projects that everything south of I10 would be flooded. Everything.

That is how big of a disaster it would be. And sure, you could have warning. But how would you get out?

The last time New Orleans was evacuated for a Hurricane, it took people more than 6 hours just to make it out of the city. And that was during the day. By nightfall it was nearly impossible to get out by any means other than private plane.

So, yes, it could indeed be a disaster that big.

	From: ndemeter	Date: February 17th, 2005 07:44 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Right, but you would not be willingly staying and facing the storm, right? My point is that vampires that have been smart enough to survive over World Wars, other natural disasters, and even had their bodies somehow shipped to the US from overseas without raising any eyebrows would simply not keel over and face a storm head on.

	From: whitesamurai	Date: February 17th, 2005 05:21 am (UTC)		(Link)

The new books look great, just one fans opinion. I think it's the best work you folks have done. Congrats on all your hard work.

	From: stephenshepherd	Date: March 8th, 2005 08:15 pm (UTC)		(Link)

That’s sorta funny

My re-introduction to the world of Darkness was through the downloadable demos.. I printed them all out into a binder and was getting ready to run them.

I should also mention that I live in Orlando, Florida. I ran the demos during the three Hurricanes that hit us when the power went out. Multiple nights of game play by candlelight, heavy winds, torrential rains, boarded up windows and listening to the radio to make sure we weren’t flooding.

Ever since then I have been toying with the idea of running a game set in a hurricane..

Cool stuff :)

-Stephen Shepherd

	From: theycallmefro	Date: March 11th, 2005 12:53 am (UTC)		(Link)

The Never-ending Hurricane!