I prefer games with player-facing rolls. I also prefer emergent gameplay so I’ll roll on random charts, but that’s it. Stakes are stakes, and character death should be something in the forefront of player minds imo

What stakes do you have in your games? What does your prep look like?

Idk it’s like my second favorite edition of D&D©️ after b/x. There are dozens of us!

These are just things I learned running it and they worked for me but might not be the case for everybody

• Focus on just the core book. WoD has always suffered from bloat and an early game I ran got out of hand pretty quick bc I let PCs pick from anything

• Start small. 5e I think does a balance of horror great, but don’t worry about shit going on in the far corners of the world with millennia-old vampires; let your PCs carve their niche out first

• Lorebooks at your own risk. I didn’t like them but again, IDGAF about the metaplot

• Don’t forget hunger is always there and should affect rolls but also you should always be challenging that hunger. I’m not a combative dm/st/gm whatever but like … I think that’s the whole point. Kindred existence is just a constant war of controlling the Beast.

• Ask lots of questions and use those answers against the players especially during character creation and extra especially with Advantages and Flaws

• Watch having thin-bloods in with your genned kindred. I felt like there was a huge power gap, or at least make players aware it might get weird

Idk the rules went fine but I’m used to WoD dice pool weirdness. I never house-ruled any of the 5e rules myself other than the mixed-gen coterie thing