Children of the Lost Eden

I. Information

Domain Name: Children of the Lost Eden
Domain Number: NY-004-D
Venue: Requiem
Venue Name: “Mean Street”
Lead Venue Storyteller: Ryan C.
Storyteller Contact: VSTRequiem.NYC@gmail.com
Games Hosted On: First Saturday of each month, with game sites announced via the NYCCAM Yahoo email list and Chapter Website: http://www.nyccamarilla.org

II. Styles of Play

Action Combat and Challenges 3
Character Development 4
Darkness PC death and corruption 4
Drama Ceremony and grand story 2
Intrigue Politics and negotiation 4
Manners Social etiquette and peer pressure 4
Mystery Enigmas and investigation 3
Pace How fast stories develop moderate

Rating Description: 1 Never present, 2 Sometimes present, 3 Often present, 4 Usually present, 5 Always present

The Storytelling Staff reserves the right to ask participants of a scene to run the scene theatrically and with role playing rather than with challenges.

III. Venue Description

“At night I walk this stinkin’ street past the crazies on my block
And I see the same old faces and I hear that same old talk
And I’m searching for the latest thing, a break in this routine
I’m talkin’ some new kicks, ones like you ain’t never seen
This is home, this is Mean Street”
-Van Halen, “Mean Street”

The city is predominantly gray with overcast clouds that roll across the sky, blacking out the moon and lights of heaven. From the highways, the skyline looks like a twisted hand defiantly reaching toward the heavens, each building a concrete finger clawing at the sky. Inside, the skyscrapers are monolithic gods. Faceless slabs of concrete and steel loom above humanity, built by the dreams of richer and better men. Modern church steeples lean across the city, with medieval gargoyles that snarl at the dregs below.
Below the blackened sky, beneath the corporate logos like flashing neon angels, the city is choked by blue toxic smoke. Soot and decay linger here – clinging to the air, the food, the broken subways. It seeps into the souls of lesser men, turning young idealists into bitter seniors, and philanthropists into a jaded autocracy.
The darkest corners of the city are utterly depraved. Street brawls, loveless fornication, and narcotic madness light the back allies of Harlem and Hell’s Kitchen like path stones to hell.
In the outskirts and barrens, history bubbles through the erosion of ages. Vast cemeteries with crumbling tombstones peak through a strangling den of weeds and vines. Old mansions turned into museums hold the treasures of a dying vision of the world. And everywhere lie the skeletal remains of a history forgotten and ignored – faded plaques, forgotten monuments, crumbling statues.
Despite the occasional respite of beauty and refinement, the city is fuelled by wrath, lust, and greed. More often than not, these sanctuaries are just the porcelain mask of a face too bitter and too foul to see the light. True havens from sin and vice are rare. This makes the city a place of unparalleled darkness and infinite secrets. It is all things cruel, mad, and horrifying. It is the city that never sleeps, because it can’t.
Welcome to New York.

IV. Storytelling Mechanics

1. Proxy Rules: All proxy requests to the Mean Street Requiem venue must be received by the Venue Storyteller in writing or email no less than 48 hours in advance. Proxies fall into two categories; “Soft” proxies (proxies which involve no tests, and may be run by players over IRC, IM etc) and “Hard” Proxies (which are run by the Storyteller staff). The ST determines which category a proxy falls under, and may at any time change a proxy from “Soft” to “Hard”. At such time, the ST will freeze the scene to collect the needed information.
a. Hard Proxies require permission from the VST and require the following:
i. Full character sheet. This includes any special approvals for items/powers/influence/merits/flaws that require special approvals. Without proof of these approvals, those special approval items will **NOT** be used in the proxy.
ii. VST / DST / RST contact information (e-mail & phone number when possible). I will need to able to confirm things with them and give them the results of the proxy so they can incorporate said results into their games.
iii. Clearly stated goals for your character. Preferably a copy of the 13 questions made during character creation. You need to be as precise as possible when you state your character’s goals and actions for the proxy. Any information that is left out will be left up to the storyteller staff to include. Assumptions can and will be made if necessary.
iv. Contingency plans & Exit strategy. Please include contingency plans as the best-laid plans are sometimes disrupted. Without the contingency plans, the storyteller staff will make decisions for the characters. These decisions may or may not be what the players would have done
b. All Proxies: Players Agree to the following conditions. If you are not comfortable with these conditions, then do **not** proxy your character.
i. All proxy play is final. There are no do-overs. Death or worse are possibilities. In every proxy scene, there are inherent dangers. Players who agree to proxy are being made known these results are possibilities of proxy play.
ii. While in proxy play, the character will not play any place else or in other proxy scenes, or electronic forums. This includes the use of Auspex or similar powers to move outside the body.

2. Feeding: Incoming Vitae will be calculated in the following way for Kindred PCs.
a. Base Draw: A single card + Character’s BP representing the character’s pool on waking. The maximum possible pool is one less than full. Characters with “Blood Seeps Slowly” or similar powers may substitute that power for this step. Herd may be added once this draw is complete.
b. Hunting Draws: Character will be asked where and how they hunting. A maximum of two hunting draws may be made before game starts. If a character wishes to make additional draws, they must wait 30 minutes out of play per draw. Blood may be spent before or after any of these draws.
c. Storytellers may add additional feeding rules due to plot consideration.
d. IC feeding zones are enforced IC and it is assumed that PCs coming in to the city have been informed via their Prisci provided they have attempted to make contact.

3. Experience Award Guidelines
a. Per Game: The experience reward for a game session is FIVE (5) experience points per player. If a player plays two PC’s for the session, they may divide the FIVE experience points as they see fit between the two PC’s, but may never exceed FIVE total points between the two PC’s. Additional XP may be awarded by the STs for good roleplay, costuming, and other goodies.
b. Chronicle: If a house player submits a chronicle (or Live Journal entry) detailing what their characters did at the session, she/he will receive TWO (2) additional xp.
c. Downtime: Within three weeks after game, a house player may submit a write up of downtime and goals, where they will be rewarded TWO (2) additional xp for their work.
d. Extended Downtime: Downtimes of extended length and detail (minimum >1 page) shall be awarded ONE additional xp for a total of THREE (3) xp for a Downtime submission. House Players may also earn this downtime award through Soft Roleplay with other players, if they notify the STs and submit a record or summary of the scene(s).

4. Visiting Character Guidelines: As most players in the venue are low to moderate in MC; visiting characters will be asked about their goals when entering the city and asked to follow “big dog” guidelines, deferring to characters with local status. The Storytellers reserve the right to deny entry to characters that will be unbalancing or detrimental to the stability of the game. The Storytellers also reserve the right to yank such a character from play.

5. Antagonists: Focus will be on the internal social struggle of the city’s Kindred. The external antagonist for this venue will predominantly be other Kindred: the court of Hammer Bay from Long Island, and characters from the city’s past, Belial’s Brood and VII where appropriate. Other monsters, spirits, and ghosts may on occasion appear to challenge characters for pieces of the WoD. Mortals will be used both as antagonists and victims, and to explore the implications of Vampiric activity on the world at large.

6. Travel Risks: With numerous points of entry, travel into New York carries a negligible risk. While travel into New York is easily negotiated, it is the city itself that is the greatest risk to vampires. Rivaling clans, covenants, blood lineages, coteries, shape changers, hunters, and the everyday madness that is New York give characters pause before remaining long in the mean streets. The NYPD has become one of the foremost law enforcement agencies in the world, rivaling that of many small countries. Any number of institutions are infiltrated by the Damned, making the comings and goings of outsiders almost certain to be noticed. Exactly who takes notice can make a character’s trip pleasant or painfully deadly. Manhattan is considered “Safe” territory. Venturing through the other boroughs without knowing who controls what invites disaster.

7. Restricted Items: Storytellers reserve the right to disallow the following: explosives; military weapons, munitions, equipment and vehicles; WMD and other mass casualty or instant kill devices. No Cross-venue character will be allowed without appropriate approvals and convincing roll-playing reasons. The teaching of cross venue lore’s or gifting/trading of cross venue items will be scrutinized. Items with custom mechanics may not be used without the appropriate approval numbers and written explanation of those mechanics.