The Joys of House Rules

Today should be my wife and I's first official entrance my buddy's Vampire the Requiem game.  Last Friday we played a quick little game to introduce our characters to the city the game is being played in. There were supposed to be other players there but as we get further and further into adulthood gathering up four or five players in one room to play a game is becoming a larger task.  Assuming  tonight's game actually happens I'll probably start posting a bunch of World of Darkness stuff in my excitement.

*trigger warning: A lot of what follows assumes you have a working knowledge of the New World of Darkness game systems*

During the course of the game last week our story teller had made some interesting house rules I felt like posting about.  Throughout the course of the game he rewarded exceptional role playing by granting characters free one dot merits he madeon the fly.

 For instance in one scene my character, a Lancea Sanctum spy, had to introduce himself to the Prince of a Carthian controlled city. Despite the bad blood between our two covenants my character behaved himself and apparently made a good enough first impression that the story teller saw fit to give me one dot merit entitled Gentleman's Repose, which will grant my character an extra dice when rolling social rolls for first impressions.

Now normally in the New World of Darkness games the system for rewarding good role playing is an extra experience point at the end of the game. I rather like the free merit dots especially as it gives me something to do with my super fancy four page character sheets.  We've always had a house rule in our games that story tellers could award a dot in a merit if the character does something to earn it, for example awarding a character a dot in resources for moving out of their mother's basement and getting a damn job.

House rules can add a lot of fun to the game, or as in this case provide players with an incentive for role playing their character.  They can also break a game if not used sparingly. Game Master bribery used to be a widely accepted practice at our game tables. When Game Masters pay their players for cigarettes, snacks, booze, and other illicit contraband you could find yourself with low level characters decked to the nines in magic armor, bejeweled crowns, +6 talking swords that are also tamagotchies, and your game master just took an 8 ball of blow to the dome. 

tldr: house rules are awesome/using sparingly or your gaming group will become a dystopian hell hole.

Obligatory Introductory Post

Welcome to Danger House Hobbies.  What we're planning on doing here is posting all manner of things that appeal to those with certain nerdy sensibilities.  I'm planning on discussing video games, table top games, movies, music, and whatever else I feel like. 

I've been playing video games since my father shoved an Atari 2600 joystick in my when I was a toddler because no one from his generation had any idea what the possible ramifications of giving a toddler video games. So naturally games of all sorts have been a cornerstone of my life.

I typically partner with like minded folks to produce content.  We used to run a podcast called "You Might Also Like A Podcast" in which we reviewed movies that were available through streaming services. We were kind of funny and unprofessional, I hope to do the same here.

We play a lot of board games, Magic the Gathering, miniature war games, and we do other things too.

So strap in and enjoy the show. 

DC