Favorite Things
☥ Favorite Clan
Malkavian! While I initially started with Gangrel, Malkavian is objectively the best. Easy as fuck to make into a broken killing machine and have unique, appropriately mad dialogue. All of the clans allow you to roleplay to some extent and get yourself in, but the Malkavian PC in VtMB actually feels like their own character. They're just a quirky crazy fish Malk!! And this is on top of the clan being genuinely interesting, both in the game (the Voerman sisters, Grout, the one ghoul I shall not name), and in the TTRPG itself. All of the initial seven clans in VtM are great, but none feel as fully realized as an individual character as the Malkavian in VtMB, though Nosferatu ain't far behind, what with how everyone is grossed out and scared of them lol.
☥ Sect of Choice
Anarchs, baby! I mean come on, they're all edgy punky people whose residence blasts Lecher Bitch, of course I picked them straight away! And I love Jack, Nines and Damsel! They're my friends!!
☥ Favorite Characters
Piss Baby Of The Year, Sebastian LaCroix. He is just way, way too much in one man. He's whiny, he's annoying, he's hilarious, he's just a total drama queen to where you just wanna watch what he does next. I love him! I want to call him a cracker and throw him across the room, I want to take his lunch money and give him a wedgie, I want to grab him by the scruff of his neck like a cat. I want him to come back somehow despite being literally blown up just so I can kick his ass a second time.
Best Girlies The Voerman sisters, oh my fucking god. I don't have DID, but a close friend of mine does and we both agreed they matched surprisingly close to the real deal. Therese is a bitch but she is genuinely sympathetic and it becomes very, very clear that her fixation on "cleanliness" and being chaste is born out of trauma, while Jeanette is an out and out maniac horny girl who...Also does it as a response to the trauma she's been through. In a way, they represent the mental sparring you get in when you have sexual trauma, especially if it occurred at a younger age, feeling simultaneously filthy, tainted, dirty but now you have all these urges you can't shake off, these images that just keep activating you. Their questlines also act as a gateway to what makes the game amazing. More on that in a bit.
The One Who Definitely Would Enjoy Headpats, Beckett is a sassy little shit. He is probably the only sane man in this entire mess and he wears a trenchcoat. And turns into a wolf. And he's up to some crazy shit in the TTRPG lore proper and even banged Dracula!? ICON!!
The Smiley Boy, Smiling Jack! Or, just Jack as he's called in the game proper. This man is a goddamn riot, he's fucking voiced by John DiMaggio, he guides you in the tutorial and though he's a Brujah who will beat ass, he'll letcha into his business, even if you're being a dumbass Ventrue suck-up, he's my man! He literally sets up all the fuss about the Ankharan Sarcophagus just to fuck with all the Elders and even put a damn bomb in it. This man is a goddamn ICON, and him and Nines saving me was the reason I picked the Anarchs on the first playthrough, without hesitation.
Number noine, Nines Rodgriguez has to be mentioned here because bro literally saved my ass twice!! Am I really gonna go NUH-UH YOU AIN'T MY FRIEND at him??
The Angriest One, Damsel!! She's so fucking angy I love her! She is full of sheer, unfiltered rage and hates Cammies much like I would if I was in this universe, she's genuinely amusing and endearing. Also she HUNTS NAZIS FOR BLOOD!! ICONIC!! I. CON!!
The Best Ghoulie, All the Ghouls, save for Patty, are good boys (and girl in the case of Heather) who have brought me nothing but joy. Mercurio's a real one, he's helped me so much after I healed him up and kissed his booboo better with morphine, he gives you cool shit at the end of the game if you're not a snitch, and he talks like a Mafioso wiseguy.
Knox starts out as endearingly hyper about how awesome Vampires are, just gushing at you and telling you what Ghouls are...And turns out, he's a loooooot smarter than he seems, outright deceiving you if your Inspection's lower than three. I wish we got to see more of him, but what we got, I love his happy yet sneaky lil ass, and he's cute!!
And who could forget Heather, your sweet little Ghoul girl you can rescue and toooooootally not just take money from her. You can feed on her and she'll also give you some nice prey for you...:3 You can also get her to play dress up for you, so, uh, thank you for the eye candy? The real fun, however, is if you're a Malkavian and you Ghoul her, where she'll just go fucking bonkers instantly. Yes girlie we love a nutjob!! Only problem, I wish we had more options to dote on and spoiler her like let me give her gifts! Let me hug or kiss her, it feels a bit too one-sided even if yes I know Ghouling's inherently not good.
Wait, am I forgetting someone? I feel like I am...Hmmmmmmmmmmm....
The Worst Ghoulie, Vandal Cleaver! For some reason, my brain chose Vandal as not only the one I brainrot over, but straight up was like AIGHT THIS YOUR HUSBANDO NOW. Anyways, I adore this wretched little cretin as Malkavian rep despite being only a Ghoul, being genuinely unsettling while also lowkey hilarious if you think about him after the "OH GOD HE'S A NURSE DOING THIS SHIT!?" wears off (he's basically a spooky fast food worker HAHA). I also like that he's just a single NPC, a fucking vendor but he has more going on than you expect, considering he canonically has a criminal record and also is explicitly mentioned as being into "pliers and blowtorch" shenanigans. Shout out to him for being the first shopkeeper who banned me from a store nonviolently. Usually when a shopkeeper's mad at you they go full guns blazing, but not this guy! He just yells at you and stops selling blood to you..And you can just get past that super easily by your epic Vampire mind powers.
He used to have his own page and I once declared him the "Worst Blorbo" but in a post-Jimmy Mouthwashing world, the competition for "worst recipient of brain rotations" has stiffened significantly.
Now, some humans, rapid-fire! First we got Fat Larry who's...Fat Larry, I do not need to elaborate. Then we have Venus Dare, my cute goth gf who gives me money and I go protect her in return. Honestly, her nightclub is so gothic I legit forget it's not Elysium (though she was apparently planned to be a Ghoul initially). And now I'm just gonna shout out Slater for selling guns at a convenience store. I really love the gas station tweaker accessiblity, and he will let you in even if he thinks you're the Southland Slasher. Sure, he's banned from Vesuvius, but if he trusts me this easily, I trust him.
☥ Favorite Quests
The Ghost Haunts at Midnight / Slashterpiece / Bad Blood / Sibling Rivalry
AKA, the Therese and Jeanette quests. I love them in part because of these quests, as they are an amazing introduction to VtMB's world. In a sense, they're when the gloves are off. You're not just dealing with dumb thugs or some random killer guy, you're dealing with an extremely unwell Malkavian DID system that is actively yanking you left, right and center, having Jyhad with themselves First off, the Ocean House Hotel made me shat my pants the first time I played it, so thanks, Therese. Second, at the end of all the chaos, you're forced to make a brutal decision, perfectly establishing the tone of this game: unless you played your cards right, you will have to basically sacrifice an alter. If you don't have "Tourette", you have the remaining sister standing in front of you, sad the other's gone. And you don't feel like you made the right decision, at all. There is no going back either, you can't "revive" her. She's gone. Forever.
This perfectly encapsulates the themes of this game: you have no one to guide you beyond the tutorial, you're forced to make terrifying, hard decisions, and you'll have to hurt someone in order to get by, no matter how much you don't want to. I did not want Therese to die. I did not want Jeanette to die. Fucking OW.
Calling Dr. Grout
This one has to be put in, just for the sheer clusterfuck of a mansion you're in, trying to survive attacks from raving mad Ghouls as you listen to recorded messages from Grout monologuing how much he misses insane asylums...Yeah. The entire location is just, well, insane, and he's a good demonstration of a Malkavian who isn't mad in the "hot mess" or the "crazy" way as much as this cold, calculating yet sadistic type of mad. I mean fuck...He ain't even alive and he still gave me the heebie-jeebies! Shame he's dead, but the mansion itself is just. Oh my god.
Dead Ex / Snuff Is Enough / Going The Way of Kings
These sets of quests are a goddamn doozy. Isaac wants a VHS tape. Alright, lemme go grab it from a fucking crypt, yanno, the most normal place ever. Give it to him, and it turns out, not only is it a snuff film, it's incomplete(the horror!) On the hunt for the second one, you get the password for the payphone guy, go to the Luckee Star motel, and soon enough, you got a key card that leads straight into the back of the Ground 0 Cafe. Goin' into the internet gamer cafe with cool ass music in the plus patch and...Oh. Oh no. OH NO. Before you know it, you descend down the stairs and stumble across Death Mask Productions studio, full of these horrible fucking Geodude but awful monsters who destroy my speakers as they attack you! Wade through this mess and you'll find out DMP didn't even make the film. They just stole it. Fuck.
Now, you got the second half of the tape, turns out, Isaac recognizes the house and the creatures; turns out ,the little shits are terrorizing Nosferatu. You go to the house on 609 King's Way, and at first, it's looking really normal aaaaaaaaaand then on the inside, it's made of flesh EWWWWW! Just this awful, disgusting flesh house! And oh fuck, there's Andrei and you gotta go whoop his ass before he runs away! Only problem with this quest is it makes you go into the Nosferatu Warrens after. *Shudders* Worth it tho, I've always been fascinated by snuff film legends and goddammit, it sent me to a flesh house. Amazing.
☥ Favorite Disciplines
Dementate, Thaumaturgy, and Protean. Dementate for how absolutely broken it is in its power and for its themes of literally spreading your crazy to other people, Thaumaturgy for its whole making people explode thing, and Protean for GRRRR I TRANSFORM I AM MONSTER!!
☥ Favorite Songs
Threeway tie between Lecher Bitch by Genitorturers, Bloodlines by Ministry and Swamped by Lacuna Coil. Though honestly, all of the songs are fire!
☥ Favorite Locations
The Asylum and Confession. They are peak goth club vibes! And you can dance in them!! :D