Kismet's Virtues and Vices 2.0

by: Kismet Rose

"Hollow" by PaolaPieretti (unmodified) is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0

 

 

What They Are

A Virtue is a trait or quality that represents the best a person can be, according to the culture they live in. Virtuous behavior is encouraged socially and in turn reinforces social ties to others who hold the same value system. Acting out a Virtue is personally rewarding (even if it isn't praised or rewarded by others) because it affirms your sense of who you should be in your community. Virtuous actions replenish self-esteem because they're done to build the best life possible. They aren't always carried out in public, but they necessarily involve interacting with other people. That’s because our values are largely determined and tested due to the actions of those around us.

A Vice, then, represents the worst a person can be and do, as determined by their culture. Vices are rooted in destructive impulses all humans have; giving into these urges is deemed a personal failing, while reveling in them is deemed monstrous. That’s because Vices are antisocial and unhealthy behaviors. Even when they’re carried out with others, Vices interfere with lasting, mutually beneficial social bonds because they act as an escape from the world and obligations to others. They invite people to be self-centered and careless. The forbidden quality of Vices makes them tempting and may also make them feel personally rewarding. After all, by indulging in a Vice, a person is defying their culture to have their own “good time.” They don’t have to wait for permission; they don’t have to worry about the next day. They’re able to live for themselves in the moment, rules and restrictions be damned.

Taken together, Virtues and Vices represent a range of behaviors that are noteworthy in a particular place and era. They’re the focus of social interactions and key concerns for groups; they shape discourse, norms, and laws. They’re also ways to understand how members of society act and react, what they value, what they enjoy, and what they struggle for and against the most. Whether they're embraced by individuals or groups, Virtues and Vices are socially influenced and can change over time. And whenever expectations and values shift, conflict won’t be far behind.

Ultimately, Virtues and Vices are ideals a community aims to embrace and reject for the purported good of the whole. This means they’re not absolute realities but socially mandated goals and taboos. They all exist in various forms and degress, and the community is constantly engaged in promoting and suppressing them. But human groups are never completely consistent. Some will reject the norms around them, and communities won't always follow through with their highest ideals or threatened consequences. Virtuous behavior isn’t always recognized or rewarded (there’s a reason why the saying “no good deed goes unpunished” exists). Debauchery might be ignored, downplayed, or embraced temporarily. There are many reasons for this, including how close-knit a community is and the power of those involved. But by understanding which primary Virtues and Vices are at work, you'll be able to understand why conflicts arise and how they shape your game.

How Players Can Use Them

The beauty of the Virtue and Vice mechanic in the World of Darkness is that it can easily apply to groups or individuals, which means it’s useful to players and Storytellers. On the one hand, it’s a method players can use to understand their characters’ key motivations. A character can act on any Virtue or Vice anytime, but there will be one Virtue and Vice that resonates with them the most. They’ll bend their lives and efforts around these two poles. They’ll feel the most satisfaction when serving these two drives. Once a player figures out their character’s best and worst drives, they can make decisions and take actions that reflect their character’s deepest values and flaws.

If you have a fairly clear character concept from the start, figuring out their primary Virtue and Vice might be easy for you, but it’s common to have trouble making these decisions. The thing to remember is that these traits are culturally determined but are personally internalized. Characters identify with a Virtue and Vice more than others, seeing them as their best and worst traits. They act them out (or fight against the urge to do so) regularly because of who they are and how they prefer to operate. Both traits represent long-standing patterns of behavior; they’re unlikely to change over the course of a chronicle because they’re intimately tied with the character’s deepest feelings about who they are and what they do.

If you find it difficult to choose a primary Virtue for a character, ask yourself the following questions:

• What do they value most?

• What do they see as their best trait?

• What will they struggle the hardest to attain?

Once you’ve settled on a Virtue for your character, a Vice might jump out at you as being particularly appropriate because of how it relates to their Virtue. At this point, you should also consider how you want to experience your character during play. If you want a lot of internal conflict, for instance, you could choose the polar opposite for the character’s Vice. If you want to set up a slippery slope, choose a Vice that’s similar to the character’s Virtue. That way, they might fall into Vice while believing they’re on the straight and narrow path. You might choose the same Vice as one of the character’s parents to explore generational struggles or use the same one as their sire to explain why they were chosen for the Embrace. You can also ask your Storyteller what the primary Virtue and Vice are for the chronicle or local area and make your choices accordingly. If you want to fight the social tide, you can choose opposing traits or create new ones that don’t mesh with the surrounding norms at all. If you want your character to manipulate their way to the top, you could give them the chronicle’s Vice as a kind of camouflage.

If you’re having trouble settling on a key Vice for a character, ask yourself these questions:

• Which key trauma is the character trying to escape, and which Vice seems like the character’s most likely response to that situation?

• Which method of escape will the character risk the most to experience, whether they realize how much they’re risking or not?

• Which Vice do they have the least control over and have the easiest time rationalizing?

Once you’ve settled on your choices, it’s time to use them during gameplay. Mechanically, Virtue and Vice are a way to replenish spent Willpower points, but how much is restored depends on which path you choose.

The Mechanics

It’s not enough to act out a character’s primary Virtue once in private. You have to stay the course for one or more scenes during a chapter (one game session), with one or more characters present. This shows a willingness to struggle to be the best in a social setting and to act as an exemplar of your values. The scene(s) should also present some consequences for failure or social resistance. (Nothing ventured, nothing gained.) You should declare a desired outcome related to your character’s Virtue as soon as possible during the first scene so your Storyteller can follow your progress. If your character succeeds in your stated goal, even if they suffer social consequences, they regain all spent Willpower points. Pride in a job well done - and setting a good example - is its own reward.

On the flip side, whenever a character indulges their Vice during a scene and isn’t stopped, they gain one Willpower point. You should declare the particular kind of escape your character seeks early in the scene. If they’re punished for their transgression while it’s occurring and their escape is cut off, they don’t feel the relief required to call it a win. If, however, they’re able to continue acting out their Vice largely as they planned, the character regains one Willpower point.

Satisfying Virtue and Vice isn’t always done immediately through a character’s individual actions. For instance, a Kindred Prince might have a long-term plan to root out corruption in the local government (following her Virtue of Justice). Such a grand scheme will require the help of others over the course of months or years. However, Virtue and Vice as we’ve discussed here is a more immediate reward system. This means that the Prince will have to break her larger goal into smaller steps. She’ll have to decide how she pursues her agenda during each game session. She could aim to convince a particular politician to change his ways during a private meeting. After that’s resolved, the Prince can then decide who she wants to work on next. She could try to give an underling all the tools he needs to convince the politician to step down, instead of doing it herself. If the underling succeeds in the Prince’s stated goal, the Prince regains all spent Willpower.

The Choices

This system invites players to consider how they’re going to portray their characters and why. Players should consider how their characters usually regard and respond to their Virtues and Vices. How they feel about their drives comes from past experiences, new victories and failures, current goals, and social interactions. These feelings can range from pride to shame to horror to acceptance, and they influence what a character does about their urges. No one pursues a Virtue or Vice in every scene; there are other things to do. No one reveals their best or worst facets all the time, either. The worse a character feels about their Vice - and the more penalties they face for acting on their Virtue - the more likely it is that they’ll try to hide those parts of themselves. (If you’re a classic WoD gamer, this is where Virtue and Vice can be said to intersect with Nature and Demeanor.)

Here are some choices characters can make about their Virtue and Vice:

• Deny: subconsciously rejecting the urge, any needs associated with it, and probably uncomfortable past experiences with it

• Avoid: evading situations which will likely call for a Virtue or Vice to be acted upon

• Suppress: actively and consciously trying to ignore the urge

• Disguise: trying to display another Virtue or Vice, or trying to highlight a Virtue instead of a Vice (or vice versa)

• Sublimate: seeking to satisfy the desire in a socially acceptable way

• Displace: acting out the drive in an inappropriate context or fashion

• Project: attacking others for having your Vice, whether or not they do

• Enact: seeking to satisfy the desire in a context where such behavior is expected

• Boast: showing off your Virtue or Vice in a loud, self-glorifying way

• Sacrifice: giving up an immediate chance to enjoy a Vice in order to fulfill a Virtue (or vice versa)

You don’t have to worry about this in each scene; you can figure out how your character feels about their Virtue and Vice per game session, or after a major event might change their minds. What you will have to decide on a scene-by-scene basis is what your character’s goals are. Will your character seek a Virtue or Vice at that place and time? If so, how and why? Will their behavior further longer term goals, or are they living purely in the moment? This doesn’t have to take a long time to figure out; jotting down a simple statement of intent is best: “I’m going to act out my Virtue/Vice by [insert a quick course of action] because [state your goal or key motivation].” Your Storyteller may want you to tell them your goal privately or in front of the group. From that point on, however, you know what your character’s purpose is in that scene. If you’re seeking a Virtue or Vice, you’ve decided the terms of victory. You may not be able to carry out your mission in every instance, but your Storyteller should offer regular chances to give it your best shot.

If you’re playing 2e Chronicles of Darkness, Virtue and Vice might only be available to mortal characters. There are good reasons, however, for Storytellers to consider allowing any kind of character to choose these traits. Talk with your Storyteller if you really want to try out what’s explored here.

How Storytellers Can Use Them

Virtue and Vice aren’t just for players who want to establish their characters’ modi operandi or replenish their Willpower pools; the system offers useful options for Storytellers, too. First, it’s a great way to set up the unique feel and goals of a chronicle. A Storyteller should take some time to carefully consider the dominant cultures of their setting; it can help establish overarching moods and themes. Choosing Virtues and Vices can reveal the values of the time and place, as well as what’s most important in the chronicle. What do the NPCs tend to care about and discuss? What do they ignore, demean, or punish? How do they usually go about building up and tearing down people, places, and ideals? By deciding on larger scale Virtues and Vices for the chronicle, city, and major groups, a Storyteller sets up guideposts for everything else that follows. Even if players aren’t made aware of these traits, they’ll see them in play and learn what to expect from the chronicle.

This system can also be a handy way to outline the values and methods of NPCs, individually or in groups. Storytellers who create NPCs on the fly can use Virtue and Vice to quickly establish key aspects of characters they don’t know well. These choices can make it easier to portray NPCs and explain the actions they take. After all, Virtue and Vice drive all kinds of behavior, from reactions to plots to mistakes. Storytellers who craft NPCs beforehand can delve deeply into characters’ psyches by considering how Virtues and Vices interact. Does an NPC reflect or reject the values of their society (or the chronicle itself)? Are their ideals inherently at odds with the PCs? What have they done in the past to uphold their beliefs? What are they willing to do to create a future that falls in line with the way they think the world should be? The same kinds of questions can also be asked when creating organizations, regardless of how big or small they are.

Virtue and Vice can guide responses to player character actions in any scene. If the PCs are employing Virtues in line with the community, they’re likely to be lauded for doing so, especially by people and organizations that share their Virtue. They may encounter less resistance when seeking help and networking. On the other hand, if they’re acting out Virtues that are downgraded in the area’s hierarchy, they could be dismissed out of hand and find it difficult to convince others of their project’s importance. Acting out Vices in areas strongly associated with Virtues will probably lead to outrage and pushback from bystanders; authorities will probably show up quickly to suppress the problem. Carrying out a Vice in an area where it’s expected (or even encouraged) might not lead to pushback until property or people are threatened with grievous physical harm. PCs may have an easier time gathering shady Contacts, information, and supplies in locations that share their Vice.

Storytellers shouldn’t feel pressured to employ every method outlined above. Just paying a little more attention to how Virtue and Vice can influence game sessions can result in more realistic characters, engaging conflicts, and distinctive settings.

 

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