My brother crapdaddy hates the Camarilla. I’m not to fond of it, either, but I like playing with my friends and they like playing in the Camarilla, so if I want to play with my friends, I’m kind of stuck.
So, instead of making a laundry list of what’s wrong with the Camarilla club, I’ve decided to make a few suggestions on how the club structure could be re-organized so we can avoid some of the pitfalls of the club’s past. Let’s begin with a doozy.
As most everyone who’s come into contact with the Camarilla club knows, Membership Class (MC) is a touchy subject. In short, MC is an OOC ranking system that encourages participation in the club. New members start at MC 1. If a new member participates in the club as an officer (a storyteller or coordinator), he is awarded a monthly sum of Prestige. Members who devote time and energy to the club are rewarded with “Prestige,” which is kind of like experience points: the more Prestige you get, the more benefits you get out of the club. Member Class goes from 1 to 15 (an honorary rank) and the amount of Prestige necessary to move up in the club ranks in the thousands.
The most prominent reward of MC and Prestige is the bonus experience points you get to make a character within the club. For every “level” of MC you have, you gain an additional 20 xp to add to your primary character in the club, one character per venue. In other words, one Vampire character, one Werewolf character, and one Mage character. (I believe this has changed recently, but I haven’t kept track. I think you can now have two primary characters, as you did in the last incarnation of the club.)
This means that high-ranking members of the club have very powerful characters. Members with MC 10 or higher literally have hundreds of experience points to add to their characters. This accomplishes another goal in the club: the presence of older and/or more powerful characters. Because an important part of the Vampire genre is “elder vampires” who move and shake the world from behind the scenes, the MC system rewards players who participate in the club by allowing them to play these elder characters.
The MC system, it has been argued to me, is necessary for the club to work, and I mean “necessary” in a philosophical sense: it is impossible for the club to exist without it. Without a reward, it has been argued, the club would simply cease to exist: nobody would volunteer for the vital officer positions that make the club go. Without the MC reward of bonus xp, players would not volunteer to be storytellers or coordinators.
Well, let’s start with that little claim. Remember, the claim is “Without a tangible reward like bonus experience points, the club would not exist.”
Now, to refute that claim, I could use an example of another club that operates in a very similar manner, providing the same benefits as the Camarilla, but without an MC system. If such a club existed, and existed on the same level as the Camarilla, the claim of “necessity” would be proven false.
I could do that by pointing to the One World by Night organization. One World by Night (OWBN) provides the exact same environment as the Camarilla club without the use of any system of reward. The game is a global game: there are members world-wide participating in a single chronicle. My first night at a OWBN game, I watched a player contact the Prince of Orlando, Florida by celphone. OWBN’s membership rivals the Camarilla’s membership numbers (if you believe either or both of their claims of “active members”) and having participated in both organizations, I can safely make the claim that I saw no discernable difference in player quality. In fact, I had more fun playing in OWBN than I did in the Camarilla.
Now, a quick rebuttal of this argument will be something along the lines of “OWBN has it’s own organizational problems…” and that claim would be true: but it would not refute the argument that a club exists with officers, storytellers and coordinators without an MC system. These people volunteer their own time because they believe in the organization. I was a Storyteller in OWBN not because it gave my characters better powers but because I enjoy running games and wanted to run games for my friends.
I was an ST in both organizations, earned Prestige in only one of them, and felt no obligation to “perform better” in the Camarilla because I was getting a reward. I am an ST because I love running games.
Now, let me ask you a loaded question: Which would you prefer? The ST who runs games because he loves running games, or the ST who is running the game because he wants Prestige? It’s an unfair question, a false dilemma, but I’m up for that every once in a while.
I will also point out another organization that exists without any tangible reward to encourage its members to participate. It is a little bit older than the Camarilla or OWBN, but I think you may have heard of it. It’s called The Freemasons.
I’ve been a Mason for almost a year. I have received no material benefit from joining the organization. Sadly, I do not receive checks from the United Nations, nor do I get escorted flights in black helicopters. I have gained no “insider trading” knowledge, nor have I made contacts that will propel me to the top of the social order. Instead, all the “benefits” of Freemasonry have been entirely intangible: knowledge and fraternity.
The Masons do not reward their members: they challenge their members. I’ve been pushed both mentally and spiritually. And I pay dues. And I keep going back because of the reward of being with men who believe an unreflective life is not worth living. I don’t do it for MC or extra experience points; I do it because I want to learn one of the most beautiful symbol systems in the world. Something that will not help me in any “real” way in the “real” world.
So, I believe I have effectively refuted the “the club will fail if there is no MC system” argument. As to the other part–the “providing elder characters” argument–I think I have an effective solution. A lottery. Here’s how it works.
When a player makes a new character, he draws from a bowl. In the bowl are 4 chits. One says, “Neonate,” the second says, “Ancillae,” the third says “Elder,” and the fourth says “Choose.” Make a draw. Now, once you make a draw, that particular draw comes out of the pot. You continue to make draws for each new character, but each time you draw, the lot you chose comes out of the pot, thus eliminating that lot from future draws. Once you’ve chosen “Neonate,” that lot is not available at your next draw.
This way, everyone gets the opportunity to play an Elder, a Neonate and an Ancillae. It’s random. This creates an alternative system. It creates the presence of vampires of varrying age in the chronicle and does it fairly. Because, you see, that’s one of the problems with the MC system: it discourages new players.
Like friends of mine have said over at Sheldon’s journal, I have also been told that “new players have to earn their fun.” And I’ve been told it by multiple members (some of which asssumed that because I was an industry professional, my MC was much higher than it was). If the Camarilla club is interested in attracting new members, it will reward them for joining. This is a simple principle that I feel many members of the Camarilla club do not understand. So, let me use an analogy (otherwise known as “the worst form of argument”).
Think of the Camarilla club as a college frat house. Now, use the same kind of language in reference to the “new members.” I think you’ll see my point. A bit of an unfair statement here: the fact that 99% of the Camarilla membership would never make it into a frat house should be figured into your evaluation.
In closing, I feel the MC system in the Camarilla is a) unnecessary, b) provides biased and unfair rewards to its membership, and c) discourages new membership. All of these can be fixed and I have provided alternatives and examples for each.
Thank you for your time.