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Vampire: the Masquerade
New York by Night
One Sect Falls, Another Rises
In the wake of the Sabbat's aggressive campaign along the East Coast of the United States, the sect has spread itself too thin. The clever Camarilla took advantage of the Black Hand's disorganization and reclaimed New York City as its own. But with established princes and entrenched elders claiming domains elsewhere, to which Kindred will this new prize fall?
In the wake of the Sabbat's aggressive campaign along the East Coast of the United States, the sect has spread itself too thin. The clever Camarilla took advantage of the Black Hand's disorganization and reclaimed New York City as its own. But with established princes and entrenched elders claiming domains elsewhere, to which Kindred will this new prize fall?
128 pages, Paperback
First published November 12, 2001
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 6, 2017
The Camarilla have just wrested the Big Apple from the clutches of the Sword of Caine. Their timing couldn't have been anymore perfect. They launched a precision strike at several key locations and attacked when the Sabbat were at their weakest, right after their numbers were down due to the 3rd Civil War.
The Sabbat have all but been routed, which leaves a vacuum to be filled. Most of the elders are hesitant to leave the comfort of their established domains. It is here that young Kindred can finally aspire to make a name for themselves. Sheriff? Harpy? Primogen? Perhaps even Prince?! It's up to the players and storyteller to claim the night.
Novice and veteran storytellers of Vampire: The Masquerade will have something to "take home" from this meaty supplemental. This book will have almost everything a storyteller will need to be able to run a decent story/chronicle from New York City... From the history of the city, to the denizens (supernatural and mundane) that inhabit this metropolis, to the story lines and plot ideas to help you get your story started. Enjoy!
The Sabbat have all but been routed, which leaves a vacuum to be filled. Most of the elders are hesitant to leave the comfort of their established domains. It is here that young Kindred can finally aspire to make a name for themselves. Sheriff? Harpy? Primogen? Perhaps even Prince?! It's up to the players and storyteller to claim the night.
Novice and veteran storytellers of Vampire: The Masquerade will have something to "take home" from this meaty supplemental. This book will have almost everything a storyteller will need to be able to run a decent story/chronicle from New York City... From the history of the city, to the denizens (supernatural and mundane) that inhabit this metropolis, to the story lines and plot ideas to help you get your story started. Enjoy!
September 22, 2019
This is one of the sourcebooks that came out after I stopped collecting World of Darkness books during the revised edition, so I had rather low expectations for this book.
Well, I stand corrected. This was actually pretty good. Despite espousing the book would be oh so very different from all the previous iterations oft "by Night" books it presents a playable setting anchored in the past of the game line, referencing characters and events from earlier books in both the VtM and Dark Ages series. And while it purports to be a setting for young Kindred there are levels of the Jyhad here that neonates would be wise not to touch...
Well, I stand corrected. This was actually pretty good. Despite espousing the book would be oh so very different from all the previous iterations oft "by Night" books it presents a playable setting anchored in the past of the game line, referencing characters and events from earlier books in both the VtM and Dark Ages series. And while it purports to be a setting for young Kindred there are levels of the Jyhad here that neonates would be wise not to touch...
August 27, 2025
Podoba mi się zarysowany obraz miasta oczekującego na nowy konflikt polityczny, w który można wrzucić nową koterię. I to jest tu najważniejsze. Książka mogłaby natomiast być obszerniejsza, zawierać więcej BN-ów, jakiś szczegółowy scenariusz do rozegrania w przerwie (albo w trakcie) politycznej intrygi. Nie podobał mi się motyw przedpotopowca w podziemiach – baaardzo tani trik. Niezbyt postarano się przy portretach postaci niezależnych, nieciekawy styl i brak szczegółów.
May 26, 2019
Pretty good sourcebook that gives you a solid idea of how to run a chronicle in New York without overwhelming you with details to keep track of. The city's dynamics allow even relatively newly-fledged characters to try their hand at top tier politics.
June 17, 2016
While Cairo by Night is about ancient history and how events that happened hundreds or thousands of years ago can still have reverberations down to modern times, New York by Night is about the now. The Sabbat have been driven from New York. The old Camarilla "Prince" Michaela, who fiercely defended Manhattan from all comers, has met Final Death. Calebros, the Prince pro tempore, oversaw the Camarilla invasion, the taking of the city from Sabbat Archbishop Francisco Domingo de Polonia, and the consolidation of power, and has since stepped down and refuses to seek the princedom. The position is open to any Kindred with the wit and ruthlessness to take it. And of course, the Sabbat aren't going to take the loss of their 230-year-long domination of New York without fighting back...
As the introduction states, this book is designed to set up a city where the average vampire is very young, has little established power, or both. There are no powerful elders, because the Sabbat is gone, Michaela is dead, and most other vampires don't want to leave their existing spider webs to try for power in New York. It's a city where the existing stasis of vampiric society isn't yet in place, and where the PCs can come to try their hand at being kingmakers or kings themselves. In that, I think it does a pretty good job. New York is such an important city in America that it's a bit strange that more vampires wouldn't try to gain influence over the U.N. or Wall Street, but there's been enough published about how elder vampires don't get old by taking risks that it remains plausible. Of course, that's the average vampire. The Tremere have several chantries in the city and Michaela's childer still exist, so the PCs will have stiff competition. But at least in New York, it's reasonable competition, not overwhelming, implacable force. As the book repeatedly points out, the princedom is determined by who can get all the other vampires to call them Your Highness, and there are plenty of ways to go about that that don't rely on raw power.
Another thing I liked is the history section. The book presumes that most people reading will know about New York and dedicates a relatively short section to the mortal history of the city, spending much more time on an oral history of the Battle of New York than on explaining the renewal of Times Square--though come to think of it, I expect that never happened in the World of Darkness. There's an explanation of the Camarilla using radioactive "Methuselah blood" and helicopters with geiger counters to find Sabbat havens and attack them during the daytime, and a competing explanation that the Camarilla just contracted with the Giovanni and summoned up wraiths to find the vampires. There's a shoutout to the Vampire: the Masquerade: Redemption computer game with the inclusion of Katherine Wiese, a.k.a. Ekaterina the Wise, the main character's sire, a thousand-year-old Sabbat elder who is masquerading as a Camarilla ancilla. There's a climactic final battle between the Camarilla archons and the archbishop's forces, leading to the archbishop and his ally Lambach Ruthven fleeing and the Camarilla's victory. For now.
I also liked the depiction of the Sabbat. Perhaps because the Sabbat had been on power in New York for so long, they had lost some of the kill-and-burn emphasis that the Sabbat has in other cities, or at least the emphasis that's often put on them. Of the packs depicted, the Midnighters are vampire street-racing enthusiasts and the Number-One Heartthrob are Sabbat socialites. There's not a ton of material on either of them, but just their mere existence helps to show
There are a few other story seeds too, like the conflict between High Regent Sturbridge and Lord Wainwright over the proper direction for the Tremere to take, an Assamite who plans to rendezvous with the schismatics and petition for Camarilla membership, and, of course, the slumbering form of the Tzimisce Antediluvian far beneath the city's streets.
Overall, I think New York by Night accomplishes its goals. It's possible that a native New Yorker might notice some errors in the scant geographic descriptions, but I've been in New York a grand total of six days, so none of it seemed wrong to me. And anyway, the emphasis here is definitely on the by Night part of the book, because the main goal is being a city where the PCs can finally rise to power, and it does a pretty good job. It won't be easy, and there are a lot of obstacles in the PCs' way if they try, but one of the major complaints I've heard about Vampire is that there are too many superpowerful NPCs for wannabee-novelist GMs to use to force the PCs into sticking to their plot, and the New York definitely avoids those.
As the introduction states, this book is designed to set up a city where the average vampire is very young, has little established power, or both. There are no powerful elders, because the Sabbat is gone, Michaela is dead, and most other vampires don't want to leave their existing spider webs to try for power in New York. It's a city where the existing stasis of vampiric society isn't yet in place, and where the PCs can come to try their hand at being kingmakers or kings themselves. In that, I think it does a pretty good job. New York is such an important city in America that it's a bit strange that more vampires wouldn't try to gain influence over the U.N. or Wall Street, but there's been enough published about how elder vampires don't get old by taking risks that it remains plausible. Of course, that's the average vampire. The Tremere have several chantries in the city and Michaela's childer still exist, so the PCs will have stiff competition. But at least in New York, it's reasonable competition, not overwhelming, implacable force. As the book repeatedly points out, the princedom is determined by who can get all the other vampires to call them Your Highness, and there are plenty of ways to go about that that don't rely on raw power.
Another thing I liked is the history section. The book presumes that most people reading will know about New York and dedicates a relatively short section to the mortal history of the city, spending much more time on an oral history of the Battle of New York than on explaining the renewal of Times Square--though come to think of it, I expect that never happened in the World of Darkness. There's an explanation of the Camarilla using radioactive "Methuselah blood" and helicopters with geiger counters to find Sabbat havens and attack them during the daytime, and a competing explanation that the Camarilla just contracted with the Giovanni and summoned up wraiths to find the vampires. There's a shoutout to the Vampire: the Masquerade: Redemption computer game with the inclusion of Katherine Wiese, a.k.a. Ekaterina the Wise, the main character's sire, a thousand-year-old Sabbat elder who is masquerading as a Camarilla ancilla. There's a climactic final battle between the Camarilla archons and the archbishop's forces, leading to the archbishop and his ally Lambach Ruthven fleeing and the Camarilla's victory. For now.
I also liked the depiction of the Sabbat. Perhaps because the Sabbat had been on power in New York for so long, they had lost some of the kill-and-burn emphasis that the Sabbat has in other cities, or at least the emphasis that's often put on them. Of the packs depicted, the Midnighters are vampire street-racing enthusiasts and the Number-One Heartthrob are Sabbat socialites. There's not a ton of material on either of them, but just their mere existence helps to show
There are a few other story seeds too, like the conflict between High Regent Sturbridge and Lord Wainwright over the proper direction for the Tremere to take, an Assamite who plans to rendezvous with the schismatics and petition for Camarilla membership, and, of course, the slumbering form of the Tzimisce Antediluvian far beneath the city's streets.
Overall, I think New York by Night accomplishes its goals. It's possible that a native New Yorker might notice some errors in the scant geographic descriptions, but I've been in New York a grand total of six days, so none of it seemed wrong to me. And anyway, the emphasis here is definitely on the by Night part of the book, because the main goal is being a city where the PCs can finally rise to power, and it does a pretty good job. It won't be easy, and there are a lot of obstacles in the PCs' way if they try, but one of the major complaints I've heard about Vampire is that there are too many superpowerful NPCs for wannabee-novelist GMs to use to force the PCs into sticking to their plot, and the New York definitely avoids those.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews