VtM Bloodlines v8.8 unofficial patch by Wesp5

People whine about that section too much. First playthrough i did it was horrid for me as well, but since i generally run multiple play-throughs (on games i like at least) i didn't find it that irritating afterwards. Just running 3 concurrent chars (malk nos trem) and passed the sewer section like today with all 3 (been more than a year since the last time i played), first one was meh, other 2 were easy as hell.

 

Sewers are very easy. If you are ready for them, of course I admit that when I first played Bloodlines, I already knew about sewers and end-game sequence, so I invested my skill points accordingly. It wasn't difficult, just boring compared to the first half of the game.

 

Topics you'll never see on a video game forum: "Games with great sewer sections/levels."

 

It's not that it's hard, nothing in bloodlines is hard. It's just that the sewers are a boring fucking hassle. I usually noclip my way through the entire sewers and the game is much more enjoyable for it. So it's nice that CQM made it skippable.

 

I remember being told they're referred to as Lasombra by the game internally somehow, maybe in the scripting. Plus their shadowport ability is straight out of Obtenebration (the Lasombra clan discipline), although it's a 6 dot power. The only other teleport ability I remember from VTM was a 7 dot celerity ability that I think might have just been from the LARP rules. And Temporis, I guess, but if they had that they could have done worse to you than just teleport with it.

 

Yeah, I don't disagree that they are most likely Lasombra, I just wasn't sure if there was, as you said, something that explicitly referred to them as such.

 

I have been thinking of doing a replay of this for sometime. Has any of the patches up to V8.8 done anything to change the Tremere's thaumaturgy or anything about them in general ?

 

Well I haven't been playing the game lately, but one thing I remember from the plus unofficial patch is that Tremere can now use Dominate in dialogue (but unlike the Ventrue, only the first or maybe second level). Some of other mods might have made more difference. Camarilla edition certainly changes some thaumaturgy powers and even allows you to pick up an extra discipline.

 

Coming back to this since my CE playthrough is near over, is there an ETA or any news on when this will go out?

 

Also what do people know of the Final Nights mod?

 

What exactly is the viability of used a Tremere with the fire arms skill ?. The game will attempt to auto level into the skill but I always used melee weapons when I had to deal with an immediate threat and the katana was very affective when dealing with other kindred. Is it something that is worth leveling or should I just stick to magic and melee ?

 

Just got auspex going for it, which is nice, but not something you keep on all the time. Meanwhile, brujah/toreador got celerity too, that is obviously tremendous for firearms.

However, any vampire in bloodlines can dominate the firearms skill with minimal investment, because it's got around 4 free dots in the game if you manage them wisely (although this means waiting a hell of a long time coasting around 2 skill if you're going to 'optimize')

 

You can reach 10 in firearms with Tremere and go over that with the bonuses from Auspex (at least in CE, not sure if you can go over 10 in a stat in vanilla), your melee max level as tremere is limited by the str restriction. Blood Purge + ranged is p good on Tremere tbh.

 

Then I will have to give it a try since the I used to couple bloodshieldelee and still get wrecked in Chinatown. But It seems I will need to to rely on my blood magic to carry me through the early Santa Monica game play at least until I get a good handgun and see how it goes from there.

 

Fucking sewers and warehouses. The bane of game levels.

 

Chinatown warehouse is generally the hardest fight in the game if you're trying to save Mr 'suicidal' Zhao, which necessitates godly disciplines (celerity) and sheer recklessness to make them lock into you instead of him. Otherwise they'll snipe him pretty soon in the fight when the dumbass runs down the stairs or even when they shoot at the window.
Actually, maybe the original cemetery minigame without celerity is harder.

 

In the mid-late game Spas/Steyr will shred through anything in record time, including other kindred.

 

I never got the sewer hate coming from a group of people who play games with nothing but dungeon crawling. I mean VTMB combat isn't great but most dungeon crawlers are just button pushing all the same. I guess the sewer part doesn't really fit the flow of the game but it's not that terrible really.

 

Personally I hated the Malk mansion more. At least after the first play through... that place is just so unbelievably boring.

 

^^Probably because until then the game lets you get by with a character that mostly ignores combat skills.

Underwater levels and NPC escort sections as well.

Someone should make a game that consists of guiding a suicidal NPC with no combat abilities whatsoever through a gigantic sewer with lots of flooded tunnels. Legend of Ragequit.

 

I don't know, I didn't have a problem with that because I assumed the game was going to require me to have different sorts of skills so my chars always had a mix of social and combat feats. I mean lots of Codex complains about games with useless skills that allow easy minmaxing but then gets annoyed when a game forces them to diversify to succeed. I'm not sure what else you'd do besides maybe try to telegraph that you couldn't rely on one thing better. Still, you can still sneak through most of the sewer with Obfuscate or use Celerity to just blaze past. Only the miniboss parts actually require a fight IIRC.

 

Propably the biggest problem with VTMB, but then again, I can't imagine how lore(duh!)-wise could you talk yourself out of combat with sheriff or weeboo vampires.

But Grout seems (seemed?) to be pretty bro-tier Malk

 

Shouldn't be problem if I use saves from older version of patch, like 7.6 or something? I've found some from December '12 (almost year). Game loaded fine.
No New Content installed.

I have no problems with sewer levels in any game, have no clue what so rage about them...

 

I would have enjoyed being able to recruit minions to take with you into the sewers, kind of like damage sponges or something.

 

The sewer level isn't a problem in and of itself, what it needed was more opportuneties to use non combat skills to beat it. Like using lockpicking/hacking to flood a room full of monsters or maybe running into a couple of nosferatu you could entice into helping you if your social skills were high enough. And it could've been a bit shorter too, I guess.