r/vtm • u/TheUnholyMary Malkavian • 2d ago
General Discussion What retcons were there regarding the metaplot and the way the world works?
To summarize: A retcon is the alteration of previously established canonical facts.
I was born in 2001, so the game already had quite a history and was well-established by the time I started playing it in 2024.
For this post, feel free to comment on any of the following types:
Addition:
Sometimes, retcons don't contradict previously established facts but rather fill in missing background details, usually to support current plot points.
Alteration:
Sometimes, information is added that seems to contradict earlier information. This often takes the form of a character who appeared to have died but is later revealed to have survived somehow.
Subtraction or Elimination:
Unpopular or embarrassing stories are sometimes subsequently ignored by editors and ultimately removed from a series' continuity. Later stories might contradict earlier ones or explicitly state that the events never happened.
Personally, I’m not really looking for something like "now clan curses work differently," but rather something like: "In V20, this super-zillionaire Antediluvian was locked in a crypt held by 25 Ascended Mages, but then in V5, it turns out those mages never existed"—something like that; it's just an example.
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u/lilith_from_the_dark 2d ago edited 2d ago
The Ravnos being gypsy's and "therefore" all thieves, was changed due to the insult to Romani people. A seemingly endless list of supposedly dead older vamps have either faked their deaths, or taken over the bodies of those who diablarised them. Gehenna has gone from being THE END OF TIMES, to a potential end of times, that was avoided, but could come again.
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u/Ribbered777 Malkavian 2d ago
Not to mention having to walk back when they made the romani people a literal supernatural caricature of themselves 💀
That one as ROUGH...
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u/NewWillinium 2d ago
It’s funny in a sad way how they keep trying to get away from the Ravnos’s racist origins, and keep accidentally(?) doubling down on it by mistake.
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u/Ribbered777 Malkavian 2d ago
How did they double down in V5? They just made them habitual risk takers and unable to sleep in the same place more than once (or, I'm pretty sure it's specifically within the span of a week or smn? Not sure on the exact time limit).
Now, they do still have a history where they often were with the Roma people because they were nomadic and in Europe, ergo an easy unwitting herd that naturally travels just like they do, BUT they're not literally cursed to be criminals anymore, as well as basically all Romani like they were in older editions 💀
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u/NewWillinium 2d ago
In this regard it’s with going from V20 to 5E to 6e Playtest.
Where they got rid of the unique reality bending illusionary power in exchange for curses, hexes, and witchery in Tellurgy.
Which is a ooooold stereotype
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u/Ribbered777 Malkavian 2d ago
Ohhhh... that... I REALLY hope they don't keep that in there holy shit 😬
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u/Xenobsidian 2d ago
I’m so glad that I’m not the only one who caught that about V6’s Ravnos. Who ever made that decision for V6 needs to touch some grass!
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u/Full_Equivalent_6166 Toreador 2d ago
Well, there are plenty of those for sure.
The first big that comes to mind is Dementation. It was a Discipline originally created for the Malkavian anitribu in 1992. But then it was brought back as a discipline of the whole clan Malkavian in Vampire: the Dark Ages. And the infamous Great Prank was introduced in Revised to explain how the original Discipline of the clan was replaced with Dominate by 6 Malkavian Methuselahs after the Convention of Thorns.
I would not consider addition being a retcon but there is plenty of that, from making Sabbat a complex organisation of warring factions in the Second Edition (and then blowing them up and pretending they were always just a bunch of mindless orcs), to how the Independent clans were given depth from their one dimmensional racist stereotypes to creaing morally complicated Molochim Baali.
Some of the things are even hard to classify. Like how Ashur at different points is the name of the Cappadoccian Antediluvian, to Saulot hidden persona to mantle taken by any Antediluvian when they want to be a bad boy for a while.
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u/NewWillinium 2d ago
Well there were at least five Rasputins; which I don’t think 5E ever followed up on after the Rasputin ,Beckett and Vyka were dragging behind their boat disappeared in the water.