Epitaph #1 was a single issue e-zine produced by White Wolf in April 2009.
It had replaced White Wolf Quarterly, but still held onto the same structure and layout as the previous e-zine. While there was no second issue, White Wolf Blogcast also debuted later in the same year as Epitaph.
Onyx Path Publishing would also introduce their own e-zine brochures by 2013.
Table of Contents[]
Dead Man's Party[]
Welcome, fiends and friends, to the White Wolf Publishing’s newest online newsletter Epitaph. Within its pages we’ve decided to show you our adoring fans some of the “magic” that’s behind the curtain of our sunless lives. Within Epitaph’s pages you will find tidbits and trinkets of knowledge and lore. You will find both previously unpublished material, information on upcoming releases and interviews with some of our most talented fiends. Lastly, and for good measure we have included a few terrifying tales as written by you, our fans.
Enjoy!
Table of Contents[]
The Black Streets of Babylon[]
An exclusive excerpt from the upcoming Vampire: The Requiem supplement Ancient Bloodlines.
Rise of the Covenants: Ancient Egypt[]
An exclusive excerpt from the upcoming Vampire: The Requiem supplement Ancient Mysteries. As a companion to its sister book Ancient Bloodlines.
I Am The Very Model of Experimental Publishing![]
By Eddy Webb, Alternative Publishing Developer
About this time last year (almost to the day, in fact) I wrote an article for the eQuarterly called “Just What The Hell Are Alternative Products?” I had worked as AP Developer for nearly four months when I wrote it, so we were all learning what alternative products (now collectively called “alternative publishing” or just “AP”) were really all about. The editor gave me a page to talk a little bit about AP, so I decided to take the opportunity to look back before looking ahead.
I’ve Information PDF, PoD and Other Things
The workhorse of AP has certainly been the Storytelling Adventure System line of downloadable adventures and adventure support materials. As of February 17th, we have nineteen SAS products that cover all of our current World of Darkness lines as well as Exalted and Scion. Our website team also whipped up a brand-new SAS site for us, which allows you to easily browse the variety of products we have.
We’ve also put out more PDF-exclusive products, like Block by Bloody Block for Hunter: The Vigil and New Wave Requiem for Vampire: The Requiem. These were products that I felt added a lot of value to their respective lines, but they wouldn’t work as traditional releases. When we don’t have to hit a certain page count, we can put out products with a much tighter focus and really get into the nuances of a smaller topic (such as building a city for hunters to play in, or examining the nature of vampires in the 1980s of the United States). We’re just starting to explore the potential of these kinds of products, but already some fans have gotten really excited about the possibilities.
We also had a growing print-on-demand program, but due to some complications with that partnership, we temporarily suspended our PoD products earlier this year. We will be taking time to make sure that when print-on-demand books are offered again, that they will be of the quality that you as customers and we are publishers demand from our products, and a number of our PDF-exclusive products will have PoD alternatives as soon as we can offer them. But like the title of this piece says, a lot of this experimental, and like all experiments, some just don’t work out the first time through.
The Future Is Exciting And Really Not Ethereal
So with all that being said, we have a lot of new and exciting products coming down the line in 2009.
• Collection of Horrors: A new twist on the SAS line, this is an anthology of scenes, characters and props rather than a pre-constructed story. Each file has one scene, one character and one prop inspired by one of the stories in the Hunter Horror Recognition Guide. Even cooler, some of the props are audio files that you can play right at the gaming table – a recording from a reporter, a voicemail message, an autopsy report and even an interrogation scene make up some of the audio possibilities in this collection.
• Ready-Made Player Character Groups: The SAS adventures make it easy for a busy Storyteller to download a story and go, but very few of them offer pre-existing characters to use in those adventures. To fill this need, we’re going to offer pre-constructed player character groups for each of our World of Darkness games, along with advice for Storytellers on how to build stories around that group. Once they’re available, you’ll be able to download absolutely everything you need for a game right to your desktop. Well, everything except pencils and dice, and there are even some companies that have cardboard dice you can download….
• More AP Supplements: We’re not stopping with just Hunter and Vampire with our small, focused products. We have a PDF in the works for Changeling: The Lost covering goblin markets, as well as one for Exalted about the Incarna. We also have a product coming up covering the Testament of Longinus for Vampire. And there’s even more ideas we’re kicking around for the future.
So Have Some New Scion Companion Bonus Material
To celebrate a year of experiments and exciting new prospects to come, I pulled together some of the material that ended up getting cut for various reasons early in the development process of the Scion Companion (one of our biggest and most successful AP ideas last year) and compiled it here for you. Enjoy!
What’s up with the titles in this article?
Look up the lyrics of “Major-General’s Song” by Gilbert and Sullivan, used in their musical “The Pirates of Penzance,” then read them again. You’ll get it.
Back Into the Hedge, a Changeling Post-Mortem[]
By Ethan Skemp
Artist Spotlight: Efrem Palacios[]
Showcasing one of White Wolf's freelance artists by Priscilla Kim.
There Will Be Blood[]
An excerpt from the upcoming World of Darkness supplement Immortals.
Who's Who at CCP?[]
Something wicked this way comes. An interview with CCP game designer Natasha Bryant-Raible by Shane DeFreest.
Rise of the Imperator[]
A Vampire: The Eternal Struggle Storyline Event.
In this constructed VTES Storyline Event, players will join the power struggle, and choose the Camarilla’s military commander. Players will design and play decks featuring one the core Camarilla clans as they try to outwit, outmaneuver, and overcome their rivals to elevate one of their own. Boons will play a special role as ancient debts come due, and favors granted become obligations and tools for political leverage.
In addition to the players’ decks, and the standard tools at a Methuselah’s disposal, this event will feature a special Imperator deck that will be shared by all players. The Imperator deck represents the additional resources the the Methuselah bring to their struggle for political power -- their political maneuvers, their cunning schemes, the weaknesses for their enemies to exploit.
The Rise of the Imperator Storyline Kit contains the all new Imperator promo card and the Kaymakli Fragment promo card that was first introduced for the Black Miracles and Lies Storyline. It also contains 12 booster packs as prizes, spoils to be showered upon the victor.
- WW2881 $29.99 VTES: Imperator Storyline Kit
Coming soon, after the Imperator is chosen -- the next chapter in the VTES Storyline...
For centuries the Royal Order of Edenic Groundskeepers conducted their clandestine research. Slowly, carefully, they built their maps, documenting in detail, the secret resting places of the world’s Antediluvian and the Methuselahs. The members of the order have gathered the secrets of their forbearers and the world’s greatest trove of Kindred lore. Recently, several scholars of the order mysteriously disappeared while researching a site near Mombasa. Teams of strange Kindred have appeared in cities around the world to abduct the remaining members or the order and claim their research. It has become clear that the secret society had been penetrated or betrayed.
As the secret of the Edenic Groundskeepers is revealed, the world’s Methuselahs realize their sudden peril, and the opportunities before them. The clandestine struggle for control of the information unearthed by the order begins. Some of the Methuselahs are motivated by desire for the secrets to remain hidden. Others are motivated by knowledge and the chance to learn secrets of the Edenic Groundskeepers. Some of the Methuselahs see the order’s trove as the key to victory in the great Jyhad. Others see it as instrumental to Gehenna itself.
Only when the fate of the order has been determined, and the reasons behind their betrayal and abduction are revealed, will the Methuselahs come to understand Eden’s Legacy.
VTES Tournament Corner[]
A listing of the top-ranked players, events and stories.
The Idigam[]
An excerpt from the upcoming Werewolf: The Forsaken supplement Night Horrors: Wolfsbane.
Who is "The Unrequited Lover"?[]
Fan Fiction[]
The Path to Power (Vampire: The Requiem)[]
By Tyler Huffman
Ad for Hero Lab by Lone Wolf Development[]
Software for character creation.
The Ritual of the Shovel-Head (Vampire: The Eternal Struggle)[]
By Dane Smith
Love and Monsters (World of Darkness)[]
By Andrew Peregrine. Parents in ‘World of Darkness: Innocents’.
Traits, Merits and Flaws for Parent characters.
Achillies Heel[]
I don’t know if you guys know this or not, but I’m the guy in charge of who gets to be vampires around here. Sure, my work on Masquerade and Requiem was in years past, but that’s just my cloak of obfuscation at work. I’m the master vampire. You don’t see me. I work from the shadows and I keep my fangs retracted.
A lot of these new guys, they think they can just come through the front door, pick up a vinyl cape, and dance the night eternal. What a bunch of rubes. It’s my job to shed the scales from their eyes (often by kicking them in the head) and choose which among them receive the offer of infinite unlife and who’s doomed to share the downstairs bathroom with the content developers (who are pretty much werewolves).
Vampire Applicant #OA56697-PL
Chad Brown, Operations Associate
Chad has knives and knows where to hide the dead bodies. He will eat snakes if necessary, and can stomach month-old sushi, so he has a significant constitution. He also has a company credit card, so if resources ever became an issue, he would perform admirably as a minion. And by that I mean buy stuff.
Benefits: Already does my bidding. Easily cajoled.
Drawbacks: Short. Weird. Familiar with my modus operandi.
Petition for vampirism ACCEPTED.
Vampire Applicant #CS77252-PD
Yas Bennett, Lead Accountant
A lead accountant sounds awesome, which would put the full might of corporations at my disposal. Do vampires write checks? No, seriously, think about it. Have you ever seen a vampire write a check? Oh, who cares. It’s about the power, not the details.
Benefits: Controls who gets paid and when. Doesn’t put up with people’s crap. Once slammed Greg Fountain’s sacroiliac in a car door.
Drawbacks: Knows where I live. Knows my wife. Knows my salary. Knows too much. A tough call, but we’ll roll the dice. Petition for vampirism ACCEPTED.
Vampire Applicant #IL26595-RK
Nathan Richardsson, Executive Producer
If booze were blood, Nathan would probably be unimpeachable Prince of Hella Damnation for All Time. Also, if falling down and being unintelligible for about six hours were blood, he would still be a pretty accomplished vampire.
Benefits: Good shoes. Usually pretty clean. Mouth already filled with deadly fangs.
Drawbacks: Falls down so much. Exceeds my range of influence. Knows a language I don’t, so he can communicate in ways I cannot know, which might undermine my status as Master Vampire.
Petition for vampirism DENIED.
Vampire Applicant #PA11743-UL
Richard Thomas, Creative Director
Rich has been here even longer than I have, and knows the secret treacheries that hide deep within the festering guts of the organization. He’s also older than me, and I might be able to convince other people that he’s the Master Vampire (he’s not), and they’ll come after him instead of me.
Benefits: Evil. Is my boss. Likes Deadwood.
Drawbacks: Might be smarter than me and manipulating me in reverse. Hey, what if he’s already the Master Vampire (he’s not) and has me tricked into thinking that I’m the Master Vampire? No, that couldn’t happen.
Petition for vampirism ACCEPTED.
Vampire Applicant #MH65831-AD
Aileen Miles, Art Director
She’s like a thunderhead of bile and wrath. That sounds like a pretty cool asset to have at one’s command, doesn’t it?
Benefits: Mean as a snake. Works from the remote office (would extend the range of my nefarious plans). Already has minions of her own (Developer Ethan).
Drawbacks: Mad all the time. Can’t drive a car.
Doesn’t drink.
Doesn’t drink? Petition for vampirism DENIED.
As you can see, it’s pretty difficult to weigh the souls of Men and see who makes the cut and who doesn’t. That’s fine with me, though, because building a hoary host of undead with which to threaten the night and execute World Domination isn’t something that can be done lightly or by a part-time staff. Part-time, staff? Huh. Maybe I need an assistant.
| Previous release | Game Books | Next release |
|---|---|---|
| WW: White Wolf Quarterly Spring 2008 Volume 7 | White Wolf Quarterly | WW: White Wolf Blogcast 0: Introduction 
|