I've tried to explain a little of how downtimes work, particularly for those of you who have just joined us, so you can get plotting and schemeing straight away

Downtime Actions.

For your information, here is how downtimes work.

Each month there is a deadline. You submit your actions (what you would like to do, and how you intend to do it – e.g. under obfuscate I intend to follow a man home from the pub and once in his house, rob him blind) by this downtime and you will get a response before the next game (e.g. the man is quite drunk when he leaves, staggering up the steps to his house. Once inside, he quickly passes out in front of the TV, giving you ample opportunity to rifle through his things).

You get one action for each dot of Resolve your character possesses.

Additionally, for each purchase of the Retainer, Allies, Mentor or Contacts merit you may ask the person/people the merit represents to perform one action on your behalf. (e.g. I will ask my ghoul to go to the public library during the day to examine the newspaper archives for any murders that may have taken place at address X)

You also get one free ‘learning’ action each month – allowing you to buy up a skill, stat, discipline or devotion without spending a Downtime action.

Actions are generally things that take up your ‘free time’. Things that are considered part of your ‘night to night’ activities probably do not require you to spend an action. Feeding for example, is something that you have to do and does not require any additional effort, however you may spend an action on feeding to gain bonuses to your blood draw at the beginning of the next game.

Similarly, if you have purchased the Resources merit, you do not need to spend an action to gain the money that comes with it – whether it is managing stocks, working as a bouncer or being a high priced dominatrix.

There are no hard and fast rules as to what constitutes an action, but generally if it would involve a draw (dominating someone to lie to the police), be considered investigating (researching the history of a haunted building) or something that advances plot (personal or otherwise) it will require an action to be spent.

On top of that, flavour text, character diaries and opinions of other characters are always interesting to read and help STs to personalise plot elements and try to make the game fun for everyone.

I hope that helps explain things a bit.

Mouse