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Current Music: Supersuckers - Hey Ya! (Squid's Redoubt)
Well, yes, AIT's system bites the wax tadpole. So, what other options are there? Oh, c'mon, you just asked me for different system options! Are you crazy? Let's start with Wushu, since it's the easiest system to design in, bar none. Ryo Shinta
Occult Librarian (4), Vampire: Mental (3), Geomancy: Lure of Flames (5), Traditional Vampiric Weaknesses: Can't cross running water, stakes put them in torpor, vulnerable to fire and holy might, etc. (1) Occult Librarian represents all the things the bookish occultist might need, including contacts for books, knowledge of obscure magical beasts and a certain amount of income from their licit or illicit trade. Vampire: Mental gives one the general abilities of the vampire (strength, speed, etc) with a focus on the mental powers of such beasts, including entrancement, knowledge of more obscure things that they, in fact, lived through, inhuman ruthlessness, etc. Geomancy: Lure of Flames is the particular field of sorcerous knowledge that Ryo has specialized in. The applications range from lighting a match with a fingertip to conjuring massive sheaths of fire which burn nothing of him. Traditional Vampiric Weaknesses neatly packages up all the useful means for finding and tracking vampires. Whenever trying to oppose one of them or if one is brought to bear against him, the relevant Traits becomes 1. And there you go; not only is the system itself more succinct, but its immensely more flexible for casting off all the burdensome crap that bogs larger systems down. Coupled with Wushu's "whatever you say goes" attitude toward Player power, you can have characters which do all the cool, big things of the most cinematic of the vampire stories and still be useful. Example Conflict: Ryo is surrounded by a group of cops who've stumbled into his feeding, after being on the run from the city's Scourge after a minor misunderstanding. The GM decides they represent a group of 8 point mooks; hardly a significant threat, more an excuse to show off. "Ryo strikes a pose, fingers hooked and fangs bared (*), forcing the cops back a step, paling almost as white as his dead skin (*). With a sudden shout of power, his entire body bursts into a pillar of spinning blue flame (*), and he leaps toward the cops, arms spread, as if to embrace them (*). Two of the poor men stumble backwards over their own feet and start screaming (*), pissing their pants in terror (*)." That's 6d total for this exchange. Ryo's player puts one die in Yin, trusting to his joss to succeed, and the other four in Yang for the attack. The GM decides that the bulk of the effect is sorcerous so the target number to roll at or under is 5. The Yin die succeeds, so the mooks don't take a point of Chi, and the five Yang dice come up with four successes. Looks like another round of conflict and the cops'll be taken care of. Later Ryo and his Coterie stumble over a haunted house, filled with the screaming souls of hatred sneaking through a rift from the Underworld. Naturally, Ryo'd like to get a handle on this phenomenon. "Flipping through an ancient text called 'Flesh-Renders Bite The Thumb' (*) and which is well-known in the occult circles for its findings in this matter (*), he finds a section on the social order of the Underworld (*), illustrated by strange diagrams which appear to be sketched in human blood (*)." Since things aren't hugely stressed yet, Ryo's player only generates 4d for the check, planning to use it for dice in a pool to call up later. As it's entirely in the domain of the occult librarian, his target's 4. Two successes get banked from the research for him to pull up later in a tight spot. To use Wushu as the core in a LARP, you'd really need a different system than d6 to convey the random vector. A 36 card deck made up of the numbers 1 - 6 repeated 6 times would probably be random enough to do. Shuffle, cut, and draw a card off for every detail of your embellishment during one turn of the Scene. Mooks get no cards, just are assumed that they do one success in damage every turn that needs to be defended. Burning a point of Chi lets you ignore one success of a test. Run out of Chi, and you go down (out of the Scene) when another test goes against you. Rebuild Chi by one point every Scene / an hour. Start with three Chi. Ta da! Next, I'll have to go through a different system. | 
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