Game Starts and Chronicle Setup

A Game Start is the entry point where players choose their characters and step into the chronicle. It defines the opening scene, the starting location, which characters are playable, and what the players see before the first moment of play. A good chronicle has several game starts covering different opening scenarios. Getting this right means players land in the world with momentum, not confusion.

What a Game Start File Contains

The game start file itself (.game-start.json) holds only the lobby card: name, image, and description. This is what players see when browsing available starts — a cover image, a title, and a short pitch paragraph. The description should be one or two sentences that sell the premise: "You are the Prince's sanctioned neonates, patrolling the border between Camarilla territory and Anarch turf. Tonight, someone has crossed the line."

The Play Configuration

The actual play setup — starting location, playable characters, opening beats, and per-character opening narration — is designation metadata that lives outside the file content. You configure it with the game-start bash command, not by editing the JSON file. The update tool cannot touch this metadata.

To set up a game start, you need:

• A starting location (reference to a location file)
• An array of characters that are playable in this start
• Optional startingBeats (scene-setting narration the AI delivers on game open)
• Optional per-character characterOpenings (unique narration for each playable character)

Read the platform instructions for game starts before your first configuration — the exact command syntax and shape are detailed there.

What Makes a Good Game Start

A clear hook. The premise should be immediately graspable. "You are an Anarch cell on the industrial edge, and the Baron just called an emergency meeting." The player should know who they are, where they are, and what kind of trouble they are in before the first line of dialogue.

A manageable cast. Three to five playable characters per start is the sweet spot. Too few and the group lacks variety. Too many and players face analysis paralysis scrolling through a dozen options they have never met.

A location with teeth. The starting location should have atmosphere, faction tension, and at least one implicit threat. Don't start in a safe, empty room. Start somewhere that immediately communicates the tone — a tense Elysium gathering, a back-alley feeding ground, an Anarch safehouse with the SI closing in.

Pre-built relationships. The playable characters should already have relationship files connecting them to each other and to key SPCs. The AI should open the game already knowing who hates whom and who owes what. A game start with rich pre-existing relationships feels like jumping into season three of a show that has always been running.

Coterie Archetypes for Starts

Game starts are typically built around a specific coterie archetype, each paired with a crisis appropriate to its political position:

• Camarilla legwork — neonates working directly for the Prince
• Anarch revolutionaries — a cell on the Movement's frontier
• Thin-Blood collective — hiding from both sects
• Independent radicals — a coterie running nightlife and vice
• Lasombra probationers — navigating the shadow court
• Malkavian visionaries — interpreting the madness
• Mixed-sect border crew — at the edge of Camarilla and Anarch turf
• Gangrel predators — patrolling the Lupine frontier
• Hecata operatives — in the death trade
• Sabbat remnants — survivors of the purges
• A Baron's inner circle — the Movement's trusted few
• The underground railroad — Kindred running safehouses for the hunted

Adding a New Game Start

Create the .game-start.json file with name, image, and description. Then use the game-start set command to configure the play metadata — the starting location, the playable character list, and opening beats. Test the start by running it: the AI should open with the starting beats, know where everyone is, and have relationships to draw on immediately.

If your start uses a coterie that doesn't exist yet, create the coterie first. If it uses characters not in the project, create those characters and their relationships first. A game start is the final assembly step, not the first one.