Because White Wolf rule books
- while grabbing your attention and imagination - read like a novel, it's
practically impossible to remember (or find) all of the rules presented.
Every time I re-read a book I find a new piece of information. One mistake
we made was what I call The Holy Order of Things. I call your attention
to page 169 of the Mage book: this is the Holy Order as they apply to ALL
of the games.
-
Do something and roll the dice.
-
Spend Quintessence if you're a Mage... and if you want to, otherwise skip
this step.
-
Spend Willpower if you want/need to.
We'd been doing it in the exact opposite order. I believe Vampire first
edition had it 'our' way, and it just stuck.
Of course, Vampire Revised
Ed. does a 180 and has you spending Willpower and then rolling.... Considering
how difficult it is now to botch, however, I can see why they did that.