Timeline

Chronological Timeline Index

A player-friendly history of Madtown by Night, from the beginning of Creation to the supernatural crises of 2025.

Madison looks like an ordinary Midwestern city. Beneath its streets, however, ancient powers have fought over sacred places, hidden realms, and the shape of reality itself.

This timeline introduces the events most characters might know through rumor, research, supernatural lore, or personal experience. Some accounts remain incomplete or contradictory.

Current Setting	2025
Major Turning Point	1985
Current Chronicles	Awakened of Madtown and Kindred of Madtown
Player Knowledge	Major Storyteller secrets are intentionally omitted

Using This Timeline

The history of the World of Darkness is not perfectly recorded.

Mages alter memories. Kindred destroy evidence. Spirits remember promises differently from mortals. The Digital Web sometimes preserves events that never happened.

This page presents the broad history of Madison. Follow the links for deeper accounts of individual eras.

Prehistoric and Mythic Eras

Long before Madison existed, supernatural powers fought over Creation, humanity, and the spirit world.

• 10–20 Billion BCE – The Big Bang and the Triat Begins
• 3.5–4 Billion BCE – Emergence of Life and Spirits on Earth
• 400 Million BCE – Ananasa Diversifies Insects
• 360 Million BCE – The Spider Spirit is Born
• 150 Million BCE – Age of Kings and Mokole Civilization
• 65 Million BCE – Fall of the Drachid Form and Age of Kings
• 2.5–1.75 Million BCE – Humanity Adopted by Weaver, Creation of Garou
• 100,000–10,000 BCE – Diaspora, Banestorm, War of Shame

Ancient History

Around 6000 BCE, a supernatural alliance imprisoned an entity remembered as the Nameless. The prison weakened several times over the following millennia, forcing later generations to defend or renew it.

• 6000 BCE – Sealing of the Nameless (First Binding)
• 5000 BCE – Fracture of the First Seal
• 4000 BCE – Rise of Babylon, Druidic Magick, First Shadow Tensions
• 3000 BCE – First Breach Attempt, Wounded Anchors
• 2000 BCE – Nephandi Almost Free the Nameless
• 1000 BCE – Third Fire Renewal by Croatan

Classical to Early Modern History

The land surrounding the Four Lakes remained spiritually important through the rise and fall of nations, religions, and supernatural societies.

• 1 CE – Dream of the Hollow Mask, Sentinel Appears
• 1000 CE – Silent Confluence and Renewal of the Third Seal
• 1634–1836 CE – Indigenous Stewardship, Colonial Spiritual War

Madison Is Founded

Madison was built upon land already inhabited, protected, and contested by Indigenous peoples, spirits, and supernatural factions.

As the city grew, construction disturbed ancient spiritual paths beneath the Four Lakes. Mortal government rose beside the Capitol Node, one of the most powerful and dangerous places in the region.

During this period, the hidden sanctuary called New Avalon also began taking shape.

• 1836 – Madison Founded atop the Third Anchor
• 1860s – Civil War, Camp Randall Necromantic Spillover
• 1883 – Baali Capitol Collapse
• 1890s – Technocratic Assaults, Gahara Pact Forms

The Twentieth Century

1900 to 1919: Fire and Accord

The 1904 Capitol fire concealed a major supernatural confrontation. In its aftermath, Madison's supernatural factions established the Gahara Pact, an agreement intended to prevent open war.

New Avalon grew into a true Horizon Realm and sanctuary for the Awakened.

• 1900–1915 – Capitol Fire, Fall of the Lords of Madison
• 1914–1920 – WWI, New Avalon Echo, Sabbat Probes

1920 to 1949: Hidden Empires

Prohibition, organized crime, war, occult smuggling, and Technocratic operations changed Madison. Truax Field and other wartime projects left supernatural scars beneath the modern city.

• 1920–1939 – Prohibition, Syndicate Rise, Madtown Mage Cabal Forms
• 1940–1949 – WWII, Truax Field Founded, Nephandi Rituals

1950 to 1969: War and Awakening

Conflict between Madison's Kindred and Garou turned sacred places into battlegrounds.

Later, civil rights activism, student protest, new religious movements, and cultural rebellion changed the city's supernatural balance.

• 1950–1959 – Kindred–Garou War, Cold War Occult Espionage
• 1960–1969 – Civil Rights Awakening, Hollow One Expansion, Malkavian Prophecy

1970 to 1979: Anarch Madison

A new alliance between Madison's Kindred and Garou brought an unstable peace.

Madison became an Anarch-controlled city. Its Kindred rejected direct Camarilla rule while continuing to use traditional offices such as Prince, Sheriff, and Primogen.

• 1970–1979 – Olbrich Alliance, Sabbat Incursion, Eclipse Ritual

1980 to 1985: The Old Order Breaks

Conflict spread through the Digital Web. Madison's alliances weakened, and ancient supernatural protections began to fail.

• 1980–1985 – Digital Web War, Capitol Murders, Nameless Awakens

1985: The First Collapse

The year 1985 changed Madison's supernatural world forever.

Prince Tori Redford and Garou Elder William Burke were found murdered. Their deaths threatened the alliance between the Kindred and Garou, weakened the Gahara Pact, and pushed several factions toward war.

At the same time, Madison, New Avalon, and New Eden became entangled in a final confrontation with the Nameless.

The city survived, but the old order did not. Leaders died or disappeared. Alliances fractured. New Avalon became inaccessible, and many truths about the crisis were buried.

• 1985

1986 to 1996: Reconstruction

Jessica Woodfield became Prince and held Madison's Anarch domain together.

The city's Awakened were less fortunate. Their council weakened, the chantries became isolated, and irreplaceable knowledge disappeared with each death.

Madison remained peaceful on the surface, but that peace depended increasingly upon a few exhausted survivors.

1997 to 1998: The Web Breaks

On November 10, 1997, a supernatural catastrophe struck the Digital Web.

New Eden survived, but entire sectors disappeared. Records contradicted one another, and some digital inhabitants remembered places that apparently never existed.

In the aftermath, New Eden's purpose began to change. It was no longer merely a refuge. Some believed it could become the foundation of an entirely new civilization.

1999: The Avatar Storm

During the Week of Nightmares, supernatural catastrophes erupted across the world.

The Avatar Storm made travel between the physical and spiritual worlds extraordinarily dangerous. Madison lost many of its remaining Awakened teachers, guardians, and leaders.

Several chantries were cut off from their allies. Others were left in the hands of students who had never expected to inherit them.

The city survived its second supernatural collapse, but the Age of Masters was over.

2000 to 2005: The Failed Rescues

Madison's surviving mages attempted to rescue those trapped beyond the Avatar Storm.

Some expeditions vanished. Others returned with missing memories, spiritual wounds, or years of their lives unaccounted for.

By 2005, organized rescue efforts had ended. Too few experienced mages remained to risk another expedition.

2006 to 2014: The Closed Doors

The surviving chantries stopped functioning as a unified magical society.

Some became isolated households. Others stood empty behind wards their inhabitants no longer understood. Libraries remained locked, and old spirits continued waiting for promises nobody remembered making.

Meanwhile, Jessica Woodfield preserved Madison's fragile political peace.

2015 to 2019: The Untrained Generation

New mages continued to Awaken, but few teachers remained to guide them.

Many interpreted their experiences as psychic powers, religious visions, strange technology, witchcraft, artistic inspiration, extraordinary luck, or mental illness.

The Traditions still existed in Madison, but often as empty buildings, broken lineages, and stories inherited without explanation.

2020 to 2024: The Returning Paths

The Avatar Storm weakened and eventually ended.

Travel into the spirit world became possible again, but the old paths had changed. Some remained broken. Others led somewhere new.

Messages began arriving through channels that had been silent since 1999. New Awakenings increased, but Madison's remaining supernatural institutions were not prepared.

The city appeared peaceful. Underneath, old agreements were beginning to fail.

2025: The Present Chronicle

The Death of Jessica Woodfield

Prince Jessica Woodfield is dead.

Her death ends forty years of relative political stability. Madison's Anarch establishment is vulnerable, and the Camarilla sees an opportunity to claim the city.

The Primogen must decide who will rule, what Madison will become, and how much blood will be spilled before the question is answered.

Awakened of Madtown

Newly Awakened mages enter a city whose magical institutions have already failed.

The old masters are dead, missing, damaged, or pursuing private agendas. The chantries hold more secrets than living members.

The characters must discover what they have become while old protections begin failing around them.

Kindred of Madtown

Madison's Prince is dead, and every faction has its own version of what should happen next.

The city's Kindred must investigate the crisis, contain political violence, protect the Masquerade, and decide who has the right to rule an Anarch city that still calls its leader Prince.

Gen Con 2026

The 2025 crisis provides the shared setting for two Gen Con 2026 chronicles:

• Awakened of Madtown, using Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition
• Kindred of Madtown, using Vampire: The Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition

No previous experience with Madtown by Night or the World of Darkness is required.

Timeline at a Glance

Period	What Changed
Before 1836	Ancient supernatural powers struggled over the land surrounding the Four Lakes.
1836 to 1903	Madison was founded, and New Avalon grew as a hidden sanctuary.
1904 to 1974	The Gahara Pact created an unstable peace between supernatural factions.
1975 to 1984	Madison became an Anarch-controlled city.
1985	The Capitol murders and Nameless crisis destroyed the old supernatural order.
1986 to 1998	Madison rebuilt while its Awakened institutions slowly collapsed.
1999	The Avatar Storm killed or stranded most of Madison's remaining masters.
2000 to 2019	Isolated survivors failed to rebuild the city's magical society.
2020 to 2024	The Avatar Storm ended, but the old order did not return.
2025	Jessica Woodfield's death placed Madison's future in the hands of the player characters.

See Also

• Major Characters
• Supernatural Factions of Madison
• Capitol Node History
• New Avalon (Horizon Realm)
• Nameless – Entity File
• Gahara Pact – Founding Accord

Editorial Note

This page presents the current player-facing continuity for the 2025 setting.

Some linked articles contain older material that is still being reviewed. Information known only to the Storyteller has been deliberately omitted.