Dictionary of Devious Disciplines

that is not one of their Clan Disciplines, the

character also needs to taste the Blood of someone
Contents who possesses it.
Animalism
Auspex Selecting Powers
Celerity Every time a character gains a dot in a Discipline
Dominate they choose one power from among the listed,
Fortitude either from their new Discipline level or below.
Obfuscate Vampire characters normally have an equal
Oblivion number of dots and powers in a Discipline - no
Oblivion Ceremonies more, no less.
Potence
Presence
Protean EXAMPLE:
Blood Sorcery At character creation, Martha has gained two dots
Blood Sorcery Rituals of Fortitude. With the first dot she can choose
Thin-Blood Alchemy either of the level one powers, picking Resilience.
At the second dot she can choose either
Sources Unswayable Mind (the second level 1 power) or
The Disciplines of this book are taken from Toughness, the level 2 power. She picks
several sources to make it easier for you, dear Unswayable Mind. When she later gains her third
reader, to understand. The Sources are as dot, she can pick either Toughness or any on the
follows… level three powers: Defy Bane or Fortify the Inner
■ Vampire: the Masquerade V5 Rulebook, Façade.
abbreviated as VTM Note that she cannot pick the amalgam
■ Cults of the Blood Gods, abbreviated as CotBG power Enduring Beasts at any level, as she lacks
■ Chicago by Night abbreviated as CbN the
■ Vampire: the Masquerade Companion, prerequisite of one dot in Animalism.
abbreviated as VTMC
■ The Chicago Folios abbreviated as TCF
■ The Winter’s Teeth Comics, abbreviated as Using Powers
WTC Unless otherwise stated, a vampire can activate a
■ Trail of Ash and Bone, abbreviated as ToAB Discipline at any time; this takes little time or
■ Let The Streets Run Red, abbreviated as LtSRR overt action. Powers do not usually activate
■ Sabbat: The Black Hand, abbreviated as StBH retroactively; they respond to, rather than
■ This Book interrupt, actions taken against the user. A
General Rules vampire can activate one Discipline power per
Learning disciplines Vampire rates Disciplines on turn. Any number of powers can be active
a scale from one to five dots, just like other Traits. simultaneously.
A character gains dots in a Discipline either at Vampires add dice equal to half their Blood
character creation or by purchasing them with Potency (rounded down) to their dice pools to use
experience points later. In order to spend or resist Disciplines (see Blood Potency, VTM p.
experience points on this, a character usually 215). General rules for specific Disciplines appear
needs to feed on the matching Resonance (VTM p. in the Characteristics section of each Discipline.
226). To later learn a completely new Discipline Amalgam Powers
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Certain rare powers require proficiency in more
than one Discipline. Characters must also possess
the listed number of dots in the other Discipline to
take these powers. For the purpose of type and
other classification, these powers count as
belonging to both Disciplines.
Additional Disciplines
In order to purchase discipline powers
beyond that of the traditional 5 dot = 5 power
limit, the following rules are applied.
■ For in-clan Disciplines:The player must take a
Merit, equal in dots to the Discipline Power Level
+ 1.
■ For non-clan Disciplines:The player must take a
Merit, equal in dots to the Discipline Power Level
+ 2.
This will be the dot value of the merit, and
the player must spend the appropriate experience
points in order to gain the new power.
You can not purchase a discipline power
above your level in that discipline.
Example:
A player has 5 powers and 5 dots in Animalism,
and is playing a Nosferatu. The player wishes to
purchase the power Drawing out the Beast(a 5
dot power), which they elected to ignore during
their initial power selection. The player takes this
5 dot power and adds 1 to the value and it is now
considered a 6 dot merit for experience cost
purposes. The cost of Merits is 3 per dot. 3x6=18.
The player must spend 18xp in order to purchase
the new power.
Animalism
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Nicknames: Doolittling, Taming, Bestiae Sermo
Perhaps the vampire has more in common
with animal than human. A dangerous set of
instincts drive them, and it takes a lot for them to
withhold the urge to just lash out. Much like a
wild dog on a chain, a vampire’s Beast will never
truly be tamed. Some Kindred find a way of
becoming one with their Beasts. Those who do are
the masters of Animalism. Some accompany the
use of this power with howls, snarls, and roars, or
communicate with animals in the animal’s
“language,” though this is an affectation and not a
necessity. The Animalism Discipline sees much
use among vampires who struggle to fit in or have
no taste for living among mortals. Often classed as
one of Caine’s gifts of utility, allowing a vampire
to thrive on unrefined blood or form
companionship with non-sapient beings, it is also
a devastating weapon against vampires who cling
to their towers, and against inquisitors who
suspect their enemies will only come on two legs.
A swarm of bloodhungry rats invading a
Kindred’s penthouse haven, the Animalism
proficient vampire who cows the Sheriff’s Beast
in Elysium, or the beady-eyed raven that spies on
a Society of St. Leopold chapter all serve to
strengthen Animalism practitioners, and weaken
their foes.
Characteristics
By default Animalism powers involving
animals can only be used on vertebrates.
Additionally, any use of the ability on herbivores
adds one to the Difficulty of skill rolls involved.
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade threat: Low to medium. While
talking to animals might seem eccentric, only the
most violent applications of the Discipline elicit
more than a few raised eyebrows.
■ Blood Resonance: Animal blood, preferably
feral.
Level 1
Bond Famulus
When Blood Bonding an animal, the
vampire can make it a famulus, forming a mental
link with it and facilitating the use of other
Animalism powers. While this power alone does
not allow two-way communication with the
animal, it can follow simple verbal instructions
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such as “stay” and “come here." It attacks in
defense of itself and its master but cannot
otherwise be persuaded to fight something it
would not normally attack.
■ VTM
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Animal Ken
■ Cost: The animal must be fed the user’s Blood
on three separate nights, each of which requires a
Rouse Check by the user. The amount of Blood
needed to sustain the ghoulstate of the animal after
this is negligible. Players starting with this power
have completed this process and can choose a
famulus for free.
■ System: Without the use of Feral Whispers,
below, giving commands to the animal requires a
Charisma + Animal Ken roll (Difficulty 2);
increase Difficulty for more complex orders. A
vampire can only have one famulus, but can get a
new one if the current one dies. A vampire can use
Feral Whispers (Animalism 2) and Subsume the
Spirit (Animalism 4) on their famulus for free.
■ Duration: Only death releases a famulus once
bound. As long as it receives vampire Blood on a
regular basis, the famulus does not age.
Sense the Beast
The vampire can sense the Beast present
in mortals, vampires, and other supernaturals,
gaining a sense of their nature, hunger, and
hostility.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Animalism vs
Composure + Subterfuge
■ System: Roll Resolve + Animalism vs
Composure + Subterfuge. A win allows the user
to sense the level of hostility in a target (whether
the person is prepared to do harm or even
determined to cause it) and determine whether
they harbor a supernatural Beast, marking them as
a vampire or werewolf. On a win, a critical gives
the user information on the exact type of creature,
as well as their Hunger or Rage level. This power
can be used both actively and passively, warning
the user of aggressive intent in their immediate
vicinity.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Atavism
By subtly projecting their beast into a
mortal animal, the vampire may cause it to revert
to it’s most base and primal instincts. Loyal guard
dogs suddenly become ravenous, slathering curs
and prized thoroughbreds throw their riders as
they champ and buck in a mad panic.
■ WTC
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice pools: Composure + Animalism
■ System: The target must be able to sense(smell,
hear, or see) the user in question to use this power.
Roll Composure + Animalism vs. Difficulty 1-4,
depending on the type of animal, its training, and
whether or not it is a ghoul. A win against the
target allows the user to choose one of two primal
responses: Fight or Flight. If Fight is chosen, the
creature reacts in kind, lashing out at the closest
perceived threat or prey. If Flight, the creature
instead flies into a panic, trying to escape its
surroundings at any cost to their safety. Well-
trained and faithful animals tend to shake off this
reaction quickly, and so, clever users tend to time
their uses of this power in order to create
maximum effect.
■ Duration: A number of rounds equal to the test
margin plus one, or the entire Scene in the case of
a critical win.
Feral Whispers
The vampire can commune with the beasts
of the wild and the city. Feral Whispers allows
two-way communication with animals. A cat
might not be interested in debating Matisse’s use
of color but happily discusses the lack of prey
around the brownstone building across the street.
Depending on the vampire’s skill, they can even
persuade animals to perform services; like
humans, animals seldom agree to things that go
against their nature or endanger them. Vampires
can also use Feral Whispers to summon a chosen
type of animal (see Animalism limitations above)
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but the animals must be present to answer.
Nothing prevents a vampire trying to summon an
orca in Central Park, but success seems unlikely.
Summoned animals listen to the summoner, but
scatter or attack if endangered.
■ VTM
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Animalism,
Charisma + Animalism
■ Cost: One Rouse Check per type of animal
chosen for the scene. Allows one summoning and
unlimited communication. Free when used on
famulus.
■ System: Simple communication requires no dice
pool test. Persuading an animal to perform a
service requires a Manipulation + Animalism roll;
the Difficulty depends on the task required.
Having a bird keep an eye out for anyone entering
the park at night is Difficulty 3, while ordering
any animal to defend a place with their lives is
Difficulty 6.
Summoning animals uses a Charisma +
Animalism roll; Difficulty depends on the scarcity
of the animals summoned. The number of animals
summoned depend on the margin on the test; a
critical win summons most, if not all, animals of
the type in the area.
■ Duration: One Scene
Level 3
Animal Succulence
The vampire can slake additional Hunger
by feeding on animals. In addition, the vampire
can consume its famulus, gaining nourishment far
beyond what would be gained from an animal of
similar stature and absorbing a sliver of its
primary trait.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: Feeding from animals slakes 1
additional Hunger, and the vampire counts their
Blood Potency as two levels lower in regards to
penalties to slaking Hunger from animal blood.
Consuming one's famulus slakes 4 Hunger,
regardless of animal size. This act can never
remove the final Hunger die. In addition,
consuming one's famulus increases the vampire’s
Attribute most associated with that animal (as
determined by the Storyteller) by two dots.
Consuming a cat might raise Dexterity or
Composure; consuming a dog might raise
Charisma or Resolve. Storytellers may vary the
reward from famulus consumption: draining an
owl might raise the Attribute in any perception
pool by two dots, or in pools involving wise
decision making. The bonus lasts until the
vampire’s next feeding or until their Hunger
reaches 5.
■ Duration: Passive
Quell the Beast
By locking eyes with a target, the vampire
cows their inner Beast into temporary slumber.
Mortals affected thus become apathetic, unable to
take any actions other than to stay alive, while
vampires’ bestial urges temporarily abate, for
better or worse.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Animalism vs Stamina
+ Resolve
■ System: Roll Charisma + Animalism vs Stamina
+ Resolve. A win against a mortal target
incapacitates them for that scene, instilling severe
lethargy. They act only to preserve themselves,
not against the user or anyone else. A win against
a vampire prevents the target from performing
Blood Surges. While their Beast is quelled,
vampires do not score messy criticals. Against
vampires, this power lasts a turn plus a number of
turns equal to the win margin on the contest. A
critical win against a vampire target also ends their
frenzy.
■ Duration: One scene, or a number of turns equal
to the test margin plus one.
Scent of Prey
The mind-numbing fear of realizing one’s
role as prey is unique, and vampires versed in
sensing the Beast can learn to recognize it in those
who experience it. This power allows a vampire to
become aware of any mortal in an area projecting
4
the distinct note of fear produced by prey animals
having come face to face with their predator,
allowing them to quickly track and silence those
who would threaten their clandestine presence.
■ StBH
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: Resolve + Animalism
■ System: The vampire sniffs the air and rolls
Resolve + Animalism. Each success on the roll
allows them to sense and track the position of a
mortal who has witnessed what a Camarilla
Kindred would call a “Masquerade violation.”
(The user senses the closest mortal first if there are
more than one and order matters.) The effect lasts
for one scene, or one night on a critical win. The
power is ineffective on mortals who are familiar
enough with vampires to sublimate the note of
fear, such as ghouls, vampire retainers, or
dedicated hunters.
■ Duration: One scene or night
Unliving Hive
■ Amalgam: Obfuscate 2
Most often seen amongst the Nosferatu,
this unnerving power allows the user to extend
their animal influence to swarms of insects such as
flies or roaches. Certain vampires even go so far
as to adopt swarms as famuli, giving them a
permanent home within the folds and orifices of
their malformed flesh.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: This power extends all powers
previously restricted to vertebrates to insect
swarms, treating a swarm as a single creature. The
vampire can bind the swarm as a famulus, and
some even give it the ability to nest inside the
cavities of their body. This hides the swarm from
sight while allowing it to nurse the minute
amounts of Blood needed to sustain it indefinitely.
While nested, the swarm is undetectable by
anything less than X-rays.
Swarms do little damage in combat. They
have Health 5 and a pool of 8 dice to resist
attacks. Swarms take Superficial damage from
Brawl; flame and insecticide cause Aggravated
damage. Vampires can use swarms for spying, as
distractions (resulting in a two-dice penalty on any
roll for a single swarmed individual), or to
intimidate mortals (add between one and three
dice to Intimidation pools, depending on the type
of insect and the victim’s phobias). Players and
Storytellers can doubtlessly come up with even
more creative uses of this power.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 4
Subsume the Spirit
The vampire can completely transfer its
mind into the body of an animal. They can control
the animal and use its senses freely, even during
the day should they manage to stay awake. While
doing this, the vampire’s body lies immobile as if
in torpor.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check. Free if used on
famulus.
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Animalism
■ System: Make a Manipulation + Animalism test;
Difficulty 4. On a win, the vampire can inhabit the
animal’s body for one scene. On a critical win, the
vampire can inhabit the animal indefinitely.
Extending this possession into the
daylight hours requires the vampire to stay awake
(VTM p. 219); seeing the sun requires a test for
fear frenzy though the sunlight does not damage
the animal being ridden. The user remains
oblivious to their original body, but harm to it
pulls them out of the trance and releases the
animal. Death of the possessed animal also ends
the trance, and the vampire takes a point of
Aggravated Willpower damage from the shock.
■ Duration: A scene / indefinitely (see above)
Level 5
Animal Dominion
The power the vampire holds over beasts
is now great enough to command flocks and packs
as if they were extensions of their own body. At a
gesture, animals lay down their lives by the
dozens, even hundreds, to appease their master.
5
■ VTM
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Animalism
■ System: Chose a type of animal and make a
Charisma + Animalism roll with a Difficulty
depending on the nature of the animals and the
order given. Getting a flock of crows to disperse
and look for a specific individual (given some
means of identifying their target) is relatively easy
(Difficulty 3), but getting a pack of dogs to give
their lives in a suicidal attack on another vampire
is more of a challenge (Difficulty 5). The power
does not allow the user to summon animals, but
compels those already present to obey. The
vampire can command the animals to return after
completing their task, if they have means to do so.
■ Duration: A single scene or until the directive is
fulfilled, whichever is shortest.
Drawing out the Beast
The vampire can project their Beast at the
moment of terror or fury frenzy, transferring it
into a nearby subject, either mortal or vampire.
That person immediately experiences the frenzy
instead, going on a merciless rampage or fleeing
in terror depending on the trigger.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Animalism vs Composure +
Resolve
■ System: Instead of the Willpower roll to resist a
terror or fury frenzy, roll Wits + Animalism vs
Composure + Resolve of the target. If the user
fails, they enter frenzy as though they had failed
the Willpower roll. On a win, the target
experiences that frenzy instead of the user. Later
stimuli can still provoke frenzy in the user, but
they can use this power as long as they can make
Rouse Checks and further targets remain
available.
This power cannot transfer a hunger
frenzy.
■ Duration: Frenzy duration (VTM p. 220)
Auspex
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Nicknames: Voyeurism, Scrying, Anima Visus
Among the greatest gifts and worst curses
afflicting vampires, the Discipline of Auspex
allows Kindred to discern truth from lies, probe
the minds of those around them, and perceive
reality on a different level than other beings. What
appears to be the ultimate power in foresight and
vision grants its wielders perhaps too much
knowledge. They may detect an assassin’s blade
before it strikes or get into an enemy’s head to
turn them around, but they can also sense every
shift in emotion, good and bad, see things they
wish they had not, and discern futures they may
not wish to explore. Users of Auspex invite
paranoia, but using it is addictive. Once you know
the truth rests within your grasp, you seek it out at
every opportunity.
Kindred use Auspex in many ways. Some
vampires act as spies for their courts or factions.
Others act on their own, blackmailing mortals and
immortals with secrets gleaned from quiet
conversations, subtle emotional shifts, and
telepathic intrusion. Auspex allows its user to play
the role of domain detective, studying the scene of
a vampire’s destruction for tell-tale spiritual clues
or interrogating suspects with unnatural accuracy.
Characteristics
Storytellers may wish to make Auspex
rolls for characters in order to more convincingly
provide wrong or incomplete answers after failed
rolls.
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade threat: Low. Auspex never by itself
manifests in a way visible to the naked eye or
causes effects that can’t be rationalized, if only as
dumb luck.
■ Blood Resonance: Phlegmatic. Artists
(especially photographers) and visionaries, certain
schizophrenics, users of psychoactive substances,
detectives.
6
Level 1
Heightened Senses
The vampire’s senses sharpen to a
preternatural degree, giving them the ability to see
in pitch darkness, hear ultrasonic frequencies and
smell the fear of cowering prey.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free (but see below)
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Resolve
■ System: The user adds their Auspex rating to all
perception rolls. If exposed to extreme sensations,
such as loud bangs, flashes of intense light or
overpowering smells while the power is active the
user must succeed on a Wits + Resolve (Difficulty
3 or more) roll to dampen their senses in time, or
the overload causes them to sustain a -3 dice
penalty to all perception-based rolls for the rest of
the scene.
■ Duration: Until deactivated. Having the power
active for longer stretches of time without rest
(more than a scene), especially so for high-
stimulus environments, might necessitate spending
Willpower, at the Storyteller’s discretion.
Sense the Unseen
The senses of the vampire become attuned
to dimensions beyond the mundane, allowing
them to sense presences otherwise hidden from the
naked eye. This can be anything from another
vampire using Obfuscate to someone using
Auspex to spy upon the character to a ghost in the
middle of the room. Dormant Blood Sorcery spells
and rituals might also be found with this power, at
the Storyteller’s discretion.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Auspex or Resolve +
Auspex
■ System: Whenever there’s something
supernatural hiding in plain sight, the Storyteller
makes a hidden roll of Wits + Auspex against a
Difficulty they choose. Against an entity actively
trying to stay hidden, the Storyteller can call for a
blind roll (“Lisa, roll seven dice for me”) as a
contest against the target’s relevant pool. (For
example, detecting a vampire using Obfuscate
would be a roll of Wits + Auspex vs Wits +
Obfuscate). If the vampire actively searches for a
hidden supernatural entity, they roll Resolve +
Auspex similarly.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Obeah
■ Amalgam: Fortitude 1
The vampire soothes the mental or
emotional turmoil of their subject, restoring to
them a modicum of steadfastness. It is especially
effective when used on mortals, either to help
them through momentary agitation, or to calm
them before feeding on them.
■ VTMC
■ Cost: One Rouse Check and additional
Willpower depending on circumstances
■ Dice Pool: Composure + Auspex
■ System: The vampire rolls Composure +
Auspex against Difficulty 2 and restores a number
of superficial Willpower damage levels equal to
the margin on the roll. Alternatively, the user
restores one aggravated Willpower damage level
for every three successes in the margin. If
successfully used on a mortal, Obeah similarly
calms them if they’re in a turbulent emotional
state, or puts them otherwise at ease. Use of this
power takes a whole turn. If the vampire spends an
entire scene instead, reduce the Difficulty to 0.
Obeah must be used on someone other than the
vampire invoking the power. A subject can be
affected by the power only once per night. If the
user soothes more than one subject per night, the
user suffers superficial Willpower damage equal
to half the number of successes in the margin for
every additional subject, as they take on the
burden of so many charges.
■ Duration: N/A
Premonition
The vampire experiences flashes of
insight. These may take the form of raised hackles,
sudden inspiration or even vivid visions. While
7
never too precise, these visions can nudge the
vampire out of harm’s way or reveal a truth
previously overlooked.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free or one Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Auspex
■ System: Whenever the Storyteller deems it
appropriate, this power gives the character a
sudden hint that aids them in some way: letting
them find a clue they’ve missed or saving them
from danger. Whether it gives the character a
sudden vision of themselves walking into a trap,
an inviting red glow over the second right turn
during a chase, or the brief flash of a skeleton
beneath the floorboards in the Prince’s office, this
power always gives the Storyteller license to
subtly speed up play or move the story onto a
desired track. The suggested limit is one
premonition per scene, even if more than one
character has Premonition.
■ The user can also actively provoke a
premonition by focusing on a subject, making a
Rouse Check and rolling Resolve + Auspex. The
number of successes rolled determines the level of
insight on the subject, if any.
■ Duration: Passive
Unerring Pursuit
■ Amalgam: Dominate 1
Locking eyes with a subject, the vampire
coaxes forth a supernatural bond between
themselves and the victim. For a number of nights,
the user is able to view glimpses of the target and
their environment whenever the target sees
themselves on a reflective surface. The target is
generally unaware of the being so observed, but
witnesses the presence of their pursuer as someone
standing just behind them in their own reflection.
While not exclusive to the Sabbat, this power is
frequently used to track quarry, whether vampires
marked as prey or mortal witnesses requiring
silencing.
■ StBH
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: Resolve + Auspex
■ System: The user locks eyes with the target, if
only for a split second, and rolls Resolve +
Auspex. On a win, the effect lasts for one night,
plus one for each success in the margin. (If used
against a vampire, the Difficulty of the roll is 3.)
While the power is active the user can
concentrate for a turn to gain a view of the last
position of the target from the perspective of the
target’s own reflection. Essentially, they view a
mental impression of the most recent moment the
victim saw themselves, intentionally or
unintentionally, in a mirror or mirror-like surface
(including polished chrome, shopping windows, or
even someone’s sunglasses). Note that Obfuscate
provides no protection from this power, as it relies
on the victim’s Self-perception.
The user can recognize the surroundings
of the target with an Intelligence + Streetwise (for
urban areas) or Intelligence + Survival (for rural
areas), the Difficulty depending on circumstances,
such as being indoors, but should range from 2 to
4. The target can get a glimpse of their pursuer in
their own reflection on a Wits + Awareness test at
Difficulty 4, and only on a critical win will
recognize their face, or recall it from where the
individual saw them if they don’t know them
personally.
■ Duration: One night plus one for each success
(or in the margin, in the case of a vampire target)
Level 3
Scry the Soul
By focusing on a person, the vampire can
perceive the state of that person’s psyche as a
shifting aura of colors. Auras reveal little precise
information, but do provide clues regarding many
subjects, e.g., emotional state, Resonance, and
supernatural traits. If looking for a specific
condition, the vampire can cursorily scan the
crowd to detect it. Such cursory scans provide no
further information.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Auspex vs
Composure + Subterfuge
8
■ System: Make an Intelligence + Auspex vs
Composure + Subterfuge roll. On a win, the
Storyteller truthfully answers a number of
questions equal to the margin of the roll about the
target’s aura and psyche, including:
◻ The emotional state of the subject
◻ The Resonance in the subject’s blood
◻ Whether the subject is a vampire, werewolf,
ghoul or any other supernatural being
◻ Whether the subject is under the influence of
Blood Sorcery or other magic
◻ Whether the subject has committed diablerie
in the last year
◻ A critical win allows discovery of something
unexpected, as determined by the Storyteller
If scanning a crowd, roll versus a
Difficulty determined by the size of the crowd and
external distractions, as well as the type of trait
being sought. (Finding the vampire in the living
room might only be a Difficulty 3, while finding
the most nervous person at a crowded rave is most
likely Difficulty 6 or higher.)
■ Duration: One turn, or Storyteller’s discretion
Share the Senses
By reaching out with their mind, the
vampire can tap into the senses of another mortal
or vampire, seeing, hearing, and feeling what they
do. The user still retains their own perceptions and
is still aware of their own surroundings, though
the effect requires some getting used to. The user
decides whether to tap into only one, some, or all
of the target’s senses. When used on a stranger
this power requires line of sight to initiate.
However, it can be used over longer distances on
someone who still has some of the user’s Blood in
their body.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Auspex
■ System: Roll Resolve + Auspex at Difficulty 3.
This Difficulty can go up depending on
distraction, distance, and other factors, such as the
amount of the user’s Blood that remains in the
target. The target usually remains unaware of the
intrusion, but Sense the Unseen can allow the
passenger to be noticed. To get rid of an unwanted
rider, the victim must beat the intruder at a Wits +
Resolve vs Wits + Resolve roll. An Auspex user
thrown out this way cannot make another Sharing
attempt until the next night.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 4
Spirit’s Touch
By touching an inanimate object or the
ground at a location, the vampire can sense the
emotional residue left by those who have handled
that object or visited the location in the past. The
user gains insight into not only that person, but
also what was done and under what circumstances.
While rarely crystal clear, the information often
provides leads impossible to gain from regular
forensics and deduction.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Auspex
■ System: Make an Intelligence + Auspex roll
versus a Difficulty depending on the information
sought. Gleaning the emotional state of the user of
a murder weapon used a few days before is
Difficulty 3, but sensing the surroundings in which
a 300-year old letter was written approaches
Difficulty 6 or higher. Each point of margin on the
roll allows the user to sense roughly one additional
previous handler and set of circumstances,
counting backwards from the most recent.
■ Duration: One turn
Level 5
Clairvoyance
By closing their eyes and entering a light
trance, the vampire becomes master of its
surroundings. In a few minutes it can gather
information from roughly a city-block sized area
(more if outdoors or less populated) that would
normally take many hours, perhaps days of
legwork and investigation. Once connected in
such a way to their surroundings the vampire can
also receive information on anything happening
out of the ordinary in the area.
9
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Auspex
■ System: Roll Intelligence + Auspex against a
Difficulty based on the security and level of
activity of the area. Using Clairvoyance on one’s
own mansion would be Difficulty 3 while an
unfamiliar city block in the slums of a major city
would amount to 7 or more. The user adds their
base Haven rating in extra dice to the pool when
using Clairvoyance on their own haven.
The Storyteller answers the vampire’s
questions about the comings and goings in the
area, what people have seen and heard, topics of
local gossip, recent major shocks or impressions,
and so forth. The player can ask roughly one
question per point of margin; answers about
deliberately concealed information might consume
more than one point. A critical win reveals
something major, regardless of the questions
asked, assuming there is something to reveal.
The vampire can also clairvoyantly
monitor events in progress, though this requires
them to remain in the area for as long as the effect
is active.
■ Duration: A few minutes for information
gathering, up to a night for vigilance.
Possession
■ Amalgam: Dominate 3
With this power the vampire can strip the
will of a mortal and completely possess their
body, using it as their own. While the mind of the
subject remains hidden to the vampire, they can do
anything and go anywhere the subject could while
the power remains active. Using this, a vampire
can even experience the sunlight, food, and
physical sexuality long denied them, their host
paying the price for whatever abuse the vampire
wreaks on their body while riding it.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Auspex vs Resolve +
Intelligence
■ System: This power can only be used on
mortals. If the mortal is a ghoul, they must first be
Blood Bound to the user. Before possession can
begin, the vampire must have eye contact with
their victim (See Dominate, VTM p. 254). The
user then engages in a Resolve + Auspex vs
Resolve + Intelligence conflict with the victim in
order to inhabit their body. If the vampire’s player
rolls a total failure, the victim becomes immune to
further Possession attempts for the duration of the
story.
Once the vampire inhabits the body of
their victim, their own body falls into a torpor-like
trance, completely unaware of their surrounding
and their own physical state except for Aggravated
damage, which breaks the trance and ends the
effects. A vampire possessing a mortal can use
Auspex, Presence, and Dominate through them. If
the user wishes to extend Possession into daytime,
they must make a roll to stay awake (VTM p.
219). Failure to stay awake ends the power. Any
Aggravated damage to the subject also risks
ending the possession – the user must succeed at a
Resolve + Auspex roll (Difficulty 2 + damage
taken) to stay in control. If the subject dies during
Possession, the resulting spiritual trauma
immediately causes the user to sustain three levels
of Aggravated damage to Willpower.
This power does not give the user the
ability to read the mind, use the skills, or emulate
the manners of the victim. Any skills employed
use the possessing vampire’s rating. The user must
make a Manipulation + Performance vs Wits +
Insight roll to successfully impersonate the
victim’s manners, expressions, and the like.
Finally, Possession violates the victim
even more profoundly than a Blood Bond. The
Storyteller should consider awarding Stains for
this action.
■ Duration: Until ended, voluntarily or
involuntarily.
Telepathy
At the highest levels of Auspex the
vampire can now literally read minds, as well as
project their own thoughts into the minds of
others. While reading a mortal mind is relatively
10
straightforward, undead minds requires a higher
effort to Penetrate.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check (plus one Willpower vs
non-consenting vampires)
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Auspex vs Wits +
Subterfuge
■ System: The user is not required to roll any dice
to project their thoughts to another, vampire or
mortal, though they do require line of sight. To
read the mind of a mortal within line of sight, roll
Resolve + Auspex vs Wits + Subterfuge while
looking into their eyes. (Unless the mortal
consents, in which case no roll is required.) A win
means that the user can discern surface thoughts
as a stream of images, with higher margin
allowing the user to probe for more distant or
buried memories. A critical win gives a coherent
picture of the subject’s current thoughts and
intentions. To read the mind of a non-consenting
vampire, spend one Willpower point before
rolling.
■ Duration: Roughly one minute per Rouse
Check. Increased to a full scene on consenting
subjects.
Unburdening the Bestial Soul
■ Amalgam: Dominate 3
■ Prerequisite: Obeah
As seekers of the promises of Golconda,
some vampires explore ways to remedy the
turbulent souls of their fellow Damned. This
power shares some amount of the vampire’s moral
serenity with a repentant Kindred, allowing some
semblance of remorse to be restored while also
keeping the Beast at bay. It does require the user
to take on part of the mind and spirit of their
subject, shackling their will to that of the user.
(Most often seen among the Salubri, this power
has no doubt contributed to their reputation as
monstrous soul-thieves...)
■ VTMC
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks, gain one Stain
■ Dice Pool: Composure + Auspex vs. Humanity
■ System: The vampire spends a scene in
seclusion with the subject and rolls Composure +
Auspex vs. the Humanity of the subject. For every
success in the margin, they can remove one Stain
from the subject, or erect a psychological “shield”
that will protect the subject from future Stains on a
one-forone basis. For example, a margin of three
applied to a subject with no Stains would
effectively “cancel out” up to three Stains
acquired later in the session. On a critical win the
user can choose to forgo the above benefits,
instead restoring a single point of Humanity to the
subject, but no vampire can gain that benefit more
than once, ever. Unburdening the Bestial Soul
works only on vampires, and only on subjects
whose Humanity is lower than that of the user. No
matter the benefits received, for the rest of the
session the subject is numbed, having part of their
mind merged with the user, and any Dominate
powers used on them by this power’s user succeed
automatically with no eye contact necessary.
When the power expires, all psychological
“shields” not used up are lost, though Stains
removed or Humanity gained on initial application
do not revert.
■ Duration: One session
Celerity
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Bolting, Slipping, Velocitas
The ability to strike fast, dodge blows, and
escape pursuers allows Kindred to become
extremely effective predators. Celerity enables
vampires to move faster than any natural creature,
though it does more than grant a supernatural
speed, with vampires employing it actually
appearing to think almost as fast as they act. While
some vampires use to slice and stab at enemies
without fear of riposte, others simply use it to get
from A to B faster than any other person on foot.
Characteristics
■ Type: Physical
■ Masquerade Threat: Medium-High. Most
Celerity powers are clearly inhuman, the only
11
saving grace being that they’re very hard to catch
on film or photograph.
■ Blood Resonance: Choleric. Fear and utter
terror, runners, athletes, amphetamine and alkaloid
users, habitual players of first-person shooters and
other twitch games.
Level 1
Cat’s Grace
The vampire gains a balance and grace
equal to and surpassing world-class trapeze artists.
They can walk and even run across ledges and
wires effortlessly and can keep their balance on
the slimmest of supports.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The user automatically passes any
Dexterity- or Athletics-based roll needed to keep
their balance. Note that this power does not allow
them to balance on support that cannot take their
weight.
■ Duration: Passive
Rapid Reflexes
While their bodies still can’t defy the laws
of nature, vampires with this power perceive
events instantly and can react to them with
superhuman alacrity. They can observe incoming
projectiles to the extent that they can attempt to
dodge arrows and even bullets without available
cover.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: With this power, vampires suffer no
penalty to their defense pools for lack of cover
against Firearms attacks. They can also take a
minor action (see VTM p. 298) worth up to two
dice per turn, such as readying or reloading a
weapon, for free.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Fleetness
Their mastery of Celerity now allows the
vampire to move and react with dizzying speed.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Add the Celerity rating to user's dice
pool for non-combat Dexterity tests. Once per turn
the user may also do this when defending with
Dexterity + Athletics.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 3
Blink
The vampire swiftly closes in on a foe,
engaging or escaping in the blink of an eye. To an
unprepared observer the user almost appears to
teleport, a rush of wind the only sign of their
passing.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Dexterity + Athletics, or as needed
■ System: The vampire moves in a straight line
toward a target, covering any distance under 50
meters while still having enough time to perform
an action, such as an attack, during the turn. If the
terrain is in any way hazardous, the character
needs to make a Dexterity + Athletics roll to avoid
stumbling and coming to a halt on the way. The
Storyteller may call for other contests as desired,
especially if the vampire races a distant foe to an
object or an action. Vampires engaging a foe with
this power act as if already engaged when the turn
begins.
EXAMPLE:
Seo-Hee has Blink, facing an FBI agent 40 meters
across hazardous terrain with his Glock 17 out.
She wants to get inside the shooter’s arc before he
can fire. She rolls Dexterity + Athletics vs. the G-
man’s Dexterity + Firearms. On a win, she can
make a Brawl or Melee attack before the Fed can
fire. If the agent wins, he can get a shot off at the
vampire first, and then she can make a Brawl or
Melee attack.
■ Duration: One turn
12

Traversal
With blurring speed the vampire can run
or climb along any surface, including vertical and
even liquid mediums. While Traversal does not
grant insect-like supernatural traction, running up
or along walls present little problem. Walking on
water remains impossible, but the vampire can run
on water for a limited distance given a run-up.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Dexterity + Athletics
■ System: Make a Dexterity + Athletics roll with a
Difficulty of 3 (inclined surface with traction) to 6
(slick vertical surface, open water), depending on
the surface and angle. Each point of margin gets
the vampire further up or out; a margin of 0 gets to
a close target, a margin of 1 to one farther than
that, and so forth. The Storyteller should inform
the player beforehand if a target is too distant to
even attempt Traversal; as a rule of thumb,
anything over water farther than 60 meters (or
more than 30 stories up a building) probably
exceeds this power’s range.
■ Duration: One turn
Level 4
Draught of Elegance
The Blood of the vampire becomes
saturated with the power of Celerity, conveying a
part of that power to anyone who drinks of it.
While this is also a first step towards a Blood
Bond, already bound thralls or servants have little
use for such worries, and even non-bound allies
might decide to brave a sip for the sake of
temporary power.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Drinking a Rouse Checks worth of
Blood directly from the user gifts the drinker with
temporary Celerity equal to half the Celerity dots
(rounded down) of the donor. The drinker gains
the same non-Amalgam powers as the donor’s, up
to that level.
■ Duration: One night; for vampires, until the next
feeding or the vampire reaches Hunger 5
Unerring Aim
■ Amalgam:Auspex 2
The world around them slowing to a
crawl, the vampire can aim and throw or fire any
weapon at a target as if the target were stationary.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Use before making a ranged attack. The
target makes no roll to dodge or defend; make the
attack at Difficulty 1. An opponent possessing
Celerity 5 can nullify this power by making their
own Rouse Check, defending at the same speed.
■ Duration: A single attack
Level 5
Lightning Strike
Faster than the eye can follow, the
vampire can strike with fist or melee weapon at
such speed that the opponent is unable to defend
or take evasive action.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Use before making a Brawl or Melee
attack. The opponent makes no roll to dodge or
defend; make the attack at Difficulty 1. An
opponent possessing Celerity 5 can nullify this
power by making their own Rouse Check,
defending at the same speed.
■ Duration: A single attack
Split Second
The speed at which the vampire moves
catches up with their supercharged perception,
allowing them to react to events around them at a
moment’s notice. Ambushers find their prey
already standing behind them, and favors asked
are completed before the words leave the
supplicants mouth.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: The player can supersede the
Storyteller’s narration of events, within reason.
13
They can choose to have their character move
through a door before it closes, circumvent an
ambush after it has been triggered, roll out of the
way of an explosion, and so forth. The action
taken must be reasonable and should not take
more than a few seconds in real time. The
Storyteller decides what Skills, if any, need to be
checked to successfully accomplish an action
begun using this power.
■ Duration: Roughly one action, as determined by
the Storyteller.
Dominate
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Snake Charming, Mesmerism,
Mentis Imperium
Dominate grants the vampire the ability to
control the actions of others, manipulate their
memories, and force living creatures into acts they
would not perform of their own volition. At its
most basic, Dominate enables a vampire to make a
victim forget the feed they just endured or
enjoyed. At its most dangerous, it allows Kindred
to enslave entire crowds of kine. This is the Beast
at its most cruel and controlling.
Dominate acts as a bludgeon to enforce
the Masquerade, create submissive servants, and
reinforce the self-assuredness of the vampire.
When using this Discipline, Kindred feel
omnipotent, although the wisest of them know that
this too may be shackles of a kind, slipped upon
them by the Blood.
Characteristics
Most Dominate powers require eye
contact with the victim. Once they establish
contact, Dominate holds the gaze of the victim
until the user conveys their command or
commands, barring interference. Catching the eyes
of someone actively attempting to avoid the
vampire’s gaze requires a contest of the user’s
Resolve + Intimidation vs the target’s Wits +
Awareness. It is of course impossible to catch the
eyes of someone squeezing their eyes shut or
wearing a blindfold, but that person should be
easy prey to other tactics.
Using Dominate in combat or in other
frantic situations is limited to people attacking or
otherwise interacting with the user directly, as
everyone else’s attention is firmly focused on their
own peril.
Unless the user has supernatural means
such as Telepathy (Auspex 5) at their disposal,
they must command the victim verbally. The
victim must be able to hear the user and
understand their language.
Without Terminal Decree (Dominate 5),
commands resulting in obvious death or serious
injury fail automatically. Subjects roll to resist
commands resulting in other social or physical
harm, such as undressing in public. (See
individual powers for details.) Vampires cannot
use Dominate to extract information, as the victim
becomes a mindless puppet while under its
influence. For example, the Compel command
“Speak” results in blabbering word salad, while
someone Mesmerized to “tell what you know
about the assassin” responds “what you know
about the assassin.” Dominate cannot make
subjects do something they could not do on
command, such as “Sleep.” Ultimately, the
Storyteller determines what the Discipline can
accomplish, but they should take care that
Dominate remains one Discipline of many, rather
than the catch-all solution to every problem.
Dominate cuts to the core of vampiric
mastery and predation. Thus, vampires must resist
attempts to Dominate them. A vampire of lower
(stronger) generation can resist Dominate attempts
from higher generation vampires by spending a
Willpower point, negating the effect completely.
On a total failure on the roll of any
Dominate power, that vampire can no longer
Dominate that target for the rest of the story.
Dominate threatens Humanity, especially
if the vampire has any Principles involving
personal freedom or forbidding violations of
14
human integrity. Using it may incur Stains
(VTMp. 239).
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade Threat: Low. Barring someone
Dominating an entire auditorium to jump off the
cliffs of Dover, it remains one of the more subtle
vampiric powers.
■ Blood Resonance: Phlegmatic. The blood of the
submissive or the dominant, masters and slaves,
captains of industry, power trippers, cult leaders
and followers.
Level 1
Cloud Memory
By uttering the phrase “Forget!” the user
can make the Dominated victim forget the current
moment as well as the last few minutes, enough to
mask a superficial feeding or a chance meeting.
No new memories are formed and if pressed the
victim realizes they have a few minutes missing.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Dominate vs Wits +
Resolve
■ System: No roll is required against an
unprepared mortal victim. Clouding the memory
of a resisting victim or another vampire requires a
Charisma + Dominate vs Wits + Resolve roll.
■ Duration: Indefinitely
Compel
With eye contact, the vampire can issue
the victim a single-action command, no longer
than a short sentence, to be obeyed to the letter. It
must be possible to complete the command in a
single turn. The Storyteller decides whether to
interpret ambiguous commands in an unexpected
or unfavorable way; alternatively, the command
simply confuses the victim and fails.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Dominate vs
Intelligence + Resolve
■ System: No roll is required against an
unprepared mortal victim. Commanding a
resisting victim, a victim the vampire has
previously Dominated in the same scene, or
another vampire requires a contest of Charisma +
Dominate vs Intelligence + Resolve. Commands
that go against the victim’s nature also require
such a contest.
■ Duration: No more than a single scene
Level 2
Mesmerize
The vampire can issue complex
commands to a victim, as long as they have the
subject’s gaze and relative quiet in which to issue
instructions. The instructions must be carried out
immediately to the victim’s best ability, and must
not contain any conditional actions (“...if you see
Henry, give him the document”), as this would
require the victim to exercise cognition.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Dominate vs
Intelligence + Resolve
■ System: No roll is required against an
unprepared mortal victim. Commanding a
resisting victim or another vampire requires a
contest of Manipulation + Dominate vs
Intelligence + Resolve. Commands that go against
the victim’s nature also require such a contest.
■ Duration: Until the command is carried out or
the scene ends, whichever comes first.
Dementation
■ Amalgam: Obfuscate 2
This subtle power requires nothing more
than casual conversation, as the vampire’s
insidious influence hides between the lines and
inflections employed. The victim finds themselves
increasingly agitated as their inner demons bubble
to the surface, eventually drowning out all rhyme
and reason.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check per scene
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Dominate vs
Composure + Intelligence
15
■ System: After engaging in conversation with a
victim, the user can activate this power. For the
duration of the scene, the user may attack a single
individual each turn in a Manipulation + Dominate
vs Composure + Intelligence conflict, causing
Superficial damage to Willpower. A mortal who
becomes Impaired by this power experiences a
nervous breakdown or psychotic break, the shape
and nature of which depends on their personality
(and perhaps their blood Resonance). A vampire
that becomes Impaired by this power must
immediately succumb to a Compulsion, as chosen
by the power’s user.
If the user wants to affect multiple
victims, they need to make a separate Rouse
Check for each one.
■ Duration: One Scene.
Domitor’s Favor
Kindred are creatures of cruel irony, and
the name of this Discipline power is one such
example. While conditioned with the Domitor’s
Favor, a thrall with a Blood Bond to that vampire
finds it much more difficult to act against their
master. Domineering Tzimisce are especially fond
of this power, using it to ensure the loyalty of their
servants.
■ VTMC
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Defiance rolls for willful thralls under
the effects of Domitor’s Favor are made at a three-
dice penalty and thralls may not spend Willpower
on them. Additionally, total failure on a defiance
roll means that the Blood Bond does not weaken
that month. See p. 233-244 of VTM for more
information on Blood Bonds and rolls made to
defy them.
■ Duration: One month
Slavish Devotion
■ Amalgam: Presence 1
Those already under the mental dominion
of the vampire find their minds strengthened
against interference from other Kindred.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: Any attempt to mentally coerce a
character already under the influence of the
vampire’s Dominate has its Difficulty increased
by two, or suffers a four-dice penalty in contests.
The Difficulty cannot rise above 7.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 3
The Forgetful Mind
The vampire can rewrite whole swathes of
the victim’s memories, as long as they can keep
the victim’s gaze and full, uninterrupted attention.
The vampire verbally describes the victim’s new
memories, which the victim then accepts as their
own. This power does not allow the user to
investigate the victim’s true memories; it more
resembles blindly painting over the old canvas.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Dominate vs
Intelligence + Resolve
■ System: The user rolls a contest of Manipulation
+ Dominate vs Intelligence + Resolve. Each point
of margin allows the user to add or remove an
additional memory. The victim recalls the edits
vaguely, foggy ideations that can fall apart under
close questioning. A critical win creates a flawless
imprint, as real as any true memory.
■ Duration: Indefinitely
Submerged Directive
When using Mesmerize, the vampire can
now implant a posthypnotic suggestion, allowing
the command to remain dormant until a specific
stimulus occurs. This trigger can be anything from
a specific date, to a person (“When you meet
Roland, tell him these words”), to hearing a
specific phrase. The Submerged Directive never
expires; people can conceivably walk around with
an order buried in their mind for years. The user
can only embed one suggestion per victim.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: As Mesmerize, though the Storyteller
might want to make any rolls in secret. There’s no
16
way of knowing if the submerged suggestion
works until the conditions are met.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 4
Ancestral Dominion
■ Amalgam: Blood Sorcery 3
Vampires of great age and potency find it
possible to exert their will via the Blood, without
the traditional need for eye contact and verbal
communication with their target. This power
enables a Kindred to compel a descendant to take
an action on their behalf, even if it’s one the target
would normally be opposed to. Vampires
instinctively know an ancestor is manipulating
them, when subject to this power.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Dominate vs.
Intelligence + Resolve
■ System: On a successful roll of Manipulation +
Dominate, the victim acts to fulfill the dominating
vampire’s request, providing it doesn’t entail
harming themself. For every generation beyond
the first one separating the user of this power from
their target, the resisting vampire gains an
additional die to their roll. For example, when a
Fifth Generation vampire attempts to use this
power on a Seventh Generation descendant, the
Seventh Generation descendant gains one die in
defense. An Eighth Generation descendant would
gain two dice. If the number of dice in the
resisting vampire’s pool would exceed ten, the
power automatically fails. On a total failure, the
vampire cannot use this power on that target for
the remainder of the chapter.
■ Duration: Whichever comes sooner: until the
compelled action is taken or the scene ends.
Rationalize
The vampire’s victims now believe that
anything they do under the influence of Dominate
was a result of their own free will, and defend
their actions, however absurd. Long-term
exposure to this power can lead to severe mental
trauma in the victim.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: If pressed on their belief, the victim can
make a Wits+Awareness test (Difficulty 5). A win
makes them question their own statement, and
possibly their sanity.
■ Duration: Indefinitely
Tabula Rasa
Less memory manipulation than
eradication, this callous power does away with
subtlety and wipes every trace of memory from a
victim, leaving them a pliant effigy of themselves.
While they retain most of their learned skills, they
forget everything else – their experiences, friends,
family, wants and wishes – in most cases, forever.
Use of this power outside the Sabbat is rare, as
even the most ruthless of the undead find it
excessive. The Black Hand isn’t above taking this
shortcut to ensure that a captive servant is made
ready for conditioning or that a promising childe is
remade to their tastes.
■ StBH
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pool: Resolve + Dominate vs. Composure
+ Resolve
■ System: The user Rouses their Blood, holds the
gaze of their victim, and must then engage in an
extended conflict of Resolve + Dominate versus
the victim’s Composure + Resolve, accumulating
ten successes during an entire scene. The process
must not be disturbed, and the victim must be
restrained or otherwise submit during the act, as
any break in concentration requires the conflict to
be restarted (and another two Rouse Checks), as
does a critical win on the part of the victim.
Once the process is complete, the victim is
left a confused, slack-jawed shell. They lose
memories of their name, history, and most of their
old personality. They lose Convictions,
Touchstones, and Ambition, and most of their
Backgrounds become moot, as they forget how to
access them. (These, together with other
Advantages, are left to the Storyteller’s discretion
17
– a Contact may remember them if they cross
paths again, for example.) Attributes, Skills, and
Disciplines remain, however. The memory loss is
permanent, though on occasion a victim has
regained some of their past when faced with a
traumatic event involving a past Touchstone. (Test
Resolve + Composure at Difficulty 5, for example
when a former Touchstone is threatened, hurt, or
killed while in their presence, at the Storyteller’s
discretion.)
A wiped victim is usually fed whatever
lies are needed to keep them loyal, or quickly
subjected to Path indoctrination. Use of this power
is exceedingly cruel, and should merit Stains in
most chronicles.
■ Duration: Permanent
Level 5
Mass Manipulation
The vampire can now command entire
gatherings of mortals, and in some cases even
groups of vampires. The vampire can use this
power both to issue instructions and to manipulate
memories.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check in addition to the cost
of the power amplified
■ System: The vampire can amplify any of their
other powers to affect a group of people, mortal or
vampire, at once. All of the victims need to see the
eyes of the user. The user makes any needed roll
against the strongest opponent in the group.
■ Duration: As per power amplified
Terminal Decree
No longer hampered by the self
preservation instincts of their victims, the vampire
can now issue commands that directly lead to the
harm or death of the victim. Mortals can be made
to blow their brains out, jump from rooftops, or
swallow poison. Vampires can, with a bit of effort,
be made to walk into fire or sunlight.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional Hunger cost, but the
Humanity cost is potentially severe
■ System: Terminal commands now must be
resisted (see individual powers regarding rolls
involved), rather than failing
automatically.
■ Duration: Passive
Fortitude
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Bricking Up, Stone Flesh, Resistentia
Much prized by immortals, Fortitude
grants the ability to resist physical and mental
assault. Few vampires survive longer than a
century without at least a mote of Fortitude,
especially in a world where violence is common
and not even Kindred are safe. In these nights,
fewer vampires use Fortitude to resist the sun than
they do to withstand violent harm, fire, and
supernatural coercion.
Those possessing Fortitude exemplify the
stolid pillars of Kindred society, able to withstand
blows and charms without movement or sign of
dilapidation. Few vampires feel as secure in their
immortality
as do elder Blue Bloods and Ferals.
Characteristics
■ Type: Physical
■ Masquerade Threat: Medium. Eyewitnesses
undoubtedly react upon someone taking a terminal
beating or a hail of bullets and getting back up
seemingly unhurt. Favorite cover-up explanations
include erroneous recollection in the excitement
(the bullets only seemed to hit), special effects
(YouTube prank), or the tried and- tested “must
have been on PCP” rationale.
■ Blood Resonance: Melancholic. Survivors of
war, abuse, or misfortune; endurance runners;
mountain climbers; infantry and special forces;
those with very powerful immune systems.
Level 1
Resilience
18
 Endowed with supernatural endurance, the
user can strengthen their physical resolve.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The user adds their Fortitude rating to
their Health track.
■ Duration: Passive
Unswayable Mind
The user gains a mystical ability to resist
any attempts to sway them through mundane
charms, coercion, and wiles. Some exhibit
Unswayable Mind as zen-like calm, others as
supernatural stubbornness.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The user adds their dots in Fortitude as
extra dice in any roll made to resist coercion,
intimidation, seduction, or any other attempt to
sway the user’s mind against their will. This
power also works against supernatural abilities
such as Dominate and Presence.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Toughness
All vampires with this power exhibit an
innate ability to ignore damage that would
otherwise inconvenience and even disable others
of their kind. While this power alone gives no
protection against banes and other aggravated
damage, the protection it confers adds up in the
long run.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse check
■ System: Subtract the Fortitude of the defender
from all Superficial damage sustained. This occurs
before halving the damage, and cannot reduce the
damage below one.
■ Duration: One scene
Enduring Beasts
■ Amalgam: Animalism 1
The user shares a small portion of their
unnatural toughness with the animals they
influence. Teeming swarms and great beasts alike
exhibit a resistance to fleeting injuries almost
equal to the vampire themself.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free (for famulus); One Rouse Check (for
other animals)
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Animalism (for non-
famulus animals)
■ System: The vampire can choose to extend some
of their Fortitude powers to animals affected by
their Animalism. Any animal thus imbued gains
additional Health levels equal to the Fortitude dots
of the vampire. Using this power on their famulus
is free and automatic. To imbue other animals
besides their famulus, the user must make a Rouse
Check and roll a test of Stamina + Animalism
(Difficulty 3). The user can fortify one animal per
point of margin. When the effect ends, remove
unmarked Health first; this may result in the
animal expiring.
■ Duration: One Scene.
Obdurate
■ Amalgam: Potence 2
Though the discipline of Fortitude allows
kindred to resist damage from bullets, blades, and
even burning fire and sunlight. It does little,
however, to keep the forces of physics at bay and
an overwhelming blow can still stagger or knock
prone an unprepared vampire. By shoring up their
physical hardiness with vampiric Potence, the
Kindred may maintain a steady footing when
struck by a massive force.
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Survival
■ System: When activated, a vampire may use this
power to become a sturdy and strong immovable
object. Vampires falling from great heights find
themselves able to literally hit the ground running.
Vampires struck by moving vehicles don’t budge
an inch while the car crumbles like aluminum.
Users may consciously activate this ability in
advance or may instinctively activate it by making
a successful Stamina + Survival check at
Difficulty 3. Any superficial damage received
19
from falling or collisions is reduced by the user’s
Fortitude score before being halved.
■ Duration: One scene
Valeren
■ Amalgam: Auspex 1
The vampire projects their Fortitude
outwardly, willing the power of their Blood to
mend the injured body of another vampire.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check and additional Health
depending on circumstances
■ Dice Pool: Intelligence + Fortitude
■ System: The vampire rolls Intelligence +
Fortitude against Difficulty 2 and mends a number
of superficial Health damage levels equal to the
margin on the roll. Alternatively, the user mends
one aggravated Health damage level for every
three successes in the margin.
Use of this power takes a whole turn. If
the vampire spends an entire scene instead, reduce
the Difficulty to 0. Valeren must be used on
someone other than the vampire invoking the
power, and can be used only on vampires. A
subject can be affected by the power only once per
night. If the user mends more than one subject per
night, the user suffers superficial Health damage
equal to half the number of successes in the
margin for every additional subject, as they take
on the burden of so many charges.
■ Duration: N/A
Level 3
Defy Bane
By preparing themselves with an
expenditure of power, the vampire can make
themselves temporarily resistant to fire and
sunlight as well as other grievous wounds that
would threaten them with Final Death.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Survival (to activate
reflexively)
■ System: The user can convert a number of
Aggravated damage equal to their Fortitude rating
to Superficial damage when sustained. They may
not heal that Superficial damage for the rest of the
scene. This power converts a number of damage
per scene, not per wound or per attack.
EXAMPLE:
Salman has Fortitude 3. During the upcoming
brawl, he could for example convert 2 points of
Aggravated damage to Superficial, then convert 1
more point of Aggravated damage taken the next
turn before his power expires. The user can renew
this power once expired by making another Rouse
Check. If endangered unexpectedly, the user can
activate this power reflexively with a Wits +
Survival roll (Difficulty 3) upon receiving
Aggravated damage. If the user fails the test, the
power does not activate; if they win the test, they
must make a Rouse Check to pay for the power.
■ Duration: One scene or until expired, whichever
comes first
Fortify the Inner Facade
Instead of hardening the vampire’s
physical frame, this power allows the user to
protect their thoughts and emotions from
supernatural prying. Their mind appears
completely blank while their aura is, for lack of
better words, flat.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: Increases the Difficulty of using Scry
the Soul (Auspex 3), Telepathy (Auspex 5), and
similar powers on the user by half their Fortitude
rating (round up). If the rules allow the user to
resist these powers, they add their Fortitude rating
to their dice pool instead.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 4
Draught of Endurance
The Blood of the vampire becomes
saturated with the power of Fortitude, conveying a
20
part of that power to anyone who drinks of it. This
is the Fortitude equivalent of Draught of Elegance
(VTM p. 254).
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Drinking a Rouse Check's worth of
Blood directly from the user gifts the drinker with
temporary Fortitude equal to half the Fortitude
dots (rounded down) of the donor. The drinker
gains the same powers as the donor, up to that
level.
■ Duration: One night; for vampires, until the next
feeding or the vampire reaches Hunger 5
Shatter
■ Requirement: Toughness
When a fist hits concrete, it’s usually the
fist that breaks. So it is with this power, where a
vampire turns a blow against the one delivering it.
This power has been known to break weapons and
shatter bones.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Fortitude vs. Stamina (+
Fortitude, if the attacker is attacking unarmed and
possesses Fortitude)
■ System: Anyone who makes a successful Brawl
attack against the user suffers the damage which
Toughness subtracts (see Vampire: The
Masquerade p. 258) as Superficial Health damage.
Melee weapons also suffer reflected damage, and
break once they endure their damage modifier’s
worth (unless it is holy, magical, or otherwise
unbreakable). This power may only be used while
Toughness is active, and can be used in response
to an attack so long as the vampire has yet to use a
Discipline during the current turn.
■ Duration: One scene (or until hit)
Level 5
Flesh of Marble
The power of the Blood causes the skin of
the vampire to harden, taking on a marble-like
sheen that is still supple but stops almost any blow
before momentarily breaking and reforming. A
vampire using this power is almost impossible to
destroy outright, barring a lucky blow or physical
restraint.
■ TMR
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ System: With this power active, the vampire
ignores the first source of physical damage each
turn, including fire but not sunlight. If confusion
arises about which source is “first,” the Storyteller
either decides based on the narrative, or the
vampire ignores the most damaging single source
that turn. A critical win on an attack roll bypasses
this power.
■ Duration: One scene
Prowess from Pain
Injuries and impairments now only fuel
the powers of the vampire, who grows stronger
and faster from each blow, rend, or tear received.
Only utter destruction can stop one who calls upon
this Fortitude power.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Upon activating the power the vampire
no longer suffers any dice penalties from Health
damage sustained, such as physical Impairment.
Additionally, they can increase one Physical
Attribute by one dot (derived stats are unaffected)
for each level of damage on their Health track,
aggravated or superficial. The user’s Attributes
cannot exceed a value equal to their Blood Surge
+ 6 through this ability.
EXAMPLE:
Darin has Blood Potency 3, giving him a Blood
Surge of 2. He cannot increase his Physical
Attributes past 8 using Prowess from Pain.
■ Duration: One scene
Obfuscate
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21
Nicknames: Stealth Mode, Cloaking, Veiling,
Occulto
For any hunter, the ability to hide, move
without being seen, and employ camouflage
proves vital. For the Kindred practitioners of
Obfuscate, the Discipline provides the perfect
cover to get close to a victim, disguise themselves
as harmless, and escape when the heat grows too
much.
Obfuscate experts may utilize the
Discipline to lurk in the shadows while spying,
change appearance in a crowd while under
surveillance, or even spread the gift to a group of
vampires looking to
hide.
Characteristics
Obfuscate powers work through ambient,
low-level mesmerism. Observers see the vampire
but their minds choose to ignore it. Witnesses
unconsciously move out of the way if the user
blocks their path and rationalize their behavior if
pressed. Obfuscate affects all five senses unless
otherwise noted.
The Discipline does have limits: the
illusion fails if the observer cannot ignore the user
or if the user backs the observer into a corner. A
vampire blocking a doorway cannot maintain
Obfuscate against someone walking through it.
Likewise, violent action jeopardizes the façade, as
does actions like raised voices, failed pickpocket
attempts, and weapons raised to strike.
Whispering without breaking Obfuscate is still
possible.
Generally, the Discipline offers no
protection against machine surveillance. A human
staking out the vampire has a hard time pointing
the lens in the right direction, but automatic
cameras and other types of detectors can catch
them.
A vampire with Sense the Unseen
(Auspex 1) can detect Obfuscated characters by
rolling Wits or Resolve + Auspex vs Wits +
Obfuscate. Anyone can detect an Obfuscated
vampire who draws attention to themselves; such
observers detect such accidental revelations with a
contest of Wits + Awareness (or Resolve +
Awareness for an active searcher) vs
Wits + Stealth. This also applies to surprise
attacks from Obfuscate – a victim always has a
chance to sense the danger a moment before the
strike.
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade Threat: Low. Avoiding detection is
the whole point of this Discipline.
■ Blood Resonance: Melancholic. The ignored
and unseen, the homeless, forgotten, and
depressed; spies, pickpockets, excellent servants,
roadies and stagehands, and all the background
people.
Level 1
Cloak of Shadows
Standing perfectly still, the user blends
into the surroundings. As long as they have some
kind of cover, make no sound, and don’t move,
only mechanical or supernatural means can detect
them.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: Follow the general rules for Obfuscate.
The effect lasts until the user moves or they are
detected by other
means.
■ Duration: One scene
Silence of Death
Popular among the Banu Haqim, this
power completely silences the user, nullifying all
sound made by them. As with other Obfuscate
powers, this only works on people within earshot
and does not fool microphones or other electronic
sound detectors. Unlike Obfuscate in general, this
power works only on the sense of hearing, but in
exchange operates more robustly. A vampire
needs to make a whole lot of noise to break this
Silence.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
22
■ System: The user silences their footsteps,
clothing, minor collisions, and other sounds of
their person. This makes the vampire undetectable
if an observer could only notice them by sound,
such as when on a different floor of a house. This
power does not eliminate sounds the user makes
outside their personal space (throwing or dropping
objects, or slamming doors, for example). Failing
that, only Sense of the Unseen (Auspex 1) can
detect the user.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 2
Chimerstry
■ Amalgam: Presence 1
The vampire is able to create brief but
vivid hallucinations, distracting and drawing the
attention of those affected. A hallucination can
affect any single sense — it can be visual, audial,
tactile, etc. — occurring long enough to make an
impression before ceasing. The user decides on
the specifics of the hallucination, though due to its
brief nature it cannot convey more than something
glimpsed in the corner of the eye or a voice faintly
heard (it cannot be employed to create a fake ID,
for example).
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Obfuscate vs
Composure + Wits
■ VTMC
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: The vampire rolls their Manipulation +
Obfuscate. Anyone unprepared and within
eyesight of the vampire and eligible to experience
the hallucination (by being in line of sight of its
projected appearance, or by being the target of a
tactile sensation) is distracted, losing two dice on
their next action. Additionally, those who fail to
resist using their Composure + Wits lose their next
active action if they fail. (However, they can still
defend and resist as normal, with a two-dice
penalty.)
Other effects resulting from the
hallucination are up to the Storyteller, but they are
advised to err on the side of caution.
These hallucinations can never be
recorded or transmitted (such as by using Ghost in
the Machine).
■ Duration: One turn
Unseen Passage
With this power, the vampire can now
move around while staying hidden. The user is
functionally invisible, per the usual Obfuscate
limitations.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: As long as the user emits no
overpowering odors and no sound louder than a
whisper, this power automatically works. Only if
the observer has their attention drawn to the user
can they make a detection roll.
Sense the Unseen (Auspex 1) can also
detect the hidden vampire, as per the general
Obfuscate rules.
Note that the user cannot use this power to
disappear while being actively observed; it
automatically fails in such
a case.
■ Duration: One scene or until detection.
Level 3
Fata Morgana
■ Amalgam: Presence 2
The vampire can craft elaborate
hallucinations, making any subjects in their
vicinity see, hear, and feel whatever the user can
devise. From seeing and tasting a takeout
container filled with maggots and rice to a
thunderous torrent of reeking, rancid blood boiling
out of the sewers, Fata Morgana causes witnesses
to experience circumstances that just aren’t real.
There is no limit to the number of victims
who can be affected simultaneously, but in order
to be affected by Fata Morgana a subject needs to
be able to see the user or vice versa, though they
do not need to be actively aware of them. The
vampire does not need to remain present once a
victim is affected.
23
 Visual effects are always separate objects.
They cannot be used to “mask” or otherwise
disguise items or individuals, and can never
entirely block line of sight. Fata Morgana
hallucinations cannot appear to affect the
surrounding reality: The torrent of blood won’t
wash away cars parked in the street or pedestrians,
and an explosion created with Fata Morgana will
not cause any damage, hallucinatory
or otherwise. A collapsing staircase won’t tumble
anyone currently descending the staircase.
Sensory effects created by Fata Morgana cannot
blind or deafen or in other ways overload senses,
not even those supernaturally augmented.
Similarly, hallucinations are not caught on camera
or other kinds of recording devices.
■ VTMC
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: Manipulation + Obfuscate
■ System: The user makes a Manipulation +
Obfuscate test against a Difficulty equal to one
plus the number of senses the hallucination
targets. (An audio-visual hallucination would thus
be Difficulty 3, while a complete five-sensory
experience would be Difficulty 6.) The easiest
visual hallucinations to create are fairly small or
discreet — increase the Difficulty by one for
room-sized hallucinations, two for house-sized
hallucinations, and so on. Further complications
can add additional Difficulty, but that is left to the
Storyteller’s discretion. Any attempt to mimic the
appearance of a specific individual or in other
ways deceive can require additional Performance
or Subterfuge tests as appropriate.
Vampires and other supernatural creatures
have a chance to disbelieve the hallucination, but
mortals can do this only if they have reason to
suspect it to be fake. In both cases they roll
Intelligence + Awareness against the user’s
Manipulation + Presence. A success means that
the individual in question is no longer affected by
the hallucination, and it effectively disappears for
them. Any attempt to interact with the
hallucination will also cause it to lapse entirely, as
everyone present will become aware of its unreal
nature (as with the collapsing staircase example, if
someone is using the staircase). Note that the use
of this power is not overt, so even if the
hallucination is revealed, it is not obvious from
whom it originated. These hallucinations can
never be recorded or transmitted (such as by using
Ghost in the Machine).
■ Duration: One scene, unless the vampire
chooses to let it lapse before that.
Ghost in the Machine
The user can now transmit the effects of
Obfuscate through electronic media, allowing the
vampire to appear invisible or masked when
viewed live on screen. If an observer views the
image later, as in a photograph or recording, the
effect lessens: the image seems slightly blurred,
making identification hard. In addition, automated
surveillance has a tendency to glitch in the
presence of the vampire, lessening their chance of
being caught by automated systems.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: No additional roll is required when
being viewed on a live feed. Treat observers as
present with the vampire, with regard to the
Discipline. The observer adds +3 to their
Difficulty on tests to identify the user on film,
video, in photographs, or the like taken during
active Obfuscation. The user also gains three
additional dice to pools they use when trying to
circumvent automated electronic surveillance and
countermeasures.
■ Duration: As power used
Mask of Isolation
■ Amalgam: Dominate 1
■ Prerequisite: Mask of a Thousand Faces
Subtle but effective, this power forces the
effect of Mask of a Thousand Faces on an
unwitting subject. The victim will no longer be
seen for who they are, even by those closest to
them. Often employed over a longer period of
time, the power is used by those who want to
break their subject subtly but utterly, cutting them
off from means and society to the point that they’ll
do anything to escape such a fate.
24
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: Manipulation + Obfuscate vs.
Charisma + Insight
■ System: The user locks eyes with the victim and
must then succeed at a Manipulation + Obfuscate
vs. Charisma + Insight test. On a win, the effect
lasts for one night, plus one for each success in the
margin. While under its effect, the victim is
treated as employing Mask of a Thousand Faces,
and is unable to be recognized by anyone. (The
user can try to persuade friends and family with a
Composure + Persuade test, but even when
presenting proofs, the apprehension caused by this
particular power will make it hard to convince
them.)
If the subject is ever made aware of the
power being used on them the effect ends, and the
power cannot be employed on someone aware of
its effects: It relies on the unconscious ignorance
of the victim to remain active. As use of the power
isn’t overt, it can be reapplied repeatedly though,
so long as the user doesn’t reveal their intent.
In most chronicles, use of this power to
break someone should merit Stains.
■ Duration: One night plus one additional night
for each success in the margin
Mask of a Thousand Faces
Instead of disappearing, the vampire using
this power can make themselves appear as a
nondescript stranger, someone expected to be
present in the area. Unlike other Obfuscate
powers, this allows the user to interact and
communicate with those they might run into. They
arouse little suspicion as long as their presence is
at all plausible (meaning that it will not fool
people who do not expect anyone or would be
hostile against anyone they didn’t know). The
power also does not provide any personal
identification or other ways of misleading an
identity check.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: No test is required. Anyone viewing
the vampire sees a forgettable face of the same
gender and approximate build and height as the
user. Clothes take on the same kind of blandness,
depending on the environment. At an office the
user might appear as a nightwatchman, while they
may seem to wear overalls at an assembly plant.
Sense the Unseen (Auspex 1) can pierce the power
as usual.
■ Duration: One scene
Mental Maze
■ Amalgam: Dominate 1
Serpents maintain that Obfuscate is less
about illusion and more about perception. Mental
Maze is the ability to remove all sense of direction
and location from a victim, allowing the vampire
to make their target a prisoner in their current
environment, such as a home, a nightclub, or
worse — a vampire’s cellar. The victim finds their
location folding back on itself, subtly altering their
perception of previously visited rooms, convincing
them that an actual exit will only lead deeper into
the maze, and eventually breaking them down into
a state of panic and fragility.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One or Three Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Obfuscate vs. Wits +
Resolve
■ System: The vampire personally speaks the
words “you cannot escape” to their victim and
rolls Charisma + Obfuscate versus the target’s
Wits + Resolve, with lower Generation vampires
being able to negate the roll with a Willpower
point as per Dominate’s characteristics (VTM p.
255). On a win, the victim struggles to find their
way out of the building they’re in. An additional
two Rouse Checks allows this power to be used in
a single room or a densely packed outdoor
environment (such as a construction site or forest).
Mortals cannot attempt to escape but supernatural
creatures can make a Resolve + Awareness test
each scene using the vampire’s initial successes as
the Difficulty, suffering a point of Superficial
Willpower damage for every missing success if
they fail. This roll cannot benefit from Teamwork,
as any guidance given does not match what the
victim sees. This power ends if the environment
becomes dangerous (e.g. the building catches fire),
25
unless the vampire has Terminal Decree (VTM p.
257).
■ Duration: One night
Level 4
Conceal
■ Amalgam: Auspex 3
This ability allows the user to cloak an
inanimate object such as a door, a car, or a small
house. As with other Obfuscate powers, this does
not actually make the object invisible, but creates
a lingering hypnotic effect that causes most people
to simply ignore it. In this case the power is
especially effective, given that the object is
unlikely to call attention to itself. Unless
something causes passersby to collide with it or
someone points it out, people behave as if the
object wasn’t there, moving around larger objects
if need be.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Obfuscate
■ System: The vampire touches the object and
rolls a test of Intelligence + Obfuscate against a
Difficulty from 2 (Concealing a ring in a drawer
filled with other memorabilia) to 6 (Concealing a
house in the middle of an open square), depending
on the target’s size and location. The power lasts
for one night. Each point of margin on the win
conceals the object for an additional night.
This power conceals anyone and anything
inside the object (e.g., people in a car or shed), as
long as the viewer remains outside. This power
cannot affect anything larger than a two-story
house or any object moving under its own power
(such as a moving car). Someone with the Auspex
power Sense the Unseen (or equivalent) can notice
the object by winning a contest of Wits + Auspex
vs the Intelligence + Obfuscate of the user.
■ Duration: One night, with an additional night
per point of margin on the win.
Vanish
■ Prerequisite: Cloak of Shadows
The vampire can activate Cloak of
Shadows and Unseen Passage even while under
direct observation. The vampire appears to vanish
in the blink of an eye; even the memory of them
becomes foggy and indistinct.
■ VTM
■ Cost: As per power augmented
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Obfuscate vs Wits +
Awareness
■ System: When vanishing in front of a mortal,
roll a contest of Wits + Obfuscate vs Wits +
Awareness. On a win, the observer questions
whether the vampire was ever there to begin with;
their memory clouds on the topic. With a critical
win, the vampire vanishes entirely from the
observer’s memory. This power does not affect
vampires’ memories, but any win by the user
hides them as if they initiated their power
unobserved. This power can only be used once per
scene.
■ Duration: As per power augmented
Level 5
Cloak the Gathering
The vampire can shelter their companions
under the cloak of Obfuscate.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check in addition to the cost
of the power extended
■ System: The vampire can extend their power of
Obfuscation to a number of additional willing
subjects equal to their Wits, plus one for each
additional Rouse Check made. The Obfuscate
power used on the group can be any known to the
user, and every member of the group count as
having used it on themselves, using the
Obfuscating vampire’s rating as their own when
needed for a roll. Members of the group can still
perceive each other while under the effects of the
power. If anyone besides the user is revealed,
either through their own doing or an astute
observer, the rest of the group remains hidden. If
the user is revealed, so is everyone else.
■ Duration: As power extended
26
Impostor’s Guise
■ Prerequisite: Mask of a Thousand Faces
With some preparation the vampire can
make themselves appear as a specific individual of
any build and gender. The user must carefully
study the subject, otherwise the charade fails when
meeting anyone with more than a casual
familiarity with the person being mimicked.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Obfuscate, Manipulation +
Performance
■ System: The user must study the face to be
copied for at least five minutes, from different
angles. The user requires another ten minutes of
observation to mimic the subject’s voice and
mannerisms. The user can only copy human
appearance, not animal form. The Storyteller then
makes a hidden test of Wits + Obfuscate
(Difficulty 4). A failure means that the
resemblance is less than convincing, and anyone
close to the person copied notices something
amiss automatically. A win creates a convincing
illusion,but the user must make a Manipulation +
Performance roll to impersonate speech and
mannerisms. A critical win creates a perfect
illusion with no further roll necessary. Sense the
Unseen (Auspex 1) can pierce the mask as per
General Rules.
■ Duration: One scene
Oblivion
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Obtenebration, Necromancy,
Shadowboxing, Abyssal Mastery, Tenebrae
Imperium, Mortis, the Dark Arts, Black Magic,
Entropy
Oblivion is a mysterious, unpalatable
power that most vampires rightly fear to use,
witness, or fall victim to. Only vampires of Clans
Lasombra and Hecata wield it with any frequency,
and even they do so tentatively. Oblivion requires
cautious masters who know the power’s risks, as
no other Discipline reaches into the Underworld
and allows its manipulator to extract tangible
darkness or furious spectres. Oblivion is the
darkest of arts. Notably, while the Lasombra are
prone to expanding their repertoire of Oblivion
powers, the Hecata focus their energies on
developing Ceremonies (see p. XX). Ceremonies
take longer, but are required for communing with
and making passage through to the lands of the
dead.
Characteristics
Oblivion allows for the manipulation of
creatures and substances originating from the
Underworld. When the Hecata use this Discipline,
they tend to channel the entropic nature of the
Underworld and its surroundings, decaying flesh,
calling forth spirits, and posing a dangerous risk to
the living.
Oblivion projections and spirits sustain
damage from fire and sunlight, counting as
vampires with Blood Potency 1 in this regard.
They also take one level of Aggravated Health
damage per round from bright, direct lights, and
may also be damaged (Superficially or
Aggravated) from blessed weapons and artifacts,
depending on the strength of the blessing and
whether the wielder has True Faith. Oblivion’s
powers are ineffective in brightly lit areas.
Daylight and rooms without shadows are
prohibitive, preventing the Discipline’s successful
function, though ultraviolet light and infrared light
place no restriction on the Discipline’s use.
Moderately lit rooms apply a one-die penalty to
the Discipline roll involved. The use of Oblivion
negatively affects the necromancer’s psyche, with
many powers causing Stains as the vampire finds
themselves performing increasingly macabre acts
in service to this Discipline.
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade threat: Medium- High. Spirits
rarely show up well on cameras but are obviously
unnatural if witnessed in person.
27
■ Blood Resonance: Psychopaths and the
emotionally detached. Blood empty of Resonance.
Note: When making a Rouse check for an
Oblivion power or Ceremony, a result of “1” or
“10” results in a Stain, in addition to any Hunger
gained. If the user’s Blood Potency allows for a
re-roll on the Rouse check, they can pick either of
the two results.
Level 1
Ashes to Ashes
Destroying evidence of feeding is a
common necessity among vampires who leave
screaming, resisting vessels, especially when those
same vessels end up dead. This power enables a
vampire to destroy a corpse — fresh or long dead
— by introducing their
vitae to its body. This power does not work on
vampires, but does work on animated cadavers.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Oblivion
vs. Stamina + Medicine or Fortitude
■ System: The vampire makes a Rouse Check to
expend vitae, and introduces the vitae to the
corpse. Unless the corpse is animated, the body
disintegrates over three turns with no test
necessary. If it is, the
user rolls a contest of Stamina + Oblivion vs
Stamina + Medicine (Corpses with Fortitude may
resist with Stamina + Fortitude). If the user wins,
the animated corpse dissolves in five turns, minus
the margin (minimum one, and disintegrating
corpses suffer physical Impairment). On a critical
win, the corpse disintegrates immediately. On a
total failure, the corpse putrefies but does not
disintegrate,
and is subsequently immune to this power from
any user.
■ Duration: Variable
The Binding Fetter
The vampire closes their eyes. Upon
opening them, the irises of their eyes display a
dull reflection of their surroundings and they can
identify objects or locations important to ghosts.
These “fetters” act as icons that bind the dead to
their existence. Knowing if an object is a fetter
allows a necromancer to better manipulate the
ghost. Fetters emanate variable auras, some
bursting with vitality and glowing gold light,
others radiating decay, or odors important to the
bound wraith, such as the smell of freshly baked
bread, gasoline, or
cigarette smoke.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: Free
■ System: On activation, the user’s
senses become supernaturally
attuned to the energies of fetters,
and they may identify these auras
by sight, smell, and their other
senses. While this power is in use,
the necromancer is distracted from
other activity around them,
conveying a −2 penalty to all
Awareness, Wits, and Resolve linked
rolls.
■ Duration: One Scene
Oblivion’s Sight
The vampire closes their eyes. Upon
opening them, the irises of their eyes are black
against the white of their sclera, and they can now
see clearly within pitch blackness, and can
perceive ghosts who are not actively hiding their
presence.
■ CbN
■ Cost: Free
■ System: On activation, the user’s eyes become
supernaturally attuned to darkness, allowing them
to ignore all low-light penalties, including those of
supernatural origin. They still need their eyes to
see and are affected by blindfolds and the like as
usual. If a ghost is present and not attempting
stealth or using a power to conceal its presence,
the spirit becomes visible to the vampire using
Oblivion’s Sight. In such cases, ghosts appear as
they wish to appear, whether as humans bearing
the wounds that caused their death, as spectral
monstrosities, or as perfectly immaculate corpses.
28
Ghosts do not automatically realize when a
vampire spots them, but if they do, many react
with fear or anger rather than passivity. This
power does not grant the ability to make physical
contact with ghosts.
■ Duration: One scene
Shadow Cloak
Subtly applying the influence of Oblivion
on ambient shadows, the user masks their
appearance or seems more sinister and
threatening.
■ CbN
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The vampire gains a two-dice bonus to
Stealth rolls, as well as on Intimidation versus
mortals.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Arms of Ahriman
■ Amalgam: Potence 2
The vampire summons abyssal
appendages from unlit spots in the area, within
line of sight. Local shadows distort as murky
tentacles snake out from them and converge on
one or more hapless victims. Whether by gliding
up the body of the victim or engaging in a mystic
grapple with the victim’s own shadow, the arms
are able to hold them in place or smother them.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Oblivion
■ System: The user takes one turn and pays the
cost, summoning the shadow appendages. Using
these, the vampire can perform bludgeoning and
grappling attacks against distant targets every
subsequent turn. Additional arms can be created
by splitting the dice pool, enabling the user to
engage multiple opponents. (VTM p. 125). The
arms use the vampire’s Wits + Oblivion to attack
and deal Superficial damage or grapple, adding
half the user’s Potence rating (round up) as a
damage bonus. The vampire can do nothing else
except control the arms while this power is active.
They can also be used to perform simple actions
(such as opening doors and pulling levers) but
nothing as advanced as typing or controlling
vehicles. The arms have a length (in yards/meters)
equal to twice the Oblivion dots of the user. (Note
that the arms, being shadows, move across
surfaces, not air, and any distances must take this
into account.) The arms have three health levels
and use their owner’s Wits + Oblivion to avoid
and endure attacks. As two-dimensional shadows,
they can only be harmed by bright light, such as
from a powerful torch or daylight. The Wits +
Oblivion roll allows the tendrils to attempt to
snake into the dark corners of a room or
overpower the light for a turn, taking a health level
of damage but continuing the assault. As the
shadow tendrils constrict and assault victims via
magical means, it takes an act of will to escape
them. A constricted victim must roll Resolve +
Composure and achieve more successes than the
attacker to simply pass through the tendrils
incurring no harm. This action does not dissipate
the Arms of Ahriman, which can attack again on a
subsequent turn if the wielder wishes it and the
target is still within reach.
■ Duration: One scene or until ended or destroyed
Fatal Precognition
■ Amalgam: Auspex 2
It is said by many necromancers that the
Lady of Fate rules the Underworld through her
Stygian servants, and through communion with
her certain death-dealers have learned this power.
Fatal precognition allows a vampire to scry any
non-vampire and experience a vision of their
impending death, whether it’s due a minute from
now or several decades away. The Kindred’s eyes
turn black and they stand, sit, or lie completely
still as the fate plays out in their mind. Fate can of
course be cheated, though there’s a cost for
doing so.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Oblivion
29
■ System: The vampire must be able to see or hear
their target when they use this power. After rolling
Resolve + Oblivion (Difficulty 3 or
more at the Storyteller’s discretion), the vampire
becomes paralyzed in place as the vision plays
out, preventing them from any form of physical or
social interaction for that turn. The higher the
margin, the clearer the vision. A win grants sight
of the corpse, and with each point of margin an
additional clue is provided, such as the manner of
death, time and place of death, or the name and
face of the first living person to find the corpse. A
critical win on this roll grants the vampire a vision
of crystal clarity, along with a sense of the motive,
if the target is intentionally killed. A total failure
renders the vampire blind for the remainder of the
scene, and unable to use this power on the same
target again.
If anyone attempts to subvert the fate
observed in this way, they find everything
working against their hubristic ambition. Add one
to all Difficulties while working to directly
circumvent the precognition as cars break down,
storms erupt from nowhere, and people become
hostile for no reason. This penalty applies until the
prophecy is fulfilled or avoided, or the current
story ends.
■ Duration: Until fulfilled, avoided, or the story
ends.
Shadow Cast
Oblivion is powerful but can often be
foiled by the simple lack of appropriate shadows
from which to summon it. This power draws upon
the darkness within the user to project a
supernatural shadow from which to manifest other
powers, no matter the ambient lightning. This
shadow usually mimics the movement and shape
of the user but can sometimes grow distorted and
even monstrous, resonating with the current
temperament of its owner.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Activating the power conjures a
supernatural shadow from the vampire’s body. As
long as the power is active, the user casts this
shadow, which cannot be removed except by
direct sunlight. Anyone witnessing the practitioner
notices the shadow cast from no visible light
source on a Wits + Awareness roll (Difficulty 3).
The vampire can direct their shadow, elongating
or distorting (but not detaching) it at will, though
it can sometimes act on its own accord, at the
Storyteller’s discretion. For the purposes of other
powers such as Shadow Perspective, the shadow
can be lengthened to up to twice the practitioner’s
Oblivion rating in yards/meters. For anyone stood
within the shadow’s reach, the Willpower damage
from social conflict increases by 1. Standing in a
Oblivion’s shadow is a terrifying prospect.
■ Duration: One scene
Where the Shroud Thins
Vampires with an affinity for Oblivion
can sense locations where the Shroud between the
world of the living and the Shadowlands thins.
Though this Discipline doesn’t directly tell a
vampire why the Shroud between worlds is thin in
a certain place, it may be due to a grisly murder
that took place there many years before, or
because necromancers have frequently used the
location to summon spirits, or it might be a
location of holy or unholy resonance, among other
reasons. In locations where the Shroud is thinnest,
mortal health suffers and use of the Oblivion
Discipline becomes easier, if the vampire knows
how to harness the gap in the Shroud.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Oblivion
■ System: Following a Rouse Check, the player
rolls Wits + Oblivion (Difficulty 3) and on a win
may determine the density of the Shroud in their
nearby area, as large as an entire building or
landmark. On a critical win, this roll reveals
whether the Shroud’s density recently changed.
On a total failure, the power backfires and gives a
false reading. Without use of this power, Oblivion
users cannot benefit from a thinning of the
Shroud.
30
 The following table expresses the and speeding up the erosion of life. This power
different degrees of Shroud density, and the does not speed up the decay of dead bodies.
effects they have: ■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
SHROUD POSSIBLE EFFECT
DENSITY CAUSE ■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Oblivion vs. Stamina +
Medicine or Fortitude
Impenetrable No deaths took Vampires and ■ System: The vampire makes a Rouse Check.
place here, wraiths cannot Following a Stamina + Oblivion roll (Difficulty
consecrated land cross the Shroud 3), unintelligent organic and inorganic material
here
within 5 yards/meters of them suffers — plants
Thick Long ago a death No effect turn black and die, food rots in its packaging, and
took place here, a even bricks start crumbling.
place of joy Material affected in this way can become toxic to
ingest, if for instance this power is used in a
Thin A death recently −1
kitchen or a water supply. Such toxic food and
took place here, Difficulty
melancholic on Oblivion drink, if consumed, can be expected to inflict two
mortals often pass rolls unhalved Superficial Health damage in the
through this place following scene to the individual who eats it, and
for each scene thereafter until treated with an
Frayed A series of deaths −2 Intelligence + Medicine roll (Difficulty 3).
took place here, Difficulty
If anything living is caught in the aura, it
necromancers on Oblivion
often enact rolls makes a Stamina + Medicine (Those with
Ceremonies here Fortitude may resist with Stamina + Fortitude)
contest against the vampire’s activation roll. For
Absent A necromancer −2 every point of margin the vampire has, the victim
used Split the Difficulty suffers one point of unhalved Superficial Health
Shroud (CotBG on
damage. This damage is slowly applied
p.213) here, Oblivion rolls,
spectres regularly wraiths can throughout the scene. Repeated applications of the
pass through this freely pass to power in the same scene have no effect on the
part of the Shroud and from the Health of mortals already Affected.
Shadowlands, The power is an aura that lasts for an
mortals suffer entire scene before it fades away. Anyone with a
two Superficial sense of smell can detect a rotting odor emanating
Health damage
from the vampire during the time the power is
in this area that
cannot be healed active, inflicting a two-dice penalty to any Social
until they depart rolls the vampire makes in a positive or diplomatic
context, if doing so in person.
■ Duration: One Scene
■ Duration: One Scene

Level 3 Passion Feast

Aura of Decay
Kindred with a strong connection to
Oblivion find the Discipline affecting the world
around them, making plants wilt, animals and
humans grow sick, and food go bad. Some harness
this aura as a power, polluting vitality with rot,
■ Amalgam: Fortitude 2
The relationship between vampires and
their need for blood as sustenance is well known,
but when a vampire needs to spend an extended
period in the Shadowlands, or wishes to torment a
31
spirit, this Oblivion power allows them to subsist
on the passions of wraiths.
Wraiths have no bodies, nor do they have
blood. Instead, their raw emotions drive them.
Love, hatred, greed, or even a need for vengeance
might keep a wraith around after their former
body’s death. An accomplished necromancer can
feed on these passions for a time, enabling them to
survive without blood for longer than their fellow
Kindred. The feeding manifests as a swirling
vortex of power between the wraith and the
vampire’s maw, as the vampire doesn’t need to
actually bite down on anything to consume
passions.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Oblivion vs. Resolve +
Composure
■ System: A vampire with this power can drain a
wraith of their passion. While in close proximity
(three yards/meters or closer) to the wraith, they
may roll a contest of Resolve + Oblivion vs. the
wraith’s Resolve + Composure. A win for the
vampire inflicts one Aggravated Willpower
damage to the wraith and reduces the vampire’s
Hunger by one for the remainder of the night. That
Hunger returns on the following night regardless
of Rouse Checks, as the feeding is only a nepenthe
to dull the vampire’s hungry urges. Feeding from
a wraith may merit a Stain at the Storyteller’s
discretion, as the consumed passion dulls the
wraith’s reason for being, likely sending them
down a path to self-destructive acts. The
Storyteller determines the number of passions a
wraith possesses (though five or more is rare), and
may deem that the wraith becomes an
uncontrollable, murderous spectre once all
passions have been consumed.
■ Duration: Passive
Shadow Perspective
The vampire can project their senses into
any shadow within line of sight, seeing and
hearing as if they were hiding within any part of it.
This includes their own shadow, as manipulated
by Shadow Cast (see p.XX).
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Following a Rouse Check, the presence
of the vampire in the shadow is undetectable by
anything but supernatural means. (Sense the
Unseen, for example). While this power is active
the vampire perceives both their surroundings as
well as what can be gleaned from the Shadow
Perspective, as if looking through a screen or hole.
■ Duration: Up to one scene
Touch of Oblivion
The vampire using Touch of Oblivion
channels the power through their vitae. When they
make physical contact with a victim, the
annihilating element runs through the vampire and
into their prey like an electric current, except the
effect is to physically wither the target area.
Effective on any part of the body, the touch
shrinks and shortens muscles, snaps tendons, and
makes bones brittle, effectively aging the affected
part catastrophically. Its main use is in withering a
limb, choking a throat, or blinding a pair of eyes.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Following a Rouse Check, the vampire
grips their victim (requiring a Strength + Brawl
roll if the victim is trying to avoid the vampire),
with the victim suffering two levels of Aggravated
damage as well as a crippling injury. If this injury
is inflicted to an arm or leg, the targeted limb is
rendered crippled and will in the case of mortals
require lengthy rehabilitation, while vampires can
mend the damage as regular Aggravated damage.
Likewise, Touch of Oblivion may render a target
mute,deaf, or blind. See crippling injuries in
Vampire: The Masquerade (p. XX) for details on
the mechanical effects of crippled limbs.
■ Duration: One turn
Level 4
Necrotic Plague
Kindred scholars claim Oblivion pollutes
everything it touches, with this power as a prime
32
example. Through touch alone, a vampire might
poison a mortal victim’s
blood, imbuing them with a disease that wracks
and ravages their body. Most dangerously of all,
this disease runs the risk of being contagious, and
might inflict the same harm to other mortals.
Necromancers schooled in medicine
have enough talent to make this power appear in
the form of specific illnesses, sometimes including
those that died out in decades or centuries past.
Regardless of how it manifests, the symptoms will
eventually disappear even without medical
treatment, whether or not the victim survives.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check, Two Stains
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Oblivion vs. Stamina
+ Medicine or Fortitude
■ System: The user makes a Rouse Check and
then rolls Intelligence + Oblivion while touching
their victim. If the victim is weak (a baby, elderly,
unwell, recovering from an illness, dying, or with
3 unmarked Health boxes or less), they are
automatically infected. If the victim is healthy,
they roll Stamina + Medicine (those with Fortitude
may use it in place of Medicine), resisting the
disease if they roll more successes than the
vampire. This power cannot be used on vampires.
Storytellers may decide spreading such a horrific
disease warrants Stains.
Victims of the disease take one
Aggravated Health damage at the start of every
scene following their infection. The victim suffers
from the disease for a number of scenes equal to
the user’s Oblivion rating. The sickness cannot be
medically treated, as it is supernatural in origin,
but it is healed through drinking vitae.
If the player rolls a critical win when
activating this power, they can choose to make the
disease communicable via touch, with subsequent
recipients suffering the disease for one scene
fewer than the victim by whom they were
infected. If the player rolls a total failure, the
vampire’s own vitae convulses as if poisoned.
They suffer three Aggravated Health damage as
the infected blood pours out of them and must
make a
Rouse Check.
■ Duration: One turn to activate, variable length
of condition
Stygian Shroud
Darkness spews out of a nearby shadow as
the vampire blankets the area around them in
gloom equivalent to a moonless night, while
sounds are muffled and indistinct. Anyone
viewing the effect from without see it as a shadow
expanding over every surface, including the
bodies of any victims, in the area. Those apart
from the invoker caught in the effects find
themselves struggling to see and hear their
surroundings, and mortals are drained of their very
life by the suffocating power.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check.
■ System: The user makes a Rouse Check and
spends a turn concentrating, spreading the shadow
over the desired surfaces. The effect covers a
circular area with a radius equal to twice the user’s
Oblivion rating in yards/ meters. The area is
centered on the user or a spot in their line of sight.
Anyone caught in the Stygian Shroud receives a
three-dice penalty to all rolls, unless they possess
the ability to see through supernatural darkness.
Any mortals caught in the Stygian Shroud suffer
one level of Superficial damage for every turn
they remain within it, due to the power’s
suffocating effects.
■ Duration: One scene
Umbrous Clutch
The user creates a temporary gate out of
the victim’s own shadow, causing them to fall
through Oblivion and into the waiting arms of the
user. The victim will appear to fall into their own
shadow, only to reappear falling out of the one
cast by the user. The brief journey through the end
of everything is usually enough to traumatize the
victim into submission, though one must be
prepared if the quarry responds violently in fear.
■ StBH
■ Cost: One Rouse Check, Gain one Stain
■ Dice Pool: Wits + Oblivion vs. Dexterity + Wits
33
■ System: In order to use this power, the vampire
needs clear sight of both the victim and their
shadow. The vampire’s player or Storyteller then
rolls Wits + Oblivion vs. Dexterity + Wits to
maneuver the victim’s shadow beneath them,
creating a supernatural rift into which they appear
to fall. At the Storyteller’s discretion, a stationary
victim not paying attention can be automatically
caught.
A victim caught by this power will then
reappear, falling out of the shadow cast by the
user. (As with similar powers, the power does not
work if the caster is without a shadow.) An
unprepared mortal victim will be terrified and
likely catatonic, while a vampire must test for fury
or fear frenzy, Storyteller’s
choice, at Difficulty 4.
■ Duration: Instant
Level 5
Shadow Step
Stepping into a nearby shadow, the user
disappears only to reappear from the same or
another shadow further away. Whether they enter
the Labyrinth or merely pass along its surface is a
source of conjecture among many Lasombra and
Hecata, but the spiritual damage with which they
can emerge implies they are touching something
foul as they use this power.
■ CbN
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: The vampire must enter a shadow large
enough to cover them, and emerge from another
one turn later. The target shadow must be within
sight, though it can be perceived by mystical
means, such as Shadow Perspective, if desired. It
is possible to bring another through the passage,
but unless that person is willing, they must be held
by a successful grapple. If a Stain is incurred as a
result of using this power, the passenger also
receives one.
■ Duration: One turn
Skuld Fulfilled
Necromancers can be described as fate’s
greatest meddlers, as they have a way of
interfering with the destined paths of lives and
spirits. Occasionally, however, necromancers may
seek to serve fate by punishing those who cheat it.
This power enables a vampire to reintroduce
illnesses to victims who recovered from them,
break bones long-since healed, and eliminate the
immunity to aging ghouls experience. While this
power doesn’t work on vampires, it is an effective
way of cutting through their servants and ensuring
debts to fate are repaid, without having to come
into contact with the recipient.
■ CotBG
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Oblivion vs. Stamina +
Medicine or Fortitude
■ System: The vampire makes two Rouse Checks
as they expend sufficient vitae to coat both their
palms and their face with blood as they recall the
faces of their victims. If the user succeeds in a
contest of Stamina + Oblivion vs. the victim’s
Stamina + Medicine (Those with Fortitude may
resist with Stamina + Fortitude), the targeted
individual is affected by a serious condition
they’ve historically suffered and recovered from,
such as treated cancer, a broken bone, or a disease
— including one gained through Necrotic Plague
(CotBG p. 206) — with any debilitating effects
from this condition occurring immediately. The
condition’s effects are for the Storyteller to
determine, but they should be severe (See the
Crippling Injuries table for inspiration, Vampire:
the Masquerade p.303). If the victim is a ghoul,
this power removes their immunity to aging and
eliminates any vitae in their system, potentially
resulting in older ghouls dying or even
disintegrating where they stand. On a critical win,
this power may kill the victim by stopping their
heart completely if the user wishes. On a total
failure, the vampire cannot use this power against
that individual again.
■ Duration: Variable, dependent on whether the
condition is treatable
Tenebrous Avatar
34
 The vampire gains the ability to change husk, and if Impaired by this power they will not
their very substance into that of a shadow, return as a wraith after death.
becoming a two-dimensional patch of darkness Storytellers may decide that the spirit-
able to slither over any surface and through destroying nature of this power warrants Stains,
miniscule gaps and cracks. While in this form the though as always, an appropriate Conviction may
vampire is only harmed by fire and sunlight. mitigate these.
■ CbN ■ Duration: One turn
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks.
■ System: The transformation takes one turn,
during which the vampire is unable to do anything
else. Once the transformation is complete the
vampire can move at walking pace across the
ground or along walls, hampered only by
Oblivion
hermetically sealed barriers. Vampires using
Tenebrous Avatar can envelop victims, causing
Ceremonies
the victim to reduce all their dice pools by three Back to Contents
and suffocating mortals as with Stygian Shroud, Unless otherwise noted, performing a
above. If surrounding a mortal, the vampire can Ceremony requires a Rouse Check, five minutes
feed from them without penetrating the skin with per level to cast, and a winning Resolve +
fangs. Practitioners of this power take no damage Oblivion test (Difficulty = Ceremony level + 1).
from physical sources but can be harmed by fire Ceremonies usually require additional ingredients
and sunlight as normal. Mental Disciplines can or sacrifices to mingle the caster’s vitae with.
still be used at the Storyteller’s discretion. Unless otherwise stated the caster can only
■ Duration: One scene or until ended perform beneficial Ceremonies on themselves.
Ghouls of necromancers or thin-bloods drinking
from empty temperaments gain temporary access
Withering Spirit
to Oblivion powers, but not to Ceremonies.
This power channels raw entropy via rapid
Ceremonies each have a prerequisite Oblivion
spiritual decay, affecting vampires as well as kine
power. This requirement acts as a gateway for
by targeting the victim’s spirit. A vampire using
necromancers that blood sorcerers need not pass
this power risks Stains, as it can completely
through. At character creation a player can choose
obliterate the victim’s spirit, preventing return as a
one Level 1 Ceremony if they have at least one
wraith.
Oblivion power noted as a prerequisite for that
■ CotBG
Ceremony. Characters can buy new Ceremonies at
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks, Stains (variable
the cost of the Ceremony’s level x 3 experience
amount)
points, providing they meet the power prerequisite
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Oblivion vs. Resolve +
as well. Learning new Ceremonies during play
Occult or Fortitude
requires both experience and time, as well as a
■ System: The vampire makes two Rouse Checks
teacher who knows the Ceremony already. Expect
to expend sufficient vitae to coat both hands, and
a Ceremony to take at least the square of its rating
touches the victim. After rolling Resolve +
in weeks to learn.
Oblivion vs. the victim’s Resolve + Occult (Those
Note: Past and future products contain
with Fortitude may use it in place of Occult), the
Oblivion Ceremonies and powers that may match
victim suffers two Aggravated Willpower damage
well with those presented here. If these books are
for each point of the vampire’s margin. The attack
available, the Storyteller may feel free to suggest
erodes the victim’s spirit until they’re a broken
alternate pre-requisite powers.

35

Level 1
The Gift of False Life
Through use of this Ceremony, a vampire
can raise a corpse or group of corpses to perform
simple, single or repetitive tasks.
■ Prerequisite Power: Ashes to Ashes
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A human body (or multiple bodies),
a small concoction of blood, phlegm, and bile.
■ Process: After applying the concoction to the
corpse or corpses and performing the Ceremony,
the affected bodies animate into a form of false
life. They follow a single command from the
vampire, providing it’s simple and the corpse is
physically capable of performing it, such as
“sweep the floor,” “hold this door shut,” or “walk
around the house perimeter.” They have no ability
to think or calculate, so conditional or complicated
commands such as “attack the next person to walk
through this archway,” “drive this car,” or “build a
shack” do not work. They may be directed
towards a specific target for attack or other action
if the necromancer points at them.
■ System: The player makes their Ceremony roll
and upon a win they raise a number of corpses
equal to their Oblivion rating, or the number of
bodies they have prepared (whichever is lower). A
critical win doubles their Oblivion rating for the
purpose of determining corpses raised. The
mindless corpse’s animation ends when it is
destroyed or it concludes its task. These corpses
do not defend themselves from attacks, and decay
as normal; the Ceremony does not grant them any
form of immunity to the elements or time.
■ The Wraiths’ stat blocks can be found in the
SPCs Section
The Knowing Stone
This Ceremony enables Necromancers to
identify the locations and existences of specific
ghosts.
■ FoL
■ Ingredients: They need a stone from a church
wall (or other holy site) and a cup of the caster’s
vitae.
■ Process: They pour it from their body into a
vessel and then uses it to write out the true name
of a deceased human on the consecrated stone. If
the individual still exists as a ghost, their location
becomes clear to the vampire.
■ System: Roll Resolve + Oblivion (Difficulty 2).
If the target exists as a ghost, the vampire receives
a vision of the ghost’s location. The vision can be
accessed for the remainder of the scene.
Summon Spirit
This Ceremony enables a vampire to
summon a spirit from the Underworld.
■ Prerequisite Power: The Binding Fetter
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: One of the targeted wraith’s fetters,
a photo or other visual depiction of the wraith or
their signed name, the caster’s vitae.
■ Process: The necromancer pours their vitae over
a wraith’s fetter, and studying the picture or
signature, calls out the wraith’s name. The wraith
feels their fetter’s call, and begins a journey from
their location in the Underworld to that of the
caster. Though geography has differing scales in
the Underworld, a journey may still take several
nights if the spirit is on the other side of the world.
If the Shroud is thin enough in the summoning
location, the wraith is pulled through the veil
between worlds by the fetter’s strength. The
summoned wraith is under no obligation to serve
the vampire upon being called and may act with
hostility if they feel the vampire is threatening
their fetter, which may be an object, a building, or
even a person. Alternatively, the wraith may be
grateful for the summoning and the possibility of
Companionship.
Wraiths summoned in this way do not
manifest physically, but as shadows on the walls,
quavering silhouettes of their living selves, from
which voices might emerge. Wraiths speak the
same languages they did in life, unless they’ve
gone to the trouble of learning new ones in the
Underworld.
36
■ System: The caster daubs the fetter with their
vitae and makes an Oblivion Ceremony roll. The
wraith cannot pass through the Shroud if it’s
impenetrable in the Ceremony location (CotBG p.
205), and moving the fetter after the Ceremony
doesn’t help, as the wraith’s ability to pass
through the Shroud disappears if the fetter leaves
the Ceremony site. The wraith disappears at the
end of the scene unless a separate Ceremony is
used to compel or bind them.
■ The Wraiths’ stat blocks can be found in the
SPCs Section
Traveler’s Call
This simple Ceremony is taught by the
cult to all priests before their release into the wider
world. Since all priests of Shalim are linked by
their common bond with Apolleon the Traveler,
they are able to use his presence in eternal
Oblivion as a nexus between themselves and their
followers.
■ Prerequisite Power: Oblivion’s Sight (see CbN)
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: The black book gifted to them
following their indoctrination into the cult
■ Process: By using the Traveler’s Call with their
black book in hand and the name of another
Shalimite in mind, a priest can send a ripple out
across Oblivion, calling the target to their location.
Unlike a true summoning, this power does not
place a compulsion upon the victim, but does alert
the Shalimite being contacted to the vampire’s
current location through a repetitive, flashing
vision of the scenery surrounding the calling
Kindred.
■ System: The cultist must possess their black
book and know the name of another Shalimite.
The vampire’s player makes a Ceremony roll
(Difficulty 3). The contacted
vampire can choose to ignore the
call, but the flashing vision gives
them −2 dice to all rolls involving
concentration for the remainder of
the scene, at which point the call
disappears. A critical win by the
vampire allows them to send a
single-word message to their point
of contact along with the vision.
Level 2
Awaken the Homuncular Servant
Necromancers use this Ceremony to
create spies and stalkers out of body parts such as
hands or skulls, or small dead animals like rats or
foxes.
■ Prerequisite Power: Where the Shroud Thins
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: The required body part or animal
carcass, the weapon used to sever/kill it, a small
concoction of urine, fecal matter, and semen.
■ Process: The caster coats a blade (or other
device suited to the task) in a gross cocktail of
bodily fluids, and uses it to cut the targeted
appendage off its root limb or body, or kills the
small animal (which cannot be larger than a small
dog and cannot fly, regardless of whether it has
wings). After massaging vitae into the target, it
comes to life as a homuncular servant, unfailingly
loyal to its master. The homunculus can scale
walls, hop (even if it lacks the limbs to do so), and
hide effectively. While it cannot speak or perform
tasks requiring deep thought, it can telepathically
communicate single images to its creator.
■ System: The necromancer’s player makes an
Oblivion Ceremony roll, and after doing so, gains
a homuncular servant that will spy, follow, or
intimidate at the necromancer’s command. If it
strays farther than 100 yards/ meters from the
vampire, it falls inert, only awakening again once
the vampire enters that range. Otherwise, it
remains active for a number of nights equal to the
number
of successes rolled. A critical win on the roll keeps
the servant active forever, while a total failure
destroys all components involved in the
Ceremony.
■ The Homuncular Servant’s stat blocks can be
found in the SPCs Section
Blinding the Alloy Eye
37
 Striking a pact with a death-spirit, the
caster buys themselves a short time of immunity
to surveillance, as the otherworldly entity
scrambles cameras around the vampire.
■ Prerequisite: Shadow Cast
■ StBH
■ Ingredient: A small piece of aluminum mesh
■ Process: The user spends a scene in isolation,
contacting the spectre and bonding it to the
aluminum mesh. The mesh is then placed in a
light-proof container, to be taken out when the
effect is to be activated. Once removed and
attached to a visible piece of flesh or garment of
the caster, the effect is initiated.
■ System: Do not make a Ritual roll until the
effect is activated. If possible, the result of the test
should be kept secret from the player. If
successful, cameras around the caster will end up
scrambling their image, though they will pick up
everything else normally. The effect lasts for a full
scene, or until the mesh is removed.
Compel Spirit
This Ceremony allows a vampire to bend
a wraith to their will.
■ Prerequisite Power: Where the Shroud Thins
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A wraith’s fetter, the caster’s vitae,
an item (or threat) sufficient to damage the fetter.
■ Process: The vampire must be in close
proximity to a wraith in order to use this power,
typically through use of Summon Spirit (CotBG p.
209). The necromancer casts a handful of their
own vitae in the wraith’s direction as they hold a
destructive item to the fetter (a knife, a hammer, a
gun, or potentially holding the fetter over a fire) or
speak threatening words that the wraith believes.
The vampire and wraith engage in a contest of
wills. If the vampire gains domination over the
wraith, the wraith must serve as the vampire
decrees, at least temporarily. If the opposite
occurs, the vampire is left mentally debilitated and
the fetter disappears from their grasp.
■ System: The vampire’s player makes an
Oblivion Ceremony roll vs. the wraith’s Resolve +
Composure (or Willpower, if these traits aren’t
defined). If they have no way of physically
threatening the fetter, the player must also make a
Manipulation + Intimidation roll (Difficulty equal
to the wraith’s Resolve + Composure).
If the player rolls more successes than the
wraith’s resistance roll on their Oblivion
Ceremony roll, the vampire can command the
wraith to perform a number of moderately
difficulty tasks (spying, research, answering
questions truthfully, etc.) equal to the number of
successes rolled. For every two successes, the
vampire can instead command the wraith to
perform a difficult task (such as attacking
someone, doing something repugnant to the
wraith’s sensibilities, etc.). On a critical win, the
vampire can demand any action from the wraith,
and it will try its best to complete the task. The
wraith remains in the vampire’s service until the
end of the chronicle or until it has fulfilled its
master’s commands, at which point it returns to
the Underworld with an eternal enmity for the
necromancer.
If the wraith wins the contest, the vampire
suffers the margin in Superficial Health damage.
The wraith then re-enters the Underworld.
The compulsion placed on the wraith ends
immediately if the vampire attacks them. If the
vampire harms the threatened fetter, the wraith
suffers between one and three Aggravated
Willpower damage (depending on the importance
of the fetter) and the wraith is sent back to the
Underworld to be tormented by, and possibly
converted into, a murderous spectre (VTM p.
377).
■ The Wraiths’ stat blocks can be found in the
SPCs Section
Level 3
Fortezza Sindonica
A modern variation on a powerful
Giovanni family warding spell, this Ceremony is
kept strictly within the Hecata clan. Intended to
severely disable or halt attacks or espionage from
other necromancers, this ward pulls tight the veil
in such a way that forces any wraith who attempts
38
to cross it to become momentarily stretched
between the worlds of the living and the dead.
■ Prerequisite Power: Where the Shroud Thins
■ ToAB
■ Ingredients: Powdered bones, salt, an iron or
silver chain long enough to encircle the desired
area, the caster’s vitae, a severed human finger, a
metal basin.
■ Process: The steel chain is laid along the
circumference of the desired area, meeting and
leaving no gaps. Mixing the ingredients into the
basin, the caster dips their hands into the mixture,
coating up to the wrist, and applies the mixture by
hand along the chain at equidistant intervals. With
a final sigil located in the center of the chain, the
Ceremony is complete. Wraiths who attempt to
cross the chain are dragged into a horrid
momentary echo of physical form, often in states
of torturous wailing terror. Wraiths so affected are
temporarily visible to any casual onlooker, leading
to terrifying tales of the appearance of screaming
ghosts.
■ System: This Ceremony costs three Rouse
Checks instead of the usual one, but the caster
does not make their Ceremony roll until a wraith
attempts to cross the chain, triggering its effect.
This Ceremony is strongest when fresh, but lasts a
year and a day after it’s performed. If the ward is
triggered more than seven days after it was
performed, subtract two dice from their pool. The
wraith rolls their Willpower in a contest against
the caster and if the necromancer succeeds, they
inflict torturous pain upon their victim. The wraith
suffers three points of Superficial Health damage
and can’t enter the circle (or leave if it instead
points inward). If trapped within the boundary,
they lose two dice to all Willpower rolls and rolls
to use their supernatural abilities. The other
parameters of this warding Ceremony are identical
to Blood Sorcery Warding circles (see VtM, p.
275).
If the wraith is possessing an individual or
object when they cross the chain, the same effects
apply, and the unlucky individual suffers 3
Superficial Willpower damage as the wraith is
violently forced from them.
Harrowhaunt
Some places seem haunted, raising the
hackles of mortal and vampire alike. A place
Harrowhaunted is in a different league. Places
subjected to this Ceremony convey a sense of such
miasmic dread that most breathing creatures find it
hard to, well, breathe, let alone stay. Sabbat
vampires often use this to discourage unwanted
visitors from lingering in the proximity of their
communal havens. While it won’t scare away
encroaching vampires, most mortals will
unconsciously take the long road around it, or
make up excuses for why they’ll check up on the
rumors surrounding the place “tomorrow...
probably.”
■ Prerequisite: Aura of Decay
■ StBH
■ Ingredient: Mortals subjected to abject terror
and suffering. The more the merrier.
■ Process: It starts with a “party.” A number of
mortals are confined to the place and inflicted with
terror and torture that ends with their death. But
this is no mercy. The broken remains of their
souls, scarcely more than fear-urges and sublime
revulsion, are bound to the place, their bones
buried in the ground, and made to share their
torment with anyone who enters uninvited.
■ System: Mortals entering the vicinity (anything
up to a two-story building) are beset by an
irrational terror, requiring a Composure + Resolve
test each turn to remain. If they fail they will
indulge any excuse to leave, or run shrieking on a
total failure. Vampires are less affected, but each
scene spent in the location requires a test for fear
frenzy.
Host Spirit
This Ceremony allows a vampire to open
their body to possession by a ghost. The benefits
of having a wraith ride one’s body come in the
form of an enhanced physique, access to
whichever memories the wraith chooses to share,
and the wraith’s voice offering the vampire
advice. The wraith can take complete possession
39
of the vampire if they wish to, which some
necromancers view as a blessing to be
experienced, and others deem the main reason not
to use this power. Allowing a wraith to control
one’s actions for a night is an effective way of
confusing and mollifying the Beast, as well as
demonstrating physical prowess and knowledges
the vampire may not usually possess.
■ Prerequisite Power: Aura of Decay
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A gift to be made as tribute to a
wraith (whether the wraith values it depends on
the individual), a parasitic bug, two teeth extracted
from the vampire’s mouth
■ Process: The vampire must be in close
proximity to a wraith in order to use this power,
typically through use of Summon Spirit (CotBG p.
209). The necromancer presents a tribute to the
wraith, sometimes in the form of alcohol poured
on the wraith’s gravesite, or a bag of coins to be
buried in the earth, or even the freshly decapitated
head of one of the wraith’s until-recently living
enemies. The vampire then pulls two teeth from
their mouth, usually with pliers, and bites into a
parasite with their remaining teeth. The vampire
then opens their mouth and the wraith can choose
to jump inside, inhabiting the vampire’s body.
■ System: The vampire’s player makes a
successful Oblivion Ceremony roll. If the wraith
agrees to the proposition, it then enters the
vampire’s body and can remain for a number of
scenes equal to the successes rolled on the
Oblivion Ceremony roll. With the wraith inside
them, the vampire gains +2 dice to all Physical
Attribute rolls and +2 Health until the wraith
departs. The vampire can hear the wraith in their
head, with its advice, cajoling, or supportive
words provided by the Storyteller.
A wraith can choose to assert its
possession instead of acting as a passenger. If the
vampire resists, they make a Resolve +
Composure roll vs. the wraith’s Resolve +
Composure. If successful, the wraith’s influence is
rejected. If failed, the wraith steers the vampire
until the end of the scene, though it can’t make the
vampire do anything self-destructive. On a critical
win, the wraith is ejected entirely and returns to
the Underworld. On a total failure, the wraith can
make a vampire harm themself, but returns to the
Underworld after the first injury is sustained.
A vampire whose body succumbs or is
voluntarily opened to the possession attempt finds
all Willpower damage healed once the wraith
departs, as the spirit subdues the Beast for as long
as it is present.
Knit the Veil
Using the knowledge gained from their
mastery of
the beyond, the necromancer is able to not only
mend minor tears in the shroud, but sear shut any
weakness, making the area impenetrable for the
duration of the Ceremony.
■ Prerequisite Power: Where the Shroud Thins
■ ToAB
■ Ingredients: Ground bones, an iron needle, cat
gut thread, the caster’s vitae, a goat tallow candle.
■ Process: The caster scatters the powdered bone
around an area no larger than a football field to
mark the boundary of this Ceremony. Then, they
prepare the candle by piercing their flesh and
passing the thread under their skin. Using the
needle, they carve runes down the length of the
candle and then wrap the thread around it until
they pull it from under their skin. The candle may
then be placed inside the boundary and lit, burning
with a pale and unmoving flame that artificially
thickens the Shroud around it with radiating,
uncomfortable warmth.
■ System: When lighting the candle, the caster
makes their Ceremony roll, subtracting one die
from their pool for every wraith present within the
boundary, on either side of the Shroud. Upon a
win the Shroud density (CotB p. 205) of the area
becomes Impenetrable for as long as the candle
burns. On a critical win, the Ceremony’s duration
is doubled and no being may spy across the
Shroud. Undisturbed, it persists for as many nights
as the caster has Oblivion dots. Another
necromancer who attempts to Split the Shroud
(CotB p. 213) here must win against the caster’s
successes as a Difficulty, doing so ends this
40
Ceremony and reduces the Shroud density as per
that Ceremony.
Leer of Hades
Leer of Hades - In Ancient Greece, the
Harbingers of Skulls knew the Followers of Set as
Childer of Typhon, the Serpents recognizing the
Harbingers as kin of Hades. The close relationship
the bloodlines shared led to their coordination of
powers, to ensure the souls of their kin who met
Final Death would go on serving their respective
clans. This technique was used to reward loyal kin
with honored places in the afterlife, as often as it
was used to punish errant vampires with eternal
servitude. It has since been fine-tuned so as to
distance the Hecata bloodline from The Ministry.
■ Prerequisite Power: Aura of Decay
■ This Book
■ Ingredients: Ashes of a cremated corpse, the
Necromancers Vitae
■ Process: The Necromancer sprinkles the ashes
of a cremated corpse into a vial or jar, mixing the
ashes with their vitae. The Necromancer must then
smear the blend over their eyes when they wish to
use the Leer of Hades.
■ System: The necromancer must successfully fix
another vampire with their gaze without breaking
eye contact for at least 10 seconds (see avoiding
eye contact on p. 255 in the Core book for victims
actively trying to avoid it) up to one week prior to
that vampire’s Final Death. The gaze of the
necromancer is burned into the soul of the
vampire, and if she dies within the week, the night
following her death will see her reconstituted as a
wraith in the necromancer’s presence. The wraith
is not bound to service unless separate powers are
used.
Name of the Father
Priests of Shalim have all been trained to
use their voices as weapons, slicing through the
sugar coating their victims wrap around their love
for the world. By invoking the name of their dark
master and calling for his aid, they channel a
fraction of his power into an adversary and cloud
their very mind with shadow, causing them to
stand dumbstruck by the emptiness of Oblivion.
■ Prerequisite Power: Shadow Perspective (see
CbN)
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: The ability to speak ancient Greek,
eye contact with a victim, five charcoal sticks
■ Process: The priest invokes an incantation in a
dialect of ancient Greek, invoking the name of
Shalim as they crush four charcoal sticks in hand.
These words are spoken while making eye contact
with the victim, therefore the victim must be able
to see and hear the user for this power to be
successful. Upon crushing the final charcoal stick,
a shadow crosses the eyes of the priest and those
of the victim, leaving the eyes of each participant
entirely black as the victim succumbs to a
crushing sense of despair. Those who have
experienced this power and lived to tell of it speak
of an all-consuming darkness closing in around
their thoughts and robbing them of all sensation.
The last thing they recall is a distant, rumbling
laughter echoing in their mind.
■ System: The vampire’s player makes their
Ceremony roll vs. the victim’s Resolve +
Composure. On a win, the vampire may activate
this Ceremony’s effects any time they are in the
victim’s presence. Upon activation, the victim is
paralyzed with despair for a number of turns equal
to the margin. While under this effect, victims
cannot see, hear or experience any form of sensory
input except touch and physical pain, which brings
them out of the effect. The victim can expend
Willpower equal to the number of turns they
would remain paralyzed to break free of the
power.
Shambling Hordes
This Ceremony enables a necromancer to
raise a group of aggressive,
walking dead minions.
■ Prerequisite Power: Aura of Decay
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A human corpse (or multiple
human corpses), a fresh human sacrifice.
41
■ Process: The vampire must have a separate
corpse in addition to a human prepared for
sacrifice. The vampire murders the sacrificial
victim, spilling their blood on the corpse or
corpses intended for animation. If
the Ceremony is successful, the corpses stand (the
recent sacrifice does not), revived with the fresh
blood, and serve the vampire’s commands, even
moderately complex orders such as “kill everyone
who enters,” “groan if you see anyone pass this
way,” or “terrorize that neighborhood.” Unlike the
corpses raised using the Gift of False Life (CotBG
p. 208), these animated dead do not sit idle if left
without commands, instead attacking anyone
around them except for their master.
■ System: The player makes their Ceremony roll,
possibly incurring Stains in the process depending
on the Chronicle Tenets and the Storyteller’s
discretion. Due to the amount of blood spilled in
this Ceremony, the caster must test to resist
hunger frenzy (Difficulty 2).
Upon a win a number of aggressive dead equal to
the necromancer’s Oblivion rating or the number
of prepared bodies (whichever is lower) receive
the gift of animation. A critical win doubles their
Oblivion rating for the purpose of determining
corpses raised. Corpses animated this way do not
decay and only enter repose if commanded to by
the vampire, if the vampire meets final death, or if
they are destroyed.
As per the normal rules for temporary
Advantages like these (see VTM p. 180), their
continued usefulness beyond the current story
must be ensured with Experience — such as
through the Retainers Background (see VTM p.
196) — or the aggressive corpses may become
unstable and unruly.
■ The Aggressive Corpse’s stat blocks can be
found in the SPCs Section.
Level 4
Befoul Vessel
While many of the entropic effects of
Oblivion
are restricted to mortals, this Ceremony allows the
wielder to infect the blood of a vessel, making an
otherwise healthy-appearing mortal into pure
poison to the children of Caine.
■ Prerequisite: Necrotic Touch
■ StBH
■ Ingredient: The vampire’s saliva
■ Process: The vampire needs only introduce a
drop of their spittle to the skin of their victim,
either by feeding on them or by smearing it upon
them through physical contact.
■ System: A victim befouled in this way shows no
symptoms, and is unaware of the harm done to
them or the danger they pose to the undead.
Anyone feeding on them will likewise be unaware
of the effects apart from a rancid strangeness to
their Blood. (Generous Storytellers can allow a
Wits + Survival test at Difficulty 3 to notice that
something is amiss, allowing the player to abort
their feeding.) Once the feeding is done, the effect
occurs: The feeding vampire gains Hunger instead
of sating it, on a 1-for-1 basis. (A vampire who
would’ve sated three Hunger would gain three
Hunger.) This will likely risk hunger frenzy (see
Vampire: The Masquerade p. 220).
No matter if they are fed on or not, the
infected mortal dies in their sleep the following
night, the only clue to their fate a patch of –
mildew? – and acrid night-sweat.
Bind the Spirit
Vampires with access to this Ceremony
have the ability to bind wraiths to specified
locations and people.
■ Prerequisite Power: Necrotic Plague
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A wraith’s fetter, the caster’s vitae,
the sacrifice of an innocent human, sufficient salt
to surround a property or individual. If the target
for haunting is an individual, the necromancer
must possess
something of their body, such as fingernails, hair,
blood, or skin.
■ Process: The vampire must already have a
wraith under their control using Compel Spirit
(CotBG p.210). The vampire kills an innocent
42
human (though innocence is subjective, this tends
to apply to the young, caregivers, and genuinely
pious individuals) in or close to a location or
person they want their wraith to haunt.
Subsequently, they mix their vitae with sufficient
salt to surround the target for haunting, and paint a
circle with the mixture. The wraith’s fetter is
placed somewhere within the location or the
target’s possession. From this point, the wraith is
forever bound to the target, unless the vampire
cancels the Ceremony, the fetter ever moves from
the location or individual’s possession, or the
wraith is destroyed. Binding also ends if the
necromancer attacks the wraith. Most wraiths
bound in this way are furious or melancholic
about their plight, and their mood affects the area
around them. Many necromancers use this method
to defend their havens or haunt their enemies.
■ System: Following the steps of the Ceremony,
the vampire may incur Stains from the murder
depending on the Chronicle Tenets and the
Storyteller’s discretion. They make an Oblivion
Ceremony roll that cannot be resisted, as the
wraith must already be compelled for this power
to work.
The wraith is bound in
perpetuity to the location or
individual targeted, with no
duration applied to this Ceremony’s
effects. Any emotion the wraith
feels intensely during its binding
affects the inhabitants of the
location or the individual to whom
it’s bound, with each person
affected suffering −2 dice to all
rolls made to resist acting or
feeling the way the wraith feels.
Therefore, an angry wraith may make
vampires more inclined to frenzy,
while a depressed wraith might make
a mortal more likely to stop self-
care. Bound wraiths have the same
powers as spectres
(VTM p. 377).
Death Rattle
This Ceremony allows the caster to inflict
the full sensory experience of a chosen wraith’s
death upon a target.
■ Prerequisite Power: Fatal Precognition
■ ToAB
■ Ingredients: A wraith’s fetter, a personal item
owned by the intended target (living or undead,
but not another wraith), the caster’s vitae, over
proof rum, a black candle, a clay bowl large
enough to hold the fetter and target’s personal
belonging.
■ Process: The caster must be in close proximity
to the desired wraith in order to successfully
complete the Ceremony, typically through the use
of Summon Spirit. The fetter and target’s
possession are combined in the bowl along with
the caster’s vitae. The candle is held over the bowl
and lit allowing the wax to drip into the contents
of the bowl. The name of the wraith and the target
are chanted repeatedly. As the wax melts, it forms
a seal between the items inside of the bowl,
creating a bridge between the wraith and the
desired target. When this seal is broken, the rum
ignites the possession of the target and they
experience the death of the wraith.
■ System: The caster makes their Ceremony roll
and the target contests with Composure + Resolve
whether or not they know they’re being targeted.
On a win by the caster the victim experiences a
vision of the wraith’s death, with a higher margin
leading to a more vivid experience. For example,
one point of margin is enough for the target to
have brief flashes of the moment, while five may
cause the target’s experience to be so vivid that
they will be shocked to realize they’re not dead
afterwards. If the wraith died a violent death, this
causes Superficial Willpower damage equal to the
margin of the roll, but even a peaceful death
inflicts one point as they experience the wraith’s
dying gasp. A critical win from the target
rebounds this trauma back onto the necromancer,
inflicting the margin as Superficial Willpower
damage to them instead.
Be it a personal curiosity in death, to
investigate the situation of a death first hand, or an
attempt to gain a deep understanding of a
43
particular wraith, the caster may wish to be the
target of the Ceremony. They roll only against the
normal Ceremony Difficulty, and the caster must
open their mind to accept any resulting Willpower
damage.
Split the Shroud
This Ceremony allows a vampire to create
a tear in the Shroud through which wraiths can
pass and vampires with the correct Ceremonies
can physically enter the Shadowlands.
■ Prerequisite Power: Necrotic Plague
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A scalpel that’s been used to cut
into someone living, chalk or charcoal, a silk
sheet, a human sacrifice.
■ Process: The vampire hangs a silk sheet over a
wall in a place where the Shroud density (CotBG
p. 205) is standard, thin, or frayed. They then
murder a human sacrifice against the sheet,
usually via some manner of bloodletting, and as
blood coats the sheet, cut it open with a scalpel.
The Ceremony widens the portal between the
world of the living — which wraiths call the
Skinlands — and the Shadowlands. Wraiths who
enter the Skinlands via this method take to
haunting locations and people, indulging in their
passions, and possess humans if their powers
allow for it. Some treat the vampire with gratitude
for splitting the Shroud, while others enjoy
harassing the necromancer responsible.
■ System: The caster kills the
human sacrifice, which may result in
Stains depending on the Chronicle
Tenets and the Storyteller’s
discretion. When cutting the silk
sheet with a scalpel, their player
makes the Ceremony roll (with −1
Difficulty if the scalpel was used in
the human sacrifice). Due to the
amount of blood spilled in this
Ceremony, the
caster must roll to resist falling into hunger frenzy
(Difficulty 2). For every success on the Ceremony
roll, the Shroud’s density reduces by a level, down
to being absent.
Following this Ceremony, vampires can
access the Shadowlands with Ex Nihilo more
easily, but importantly, if the Shroud rating is
reduced to absent, wraiths can spill into the
Skinlands as they see fit for the remainder of the
chapter. Once the chapter concludes, a Shroud
density of absent increases to frayed and the
gateway for wraiths closes.
Level 5
Ex Nihilo
This Ceremony enables a vampire and
their coterie to migrate into the Shadowlands,
though doing so comes at great risk.
■ Prerequisite Power: Withering Spirit
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: Masks for each participant, a bowl
containing sufficient quantity of the caster’s vitae
so each participant might coat the soles of their
feet in it, two coins of any value per participant.
■ Process: Few Ceremonies of Oblivion come
with as much doubt and fear as Ex Nihilo, the
ability to migrate into the Shadowlands. This
Ceremony enables a physical crossing into the
lands of entropy. Vampires who physically enter
the Shadowlands may interact with wraiths as if
they were solid, but cannot carry objects beyond
those on their person with them. Vampires
destroyed in the Shadowlands disappear in a
vortex of blood and ash, sucked into the false earth
beneath their feet.
Ex Nihilo appeals to a great many
necromancers and mystics who want to study the
Shadowlands without the impediment of a time
limit. It’s an unmatched method for interviewing
ghosts and exploring the necropoli — the cities
spirits inhabit. It’s also incredibly dangerous, as
many wraiths — especially spectres — seek to
destroy vampires, draining them of their
Willpower, and there’s always the risk of meeting
the ghost of someone the vampire slew years
earlier. Such wraiths tend to hold a Grudge.
The vampire must have used the
Split the Shroud Ceremony within this chapter, in
the location they’re currently occupying, in order
44
for Ex Nihilo to function. If the Shroud density is
reduced to absent, the caster and any companions
may enter the Shadowlands from that point, if they
don masks to cover their faces, dip or paint their
feet in the vampire’s vitae, and carry a coin in
each hand.
■ System: The user makes three Rouse Checks
(sufficient to expend the required vitae) and
expends a Willpower point to prepare for the
crossing. They then make their Ceremony roll. If
successful, the vampire, a number of companions
equal to the number of successes rolled, and any
objects on their person may then enter the
Shadowlands.
The Shadowlands follows several rules
that do not exist in the world of the living:
◻ Wraiths are capable of physical attacks on
vampires (see VTM, p. 377 for an average
spectre’s stat block) but some are also capable of
attacking a vampire’s Willpower specifically, as
they drain a vampire’s passion. Defense pools
against Willpower drain, which a wraith can
attempt up to 3 yards/meters from the vampire, are
made up from the vampire’s Resolve +
Composure, vs. the attacking wraith’s Strength +
Brawl. This attack inflicts Aggravated Willpower
damage.
◻ Though there is no sun (and therefore no
daytime) in the Shadowlands, the vampire must
still Rouse the Blood every 24 hours. With no
sunlight, they are able to operate without rest.
◻ Vampires in the Shadowlands cannot interact
with the world of the living in a meaningful way.
They can only touch or speak with living creatures
by ending this Ceremony, which takes the
expenditure of a Willpower point and another
Rouse Check in a place where the Shroud isn’t
impenetrable. They can see snatches of motion
through the Shroud, and a Discipline such as
Auspex may enable them to spy from beyond the
veil, but for the most part, anything viewed has a
Difficulty 4 or more to perceive.
◻ Vampires can use their Disciplines in the
Shadowlands just as they can in the land of the
living.
◻ If a vampire is compelled to feed in the
Shadowlands, they cannot obtain sustenance from
wraiths without the Passion Feast power (CotBG
p.206), but can feed from mortals or other
vampires with them.
◻ Oblivion absorbs individuals who lose all
Health or Willpower in the Shadowlands. They
leave no wraiths if destroyed.
◻ Vampires cannot bring wraiths out of the
Shadowlands without a Ceremony such as
Summon Spirit (see CotBG p. 209), which must
be used in the land of the living to have this effect.
■ Duration: Until the power is deactivated or the
vampire is destroyed
Lazarene Blessing
This Ceremony enables a necromancer to
bring a freshly-dead body back to life, though not
how its relatives and friends might remember it.
■ Pre-required Power: Skuld Fulfilled
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: One human sacrifice, incense, the
heart of any mammal, powdered silver.
■ Process: The necromancer burns incense to
perfume the air before performing an act of human
sacrifice, cutting the heart of the victim out and
replacing it with the heart of another mammal,
though it doesn’t need to be stitched in and
working for the Ceremony to function. After
pouring a bag of powdered silver over the open
eyes of the dying or dead mortal, the vampire
invites a wraith to take the deceased mortal as a
host. Wraiths cannot be forced to possess a body,
but few refuse the opportunity to walk around in
semi-living shoes again.
■ System: Killing a mortal for this Ceremony may
incur Stains, depending on the Chronicle Tenets.
If the replacement heart was likewise taken from
someone the vampire murdered, that murder might
also incur Stains. Following a successful
Ceremony roll, a wraith can enter the freshly-dead
body and live in it as if it were their own. The
wraith must be present during the act of sacrifice.
The possessed corpse will wake bearing
the wounds that killed it, though the replacement
heart is functional (no matter its origin or
45
placement) and the body heals one point of Health
damage upon possession. The remaining Health
damage recovers with time. The body possesses
the same Physical Attributes, Disciplines (if a
ghoul), and Backgrounds it had in life. Social and
Mental Attributes, Skills, and any form of
morality rating match those of the wraith.
This possession lasts indefinitely, or until
the possessed body dies again or the wraith is
exorcised from the host. The body gains no special
resistances to harm beyond Disciplines it might
have possessed in life.
Pit of Contemplation
Only the most powerful of Shalim’s
priests have been able to manifest this ability, but
the effect is one of the most terrifying and
demonstrative uses of Oblivion yet seen in modern
nights. The ability to cast an enemy into Oblivion
terrifies even the toughest of Kindred.
■ Prerequisite Power: Tenebrous Avatar (see
CBN)
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: Pot of ink, three pints/six liters or
more of blood from an innocent the user
murdered, an unlit room (this power does not
work outside)
■ Process: The vampire personally murders an
innocent mortal, likely incurring Stains depending
on the Chronicle Tenets and their Convictions.
While innocence is subjective, traditional
sacrifices are children, virgins, and holy
individuals. The vampire then takes at least three
pints/six liters of the deceased’s blood into
an unlit room and uses it to paint a doorway on a
wall in the chamber. Finally, the vampire splashes
a pot of ink onto the blood-painted portal.
Focusing their will
upon the gateway, the priest opens a tear through
to Oblivion.
Anyone foolish or unfortunate enough to
fall into the gap is immediately transported into a
pocket of eternal black nothingness for as long as
the priest sees
fit. If the priest is destroyed without releasing their
prisoners, any undead prisoners remain trapped in
the void (unless and until another vampire
reverses the Ceremony). Priests may choose to
pass through the door, but doing so condemns
them forever. Some Shalimites do this when they
feel they have completed their work as a part of
the cult.
■ System: Following the Ceremony steps, the
priest’s player makes their Ceremony roll, and on
a success the effect is quick and implosive. A hole
opens at the point where ink and blood mix. The
hole draws objects, air, and people toward it and,
if they fail a Dexterity + Athletics roll (Difficulty
4), sucks them into a pocket within Oblivion.
While trapped, victims are suspended in an
endless blackness. They cannot see or hear anyone
or anything around themselves. Only the priest
who conjures this blasphemous gateway can free
those held within, by pouring a vampire’s vitae
over the painted door (sufficient to provoke a
Rouse Check). Mortals sucked into Oblivion are
instantly killed.
Potence
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Hulking, Blood’s Might, Percutio
There is a popular saying among the
members of Clan Brujah: “You only
underestimate our strength once.” Potence is vitae
fueled strength above and beyond other vampires’
capabilities. More powerful than any performance-
enhancing drug, more unnatural than the physique
of any bulging bodybuilder, Potence is the Beast
let loose through the fists, feet, limbs, and raw
bodily power of a vampire. The Discipline is used
for more than just hitting things, though it is
certainly good for this task. It is the vampire’s
ability to force their body into actions impossible
for mortals to replicate. Potence trumps the other
Disciplines in sheer incongruity – an elderly-
looking Nosferatu strikes harder than a mortal
heavyweight boxer or a Brujah Embraced as a
child can decapitate a target with one blow.
46

Characteristics
■ Type: Physical
■ Masquerade threat: Medium to high. Lesser
exercises of the Discipline might be passed off as
“hysterical strength,” but once pavement cracks
and buildings start to crumble that explanation
loses what little credibility it had.
■ Blood Resonance: Choleric. The strong and
healthy; athletes and young men and women in
their prime, gym rats, wrestlers, construction
workers and lumberjacks, Longshoremen.
Level 1
Lethal Body
Using this power, the user is capable of
causing horrendous damage to mortals, tearing
skin and breaking bones with bare fingers.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The user’s unarmed attacks can now do
Aggravated Health damage to mortals, if desired.
They also ignore one level of armor per Potence
level of the user.
■ Duration: Passive
Soaring Leap
Possessing unholy strength in more than
arms and fists, the user can leap far higher and
further than any mortal.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The user can jump a number of meters
equal to three times their Potence level vertically,
and five times their Potence level horizontally.
The user needs no run-up to make these leaps.
■ Duration: Passive
Level 2
Prowess
Vampires with Potence gain far greater
strength from their Blood than those who lack it.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: When activated, add the Potence rating
of the user to their unarmed damage value as well
as to feats of Strength, and add half their Potence
rating (round up) to their Melee damage.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 3
Brutal Feed
Known as the “Savage Kiss”, this power
allows the user to employ an unholy inner strength
when draining a victim. In mere seconds, the
attacker swallows torrents of blood while mauling
the victim. The result is an efficient, if messy,
feeding often employed in the heat of battle where
the mangled remains of the victim can be
disguised.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free.
■ System: The vampire can drain a human
completely in seconds, usually within a single
turn. Every point of Hunger slaked causes one
point of Aggravated Health damage to the victim,
as their blood vessels burst and organs bruise and
rupture internally. Using Brutal Feed on a vampire
does only Superficial Health damage
to their dead and inert organs.
In combat, Brutal Feed comes
immediately after a successful Brawl attack using
fangs. The victim first takes bite damage, then
damage from this power. Armor does not protect
against Brutal Feed, as the wounds are, or at least
begin as, mainly internal.
Storytellers may decide such mutilation-
killing warrants Stains (VTM p. 239).
■ Duration: One feeding
Spark of Rage
■ Amalgam: Presence 3
Combining Potence and Presence, the
vampire can incite anger and even frenzy in
onlookers, as easily as awe or dread. The user
must take care not to rile up an angry mob to turn
on them rather than the target or each other.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
47
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Potence
■ System: When active, the user can add their
Potence rating to any attempt to rile or incite a
person or a crowd to violence. In addition, the user
can activate this power and roll a contest of
Manipulation + Potence vs Composure +
Intelligence of another vampire. If they win, the
opposing vampire must make a fury frenzy test at
Difficulty 3.
■ Duration: One Scene
Uncanny Grip
Focusing their unnatural strength into
their toes and fingers, the vampire grips and
burrows their extremities into almost any surface,
enabling them to climb and even hang otherwise
unsupported from walls and ceilings. Close
observation reveals telltale scarring or
deformation on these surfaces afterward, however,
as this is an
application of brute force, not superhero-style
adhesion.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: A vampire using this power
automatically succeeds on any Skill test to climb a
non-metallic surface. The user might also be able
to climb copper or bronze cladding or other softer
metal surfaces, at the Storyteller’s discretion. Thin
glass surfaces (though generally not the glass
curtain walls of modern office buildings) may
shatter under the stress. In the same way, a
vampire can hang from a wall or ceiling for up to
one scene, though only barefoot vampires can
hang by their feet.
The climb or clinging leaves obvious
tracks detectable by anyone with an Intelligence +
Investigation test at Difficulty 2. Detecting
Uncanny Grip tracks on glass doesn’t even require
a roll.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 4
Draught of Might
The Blood of the vampire becomes
saturated with the power of Potence, conveying a
part of that power to anyone who drinks of it. This
is the Potence equivalent of Draught of Elegance
(VTM p.254).
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Drinking a Rouse Checks worth of
Blood directly from the user gifts the drinker with
temporary Potence equal to half the Potence dots
(rounded down) of the donor. The drinker gains
the same powers as the donor’s, up to that level.
■ Duration: One night; for vampires, until the next
feeding or the vampire reaches Hunger 5
Level 5
Earthshock
Their strength an elemental force, the
vampire can slam their fist or foot into the ground,
creating a shockwave that throws their opponents
prone. One of the more dramatic applications of
Potence, this power needs to be carefully
employed, lest the user literally bring the house
down upon themselves.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ System: No additional test is needed to create
the shockwave. (The ground is hard to miss.)
Anyone within a five meter radius of the user must
make a Dexterity + Athletics roll (Difficulty 3),
with the results below. Anyone prepared for the
Earthshock (such as the user’s companions) can
shift their results up by one step.
◻ Critical Win: No effect.
◻ Win: Knocked off balance. Lose current
action
◻ Failure: Fall prone. Lose current action; must
spend a turn getting up. This power causes
significant collateral damage. If used on the
ground, the earth cracks. If used indoors, furniture
breaks and mirrors shatter. On anything but the
ground floor the floor might shatter, causing
everyone within the radius to plummet to the floor
below. This power can only be used once per
scene.
48
■ Duration: One use
Fist of Caine
The vampire’s bare hands can inflict
grievous injuries, lethal to both mortals and other
vampires. They can dismember, pierce, impale,
decapitate, and even rip a heart out of the chest.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: For one scene the user can inflict
Aggravated Health damage to mortals and
supernaturals alike while Brawling, as they
literally rend flesh and tear their opponents limb
from limb with their bare hands.
■ Duration: One scene
Presence
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Superstardom, Enthrallment,
Sublimitas
Most vampires are creatures of grace and
lethality. Associated with horrific violence and
devastating beauty, Kindred embody opposites,
alternating between nightmare and dream
depending on the onlooker and the vampire’s
whims. Presence is a Discipline that expresses this
bipolar existence. Used to attract victims or
disperse them in fear, Presence allows crowd
control, emotional manipulation, and enforced
devotion. A mortal’s greatest fear could stand
before them and suddenly look like the most
radiant creature on Earth.
Many Presence practitioners use this
Discipline to easily acquire feeding vessels, while
others use it do stalk the night as creatures of
horror, making weak-willed kine flee terrified,
unsure of what they’ve just seen. Effective as a
lure as well as a defense, vampires with Presence
enjoy an easier nightlife at the expense of
forgetting what feelings projected at them are
normal and which are compelled.
Characteristics
Presence affects the emotions of those
subject to it, not the minds. While this is useful in
that victims are cognizant (unlike Dominate), they
are not under the direct control of the user and are
thus often unpredictable. In order to be affected by
Presence, the subject must be in the physical
presence of the user or at least
within earshot. The Discipline does not transmit
electronically unless the user possesses Star
Magnetism (Presence 5). Detecting the use of
Presence is very hard unless one has access to
Sense the Unseen (Auspex 1) and can even then
be too subtle to notice unless one is looking for it
specifically.
Presence power effects do not stack, so
someone using Awe and Entrancement on the
same subject would only add their Presence rating
once for any Social-based Persuasion rolls.
In combat, only the Dread Gaze and
Majesty powers have any effect, as charm is of
little use when someone has decided they want
you hurt.
■ Type: Mental
■ Masquerade threat: Low-Medium. A subtle
power, people seldom realize Presence has
affected them at all. As with most Disciplines, its
higher powers can leave puzzled witnesses behind,
especially once the effects wear off.
■ Blood Resonance: Sanguine. The beautiful and
lustful, those completely infatuated with the
vampire, models and actors and movie stars,
compelling public and private speakers from
politicians to car salesmen, YouTube sensations
and Instagram influencers.
Level 1
Awe
Anyone in the presence of the vampire
finds their attention inexplicably drawn to them.
Those listening to the vampire speak might
suddenly agree on subjects where they once held
different viewpoints. While this power doesn’t
cause rapt infatuation, it is still strong enough to
sway the minds of most mortals.
■ VTM
49
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Presence vs
Composure + Intelligence
■ System: Add the Presence rating to any Skill
roll involving Persuasion or Performance as well
as to other Charisma related rolls, at the
Storyteller’s discretion. Anyone aware that they’re
being affected can try to resist with a contest of
Composure + Intelligence vs the user’s
Manipulation + Presence. On a win, the target can
resist the effects for one scene; a critical win
makes the target immune for the entire night.
Once the power wears off, victims revert to their
previous opinions.
■ Duration: One scene or until intentionally ended
Daunt
Instead of attracting people, the vampire
uses Presence to repel. With this power the user
appears threatening and exudes an aura of menace
powerful enough to make most mortals avoid their
attention and even vampires think twice about
acting against them.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: Add the user’s Presence rating to any
Intimidation rolls. Attacking the user requires a
Resolve+Composure roll at Difficulty 2.
Vampires cannot use Awe and Daunt
simultaneously.
■ Duration: One scene or until intentionally ended
Eyes of the Serpent
■ Amalgam: Protean 1
The eyes of the vampire turn into slitted,
serpent-like orbs able to freeze a mortal meeting
the vampire’s gaze in place. The user can even
mesmerize other vampires with this power, though
the effect is short lived and likely to rouse the
victim’s ire.
■ VTMA
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Presence vs. Wits +
Composure
■ System: By catching the eye of a mortal (see
avoiding eye contact on p. 255 in the Core book
for victims actively trying to avoid it) the vampire
can immobilize a victim, keeping them frozen in
place as long as they themselves maintain eye
contact. The effect can only be maintained on a
single victim at a time, and ends if they suffer
damage or are forcibly removed.
Speech is still possible, though shouting is not. In
order to paralyze a vampire in the same way, the
user must win a contest of Charisma + Presence
vs. Wits + Composure. The vampire victim can
escape paralysis on any turn after the first by
spending a point of Willpower.
■ duration: Until eye contact is broken or the
scene ends.
Level 2
Lingering Kiss
The Kiss of a vampire induces near-
ecstasy in mortals, but this power leaves other
Kisses in the dust. Mortals fed upon by the user
become addicted to the Kiss, obsessing over it and
even seeking the vampire out for repeated
feedings. Mortals often become anemic, self-harm,
or even die from this addiction, but vampires find
it a useful power for cultivating a herd.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: The vampire can choose to use this
power or not during each feeding. The user adds
dice equal to their Presence to any subsequent
Charisma Attribute-assisted pool against the bitten
subject. A mortal fed upon with this power can
make a Willpower test (Difficulty equals the
user’s Presence) every week to resist the effects.
Winning this test for three consecutive weeks
breaks the effect, as does a single critical win.
■ Duration: Until successfully resisted.
Level 3
Dread Gaze
Briefly exposing their vampiric nature, the
user instills a single subject with utter terror.
Mortals are cowed, run, or freeze with fear, while
other vampires either submit like whipped dogs or
flee in frenzied Rötschreck.
50
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Presence vs Composure
+ Resolve
■ System: Displaying their fangs, their face
twisted in a predatory grimace, the user rolls a
contest of Charisma + Presence against their
target’s Composure + Resolve.
◻ Failure: Mortals are unable to act other than
in their own defense, backing off for a turn.
Vampires are unaffected.
◻ Win: Mortals run in fear. Vampires are
unable to act other than in their own defense for a
turn unless they spend Willpower equal to the
users margin of win (to a minimum of one).
◻ Critical Win: Mortals freeze or crumple into a
fetal position. Vampires must make a terror frenzy
test (Difficulty 3). If they win, they are still
affected as above.
■ Duration: One turn
Entrancement
The vampire focuses their unnatural allure
on a single person, instilling in them a rapt
fascination or infatuation akin to falling head over
heels in love or meeting one’s lifelong idol. The
person affected does their best to remain in the
vampire’s good graces, but stops short of causing
themselves or their other loved ones physical
harm.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Presence vs Composure
+ Wits
■ System: The vampire only needs to gain the
subject’s attention and win a contest of Charisma
+ Presence vs Composure + Wits. The effect lasts
for roughly one hour plus one per point of margin
on the win. The vampire can renew this effect
indefinitely, but a failure ends the effect and
makes the subject immune for the rest of the night.
After succeeding, the user adds dice equal
to their Presence rating to any Social dice pool
against the entranced subject. Requests resulting
in obvious harm to the subject or their loved ones,
or that oppose the subject’s Tenets, fail and
require an immediate power contest roll as above,
or the Entrancement immediately fails.
■ Duration: One hour plus one per point of margin
True Love’s Face
■ Amalgam: Obfuscate 3
Using a potent cocktail of concentrated
emotion and illusions, the vampire can alter a
mortal’s blood resonance or even risk a vampire’s
connection to Humanity. The victim (and only the
victim) perceives the vampire as a mortal they
hold strong emotional ties with (such as hate for a
rival, passion for a new lover, or the complicated
feelings a vampire holds for their Touchstone).
■ CotBG
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Presence vs.
Composure + Wits
■ System: To impersonate someone the victim has
strong emotions for, the vampire must know their
appearance and what the victim feels for them.
How they uncover this will vary between
vampires. When activated the Storyteller rolls a
hidden contest between the user’s Manipulation +
Presence and the victim’s Composure + Wits,
where failure means the visage holds no emotional
charge, which is deeply uncanny and sours any
social interaction with the victim. It also prevents
them from falling victim to this power for the rest
of the story. On a win, the vampire adds their
Presence rating to any rolls for affecting a mortal’s
resonance or a vampire’s
emotional state. Appearing as a vampire’s
Touchstone is a dangerous game, especially if the
victim possesses Sense the Unseen (VTM p. 249),
but played right it can lead to Stains for the victim
as their Touchstone appears to become damaged
or detached entirely through shifts in behavior,
ideals, or even apparent death.
■ Duration: One scene
Level 4
Irresistible Voice
■ Amalgam: Dominate 1
51
 The Presence of the user becomes a
conduit for Dominate. The vampire now only
needs their voice to be heard in order to employ
Dominate powers.
■ VTM
■ Cost: No additional cost
■ System: The user's voice alone is now enough to
Dominate a target. This does not apply to voices
transmitted through electronic media such as
phones, television, or apartment door-buzzer
speakers.
■ Duration: Passive
Magnum Opus
■ Amalgam: Auspex 3
A favored power of the Roses, with this
ability, the user may sublimate and infuse the
powers of the blood into their works of art -
capable of rendering sculptures so beautiful as to
make the viewer fall in love with them, or
paintings of such ghastly disquiet they make even
the most visceral Caravaggio seem facile by
comparison. This masterwork is merely an
illusion, however - a flash-in-the-pan beauty that
does not withstand deep scrutiny.
■ Cost: One or more Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Charisma, Manipulation + Crafts
■ System: Before embarking on a Project Roll to
create a work of art the user must one rouse check
for each roll made. The difficulty of the project
must be 10 or higher. Upon successful completion
of the project, the user finds that residual traces of
their Presence linger withing the work itself.
When your artwork is on display, audiences must
roll Composure + Resolve (Difficulty equal to the
user’s Presence rank) or succumb to the rough
equivalent of either Awe or Daunt exuding from
the piece. A Critical Success on the resistance roll
renders the subject immune to further influence by
the piece. Note: By integrating Disciplines into its
creation, the work of art has no true staying
power, aside from the initial exposure. Critics and
observers may find themselves suddenly able to
critique flaws or imperfections once they have left
the immediate area.
■ Duration: N/A
Summon
The vampire can call to themselves any
person, mortal or vampire, upon whom they’ve
previously used Awe, Entrancement, or Majesty,
or who has tasted their Blood at least once. The
target knows who is summoning them and the
user’s current location. This calling lasts for a
night. After that time, the effect subsides, but the
user can repeat it night after night if required to
reach the target or if the target is otherwise
reluctant.
Anyone Summoned feels a pull toward the
summoner and tries to reach them, though without
endangering themselves physically or financially.
They won’t sell their house to buy a ticket or miss
a vital meeting, but they might skip out of normal
work or social commitments.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Manipulation + Presence vs
Composure + Intelligence
■ System: The user needs to concentrate for five
minutes and think of the person being summoned,
then rolls Manipulation + Presence vs Composure
+ Intelligence. On a win, the target hears the
summoning, but may or may not heed it. On a
critical win, the target arrives as quickly as
possible, barring immediate risk to their well-
being.
■ Duration: One night
Level 5
Majesty
At this pinnacle of the Discipline the
vampire can amplify their countenance to
supernatural levels. Whether they appear as
heartrendingly beautiful, monstrously terrifying,
or wielding absolute command, everyone who
views them is struck by their image, unable to act
or even speak against the vampire. To experience
Majesty is to be in the presence of the divine - or
the Infernal.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
52
■ Dice Pools: Charisma + Presence vs Composure
+ Resolve
■ System: People in the presence of the user can
only stare, slack jawed, or avert their eyes in fear
or submission. Anyone wanting to act in any way
in opposition to the user, except for self
preservation, must successfully win a contest of
their Composure + Resolve vs. the vampire’s
Charisma + Presence. A win allows one turn of
freedom, plus one per point of margin; only a
critical win resists the effect for the entire scene.
■ Duration: One scene
Star Magnetism
The Presence powers of the user now
effect people viewing them on live feeds or
hearing them over the phone. Recorded images or
messages do not retain the effect, however.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One additional Rouse Check
■ System: Awe, Daunt, and Entrancement can be
transmitted through live feeds via screens or
phones. If Entrancement is used, the victim’s
name must be spoken clearly, as that power only
affects one person at a time. Anyone else viewing
the same transmission only finds the user
charming, but not supernaturally so.
■ Duration: As power used
Protean
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Morphing, Shapeshifting, Mutatio
Werewolves despise vampires for their
possession of this ability. They consider it a
mockery of their own nature, as undead beings
become wolves or bats, bearing claws and
gnashing fangs like one of their own. Yet, Protean
has flowed through the Blood for almost as long
as the Kindred have existed. The power to mutate,
shift form, and become ever-deadlier predators is
as natural to the vampire as
it is to the lupine. Practitioners of Protean employ
the Discipline for its utility.
The power enables a vampire to become a beast,
turn their limbs into weapons, or change their
shape into clouds of mist to evade capture, glide
through keyholes, or slip through cracks in a
window.
Characteristics
Protean powers that change the shape or
in other ways transform the body of the vampire
also affect clothing, swallowed items, and other
small (under a few grams) wearables. Protean does
not affect larger carried items, including
backpacks, duffel and sports bags. For this reason
users of Protean often travel light.
■ Type: Physical
■ Masquerade threat: High. One of the most overt
Disciplines available to vampires, more or less all
Protean powers can breach the Masquerade on
their own.
■ Blood Resonance: Animal blood, especially
animals matching shapeshifted forms; the blood of
werewolves, changelings, and other supernatural
chimeras of man and beast.
Level 1
Eyes of the Beast
The vampire can will a supernatural red
gleam into their eyes, giving them sight even in
the total absence of light.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: No roll is required to activate Eyes of
the Beast. While active the user ignores any sight
penalties imposed by darkness, including
supernatural. While active, the inhuman
appearance of the eyes confers two bonus dice to
Intimidation pools against mortals.
■ Duration: As long as desired
Weight of the Feather
The vampire can reduce their effective
mass and density, making themselves almost
weightless. This allows them to avoid triggering
pressure sensors as well as avoiding major damage
from falls, collisions, or being thrown. The power
53
cannot be used for longer leaps, as the vampire’s
strength is proportionally Reduced.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Survival
■ System: If the vampire has time to prepare, no
roll is required. As a reaction, such as during a
sudden fall, activating the power requires a Wits +
Survival roll at Difficulty 3. As long as the power
is in effect, the vampire is immune to damage
from falls, collisions, and being thrown. The user
also avoids triggering devices that rely on
pressure, at the Storyteller’s discretion.
■ Duration: As long as desired
Level 2
Feral Weapons
The vampire can extend their natural
weapons to monstrous proportions. This usually
takes the form of fingernails extending into
wicked talons but can also come in other forms
such as fangs elongating into veritable daggers, as
from a gigantic serpent.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: No skill roll is needed to activate this
power. When activated, the vampire adds a +2
modifier to their Brawl damage, and causes
Aggravated Health damage to mortals. Superficial
damage inflicted from Feral Weapons is not
halved.
■ Duration: One scene
Vicissitude
■ Amalgam: Dominate 2
Rare outside clan Tzimisce, this power
allows the vampire to demand obedience of their
own flesh. Skin, muscles, and even bone can be
sculpted or warped out of shape, the end result
sometimes unnervingly beautiful but just as often
monstrous. Skilled users can craft bizarre
characteristics or reshape their entire bodies,
though larger transformations exact a heavy toll
on their physique. Kindred who use Vicissitude
create everything from useful body-tools to…
expressive ornamentations.
■ VTMC
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Protean
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Roll Resolve + Protean. Every success
on the roll allows a single Vicissitude change to be
made to the user, though the total number of
changes cannot exceed the user’s Protean rating,
no matter the number of applications or successes.
Each change causes the loss of a single Physical
Attribute dot of the user, as the body mass must
come from somewhere. (No Attribute can be taken
below 1.) Each use of the power takes one full
turn to perform.
Potential Vicissitude changes are listed
below:
◻ Redistribution: Add a single dot to any of the
user’s Physical Attributes. This cannot cause any
Attribute to exceed 5 dots. These changes are
visible, but not Masquerade - threatening.
◻ Weapons (Once per subject only): The user
gains the equivalent of a light piercing or heavy
impact weapon (+2 Damage) in the form of bone
spurs or bludgeons of dense cartilage. (In contrast
to Feral Weapons, the damage caused by these
weapons is mundane, but Feral Weapons
employed by a vampire proficient in Vicissitude
often take the shape of similar osseous spikes and
blades.)
◻ Armor: One Attribute point can be turned into
two points of armor value (p. 304), with an upper
limit of six points of armor. This often takes the
form of reinforced sub-dermal reinforced bone or
layers of fat and cartilage, and appears
increasingly inhuman as the points so allocated
increase.
◻ Appearance: The user can change their
appearance, either for the sake of hiding their
identity, enhancing their Looks Merit, or to mimic
someone else. This is a time-consuming affair,
taking an entire scene to perform, and requires a
Dexterity + Craft test in order to succeed.
Difficulty is 3 to hide one’s identity, 4 to increase
Looks (each level of the Merit counts as one
change) and 5 to mimic a specific person. A
54
failure on the test yields no result (but the
Attribute dot is still lost) while a total failure
causes the Looks Merit to drop one level,
potentially turning into a Flaw if at baseline.
Nosferatu are unable to use this aspect of the
power for anything but hiding their identity.
◻ Other changes: More creative uses of this
power, such as creating a secret pouch somewhere
on the body or moving eyes around, are beyond
the scope of these mechanics, and the Storyteller
needs to decide on the number of changes (and
Attribute points lost) required, and the Difficulty
and time required for the operation. Dexterity +
Craft and Intelligence + Medicine are the most
important rolls in these cases. Changes can be
mended as aggravated damage, with each change
equivalent to a single level of damage (restoring
lost Attribute points accordingly).
■ Duration: Permanent
Level 3
Earth Meld
Becoming one with the soil, the vampire
sinks into the earth. Unless in torpor, the vampire
rises again the following night.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: No test is required, but the vampire
must be on a natural surface: rocks, raw earth,
grass, etc. This power does not work on concrete,
asphalt, or other artificial surfaces. It takes a turn
for the vampire to sink into the earth, leaving
carried objects behind atop the soil. While in the
earth the vampire is aware of their surroundings,
except during day-sleep. At those times,
disturbances (e.g., digging or loud noises) awaken
them or not as with all vampires (VTM p. 219).
■ Duration: One day or more, or until disturbed
Fleshcrafting
■ Amalgam: Dominate 2
■ Prerequisite: Vicissitude
Extending their mastery over flesh, the
vampire is now able to inflict their ministrations
on the bodies of others. The power is rightly
feared, as many of its users have a reputation for
inhuman torture, though some employ it to great
effect to enhance and adapt their servants and
allies.
■ VTMC
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Protean vs Stamina +
Resolve
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: In order to use this power, the user
must be able to work undisturbed on the subject,
who thus either needs to be willing or restrained.
For a willing subject, follow the same system as
Vicissitude (above). An unwilling subject can
resist with their Stamina + Resolve, with the
user’s margin counting as Vicissitude successes.
Each use of this power takes a full scene to
perform. Again, the total number of changes
cannot exceed the user’s Protean rating, no matter
the number of applications or successes. In case of
multiple users working on a single subject, only
count the highest Protean rating.
Changes can be mended as aggravated
damage, with each change equivalent to a single
level of damage. (Mortals will thus require
extensive surgery.)
■ Duration: Permanent
Shapechange
The vampire can assume the shape of an
animal roughly the same size as their original
mass. The vampire can only change into one type
of animal (usually a wolf, sometimes a large feline
or a giant snake), usually one associated with their
clan or the type of prey they most commonly feed
on. The animal, while usually a spectacular
example of their species, shows no signs to a
mundane observer of being Supernatural.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: No test is required. The transformation
takes one turn, during which the user may take no
other actions. Upon transformation, the vampire
gains the Physical Attributes, senses, and native
Skills associated with that animal (VTM p. 373)
and also gains that animal’s natural limits of
communication, manipulation (most animals can
55
carry one thing in their mouth), and so forth. The
vampire can use other Disciplines, at the
Storyteller’s discretion. (By and large, they can
use Auspex, Animalism, Celerity, Fortitude,
Potence, and Protean; many powers of Dominate,
Obfuscate, and Presence pose problems; Blood
Sorcery is completely off the table.)
■ Duration: One scene unless ended voluntarily
before that
Visceral Absorption
■ Amalgam: Blood Sorcery 2
A seldom-seen but unmistakably effective
way to clean up a mess, this power turns the body
of the vampire semi-permeable while drawing
inert blood and viscera in the vicinity inside them,
feeding their Beast and sating their Hunger. Other
bodily remains, bereft of blood, crumble to ash or
vanish in greasy smoke. While the vampire using
the power draws blood and gore to themselves, the
surrounding area is left remarkably clean, and the
Sabbat able to employ this ability use it as a way
to cover their tracks with great effect.
■ Cost: 1 Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: Strength + Protean
■ System: Use of this power requires at least one
dead body in the area of effect, roughly an area
extending 5 meters in all directions from the user.
The vampire rolls Strength + Protean, and is able
to absorb the blood and eradicate the remains of
one body per success rolled. The state of the body
is of no significance so long as it is fresh, and
even “somebody” whose remains are little more
than a red smear will be consumed.
The user sates one Hunger per body
affected, but cannot sate more Hunger per use than
their Blood Sorcery rating, nor can they reduce it
below one through this power. Using this power
takes one turn per body absorbed. It should also be
noted that, while efficient in getting rid of
evidence, the power is extremely overt while in
use, as the user becomes a literal vortex of blood
and viscera. Vampire remains aren’t affected by
this power.
■ Duration: One turn per body
Level 4
Horrid Form
■ Amalgam: Dominate 2
■ Prerequisite: Vicissitude
With a mastery of the body so complete
that it surpasses natural limitations, the vampire
can take on a truly monstrous form, complete with
vicious claws, protruding fangs, ridged features,
and corded muscles. Although its exact traits can
vary between occasions, the form often has an
individual, specific appearance that manifests
every time this power is used, a vision of the
user’s Beast made flesh. Some look like hellishly
malformed animals, some look demonic or
atavistic, and some defy any sense of worldly
familiarity. Many incorporate the traits of other
vampires in nature, such as leeches, bats, ticks,
and mosquitoes, magnified to grotesque
proportions.
■ VTMC
■ Dice Pools: None
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Horrid Form takes a full turn to
activate, during which time the vampire can only
defend, using their pre-Horrid Form dice pools. It
then grants the vampire a number of free
Vicissitude changes (no Attribute dots are lost)
equal to their Protean rating. These can be spent
on Redistribution, Weapons, and Armor. Generous
Storytellers can also consider other changes such
as wing-like membranes allowing the vampire to
glide, extended limbs for reach, or other creative
(but fair) uses. However, with the Beast so close
to the surface, any criticals rolled while using
Horrid Form for any reason are considered messy
criticals, and any Frenzy test taken is done at a +2
Difficulty level. The vampire also assumes an
unmistakably inhuman appearance and is unable
to communicate in anything but grunts, hisses, and
roars.
■ Duration: One scene, unless voluntarily ended
sooner.
Metamorphosis
■ Prerequisite: Shapechange
56
 This power grants an additional animal
form to the user, this time also enabling them to
change their size. Vampires most commonly
metamorphose into bats, rats, unusually large
insects, or snakes. (VTM p. 373)
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Same as Shapechange.
■ Duration: One scene unless ended voluntarily
before that.
Level 5
The Heart of Darkness
■ Amalgam: Fortitude 2
Practiced almost exclusively by vampires
within the higher echelons of the Church of Set,
this power enables a vampire to remove their own
heart and store it outside their body. The
vampire’s flesh and bone warp as they reach their
hand into their bare chest without the need for
incision, after which point, they remove the heart.
This power is not without risk to the practitioner,
and can only be used by a vampire on themselves.
The vampire typically places the heart in a
ceremonial canopic jar or urn, though there is no
restriction as to where the heart can go. Many
cult-minded Kindred take advantage of the fact the
organ can retain vitae, and even slake their Hunger
from afar, by receiving ritualistic blood donations.
For as long as it is removed, the vampire is
immune to staking attempts, unless a stake is
driven through the removed heart. The vampire’s
emotions are detached — metaphysically and
biologically, if the heart can be said to be the font
of emotion — providing them a resilience against
their Beast’s urges but a remove from compassion
and warmth.
■ CotBG
■ System: This power requires no roll, but inflicts
two Aggravated Health damage to the vampire
when removing their heart. No powers can be used
to mitigate this damage, and reattaching the heart
requires two Rouse Checks. Once removed the
vampire gains a two-dice bonus to resist frenzy,
but suffers a two-die penalty on Remorse rolls. If
the heart is dealt Aggravated Health damage equal
to or greater than the vampire’s Health, they fall
into torpor. If an extracted heart is destroyed —
only possible with fire or sunlight — the vampire
experiences final death. While the heart is
removed, the vampire’s body cannot be staked
unless the heart is located and separately impaled,
in which case the vampire falls paralyzed. If blood
is fed to the heart, it will slake the vampire’s
Hunger as normal (even Blood Bonding them if
fed Kindred vitae from the vein), and the heart can
be fed from in the same way — possibly leading
to diablerie. The vampire is still susceptible to
death via fire or sunlight even without a heart.
■ Duration: Permanent (or until the heart is
destroyed/returned)
Mist Form
The vampire gains the legendary power to
turn into a cloud of mist, perceivable to the eye
but untouchable by anything save fire, sunlight,
and supernatural aggression. They can fit through
pipes, crevices, and cracks. While strong winds
might buffet them, no natural force can disperse
the cloud.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One to three Rouse Checks
■ System: No roll is required. The transformation
takes three turns, though it can be sped up with
additional Rouse Checks on a one-for-one basis.
While in mist form, the vampire moves at walking
pace and perceives their surroundings through
mystical means as if there as normal. A vampire in
mist form cannot make eye contact or speak. They
can use only those Disciplines requiring no
physical form or presence, at the Storyteller’s
discretion.
While in mist form the vampire can only be
damaged by sunlight, fire, and immaterial
supernatural attacks (such as some Rituals).
■ Duration: One scene unless ended voluntarily
before that.
One with the Land
■ Amalgam: Animalism 2
■ Prerequisite: Earth Meld
57
 The Kindred possesses such mastery over
their own form that they may extend it even into
their domain itself. Not only may the vampire sink
into the very earth, they maintain a preternatural
awareness of events transpiring within the domain.
■ VTMC
■ Cost: Two Rouse Checks
■ System: As with Earth Meld (VTM p. 270),
except the vampire is not limited by the makeup of
the surface where they take their rest. Some
vampires have been known to suffuse themselves
into the walls of their manors, while others secrete
themselves beneath the warped floorboards of a
squat, or even hide beneath a shallow pool of
“dead water.”
Additionally, in a distance of one mile in
any direction from where the vampire’s body has
become One with the Land, the vampire may elect
to experience any sensory stimuli within that area,
such as listening to a conversation therein,
physically enjoying a lovers’ tryst, or catching the
scent of a fire that an unruly mob may be stoking.
The vampire experiences these senses through the
presence of animals, however minute, in the
vicinity of the events. If the events are discreet or
intentionally hidden, a Wits + Animalism test vs.
the relevant opposing dice pool used is required.
Rising from this state before nightfall the
day after it has been entered requires a Resolve +
Protean test at Difficulty 4, and even then it can
take up to an hour for the vampire to fully
reemerge. A critical win allows them to rise
instantly, however.
■ Duration: One day or more, or until physically
disturbed
The Unfettered Heart
Having mastered the power of Protean,
the very insides of the user become malleable,
almost viscous. The heart, seat of the vitae and
unlife of the vampire, detaches and moves freely,
if sluggishly, within the chest. This makes the
vampire exceedingly hard to stake as the position
of their heart changes nightly, and can even allow
the user to free themselves from paralysis.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ System: Increases the Difficulty on any non-
combat test to stake the vampire by three. In
Melee combat, only if the stake-wielder rolls a
critical win does the stake penetrate the user’s
heart. Even if staked, the user can make a Rouse
Check and roll their Strength + Resolve
(Difficulty 5) once per hour. A win means they
manage to free themselves from paralysis as the
stake is pushed out of their body. They cannot
attempt such stake expulsion at Hunger 5.
■ Duration: Passive
Blood Sorcery
Back to Contents
Nicknames: A Kind of Magic, Thaumaturgy,
Quietus
The Tremere maintain that Blood Sorcery,
or “Thaumaturgy” as they call it, was their
invention. To hear the Banu Haqim give their
version, “Quietus” was their blood right
long before the Tremere became vampires. Other
clans make the same statements. While its origins
are murky, the dreaded nature of Blood Sorcery is
not. Few Kindred trust the wielders of a power
that can manipulate the vitae in their veins and
turn Blood into poison.
Unlike other Disciplines, which could be
described as advancing organically through the
victims chosen by the vampire, practitioners of
Blood Sorcery require teachers. The Tremere once
relied on their pyramidic clan hierarchy to arrange
tutelage for neonate apprentices, while the Banu
Haqim stress the sire-childe relationship as being
the best form of mentorship. These nights, many a
Child of Haqim washes up in Europe or America
far from their sire, and with the Pyramid broken
Tremere neonates frantically search through
moldy tomes and palimpsests for scraps of true
lore. Genuine masters of this Discipline develop
their own Rituals, though many guard them from
others, revelling in the mystery surrounding their
unknown cache of abilities. To practice Blood
Sorcery is to twist one’s own Blood into
58
submission. Any form of this power reminds a
vampire that they’re far from human, as no mortal
could wield magic in this way.
Characteristics
Blood Sorcery is a special Discipline in
that it both confers powers, like other Disciplines,
and also unlocks the ability to perform Rituals up
to and including the level the user holds in the
Discipline. Its regular powers seem comparatively
weak, but the versatility of the Rituals more than
compensates, assuming the user can learn them.
At character creation, a player can choose one
Level 1 ritual if they have at least one dot in Blood
Sorcery. Characters can buy new rituals at the cost
of the ritual’s level x 3 experience points.
Learning new Rituals during play requires both
experience and time. Expect a Ritual to take at
least the square of its rating in weeks to learn.
■ Type: Sorcery
■ Masquerade Threat: Low-High. The individual
appearance of the powers and Rituals in Blood
Sorcery varies as widely as their effects.
■ Blood Resonance: Sanguine. Although not
inherent in the Blood itself, Blood Sorcery
responds eagerly to blood from human occultists,
sorcerers, and cult leaders, as well as hemophiles
and bibliophiles.
Level 1
Corrosive Vitae
Altering the properties of some of their
own Blood, the user can make it highly corrosive
to dead substances, able to corrode most items
down to steaming sludge, given enough time and
Blood shed.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One or more Rouse Checks
■ System: No additional skill roll is required. The
user concentrates for a turn and forces Blood
through an open, usually self-inflicted, wound.
The user then spills their Blood on a nonliving
object (except unliving flesh such as that of the
Kindred) to corrode and decompose it. Each
Rouse Check corrodes approximately 35 cm of
matter in all directions from the splash; this takes
approximately five minutes (longer on soft metals
like copper or cast iron). Harder metals such as
alloys and steel merely scar and pit; whether they
meaningfully weaken remains at the Storyteller’s
discretion. (This power might corrode through
handcuff chains given enough time and vitae.)
■ Duration: N/A
Shape the Sanguine Sacrament
Learned only by the most ostentatious of
tremere, this power is used to manipulate blood or
vitae into finely crafted images - whether
entertaining your fellows at Elysium with gaudy
magician’s tricks or diverting flowing rivulets into
painstakingly precise Hermitic sigils
■ WTC
■ Cost: Free(or one Rouse Check if using own
blood)
■ Dice pools: Manipulation + Blood Sorcery
■ System: Using a measure of blood or vampiric
vitae, the user may channel their mastery of Blood
Sorcery to influence the very essence of the blood
iteslf, to abey the user’s shim. By making a
successful Manipulation + Blood Sorcery roll, the
user may craft the blood into any shape or image
they desire. Complexity of the image varies by
difficulty - a simple message of “Help!” or basic
polygonal shape may only be at Difficulty 2, while
a lengthy diatribe or an intricate sculpture may be
Difficulty 4 or higher. Failure on this roll means
the blood fails to form the desired shape or does
not respond at all - Critical Success not only forms
the desired image, but negates the need for any
further rolls to change its shape for the duration of
the scene.
■ Duration: One Scene, unless dispelled by the
user.
A Taste for Blood
By tasting a drop of blood, the user can
discern certain basic traits of the one to whom it
belongs.
■ VTM
■ Cost: Free
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Blood Sorcery
59
■ System: The user dabs the blood on their tongue
and makes a Resolve + Blood Sorcery roll
(Difficulty 3). With a win, the user can determine
the resonance and intensity of the blood if human.
They can also identify whether the blood belongs
to a mortal, ghoul, vampire, or other supernatural
creature (it may not necessarily be able to identify
the supernatural creature if not Kindred or ghoul).
Tasting vitae also determines the relative Blood
Potency (and thus the likely generation band) of
the vampire. A critical win also reveals whether
the subject has ever committed diablerie, and the
generation (within one) of the vampire. If the user
knows of the supernatural creature in question,
they can identify the specific supernatural creature
on a critical win after tasting the blood.
■ Duration: N/A
Level 2
Extinguish Vitae
The user can intentionally remove the
unlife-giving properties of some of the Blood in
another vampire, stoking their Hunger as the
victim’s inner reserves curdle into Impotence.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Blood Sorcery vs
Stamina + Composure
■ System: The user rolls a contest of Intelligence
+ Blood Sorcery vs the Stamina + Composure of a
target vampire in line of sight while concentrating
for a turn and gesturing subtly. A win increases
the target’s Hunger by one while a critical win
increases it by two. The victim can discern who
afflicts them if they can see the user while making
an Intelligence + Occult vs Wits + Subterfuge roll.
■ Duration: N/A
Level 3
Blood of Potency
The vampire can concentrate their Blood,
increasing its potency Temporarily.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Blood Sorcery
■ System: The user makes a Resolve + Blood
Sorcery roll against a Difficulty of 2 + their Blood
Potency. A win increases their Blood Potency by
one for that scene; a critical win increases it by
two. The vampire can use this power to exceed
their generation limit on Blood Potency during its
duration.
■ Duration: One scene or one night
Scorpion’s Touch
The vampire can transmute some of their
Blood into a paralyzing poison, capable of
affecting mortals and vampires alike. They can use
this ichor to coat bladed weapons, or even spit it at
a target. Scorpionated Blood incapacitates affected
mortals, while hampering vampires if not
necessarily rendering them helpless. Specific
breathing and biofeedback exercises practiced by
some secret societies form the best defense against
this Blood, aside from Fortitude.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One or more Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Strength + Blood Sorcery vs
Stamina + Occult or Fortitude
■ System: The user concentrates for a turn and
forces Blood through an open, usually self
inflicted, wound. Each Rouse Check worth of
poison made takes a turn and emits enough Blood
to coat one bladed melee weapon stickily or to fill
one mouthful to be spat at a foe. Spitting poison at
someone involves a Dexterity + Athletics attack
roll (which can be dodged like any ranged attack),
although vampires have been known to French
kiss a victim and transfer the poison that way.
Even more subtle vampires scorpionate their
Blood to poison would-be diablerists: drinking
poisoned Blood from the vein guarantees a hit!
Aside from such vein-to-fang
transmission,however, scorpionated Blood is a
contact poison that sublimes away in liquids and is
too viscous to inject with a syringe. The user
cannot poison beverages with it or (thanks to the
pressure differential) inject it by their own bite.
Arrowheads and bullets carry too little Blood to
use this power with ranged weapons; the effect
60
does not last long enough for the user to fill
hollow bullets with scorpionated Blood.
If the poison hits, the user rolls a contest
of Strength + Blood Sorcery vs Stamina + Occult.
(Vampires with Fortitude may resist with Stamina
+ Fortitude.) If the user wins, the poison does the
margin in Aggravated Health damage to mortals
and in non-halved Superficial Health damage to
vampires. A mortal who takes even one point of
damage collapses Unconscious.
■ Duration: The poison remains potent for one
scene
Transitive Bond
The user is able to extend the Blood
Bonding
properties of their vitae, enabling it to retain its
ensnaring properties when stored, or even when
present in the body of a ghoul. Anyone drinking
the stored vitae or from the ghoul will be affected
just as if they’d imbibed it directly from the user’s
wrist. Developed by the Tremere in a failed
attempt to alleviate their Bane, the power has
resurfaced in the Sabbat, where the Discipline is
less limited by clan lineage, and has been used to
great effect in some of their longer schemes.
■ StBH
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pool: None
■ System: The user activates this power when
calling upon their Blood, either for storing or
when giving it to a ghoul. Each use empowers
three Rouse Checks’ worth of Blood. Anyone
ensnared by the Transitive Bond will be unaware
of its effect until they lay eyes on their eventual
Regnant, but they might become restless and catch
glimpses of them in dream-like visions during
daysleep. The Blood Bond otherwise functions as
described in Vampire: The Masquerade, pp. 233-
234).
■ Duration: N/A
Level 4
Theft of Vitae
Through mystical means the vampire
opens a wound in a major artery of a mortal
victim, blood shooting out through the air in a
stream toward the open mouth of the user. This
has the additional effect of keeping the mortal
subdued as if in the throes of the Kiss, and the
wound closes by itself once the effect ends,
whether the victim expired or not. This power is
extremely spectacular and a potential Masquerade
breach while in progress, but once ended leaves no
traces.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Blood Sorcery vs Wits +
Occult
■ System: The user makes a beckoning gesture
toward a mortal target in line of sight and rolls
their Wits + Blood Sorcery vs Wits + Occult. A
win opens an arterial wound, and the vampire can
start feeding from across the room. (A target
wearing full-body protection such as a hazmat suit
merely bleeds ecstatically out into the suit.) The
user can do nothing else while feeding, but they
can feed at twice the normal speed (at triple speed
on a critical win) thanks to the sorcerous pressure
of this power.
■ Duration: One feeding
Level 5
Baal’s Caress
The vampire can transmute their Blood
into an extremely aggressive poison, lethal to
mortal and Kindred alike.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One or more Rouse Checks
■ Dice Pools: Strength + Blood Sorcery vs
Stamina + Occult or Fortitude
■ System: This power uses the same system (and
its poison has the same restrictions) as Scorpion’s
Touch (VTM p. 273), with increased damage.
If the poison hits, the user rolls a contest
of Strength + Blood Sorcery vs Stamina + Occult.
(Vampires with Fortitude may resist with
Fortitude in lieu of the Occult Skill.) If the user
wins, the poison does the margin in Aggravated
61
Health damage to mortals and vampires alike. A
mortal who takes even one point of damage dies
instantly.
If a vampire target takes Aggravated
damage from this poison, the user rolls the contest
again; on a win, the vampire enters torpor when
next they go to sleep.
■ Duration: The poison remains potent for one
scene
Cauldron of Blood
This gruesome power lets the user boil the
blood of a victim in their own veins, causing
massive damage and excruciating pain. While
there are more efficient ways to kill, few methods
approach this level of cruelty.
■ VTM
■ Cost: One Rouse Check and gain one (or more)
Stains
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Blood Sorcery vs
Composure + Occult or Fortitude
■ System: The user pays the cost and touches the
victim (Dexterity + Athletics in combat or similar
situations), rolling a contest of Resolve + Blood
Sorcery vs Composure + Occult. (Vampires with
Fortitude may resist with Composure + Fortitude.)
On a win, each point of margin causes one point
of Aggravated damage in the victim. Mortals
taking at least one point of damage die screaming.
Vampire victims add 1 Hunger per point of
damage inflicted, until Hunger is at 5.
■ Duration: One turn
Reclamation of Vitae
No matter the distance, Blood calls to
Blood.
Working on that principle, this power allows a
vampire to reclaim Blood that has been yielded to
create ghouls, reclaiming that which has been
given. Regardless of where they are, ghouls of the
vampire will find the life-giving vitae in their
veins rebelling within them, returning through
mystical means to its source, while their bodies
suffer catastrophic damage. Sabbat elders have
been known to keep ghouls for this express
purpose, an emergency reserve available
anywhere at any time, at the trifling cost of a few
mortal lives.
■ StBH
■ Cost: One or more Stains (when called to return)
■ Dice Pool: None
■ System: The user concentrates for a turn and
choses which of their servants are to repay their
Blooddebt. The ghouls do not need to be present,
and distance doesn’t matter. The vampire sates
two Hunger for each ghoul, while the ghoul
suffers five levels of aggravated damage as their
body ages irregularly and rapidly, the undead
Blood inside them feeling as if it were attempting
to violently vacate them.
While the power does not require the
vampire to Rouse the Blood it should, if ever
learned by someone outside the Sabbat, merit
Stains to employ.
■ Duration: N/A
Blood Sorcery Rituals
Back to Contents
Unless otherwise noted, performing a
ritual requires a Rouse Check, five minutes per
level to cast, and a winning Intelligence + Blood
Sorcery test (Difficulty = Ritual level + 1). Rituals
usually require additional ingredients, though
some need only the uninterrupted concentration of
the user, and often involve the mingling of Blood
with ingredients chosen according to the principles
of sympathetic magic or alchemy. Unless
otherwise stated the caster can only perform
beneficial rituals on themselves.
Wards
The Tremere employ Wards extensively,
basing them on their Hermetic traditional sigils.
Banu Haqim Wards usually involve gematriac or
abjadic writing, rather than occult symbols, but the
methodology remains the same in both cases.
Wards consist of a glyph or line of script keyed to
repel a single type of supernatural, called “the
trespasser” in these rules. When touched, they
cause something like an electric shock to the
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trespasser’s mind and body, imparting both
physical burns and a sudden bout of sheer terror.
The ward does not work on forced contact - a
warded sword will not trigger the ward when
striking a trespasser, but it will if a trespasser tries
to pick it up.
Wards can only cover a space about a
meter across: for example, a caster cannot ward a
whole car, but they can ward a steering wheel. The
caster pours their Blood on the object to be
warded, tracing the glyph in it with their bare
finger. Once the caster wipes the Blood off, the
ward becomes invisible. The Ward lasts until the
warded object is physically destroyed or broken;
the trespasser cannot do this.
Do not make the Ritual roll until the first
time the trespasser touches the Ward, triggering its
effect. Gloves or other garments offer no
protection. If the caster wins the Ritual test, the
victim suffers one point of Aggravated Health
damage. On a critical win, damage for this Ward
is three points of Aggravated damage. The caster
does not need to make the Ritual roll for each
trespasser touching the Ward, only the first.
Anyone affected who wants to touch the warded
object again must spend a point of Willpower and
then win a Stamina + Resolve test (Difficulty 4, or
7 for a critical-success Ward) to make the attempt.
Sense the Unseen (Auspex 1) can detect a
Ward with a contest of Intelligence + Auspex vs
the caster’s Intelligence + Blood Sorcery.
Warding circles
A Warding circle resembles a regular
Ward, painted on the ground or floor. It requires
three times the ritual ingredients of a regular Ward
of the same type. Knowledge of one Ward does
not convey knowledge of its corresponding
Warding
circle, or vice versa. Trespassers who attempt to
cross a Warding circle suffer its effect. Unless the
caster inscribes the Warding circle “pointing
inward” around the trespasser in the first place, it
does not block attempts to leave the circle.
Its rules differ from regular Wards in a
few respects: It costs three Rouse Checks worth of
Blood to paint the circle and pentacles, which can
cover up to a three-meter radius. It takes one full
night to cast and a Ritual roll made at the time (at
+2 to Difficulty) if the caster wants it to last a year
and a day; otherwise it dissipates at dawn.
When the trespasser attempts to cross the
circle, roll a contest of Intelligence + Blood
Sorcery vs the trespasser’s Willpower. (If the
Storyteller or player wrote down the result of the
original Ritual roll used to cast a year-long
Warding circle, they can use that result here.) If
the Warding circle fails, the trespasser can enter it.
If the caster wins, the trespasser takes three points
of Superficial Health damage (three points of
Aggravated damage on a critical win) and cannot
enter. The trespasser must spend a point of
Willpower to attempt to enter the circle again. If
the trespasser wins the contest, enters the circle
and leaves it again, they must repeat their half of
the contest (the caster’s initial result remains) to
re-enter it.
Level 1
Beelzebeatit
This ritual causes lower-order living
creatures to find the ritual area repellent. Animals
avoid the area, vermin scuttle away from it, and
even plants may take on a pitiful appearance. Used
as a low-level precaution against Animalism spies,
this ritual also prevents infestations of the sorts of
creatures who would be drawn to gore, carrion,
and the other sorts of remains the Sabbat often
leaves in its wake.
■ StBH
■ Ingredients: Vinegar or alcohol
■ Process: The ritualist sprinkles the vinegar or
alcohol on the floor and turns counterclockwise,
visually circumscribing the area in which the
lesser creatures are to be expelled.
■ System: If the ritual is successful, living
creatures of animal intellect and below hastily
vacate the area of about a hundred meters square.
Thereafter, nothing prevents a directed or
controlled creature from returning (but such things
may be visible, and stand out due to their active
63
expulsion), but such creatures won’t do it of their
own volition unless enraged or no other option to
traverse it exists. The effects last for one scene or
one night, whichever comes first.
Blood Walk
This Ritual expands upon the power A
Taste for Blood allowing the user to learn more
details about the subject studied, assuming the
subject is a vampire.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A silver cup filled with Blood from
the subject. (One Rouse Check’s worth).
■ Process: The user mixes their Blood with the
subject’s and repeats an incantation over the cup,
spending an roughly an hour.
■ System: A win on the Ritual roll (see General
Systems) allows the user to learn the generation
and name of the subject as well as the subject’s
sire. A Critical Win also informs the user of any
Blood Bonds active on the subject, as regnant or
thrall.
Bloody Message
■ LtSRR
■ Ingredients: Mirror, sufficient human blood to
write the message, UV light.
■ Process: The practitioner designates a type of
individual in their mind — e.g., mortal, ghoul,
vampire, male, a child, unemployed — and bathes
a mirror in UV light. The sorcerer writes a
message on the mirror with a fingertip, using
human blood as the ink. The message appears on
another reflective surface (a mirror, polished
glass, water) the practitioner has seen before and
can mentally recall, when the designated type of
individual passes by.
■ System: The sorcerer makes the Ritual roll when
enchanting the designated surface. For every
success the practitioner rolls, the message will
repeat for each new individual of the chosen type
who passes the surface. The message clears itself
from the surface as soon as it’s been read once. It
appears in the handwriting and language in which
the sorcerer wrote it.
Clinging of the Insect
The vampire gains the ability to cling to
walls like a grotesque insect or spider.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A living spider.
■ Process: The caster fills a vial with their own
Blood and crushes the spider into it, mixing the
ground bits with the Blood before ingesting it.
(This does not refund any Hunger gained.) The
caster can only perform this ritual on themselves;
others gain no benefit from drinking the mixture.
■ System: A successful Ritual yields the ability to
cling to walls and ceiling for a scene, while a
critical win extends the duration to a whole night.
The caster must cling to the surface with both
hands and feet; they move at approximately half
their usual rate.
Coax the Garden
This Ritual allows the caster to bring plant
life, such as roots, grass, and tree branches to act
in their defense.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: Human blood, poppy seeds.
■ Process: The vampire casts a concoction of
human blood and poppy seeds onto the earth, and
in doing so rouses all plant life within a 5
yard/meter diameter. While these plants are rarely
lethal in their attacks, they can successfully
disable and alarm their victims.
■ System: A win on the Ritual roll following the
casting of the Ritual ingredients animates the plant
life. The affected flora causes a two-dice penalty
to physical dice pools for those caught in the range
of the Ritual, as plants trip and grip them.
Victims who stay in the area for longer than a turn
must make a Dexterity + Athletics roll (Difficulty
3), or be grappled and suffer one point of
Superficial Health damage for each turn ensnared.
If the caster achieves a critical win, the damage
from plant attacks doubles. On a total failure, the
plants attack the caster. The plants will target
anyone who isn’t the caster. They remain active
until the end of the scene.
64
Craft Bloodstone
This Ritual results in a Bloodstone, a
magical tracker to which the caster always knows
the direction as well as general distance. As the
Camarilla retreats from modern technology, this
previously neglected Ritual has seen a resurgence
in use.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A pebble of iron ore or a small
magnet and a liter of blood from any source in a
silver bowl.
■ Process: The user spills their Blood into the
blood in the bowl and then recites a chant over it
for an hour, repeating the chant over the next two
nights. The pebble (or magnet) absorbs the blood
over the three nights; upon successful completion,
the liquid appears translucent.
■ System: Make the Ritual roll at the end of the
third night. On a win the caster attunes their mind
to the Bloodstone. The caster can unerringly sense
the direction and distance to the stone. This effect
lasts until the Bloodstone is destroyed or a week
has passed.
A caster can have and keep track to a number of
stones up to their Resolve.
Dampen the Fear
This Ritual allows the caster to briefly
douse their natural vampiric fear of fire.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A holy object, such as a crucifix,
bible, or Qur’an.
■ Process: The vampire must burn the holy
symbol before walking into, past, or otherwise
interacting with fire. The object does not need to
be destroyed, just exposed to the fire.
■ System: A successful Ritual roll following the
burning of the holy object grants the character +2
dice on all rolls relating to resisting Rötschreck. A
critical win results in the character needing to
make no terror frenzy rolls at all. The power wears
off once the scene ends.
Herd Ward
■ LtSRR
■ Ingredients: Scorpion poison, sufficient vitae to
provoke a Rouse Check.
■ Process: The sorcerer mixes scorpion poison
with their own vitae to draw the ward. The
vampire can ward a single kine at level 1, or at
level 3 inscribe the ward on a door so all who stay
within the ward for that night are protected.
■ System: The sorcerer makes the Ritual roll when
another vampire tries to feed on the warded kine.
The transgressor suffers one point of Aggravated
Health damage if the caster wins the Ritual roll, or
three points of Aggravated damage on a critical
win.
Once the Herd Ward is triggered, a
Kindred still trying to drink from the kine must
roll Stamina + Resolve against Difficulty 4 for a
normal Ward, or 7 for a critical-success Ward.
Letter Ward
■ LtSRR
■ Ingredients: Pigeon blood, wax, dog blood.
■ Process: The letter writer, who need not be the
sorcerer, pens a missive in pigeon blood and
clearly addresses the recipient. The sorcerer then
melts wax and mixes it with dog’s blood to seal
the letter.
■ System: The sorcerer makes the Ritual roll when
anyone other than the recipient opens the letter.
The victim suffers one point of Aggravated Health
damage if the caster wins the Ritual roll, or three
points of Aggravated damage on a critical win,
and the letter destroys itself in a burst of flame.
Once the Letter Ward is triggered, anyone
wanting to open the letter must roll Stamina +
Resolve at Difficulty 4 for a normal Ward, or
Difficulty 7 for a critical-success Ward.
Wake with Evening’s Freshness
Performed before dawn, this ritual allows
the caster to awake at any sign of danger, fully
alert as if awake during the night.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The burnt bones and feathers of a
rooster.
65
■ Process: The caster mixes the ashes with their
own Blood, drawing a circle with the mixture
around their place of sleep.
■ System: Do not make a Ritual roll unless true
danger appears. If the caster is threatened during
the day, make the Ritual roll then, with the caster
rousing on a win. For the duration of the scene the
vampire ignores the daytime penalties for staying
awake. On a critical win, the effects last until the
following dawn.
Ward Against Ghouls
Wary Tremere created this ritual to protect
themselves from the minions of vengeful rivals.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Wards (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Nothing apart from the usual
requirement of the caster’s Blood.
Level 2
Calling the Aura’s Remnants
This ritual allows the caster to speak with
the residual psychic aura of someone who has
died.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A human corpse or the corpse of a
destroyed vampire.
■ Process: The ritual must be cast within ten feet
of a human corpse or the corpse of a destroyed
vampire.
■ System: A successful Ritual test allows the
caster to speak with the animate reflection of the
deceased for one scene as if they were still alive.
This communication is not with the deceased
spirit and only has access to the memories of the
deceased up to the time of death. A Critical Win
extends the duration of the speech to an entire
evening.
Communicate with Kindred Sire
The caster uses the bond between sire and
childe to open a bridge between minds, allowing
the childe to create a telepathic link for the
purpose of long-distance communication. As with
some other Rituals, this one sees a resurgence in
these nights of wiretaps and electronic
surveillance.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: An object previously possessed by
the sire and a silver bowl filled with clear water.
■ Process: The caster submerges the object in
water and lets their Blood drip into the bowl,
concentrating upon the last memory of their sire
for up to 30 minutes.
■ System: Make the ritual roll after 15 minutes
have passed. A win allows for ten minutes of two
way silent mental communication once 15 more
minutes have passed. A critical win allows
immediate communication. Any major disturbance
on either end breaks the connection.
Eyes of Babel
By ingesting the tongue and an eye of a
person the caster gains the ability to read and
speak any language known by the victim.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A fresh eye and tongue of a person
■ Process: Plucking the ingredients fresh from the
victim, the vampire chews and swallows them.
(This most likely incurs a Stain.)
■ System: The Rouse Check required for this
ritual allows for the supernatural dissolution of the
ingredients once swallowed. Once this is done,
make the Ritual roll. A win gives the caster the
ability to read and speak any language known by
the victim, at the same skill level for a week. A
critical win extends the duration to a month.
Illuminate the Trail of Prey
The ritual allows the caster to perceive the
previous whereabouts of a designated person as a
subtly glowing trail, visible only to them.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A white satin ribbon.
■ Process: The performer of the ritual soaks the
ribbon in their own Blood, setting it alight.
■ System: If the Ritual roll is a win the ribbon
catches fire despite being wet, burning
fiercely like a fuse. Once consumed, the ritual
takes effect. While the ritual remains active, the
66
caster can follow faint traces of the target even in
areas where they left no tracks, such as crowded
cities. To follow the tracks, the caster makes an
Intelligence + Survival roll against a Difficulty
equal to 6 minus the margin on the ritual test. The
target must be known by face by the caster, who
sees the path travelled by the victim over the
previous 24 hours. The path remains visible for
the entire night; a critical win extends this to two
nights.
Ishtar’s Touch
The blood sorcerer can convert a dose of
their own vitae into a touch-activated narcotic that
renders a victim uninhibited and vulnerable to
Disciplines such as Presence and Dominate, along
with attempts at mundane manipulation, coercion
and interrogation.
■ Ingredients: A small amount of hashish or other
narcotic substance
■ Process: The chosen substance is mixed with the
user’s Blood and rubbed between their fingers as
the incantation is read (or whispered). The Ritual
only takes a couple of minutes to prepare.
■ System: The user makes a Ritual roll vs. the
Stamina + Resolve of the target mortal or vampire
after they make contact with the affected vitae.
For the remainder of the scene, the victim suffers
a dice penalty equal to the margin of win on the
Ritual roll on all resist pools involving Composure
or Resolve. (Apply the penalty only once in case
the pool involves both Attributes.) The narcotic
vitae retains its potency until it is touched, up until
the end of the scene.
Truth of Blood
Until recently known only to Banu Haqim
viziers, this Ritual creates a mystic potion capable
of sifting lies from truth. This Ritual has power
enough even to sometimes uncover facts unknown
to the speaker.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: One pint of blood from the subject.
■ Process: The performer of the Ritual mixes their
own Blood with that of the subject in a vessel
large enough to allow for the dipping of the finger.
■ System: Instead of the regular Ritual roll, the
caster immerses their finger in the mixture and
makes a Resolve + Blood Sorcery vs Composure
+ Occult roll for every statement made by the
subject. The first failed contest ends the Ritual. A
Win tells them whether that statement is true, as
far as the subject knows. On a critical win by the
caster, the subject involuntarily expands upon
their answer, providing more information,
including details they glancingly saw or
subconsciously forgot. (The Storyteller should
inform the caster if there is no more information
about that topic.) The mixture bubbles and seethes
during the process, turning completely to ash at
the end of the scene.
This Ritual cannot pierce Cloud Memory,
the Forgetful Mind, or other memory wiping
powers. The caster may well guess the cause of a
blank or foggy recollection, but cannot recover the
actual memory.
Ward Against Spirits
This Ritual wards an item against
incorporeal beings suchs as wraiths, ghosts, and
elemental spirits. Any attempt by them to
manipulate or pass through the item triggers the
effect.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Wards (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A handful of salt (in some versions,
a handful of brick dust) mixed with the Blood.
Warding Circle Against Ghouls
This Ritual creates a circular Ward on the
floor or ground, intended to prevent the passage of
ghouls.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Warding circles (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The caster draws the Warding circle
with a human bone dipped in the Blood.
Level 3
Bladed Hands
67
 This ritual sharpens the caster’s hands to a
razor’s edge.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A pair of razor blades, two drops of
Kindred vitae.
■ Process: The caster places a razor blade in each
palm, gripping them tightly as the ritual is cast. At
the end of the ritual, they vanish into the caster’s
person, leaving a pair of supernaturally sharp
hands in their wake.
■ System: The caster must make a successful
Ritual test and two Rouse Checks. Success turns
the caster’s hands into light piercing Brawl
weapons with a +2 damage modifier. The caster
must be very careful about what they touch while
employing Bladed Hands (+1 difficulty to all rolls
to handle delicate objects). A Critical Win
increases the damage to +3. The ritual lasts for a
single evening.
Communal Vigor
Based on sanguinary properties similar to
the Vaulderie, this Ritual allows a Pack Priest to
share their Blood Potency with their pack, while
strengthening their own ability to keep those
packmates in line.
■ StBH
■ Ingredients: One fingernail of the Pack Priest
■ Process: The Priest tears a nail from their finger
and breaks it into pieces, one for each member of
the Pack. They place their own portion of the torn
nail in the Vaulderie chalice, while the other
members place theirs under their tongue. If the
Ritual is successful, the pieces of nail dissolve into
the Vaulderie blood consumed.
■ System: In addition to the effects of the
Vaulderie, the members of the Pack have their
Blood Potency raised to the same level as the
officiating Priest. Additionally, the Priest gains
three dice on any Dominate or Presence tests
against other members of the Pack. The effects
last for one night.
Dagon’s Call
A terrifying technique employed by the
assassins of the Banu Haqim, this Ritual lets the
user rupture the very blood vessels of the victim
from afar, having only touched them but briefly
previously. Mortals expire rather messily, and
even vampires must fear this silent killer.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A gold inlaid ceremonial dagger.
■ Process: Before proceeding with the ritual the
victim must be exposed the caster’s Blood, either
by drinking it or having it touch an open wound or
even their bare skin: a single drop smeared across
the arm is enough. After an hour but before a
week has passed the caster can perform the ritual
by piercing their own skin with the ceremonial
dagger, shedding blood. As their Blood hits the
ground the ritual takes effect.
■ System: Make a Resolve + Blood Sorcery vs
Stamina + Resolve roll. Every point of margin on
a win does a point of damage to the victim, as
their blood vessels burst and their lungs fill with
blood. This damage is Aggravated for mortals, but
only Superficial on vampires. The caster can
repeat this process up to two more times, each
time requiring them to make an additional Rouse
Check.
Deflection of Wooden Doom
By performing this ritual the vampire
protects themselves from being staked. The first
stake that would pierce their heart shatters before
penetrating the skin.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Wood splinters or shavings.
■ Process: The vampire mixes the shavings with
their Blood and draws a circle around themselves.
They must then meditate in this circle for an hour,
concluding by placing one splinter of wood under
their tongue.
■ System: Make no Ritual roll until the vampire is
staked. If the Ritual roll is a win, the stake shatters
as it touches the skin of the vampire. (A critical
win blinds the attacker for two turns, showering
their face with splinters.) This only works on
genuine attempts at staking - merely holding the
stake against the vampire does not trigger the
effect. The protection lasts until the end of the
68
night or until the splinter is removed from under
the tongue of the vampire, whichever comes first.
Eyes of the Past
This ritual shows what happened in the
caster’s present location at a specific time in the
past up to five years ago.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: One drop of blood for each year the
caster is trying to look backward in time (three or
more drops requires a Rouse Check).
■ Process: The caster selects the location for their
ritual, cuts their hand, and allows the drops of
blood to spill on the earth.
■ System: A successful Ritual test allows the
caster to see what happened in their present
location at a specific time of their selection, up to
five years ago. The caster can see what happened
in the past as if they had been standing where they
are now. Duration is one scene with clarity of
vision determined by the number of successes
scored. The vampire cannot recall the vision with
any clarity after the scene elapses, meaning the
Storyteller is not obligated to answer any
questions about the vision after that time. A
Critical Win permanently fixes the scene in their
memory.
Essence of Air
The caster creates a potion that when
imbibed allows for limited flight. The Camarilla
frowns upon the use of this Ritual, due to the
extreme risk of Masquerade breaches; for this
reason, its popularity has lessened considerably in
the modern nights.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Leaves and berries of belladonna.
■ Process: The caster steeps the belladonna in
their Blood, reducing the brew over a brazier
while incanting words of power.
■ System: Make the Ritual roll when reducing the
mixture. (A critical win prepares two doses worth
of potion.) The caster can tell whether the ritual
succeeded, so they won’t end up with a dud. The
resulting black potion retains its potency for a
night and activates when imbibed. The potion
enables the caster (and only them) to fly or hover
at approximately running speed for a scene. The
caster can carry a human-sized mass, though their
speed drops to walking speed. Grabbing and
carrying aloft an unwilling subject, or pulling the
flier to the ground, both require a contest between
the caster’s Strength + Blood Sorcery and the
other’s Strength + Athletics.
Fire in the Blood
This Ritual allows a vampire to invoke the
anguish of fire in a victim’s blood. Blistering heat
emerges from the target’s veins and causes intense
pain. The power from this Ritual differs from
Cauldron of Blood (VTM p. 274) in that it is
usable from a distance and an efficient way to
incapacitate rather than kill the victim.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A sample of the target’s blood, a
visual depiction of the target such as a photo,
painting, or video recording, a candle made from
red wax or a lighter made of iron.
■ Process: The vampire concentrates on the visual
depiction of their target (which can be the
individual in person) and burns the target’s blood
sample, usually held in a petri dish, glass bottle, or
vial, over the flame. The effect occurs almost
immediately, as the victim’s blood heats up in
their veins.
■ System: The player makes a Ritual
roll following the incantation
versus the target’s Resolve + Occult
(or Resolve + Fortitude, if the
target is a creature with this
Discipline). Each point of the
vampire’s margin is applied as
Superficial Health damage that also
inflicts wracking pain upon the
victim, forcing them to incur a −2
dice penalty to Physical pools for
the remainder of the scene. On a
critical win, the penalty increases
to −3. A Kindred target must make a
Rouse Check due to the damage to
their vitae.
69
Firewalker
A painful ritual to perform, this allows the
caster to make themselves and even their
comrades resistant to fire.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A fingertip of the caster.
■ Process: The vampire cuts one of their fingertips
off and burns it together with their Blood in a
golden chalice or bowl.
■ System: Make a Stamina + Resolve test
(Difficulty 3) to cut off a fingertip. On a winning
Ritual roll, a bluish flame consumes the Blood and
fingertip, signaling the completion of the ritual.
For the rest of the night fire damage to the caster
is halved. This ritual can be performed on others,
but the fingertips sacrificed must all belong to the
caster. The mutilation is not enough to count as
damage to the caster; the fingertip regrows during
day-sleep.
Galvanic Ruination
This Ritual violently disrupts electrical
currents in the area, shorting out or fusing all
wiring in the vicinity. Used to kill alarms,
surveillance, and artificial lighting, the element of
stealth is often short-lived, as collateral damage in
the form of fires usually follows. Many Sabbat
packs consider this less a flaw than a feature,
though.
■ StBH
■ Ingredient: A copper coin
■ Process: The caster smears their Blood on the
coin, drops it to the ground and grinds their foot
on it, as if they were extinguishing a cigarette. If
the Ritual is successful, the coin shatters like
porcelain as a Blood-borne current ravages the
electrical systems of the surrounding area.
■ System: The Ritual instantly wrecks wiring in
the vicinity to the extent that all electrical
equipment ceases to function. This includes
isolated circuits such as cars on batteries and any
backup generators running or starting up within a
minute of the casting. The area affected is
equivalent to a large warehouse or a three-story
building, though it can be extended at casting by
adding a level of Difficulty for each additional
building or building-equivalent. On a critical win
the outage is relatively discreet, but will otherwise
cause at least one fire, together with random bursts
of static electricity raising hell with speakers, car
alarms, and other loud electrical objects.
Gentle Mind
This ritual fortifies the target’s mind
against frenzy.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: Crystal glass, Kindred vitae.
■ Process: The caster shares blood with the target
of the ritual while the caster whispers quietly into
the target’s ear, weaving a temporary cage around
the target’s beast.
■ System: The caster must share a glass of blood
with their target. A successful Ritual test grants
the target a four-die bonus to resist frenzy for one
scene. A Critical Win extends this duration to an
evening. The caster must share blood with another
and cannot cast this ritual upon themselves.
Haunted House
This ritual creates the illusion that a
vampire’s haven is haunted.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: Vitae from a Kindred who
possessed the Discipline of Obfuscate
■ Process: The caster places a drop of Kindred
blood on all entrances and exits to the haven in
addition to all exterior walls and the roof over the
course of a three-hour ritual.
■ System: The caster makes three Rouse Checks
in addition to a Ritual test. Upon success, the
haven assumes an ominous cast and rumors begin
to circulate that the house in haunted. Casual
passersby will avoid the house at all cost and even
the most courageous mortals will think twice
before entering. Mortals attempting to enter the
haven must make a successful Composure +
Resolve test against the number of successes the
caster made on their ritual roll. Success indicates
they can enter while failure bars their passage
(although they can spend Willpower to enter a
turn). The effects of Haunted House last for 10
years, after which the haven appears strange and
70
run down, but not “haunted.” Dr. Mortius spent
decades crafting this ritual with vampires of Clan
Ravnos, inspiring Clan Tremere to forbid its use
as a threat to the Masquerade (and their power),
but knowledgeable Kindred may be willing to
share it with others for a price.
Illusion of Peaceful Death
This ritual heals obvious wounds on a
corpse, causing a body to appear as though it died
a natural death.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A white feather.
■ Process: The caster must symbolically “dust”
the body with a white feather.
■ System: A successful Ritual test causes a corpse
to appear as if it died a natural death. This ritual
does not add blood to the corpse, but does reduce
the chance that this blood loss will be discovered
(increase difficulty of all rolls to determine cause
of death by three). The body must have at least
half its original blood for this ritual to succeed. A
Critical Win increases the difficulty of all rolls to
determine cause of death by five.
Illusion of Perfection
This ritual shrouds the caster in the
illusion of a nondescript person that blends easily
into crowds.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A plain white mask , vitae from a
Kindred with the Discipline of Obfuscate, and a
chameleon’s skin.
■ Process: The caster performs an hour-long ritual
that concludes when they don a featureless white
mask and consume a concoction of vitae and
lizard skin. A sweat of blood forms under the
mask, spreading across the caster’s body until they
are coated in a ruby crust that mystically conceals
their true identity. The mask itself slowly turns
crimson until the
ritual wears off.
■ System: A successful Ritual test is required to
activate this ritual. Upon success, the caster is
cloaked in the illusion that they are an ordinary
person in their mid-20s, with a nondescript face
and average body similar to the Obfuscate ability
Mask of a Thousand Faces. The nondescript
appearance of this vampire shifts across different
faces, seen as different by individuals who can all
see the caster. This can of course lead to confusion
and alarm. The caster can only see their own
reflection in mirrors and photographs.
Illusion of Perfection can be pierced by
the uspex ability Sense the Unseen, ith a
contested Wits + Auspex vs. the successes scored
on the ritual roll.
Illusion of Perfection lasts one scene, but
a Critical Win extends its duration to an entire
evening.
One with the Blade
The Banu Haqim connection to the
delivery of harm and death is such that they can
speak with a weapon and command it to strike
with increased accuracy and lethality. Many Banu
Haqim are known for their dedicated weapon,
which in some cases are carried
with them for centuries of use. Such a weapon
never rusts or dulls for as long as it remains in the
vampire’s possession.
If someone else physically claims it as
their own, it ages much as a ghoul denied vitae
would do. In the case the weapon is still useable
following this degeneration, if it is used against its
original owner — the blood sorcerer — it inflicts
grievous harm in retribution for them having lost
it.
■ Ingredients: A melee weapon and enough of the
caster’s vitae to fully immerse it.
■ Process: The vampire submerges their chosen
weapon in their own vitae and speaks a mantra
dedicating their life to the weapon. The weapon
must remain submerged without interruption until
the following sunrise.
■ System: Once the Blood is exsanguinated and
the weapon is submerged, make a Ritual roll. On a
win, the weapon becomes mystically dedicated to
the user. It remains of immaculate quality unless
subjected to focused harm when outside the
caster’s ownership. Additionally, if anointed by
the Blood of the user it gains a two-dice bonus
71
when used in combat. The anointment takes a
single turn, forces a Rouse check and lasts for a
full scene. A vampire can never possess more than
one weapon dedicated this way. In order to
perform this ritual on a new weapon, the previous
dedicated weapon must be destroyed first.
The vampire with this weapon must
ensure it never leaves their possession. If stolen
and used against them, it cannot gain any
additional dice but deals Aggravated damage
against its owner (the one who originally
performed the Ritual).
Sanguine Watcher
This ritual forms a small rat out of
Kindred vitae that goes wherever the caster
instructs and observes whatever the caster desires.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: Kindred vitae, small quantities of
alcohol, silver bowl.
■ Process: The ritual is cast over the course of 20
minutes while the caster fills a silver bowl with
vitae and measured doses of alcohol. A rat made
of blood slowly forms as the caster stirs the
mixture, becoming ever more solid until it
scampers out of the bowl to serve its master.
■ System: A successful Ritual test summons a
rodent made of Kindred blood from the bowl that
is bound to the caster and allows them to see
through its eyes. The rat will go wherever the
caster instructs it to go and observe whatever the
caster tells it to look for. The rat can be instructed
to steal small items, but the caster must be very
explicit as to what they want stolen and where it is
located. The rat remains in service until sunrise. A
Critical Win allows the caster to provide the
creature with extremely precise instructions.
Sleep of Judas
■ LtSRR
■ Ingredients: Blood of Willerton’s Judas tree
(though possibly the blood from another mystical
landmark), opium.
■ Process: The sorcerer distills and boils the blood
of the Judas Tree until only a black tar-like
substance remains. They mix this with an equal
amount of opium, which can either be used as a
paste or re-liquefied with no loss of effect.
■ System: The sorcerer makes the Ritual roll when
the target is drugged. On a normal success, the
victim may oppose by rolling dice equal to their
remaining undamaged Health boxes. A critical
success immediately incapacitates a vampire and
kills a mortal or ghoul. Sleep of Judas wears off
after a number of hours equal to the sorcerer’s
Intelligence.
The Unseen Change
This ritual forces Lupines into their wolf
form.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: Wolf blood, Kindred vitae, a silver
jug.
■ Process: The caster mixes Kindred vitae with
wolf’s blood and pours the mixture from a silver
jug around a specific area. This can be as small as
a meter or large enough to encircle a house.
■ System: The caster makes three Rouse checks to
summon the blood necessary for the ritual and
marks out a closed area with a mixture of Kindred
vitae and wolf’s blood. A successful Ritual test
forces all Lupines crossing the threshold defined
by the caster to automatically transform into their
Lupus form, unless they succeed on a contested
Willpower test against the casters Intelligence +
Blood Sorcery or the number of successes scored
on the initial ritual roll (if yearlong). The ritual
dissipates at dawn unless the initial ritual roll is
made at +2 to difficulty. If successful, the ritual
lasts a year and a day. A Critical Win doubles the
number of successes the Lupine needs on its roll
to defeat the ritual. The Unseen Change forces the
target Lupine into their form as a normal wolf,
denying them the raw power of their dreaded half-
wolf form.
Ward Against Lupines
This Ritual wards an item against
werewolves, in any form. Any attempt by them to
touch the item triggers the effect.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Wards (VTM p. 275).
72
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A handful of silver dust mixed with
the Blood.
Warding Circle Against Spirits
This Ritual creates a circular Ward on the
floor or ground, intended to prevent the passage of
spirits. Although more difficult than some
Warding circles, it is one of the most commonly
found in grimoires and other sources. A human
occultist could potentially reconstruct a
functioning version of this Ritual with an
Intelligence + Occult test (Difficulty 6), although
they could not cast it without vitae or some other
supernatural aid or element.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Warding circles (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The caster draws the Warding circle
with an iron knife dipped in salt and Blood.
Level 4
Defense of the Sacred Haven
The performer of this powerful ritual can
ward their haven against the sun itself, protecting
their resting place from penetration by its
destructive rays as a mystical darkness blankets
the area.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Nothing but the Blood of the caster.
■ Process: The caster inscribes a number of sigils
and glyphs on and around the area to be protected.
They must take special care on windows and
doorways, but may even ward an open doorway if
the area is indoors. (The ritual wards gray or
liminal areas, such as ruins, at the Storyteller’s
discretion.)
■ System: The process takes an hour or more,
depending on the state or the area to be warded.
The area can be no larger than a circle with a six-
meter radius. The ritual automatically fails if the
caster steps out of the area at any time after the
warding is complete. The caster makes the Ritual
roll once the sun rises. On a Win, shadow blankets
the area, closing off any view of the outside but
also preventing any sun damage to the vampires
within. On a critical win, those inside can spy the
outside world dimly. The Ritual lasts through an
entire day unless ended by the caster stepping
outside the area.
Eyes of the Nighthawk
Related to the primitive powers of
Animalism, this Ritual allows the caster to possess
a carnivorous fowl, usually a raven or a bird of
prey, directing its flight and seeing through its
eyes. Parrots and mynahs, not being carnivores,
cannot be used in this Ritual. Some Tremere spent
years training crows or ravens to speak before
using them as nighthawks; with the Pyramid
disrupted, fewer Warlocks have the spare time
now.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The eyes of the bird used, taken at
the conclusion of the Ritual.
■ Process: The caster feeds their Blood to the bird
and enters a trance.
■ System: On a winning Ritual roll the caster can
control the bird and see through its eyes. On a
critical win, the bird can perform simple actions
under control, such as picking up objects or
manipulating keys or dials. The caster can use
most nonphysical Disciplines through the bird,
even Dominate assuming the caster has Telepathy
(VTM p. 252)or some other way to communicate
with targets non-verbally.There is no limit to the
range the bird can fly, though unless thecaster
plucks the eyes out of the bird at the end of the
night they themselves suffer blindness for three
nights to come.
Incorporeal Passage
The caster assumes an incorporeal state,
not unlike a ghost, able to freely pass through
objects and rendered totally immune to physical
damage. They cannot interact physically with the
material world except by sight and speech.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A mirror.
■ Process: The caster spills their Blood on the
mirror, chanting, and then breaks it.
73
■ System: Make a Ritual roll. If the roll is a win,
the caster assumes an incorporeal form as long as
they hold a shard of the broken mirror. While
incorporeal, the caster remains immune to
everything except fire, sunlight, and arcane
weapons and rituals capable of damaging spirits.
The caster can still be seen and heard but cannot
interact physically with anything or anyone. They
cannot Rouse the Blood while incorporeal.
Incorporeal casters have no access to any spirit
realm; the ritual does not make them wraiths or
spirits. The caster can walk through walls and
other objects but must do so in a straight line; they
cannot change direction while inside solid matter.
This Ritual lasts for one scene or until the caster
drops the shard. Returning to the material while
inside solid matter can result in anything from
destruction to entombment to minor
inconvenience (the ashtray is stuck halfway
through the caster’s arm); the Storyteller decides
the precise outcome.
Innocence of the Child’s Heart
Developed by Nicolai himself, this ritual
allows the caster to conceal their Kindred aura
from users of Auspex.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A toy belonging to a mortal child.
■ Process: The caster must acquire the toy of an
innocent mortal child and use the ritual to
mystically infuse it with the power of their
Kindred vitae, drawing the child’s innocence into
their aura. The caster must then carry the toy on
their person to mask themselves from the powers
of Auspex.
■ System: The caster makes a Rouse Check and
makes their Ritual test. Upon success, the caster’s
aura is altered to make them appear mortal, with
any stains of diablerie rendered invisible. Auspex
users employing Scry the Soul on the caster will
perceive their aura as mortal until the effects of
the ritual dissipate, unless they make a contested
roll between their Intelligence + Auspex versus
the caster’s Intelligence + Blood Sorcery + four
dice. The ritual lasts one night unless the ritual test
is made at +2 to difficulty which extends it until
the end of the story. A Critical Win doubles the
ritual’s duration. Note that there is no recorded
instance of Nicolai sharing this ritual with his
fellow Tremere and can only be learned by
capturing Nicolai’s notes or via other method of
the Storyteller’s determination.
Protean Curse
This ritual transforms the target into a bat
similar to the level four Protean ability,
Metamorphosis.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A vial of rabid vampire bat blood,
Kindred vitae acquired from a vampire with the
Protean Discipline, and a string-suspended puppet
crafted from bat bones.
■ Process: The target must drink a vial of blood
from a rabid vampire bat, mixed with Kindred
vitae while the caster puppeteers the bone
marionette.
■ System: The caster produces two Rouse Checks’
worth of their blood (with associated rolls
required), with the blood of a rabid vampire bat
and gives it to the target to drink. The ritual is
cast, and upon a successful ritual roll, the target is
transformed into a bat per the Metamorphosis
ability of the Protean Discipline.
The target may elect to resist this
transformation ith a Stamina + Occult roll. If the
target rolls more successes than the ritual’s
practitioner, they prevent the transformation,
while their Total Failure can leave them in a
horrifically deformed, half-human, half-bat state.
The half-bat creature gains +2 Strength, +1
Dexterity, +1 Stamina, and +1 Presence up to a
maximum of 5, but cannot communicate verbally,
reduces its Manipulation to 0, and takes 1
aggravated Health damage for every turn exposed
to bright light, artificial or otherwise. The ritual
can be cast on both Kindred and humans and lasts
for a full evening or until the caster dispels the
ritual via a successful ritual test. The duration of
Protean Curse can be extended by making a Rouse
Check and a successful ritual roll at the beginning
of each night the caster wants to maintain the
ritual. A Critical Win for the practitioner doubles
74
the duration of Protean Curse. The caster cannot
use this Ritual on themselves.
Rending the Sweet Earth
This ritual rends the earth to reveal a
vampire concealed by Protean.
■ TCF
■ Ingredients: A leather whip, Kindred vitae.
■ Process: The caster locates the exact spot a user
of Protean sank into the earth using Earth Meld.
They then slit their palm, smearing vitae on the
point of entry and repeatedly strike the ground
with a leather whip.
■ System: The caster makes a Rouse Check and a
ritual test. Upon success, a 10-foot by 10-foot
chasm opens, leading to the subterranean resting
place of a vampire in an Earth Melded state. The
ritual automatically awakens the target vampire if
they are asleep, but will not do so if they are in
torpor. A Critical Win opens the chasm without
waking the target.
Ward Against Cainites
This Ritual wards an item against all
vampires except the caster. Any attempt by them
to touch the item triggers the effect. However, a
vampire examining the Ward with Auspex can
read the name of the caster in it with a successful
contest of Intelligence + Auspex vs. the caster’s
Intelligence + Blood Sorcery.
This ward uses the standard rules for
Wards (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Ash warm from a still-burning fire;
casters risk terror frenzy, and cannot inscribe this
Ward that night if they succumb to it.
Warding Circle Against Lupines
This ward uses the standard rules for
Warding circles (VTMp. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The caster draws the Warding circle
with a silver knife dipped in wolfsbane and Blood.
Level 5
Creatio Ignis
The caster of this Ritual diverts hungry
flame from their flesh, using an enchanted coating
of vitae like a buffer and can set items and people
alight using the fire. This Ritual is a phenomenal
breach of the Masquerade as the power is entirely
visible and can cause intense environmental
feedback, not to mention the bloody coating of the
caster’s hands before activation.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: Sufficient vitae (from any vampire)
to coat the caster’s arms up to the elbows, a source
of flame (such as a lighter).
■ Process: The vampire immerses their arms in the
blood and withstands the urge to feed or frenzy.
After extracting their arms, exposure to flame will
ignite the vitae rather than the vampire it coats.
The vampire can then go on to set targets alight
using the fire on their skin.
■ System: If the user is at Hunger 4 or more, make
a hunger frenzy test at Difficulty 3 to avoid
draining the ingredients. At any point during the
night they may expose the vitae to fire and make a
Ritual roll. A win ignites flames on the vampire’s
hands and arms, which in a spectacular display
provoke a terror frenzy test (Difficulty 2) in all
nearby vampires except the caster. They may
touch others with Dexterity + Brawl in physical
combat to inflict two Aggravated Health damage.
Entering a grapple ignites the other person’s
clothes, continuing the damage each turn until a
Composure + Survival roll (Difficulty 3) is won to
end the burn. The caster is only resistant to flame
on their arms, and will burn as usual elsewhere.
The fiery arms extinguish when the caster wills it
or when the scene ends.
Eden’s Bounty
This rare Ritual allows a vampire to drain
blood and energy from any living creatures in the
nearby area, allowing the caster to stave off
Hunger without even having to bare their fangs.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A dead body, a living tree, one
fresh apple, one rotten apple.
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■ Process: The vampire lays a dead body (age of
the corpse is immaterial) at the foot of a tree and
places the healthy apple in the corpse’s mouth,
followed by the rotten apple into the vampire’s. If
the apple does not fit in the corpse’s mouth, the
caster may hammer it in, dislocate the jaw, or
otherwise rend the throat open, so long as it fits.
As the body rapidly merges with the tree’s roots
and trunk, blood from mortals up to 1
mile/kilometer away drains into the earth and out
through the rotten apple in the vampire’s mouth,
sating Hunger.
■ System: The player makes a Ritual roll
following the placement of the corpse and the
apples. On a win, the vampire’s Hunger is slaked
to one, despite any Blood Potency feeding
penalties. On a critical win, the vampire’s Hunger
is slaked to zero without killing. On a total failure,
the vampire falls into a hunger frenzy. Depending
on the number of kine in the Ritual area and the
type of kine nearby, Stains may accrue; for
example vampires with a Prey Exclusion (see
Vampire: The Masquerade, p. 181) may suffer
Stains if this Ritual is used in an area heavily
populated by their excluded class of mortal,
whereas varied groups with more kine to draw
from are less likely to bear an ethical cost.
A lot of blood is wasted with this Ritual, as all the
mortals in the area lose a little blood to the earth,
though the loss is not visible. For the remainder of
the chapter, those kine suffer a one-die penalty to
all Physical rolls and 1 Aggravated Health
damage.
Escape to True Sanctuary
By preparing two mystic circles in an
arduous ritual the caster can instantly travel from
one to the other. The journey is one-way, and the
caster must designate one circle for departure
while the “arrival” circle serves as an exit.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: Two charred circles of
approximately a meter in diameter.
■ Process: The caster burns the circles into the
ground or floor with an open flame, then
consecrates each circle. Consecration requires two
hours of chanting per night and two Rouse
Checks, for three consecutive nights. In total, this
ritual takes twelve Rouse Checks worth of Blood
from the caster.
■ System: Once the circles are complete the caster
need but step into the one designated for departure
and concentrate for a turn, making a Ritual roll.
(The caster makes the Ritual roll each time they
attempt to travel, but can only make one attempt
per scene.) On a win the caster vanishes,
reappearing in an instant in the middle of the exit
circle. There is no limit to the distance between
the two circles, but they must be inscribed on the
ground or on the floor of a building, not on the
floor of a vehicle. The caster can transport one
person or an object or objects totaling roughly
human mass with them. Damaging either circle
ruins the ritual completely and renders both circles
inert. A vampire can only have one pair of these
circles functional at any given time.
Heart of Stone
Performing this ritual turns the caster’s
unliving heart to stone. This makes them immune
to stakes but also, through some fluke of
sympathetic magic, completely remorseless and
cold-hearted automatons totally unreceptive to
emotional and social cues. Even more so than
normal.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A stone slab and a wax candle
drenched with the Blood of the caster.
■ Process: The caster lies on the stone slab with
the candle on their chest letting it burn down to
nothing over the course of a night. As the fire
reaches their chest, it causes one point of
Aggravated damage and forces a terror frenzy roll
(Difficulty 3). If the caster fails the frenzy roll, the
ritual ends. If the caster does not enter frenzy, they
make the Ritual roll. On a win the ritual
completes; a critical win heals the candle-fire
damage. The effect persists indefinitely, and
should the caster wish to reverse the process they
must repeat the ritual.
■ System: While under the effect of the ritual, the
caster’s heart is literally made of stone. Stakes fail
76
to penetrate it, breaking if forced. The caster also
exhibits a complete emotional detachment,
subtracting three dice from any Remorse rolls as
well as active (not resisting) Social-related rolls,
except for Intimidation and Dominate. The caster
cannot employ Presence but gains three bonus
dice to pools used to resist the effects of that
Discipline.
The Ritual of Transferring the Soul
The information presented here is
primarily for the Storyteller’s benefit, to help them
better tell the story of The Fall of London.
However, it is possible that Roger de Camden
could be given cause to teach the ritual to the
characters, or to other Kindred versed in Blood
Sorcery.
The Ritual of Transferring the Soul is a
5th level combined Blood Sorcery ritual and
Oblivion ceremony that requires two Kindred
participants: one who knows the requisite level of
Blood Sorcery, and another who is versed in
Oblivion. It is possible for a single Kindred who
possesses both Disciplines to perform the ritual
alone.
Performing the ritual requires a Rouse
check, and successes in both an Intelligence +
Blood Sorcery test (Difficulty 6) and an
Intelligence + Oblivion test (Difficulty 6). Once
the ritual has been performed successfully to
imbue the selected objects with the subject’s
essence, combining the objects again to restore the
subject’s power requires the subject to come into
contact with them again.
Multiple objects must be used – at least
five – as no single object is capable of storing all
of a vampire’s essence. Theoretically however any
number of objects could be used in this process,
with the power conveyed by each object relative
to the total number of objects used. The power
restored to the subject is similarly proportional to
the number of objects combined in the ritual’s
final phase. Importantly, this combination can
only be performed once, so any missing objects
become inert, and the remaining essence contained
within them is forever lost.
It is also possible to break the link
between the objects and the subject by performing
another instance of the ritual while in possession
of the objects, but before the subject can complete
the final incantation. A successful casting releases
the essence within each object present, rendering
them useless.
Shaft of Belated Dissolution
The Kindred fear few weapons as they
fear the dreaded stake created by this ritual.
Thought to be the origin of the myth regarding
stakes as the ultimate tool for slaying vampires,
the Shaft of Belated Dissolution not only seeks out
the heart of the vampire it’s aimed at but actually
causes Final Death when reaching its target. If
need be, the Shaft works toward this goal as a
splinter, inching its way through the target
vampire’s body to reach its goal.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: A stake carved of rowan wood,
inscribed with baneful runes.
■ Process: The caster drenches the stake with two
Rouse Checks worth of their Blood, while
blackening it in an oak-wood fire while reading
incantations over it. The ritual takes five hours to
complete.
■ System: This stake confers a three-dice bonus to
any pool on any attempt to stake a vampire,
whether hammered in while the victim sleeps,
wielded in melee, or fired from a crossbow. The
caster need not wield the stake themselves. If the
attack roll wins with a margin of five or better, the
vampire withers to dust in a single turn as if
consumed by an invisible fire. If the stake hits, but
the roll has insufficient margin (under five) to
pierce the heart, the stake breaks off in the wound,
the tip burying itself as it slowly begins to inch its
way toward the heart of the victim. Depending on
where it struck this can take hours or nights, but
unless extracted by medical or mystical means,
Final Death is assured. To remove it surgically
someone other than the victim needs to win a roll
of Dexterity + Medicine (Difficulty 6) in a process
that takes up to four hours. If no medical expertise
can be found, someone can remove the splinter by
77
severing the afflicted limb – unless the splinter has
already reached the torso.
Simulacrum Gate
A time-consuming and elaborate Ritual,
this colossal undertaking allows the construction
of a distance-defying portal allowing multiple
vampires to cross vast distances in mere moments.
While only one instance is known so far, Blood-
sorcerers of the Sabbat suspect that it is only a
matter of time before they may construct more as
means to perform devastating hit-and-run attacks
in the heart of rival sects’ domains.
■ StBH
■ Ingredients: Anything required to build a copy
of the target destination, including but not limited
to sand, mortar, concrete, metal, and dirt. One
vampire sacrifice and a number of mortal ones
equal to the number of travellers.
■ Process: In order to function, the gate needs to
be an exact copy of the target location, whether a
building, cellar, attic, or some other location
equipped with a physical structure that can be
designated as a portal. This requires spies to spend
weeks documenting the target location, smuggling
examples of materials and taking countless
pictures or making sketches of the place.
Meanwhile, the replica is built (the more remote,
the more secure), and the area consecrated with
blood – vast amounts of it. Preparing the portal
requires at least one mortal sacrifice per intended
traveler, their remains to be scattered about the
simulacrum edifice. The final activation calls for a
vampire sacrifice. If a suitable victim isn’t on
hand, the lot probably falls to the vampire present
who’s the least able to resist being forced into the
role, though ritualists have proposed Embracing a
mortal sacrifice for this purpose.
■ System: If the Ritual Test is successful, the gate
allows the desired number of vampires passage
outward, and an equal number – not necessarily
the same individuals – to return. Until that number
has been matched, the gate remains open
indefinitely, though nothing reveals the target
location as such. Mortals cannot use the gate; to
them it appears as nothing more than a repulsive
monument.
Warding Circle Against Cainites
This ward uses the standard rules for
Warding Circles (VTM p. 275).
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The caster draws the Warding
Circle with a rowan wand dipped in the mixture of
ash from a still-burning fire and Blood.
Thin-Blood Alchemy
Back to Contents
Nicknames: Cooking, Home Brew, the Craft,
Mashup
The thin Blood of the latest generations
holds barely any power of its own. But certain
thinbloods have learned to use it as a catalyst,
awakening the latent power in everything from
human trauma to gasoline. Born of the street drug
scene and cocktail culture as much as it w as
uncovered by instinct or in molder - ing medieval
texts, thin-blood Alchemy may be the defining art
of the next-millennium lick. By blending strongly
resonant human blood, and sometimes other
substances, with their own vitae, Alchemists can
counterfeit a wide range of powers from other
Disciplines – and some unique powers of their
own. Rumors already abound of specific elixirs
that grant the ability to walk in sunlight, commune
with Antediluvians, or achieve Golconda. But for
now, the street-level cookers have all they can do
to stay out of the Court’s sight – plenty of elders
consider Alchemy nothing but watered-down
diablerie. Alchemy can counterfeit some Blood
Sorcery powers (those that affect the caster’s
Blood), but not Rituals. The Storyteller can rule
any other power off-limits to Alchemy if they
worry about game balance or the plausibility of
the fiction – and reverse themselves later if they
wish, or hint at unique recipes developed in
Switzerland or hidden in a Cairo library. The
Discipline is young, and thinbloods have hardly
78
 explored every possible working or tasted every
possible cocktail.
Characteristics
All formulae require vitae from the
Alchemist and human blood of the correct
Resonance (VTM p. 226). The Resonant human
blood can be stored in a blood bag, or in a
Starbucks to-go cup for that matter. The specific
amount needed depends on the degree of the
donor’s Resonance and on the Storyteller’s whim.
In these rules, “power level” always refers
to the level of Alchemy involved, not the level of
the power counterfeited with the formula.
All formulae have a cost to distill, and
then the cost to activate. The distillation cost
reflects the fact that all formulae include the
Alchemist’s own vitae: A single Rouse Check.
Activation cost for a formula is the same as using
the power normally: free, or some number of
additional Rouse Checks.
Once activated, the Alchemist makes a
distillation roll to determine how effective the
particular mixture was. Each version of Alchemy
builds a different dice pool for the distillation roll.
The more successes, the more effective the
mixture:
Successes Effect of the
Mixture
2 Power weak, fluky, or
late in happening
4 Power works as
intended
6 Power increased in
effect
Some powers require their own dice rolls to take
effect, or to measure the degree of success. The
Alchemist makes those rolls where needed,
substituting their rating in Thin-Blood Alchemy
for the specific Discipline rating where relevant.
To learn a new formula requires research
time, whether the Alchemist spends it poring
through libraries or in meditation or on tasting
expeditions or performing laboratory
experimentation. Players should write down which
formulae their character already knows, and any
special ingredients it requires. A character
receives a formula for free for each dot in Thin-
Blood Alchemy and can purchase additional
formulae with experience and experimentation.
■ Masquerade Threat: Varies as widely as the
powers it counterfeits and the method used.
■ Blood Resonance: Required for each formula
and varies accordingly.
Ingredients The listed ingredients for each
formula are suggestions. Each thin-blood
alchemist develops their own proprietary
formulae, often writing the recipes down in code
just as the medieval alchemists did. The
alchemist’s own Blood is the only unvarying
ingredient in all alchemical formulae, although
almost all of them also require human blood of a
specific Resonance. Cold or clotted blood can
work in a formula if the alchemist has enough of
it. Ingredients need not be physical – a specific
experience or emotion caught in the blood can be
just as powerful as rare research chemicals.
The Storyteller should modify the dice
pool up or down by one or two dice based on the
quality of the ingredients – and perhaps by the
originality if the player comes up with suitably
nasty or bizarre things for their Alchemist to use.
As a rule of thumb:
■ Add one die for very rare or expensive
ingredients (ones that require at least a story to
source or Resources dots higher than the level of
the formula); subtract one die for cheap substitute
ingredients you can buy at a big box retailer.
(Many formulae include easily available industrial
chemicals or foods as standard ingredients; invoke
this penalty only when the characters substitute
such things for a superior ingredient listed.)
■ Add one die for very potent or magical
ingredients, such as unicorn horn, red mercury,
human blood with a Dyscrasia, werewolf blood, or
79
vitae with Blood Potency two levels higher than
the level of the formula; subtract one die for
medical bagged blood, melteddown candles from
the New Age shop, or other faux magics.
■ Add one die for player creativity in suggesting
ingredients, especially if sourcing them gets them
into trouble or otherwise advances the story.
distillation methods When the first dot in
Thin-Blood Alchemy is gained, the Alchemist
chooses their method. This is the way they
perform their distillation. Learning a different
method means starting from scratch, essentially
counting it as a separate Discipline. In this case,
formulae for one method do not apply to other
methods known, and the same formula must be
learnt separately for each method.
Athanor Corporis The Alchemist uses their
own body as the athanor, or alchemical furnace.
This might be a bio-feedback routine, the result of
an initial elixir consumed at initiation, or simply
intuitive understanding of how resonances
interact. Ingredients usually consist of different
types of resonance mixes, requiring the Alchemist
to sample the blood of multiple victims to get just
the right blend.
The Alchemist drinks the different types
of resonant blood required and the process is
performed within their veins with a distillation roll
of Stamina + Alchemy, together with a Rouse
Check.
Only one power can be active at a time,
and a new power must be distilled before it can be
activated. This usually takes at least three turns of
concentration, during which the Alchemist can do
nothing else.
Calcinatio The Alchemist uses the body of a
human as the athanor, adjusting their biophysical
state by means of emotional pressure and spoken
incantations. (Some practitioners of Calcinatio use
drugs on their subjects instead.) The Alchemist
then feeds their Blood to the chosen human,
paying the distillation cost, and makes the
distillation roll with Manipulation + Alchemy.
The human’s entire body distills the
formula. The Alchemist then drinks their blood to
use the power (required Hunger slaked equals
power level minus 1).
The Alchemist can only distill one power
per victim, though the victim retains the formula
within them as long as they’re kept in the same
emotional state; each power takes as long to
activate as it takes to drain that quantity of blood
(VTM p. 212).
Fixatio Lacking the physical or social
predilections of the other methods, the Alchemist
uses a conventional athanor such as a kiln, a
metalworking furnace, a meth cooker, a
repurposed propane tank, or the like. This method
most resembles “classical” alchemy: the
Alchemist pours their Blood as well as inert,
usually rare, ingredients into the athanor, pays the
distillation cost, and distills them inside it with an
Intelligence + Alchemy roll.
The resulting formulae are fixed, meaning
that the Alchemist can carry them around on their
person and imbibe them to activate their power.
(Roll the distillation roll upon consumption, not
upon production.) However, without a laboratory,
they cannot make any more – at most, they might
be able to “one-pot” a weak (Level 3 or less)
formula using a pressure-cooker or other field
expedient. Using such unsuitable equipment
reduces the distillation dice pool by 2 dice.
The Alchemist can carry a number of
fixed formulae (of any level) equal to their Wits or
Dexterity – keeping the vials safe, stable, hidden,
and leakproof is not a trivial task. (The Storyteller
can decide if each vial takes up the space of a
syringe, a can of Red Bull, or a thermos.) The
Alchemist can store a number of fixed formulae
(of any level) equal to twice the sum of Alchemy
plus their dots in Haven: a refrigerator is almost a
necessity. Fixed does not necessarily mean shelf
stable, after all. The
Alchemist can activate one power per
turn.
80

Level 1
Far Reach
This formula allows the alchemist to use
their mind to grab, hold, and push objects or
people without touching them. While few can
employ enough mental force to actually cause
direct harm, a clever applicant can find many
ways to get an opponent into, or themselves out
of, harm’s way.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, choleric
human blood, melted nylon fibers or a grated
refrigerator magnet or weird nootropics ordered
off the internet
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Resolve + Alchemy vs Strength +
Athletics
■ System: The alchemist can lift, push, or pull a
physical object or person under 100 kg, within
their sight and closer than 10 meters. The object
moves swiftly, but not rapidly enough to injure a
person with the blow; the object may break if it is
fragile.
The exception: knives or other small metal tools,
which the alchemist can wield with a Resolve +
Alchemy test, at a two-dice penalty because of the
need for precision. A knife used this way does
only one point of extra damage.
Trying to move someone actively resisting
requires a contest of Resolve + Alchemy vs
Strength + Athletics. On a win, the alchemist can
pull the victim within grabbing or clawing range,
or throw them one meter for each point of margin
on the contest, doing an equal amount of
Superficial damage. They land prone. Keeping
someone or something floating in mid-air requires
a Resolve + Thin-Blood Alchemy (Difficulty 3)
roll every turn. Fine manipulation (such as pulling
the pin of a grenade) requires a Wits + Alchemy
roll at a suitable Difficulty, as determined by the
Storyteller.
■ Duration: One turn unless held (see above).
Haze
This formula creates a field of mist that
follows the user, rendering them more difficult to
target with ranged weapons and concealing their
identity.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: In addition to the alchemist’s Blood
and phlegmatic human blood, dry ice or cigar
smoke or auto exhaust
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ System: Upon activation a cloud of mist-like
vapor surrounds the alchemist, masking their
features and obscuring their silhouette. Anyone
attempting to identify the user or hit them with
ranged weapons suffers a two-dice penalty to their
pool. The user can extend the cloud to encompass
a group of up to five people by making another
Rouse check.
■ Duration: One scene or until voluntarily ended.
Portable Shade
Portable Shade, or even more irreverently,
“suntan lotion,” is a formula developed by
Cainites on the Path of the Sun to augment a thin-
blood’s already substantial resistance to sunlight
to near mortal levels. While it doesn’t render the
subject completely immune, it extends the time
they can endure daylight while masking
immediate burns sustained by
the sun.
■ StBH
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Ingredients: Blood of the Alchemist, sanguinic
mortal blood, fresh plant leaves. Some alchemists
also use various off-the-shelf sunblock ointments
in the mix, though it is unknown whether they
contribute significantly to the formula.
■ Dice Pools: Stamina + Alchemy
■ System: Make a Stamina + Alchemy test when
ingesting the formula. The user is able to endure
sunlight without taking damage for a number of
hours equal to the number of successes on the test.
At sunset, make another test with the same pool,
this time with a Difficulty equal to the number of
hours spent in daylight. A failure causes the user
to sustain a level of aggravated damage, while a
total failure has them sustain two, as the
81
accumulated sunlight boils the Blood in their
veins.
■ Duration: A number of hours equal to a Stamina
+ Alchemy test, or the next sunset, whichever
comes first.
Profane Hieros Gamos
Alchemical texts speak of the Great
Hermaphrodite, the union of contrasts. Day and
night, male and female, life and death. Alchemists
who master the worldly aspect of the Hieros
Gamos use the fluid nature of their condition to
change their gender. It is a messy process and
requires great dedication and conviction, but it is a
power that many Kindred secretly envy in their
unchanging form. It is also a great way to change
identity or adopt a new mask.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, blood from
five different vessels identifying fully as the
desired gender
■ System: After brewing the formula, the
Alchemist performs self-castration and / or
mastectomy before falling into daysleep. Upon
awakening they find themselves a perfectly
formed specimen of the desired gender. In essence
it is as if they had been born that way. There are
even stories of self made Duskborn women giving
birth to children. If desired, a modified procedure
can create any configuration of gender or agender
imaginable.
■ Duration: Permanentm, until performed again.
Level 2
At level 2, the Alchemist can develop
formulae to counterfeit level 1 powers of other
Disciplines. Each of these formulae take at least a
week to research.
Envelop
This formula creates a mist that clings to a
victim, blinding it and (in the case of mortals)
causing suffocation.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, melancholic
and phlegmatic human blood, potassium chlorate,
smog or halon gas
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Wits + Alchemy vs Stamina +
Survival
■ System: The alchemist activates the power and
chooses a target within sight. A swirling mist
envelops the target, obscuring their sight and
penalizing them three dice from all sight-based
detection and ranged attack dice pools. In
addition, the alchemist can make the mist
suffocate a mortal with a contest of Wits +
Alchemy vs. Stamina + Survival. On a win, the
target can take no action except coughing and
choking;
on a critical win, the target loses consciousness.
The alchemist can only employ Envelopon single
targets, and only on one at a time.
■ Duration: Until scene ends or the alchemist ends
the effect voluntarily.
Level 3
At level 3, the Alchemist can develop
formulae to counterfeit level 2 powers of other
Disciplines. Each of these formulae take at least a
night to distill and at least one month to research.
Concoct Ashe
The process of creating the Ashe drug is a
form of Blood Alchemy in itself, and generally
takes place in a laboratory or workshop due to the
need for an open flame and metal filings.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A destroyed vampire’s ashes, an
open flame reaching 1,500°C, aluminum filings.
■ Dice Pools: Intelligence + Thin-Blood Alchemy
■ System: The vampire’s ashes are contained in a
vessel heated by an open flame and then mixed
with aluminum filings. Each success on the
distillation roll produces a single Ashe dose. On a
total failure, the sample is ruined and a Beast
Shard (see p. XX) emerges in the area.
When consumed, all Ashe allows a thin-blood to
access more of the power in vitae and ash than is
82
usually within their grasp. Their Blood Potency
counts as 1 for the purposes of Blood Surges and
Discipline Rouse Check re-rolls until the end of
the chapter. The drug is far from lacking in
downsides however, see Ashe Addiction (see p.
XX).
Chemically-Induced Flashback
■ Prerequisite: Concoct Ashe by melting down a
vampire’s possessions (the more important the
better) during Ashe creation, an alchemist infuses
the drug with memories from the destroyed
vampire.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: A melted-down object belonging to
the destroyed vampire.
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check in addition
to the cost of using Ashe
■ System: When using Concoct Ashe, this
formula may be used to imbue remains with the
memories of the vampire they once formed. When
consumed, this altered Ashe provokes a
Willpower test at a Difficulty of 1 + the destroyed
vampire’s Blood Potency. On a win the user
immediately enters a Memoriam (VTM p. 311),
reliving an important memory of the destroyed
vampire’s past rather than their own. This scene is
resolved normally using their own stats, but the
shifted perspective will be valuable. If they are
meditating in a place of calm at the time they
consume the Ashe, the thin-blood adds a one-die
bonus to all dice
Defractionate
This formula results in a homeopathic
elixir. When added to fractionated medical-supply
blood, the elixir returns it to freshness, allowing
vampires without the Iron Gullet merit to obtain
nutrition from it.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, sanguine
and melancholic human blood, O-negative human
blood (only a few ml), moldy spinach, hot black
coffee, sodium octanoate
■ System: The alchemist taps their vessel
(Calcinatio), or their own vein (Athanor Corporis)
to get the Defractionate elixir if they do not use
Fixatio. For each success on the distillation roll,
they get enough elixir to turn one blood bag
(slakes 1 Hunger) from fractionated to
unfractionated blood. Any vampire can consume
this blood and slake Hunger with it.
■ Athanor Corporis: The alchemist can tap their
own vein once per night for this elixir until their
next feeding, or until they reach Hunger 5. They
need not pay the distillation cost again.
■ Calcinatio: If the vessel survives the tap, the
alchemist can tap them again in a week for more
elixir. They need not pay the distillation cost
again, but the vessel pays the Health cost (3
Aggravated damage) each time they are tapped.
On-Demand Sunburn
A dread tool of the Path of the Sun, On-
Demand Sunburn traps sunlight in the very body
of its user, enabling them to unleash it as a
destructive force through their own skin, searing
themselves and their prey in a sizzling embrace.
While the damage done by a single user is not
enough to incinerate a vampire, a group of self-
immolating Heliophiles can spell doom for
fledglings and elders alike.
■ StBH
■ Ingredients: Blood of the Alchemist, choleric
mortal blood, gold shavings, mercury, as well as
assorted halogens (usually chlorine or bromide).
The formula also needs to be subjected to sunlight
for several hours before use, and alchemists
employing athanor corporis usually “juice up” on
Portable Shade (see above) for this.
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: None
■ System: On activation, the alchemist becomes
an unliving battery of sunlight with a single charge
seething in their veins. They can unleash this
charge at will, inflicting aggravated damage upon
themselves and another vampire whom they’ve
successfully achieved skin contact with, as their
own skin
smolders and blackens. The user takes two levels
of aggravated damage, while the victim suffers an
amount equal to their Bane Severity, as if exposed
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to daylight for a full turn. If the victim has the
means to reduce the damage (such as through
Fortitude) they can do so. If the formula isn’t
activated before then, the power automatically
activates at the first sunset after ingestion, causing
two levels of aggravated damage to the user.
■ Duration: Until unleashed or next sunset,
whichever comes first.
Level 4
At Level 4, the Alchemist can develop
formulae to counterfeit level 3 powers of other
Disciplines.
At this level, all formulae also require a
drop of vitae from a vampire of a matching clan or
from one who already possesses the counterfeited
Discipline. For example, to counterfeit
Shapechange the Alchemist needs vitae from a
vampire with Protean or from a Gangrel. The
Gangrel would not have to possess Protean 3, or
even have Protean at all; the power is in the
Blood, not the specific vampire.
As noted above, this drop does not cost
the donor any Health, nor does it convey a Blood
Bond. That said, Alchemists generally only get
such donations as the result of a major Boon – or
because the donor has some truly horrible and
dangerous mission they are attempting to inveigle
the Alchemist’s coterie into carrying out.
These formulae take at least three nights
to distill and at least three months to research.
Airborne Momentum
This formula enables the alchemist to lift
themselves from the ground, achieving a state of
swift flight or floating. They can fly in any
direction, including up or down, though their
carrying capacity is limited.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, choleric and
sanguine human blood, champagne, bird blood,
helium, scopolamine or belladonna extract
■ Activation Cost: One Rouse Check
■ Dice Pools: Strength + Alchemy vs
Strength+Athletics (if resisted)
■ System: The potion enables the alchemist (and
only them) to fly or hover at approximately
running speed. The flier can carry a human-sized
mass, though their speed drops to walking speed.
Grabbing and carrying aloft an unwilling subject
or pulling the flier to the ground both require a
contest between the alchemist’s Strength +
Alchemy and the other’s Strength + Athletics.
■ Duration: One scene
Discipline Channeling
■ Prerequisite: Concoct Ashe
Counterfeiting Disciplines is part and
parcel of Thin-Blood Alchemy’s use, but the
ability to channel a Discipline from the ashes of a
deceased vampire is a form of necromantic
Alchemy, at least according to Dr. Mortius and the
Duskborn who practice it. Those who practice this
Alchemy find themselves able to use any one of
the destroyed vampire’s Discipline powers, even if
they typically wouldn’t have access to powers of
this level.
■ CotBG
■ Ingredients: Crushed leaves from the indigo
plant.
■ Activation Cost: The same as the channeled
power.
■ Dice Pools: The same as the channeled power.
■ System: When using Concoct Ashe, this formula
may be used to imbue remains with the abilities of
the vampire they once formed. When consumed,
this altered Ashe provokes a Willpower test at a
Difficulty of the destroyed vampire’s highest
Discipline rating. On a win, the thin-blood gains
the use of a single Discipline power that the
destroyed vampire possessed, until the end of the
chapter. Use the destroyed vampire’s Discipline
rating whenever a channeled power calls for one.
The Storyteller may state the Disciplines and
specific powers the deceased vampire held so the
alchemist can choose from a list, or if the
alchemist has a power in mind they can request it
from the Storyteller. The Storyteller has final say.
On a critical win the thin-blood gains the use of
two Discipline powers that the destroyed vampire
possessed.
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Level 5
At level 5, the Alchemist can develop formulae to
counterfeit level 4 powers of other Disciplines.
These formulae take a month to distill and
at least three years to research.
Awaken the Sleeper
This formula results in an elixir which,
when added to human blood, can awaken a
vampire from Torpor.
■ VTM
■ Ingredients: The alchemist’s Blood, choleric or
sanguine human blood, adrenaline, ammonium
carbonate, hartshorn, caffeine or benzedrine,
melatonin
■ System: The alchemist taps their vessel
(Calcinatio), or their own vein (Athanor Corporis)
to get the Awaken the Sleeper elixir if they do not
use Fixatio. They then mix the elixir into human
blood. For each success above 2 on the distillation
roll, the elixir can awaken a vampire of that Blood
Potency.
Example: Hari gets 5 successes on his Awaken the
Sleeper distillation roll: this elixir can awaken a
torpid vampire of Blood Potency 3 or less (5 – 2 =
3).
■ Athanor Corporis: The alchemist can tap their
own vein once per night for this elixir until their
next feeding, or until they reach Hunger 5. They
need not pay the distillation cost again.
■ Calcinatio: If the vessel survives the tap, the
alchemist can tap them again in a week for more
elixir. They need not pay the distillation cost
again, but the vessel pays the Health cost (5
Aggravated damage) each time they are tapped.
The Alchemist can also simply feed the vessel’s
blood to the sleeper directly.
SPCs
Aggressive Corpse
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 4, Social 0,
Mental 0
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 6, Willpower 0
Exceptional Dice Pools: Brawl 6; Intimidation 5
■ Special: Aggressive corpses take Superficial and
Aggravated damage in the same way as vampires,
except they are immune to sunlight. They cannot
heal or mend damage. They cannot be mentally
dominated or influenced as they are bound to their
master. They do not need eyes or ears to perceive
everything around them as someone with
unimpeded vision and hearing might. Bites from
the aggressive dead inflict +2 Aggravated Health
damage to mortals.
■ General Difficulties: 3/2
Ghost in the Machine
These are wraiths who in the Skinlands prefer to
possess objects, speaking through computer
screens, short-circuiting electronics, and making
elevators crash with mortals inside, among other
activities. In the Shadowlands, they exist as quiet,
almost shy wraiths, uncomfortable with being
seen.
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 3, Social 3,
Mental 5
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 5, Willpower 4
■ Exceptional Dice Pools: Craft 6, Drive 7, Stealth
7; Intimidation 5; Science 6, Technology 7
■ Special: These wraiths cannot possess people.
Instead, they possess machines. They use a pool of
seven dice (their exceptional Technology or Drive
dice pool, depending on the machine) to influence
devices from computers to cars and televisions to
elevators. These wraiths can make such devices
broadcast messages from the wraith (if the device
is equipped to transmit), malfunction, overheat, or
indeed drive or operate as per the wraith’s will. If
the machine is destroyed, the wraith is ejected.
■ General Difficulties: 3/2
Homuncular Servant
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 1, Social 0,
Mental 1
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 3, Willpower 1
■ Exceptional Dice Pools: Athletics 4, Stealth 6;
Intimidation 4
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■ Special: Homuncular servants take Superficial
and Aggravated damage in the same way as
vampires, except they are immune to sunlight.
They cannot heal or mend damage. They cannot
be mentally dominated or influenced as they are
bound to their master. They do not need eyes or
ears to perceive everything around them as
someone with unimpeded vision and hearing
might. They can telepathically broadcast a single
image per scene to their master.
■ General Difficulties: 3/1
Mindless Corpse
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 2, Social 0,
Mental 0
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 4, Willpower 0
■ Exceptional Dice Pools: Intimidation 4
■ Special: Mindless corpses take Superficial and
Aggravated damage in the same way as vampires,
except they are immune to sunlight. They cannot
heal or mend damage, and rot at least one
Superficial Health damage each day. They cannot
be mentally dominated or influenced as they are
bound to their master. They do not react to
motion, words, or interference from anyone but
their creator. Mindless corpses may always
contribute to Teamwork (VTM p. 122) for menial
labor such as digging, lifting, or pushing even if
they lack Skills.
■ General Difficulties: 2/1
Poltergeist
Poltergeists feel perpetually downtrodden. To
their mind, it’s amusing to make life difficult for
everybody else, because it’s shit enough for them
being dead. They don’t have the patience to
inhabit items or people, preferring to launch things
around aggressively, write their names on the wall
in scratch-marks or whatever fluid comes to hand,
and terrify the inhabitants of old houses. In the
Shadowlands, they’re bombastic, often hurling
insults laced with self-deprecating commentary.
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 5, Social 3,
Mental 2
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 7, Willpower 4
Exceptional Dice Pools: Athletics 6, Brawl 7,
Larceny 6, Stealth 7; Intimidation 6
■ Special: These ghosts cannot possess people.
Poltergeists may physically influence the
environment and any objects and people in it (by
marking walls, assaulting people, or launching
items, as examples) a number of times per scene
equal to their Willpower. If they incur Aggravated
Willpower damage, their number of actions
decreases to match their current Willpower. These
wraiths can attack using their own form, clawing
with a pool of seven dice (their exceptional Brawl
dice pool), dealing non-halved Superficial damage
(+2 damage modifier). They can also use the
objects in the room to inflict additional or halved
damage (from flung knives, television sets, etc.)
though thrown weapons use six dice (their
exceptional Athletics dice pool).
■ General Difficulties: 3/2
Puppeteer
Possession is where these wraiths specialize,
enjoying the ability to enter the bodies of the
weak-willed and pursue an ersatz life for a short
while, before exorcism or the Shadowlands calls
them back. Skilled puppeteers can imitate
personality as well as controlling a flesh vessel,
while wraiths newer to the calling make
possessions inadvertently jerky and frightening. In
the Shadowlands, puppeteers are deeply
uncomfortable giving up control, and always
attempt to negotiate from positions of power.
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 4, Social 4,
Mental 5
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 6, Willpower 6
■ Exceptional Dice Pools: Brawl 6, Drive 7,
Stealth 6; Insight 7, Intimidation 6, Performance 7,
Persuasion 6, Subterfuge 7; Awareness 6
■ Special: As with spectres, these wraiths may use
the Possession Auspex-Dominate power, rolling
eight dice in the attempt to take control. They steer
their host freely, though the host is able to roll
Resolve + Intelligence once per scene against the
puppeteer’s seven dice (their exceptional Drive
dice pool), with the victim ejecting the ghost if
86
they roll more successes. Each time the victim ■ Secondary Attributes: Health 7, Willpower 4
attempts this roll and fails, they incur two points ■ Skills: Academics 1, Awareness 5, Investigation
of Superficial Willpower damage that cannot heal 1, Medicine 2, Occult 4; Athletics 3, Brawl 3,
until the puppeteer abandons the host. Drive 4, Larceny 2, Stealth 5, Survival 2; Insight
■ General Difficulties: 4/2 2, Intimidation 3, Persuasion 1, Subterfuge 2
■ Disciplines: Auspex 4, Celerity 2, Dominate 2,
Screamer Obfuscate 2
Mysterious and terrifying, the screaming dead are ■ Special: It is not possible to strike a spectre
wraiths that manifest in the Skinlands as howls, unless it takes solid form. Only dark magic or an
roars, and groans, making houses weep, trees wail, exorcism performed by a priest or inquisitor can
and empty spaces shout insults at anyone who banish, destroy, or enslave a spectre. A spectre
enters them. They aren’t quite spectres, but are possesses a mortal using a power equivalent
filled with so much anger or fear that they exude mechanically to the Possession (Auspex-
it. In the Shadowlands their screams turn to siren Dominate) power. Spectres use Manipulation +
songs, making them among the most charming Drive to control a possessed human into
and sweet wraiths. Their warm personalities can performing functions they would normally avoid.
flip on a dime, however. Spectres use Dexterity + Brawl to hurl objects
■ Standard Dice Pools: Physical 3, Social 5, telekinetically.
Mental 4
■ Secondary Attributes: Health 5, Willpower 5
■ Exceptional Dice Pools: Stealth 5; Intimidation
8, Performance 7, Persuasion 6, Subterfuge 6
■ Special: These wraiths cannot possess people.
Their primary function is to terrify mortals with
their screams, similar to the Dread Gaze Presence
power (VTM, p. 267).
When a screamer uses this power, they
roll eight dice (their exceptional Intimidation
pool) against the victim’s Composure + Resolve,
with the results emulating those of Dread Gaze
without the visual requirement.
■ General Difficulties: 4/2

Spectre
Spectres are otherwise known as angry ghosts.
These dead beings possess a fiery rage,
embodying their anger through destructive acts,
including possession of the living to make them
vessels of their wrath. Spectres have all lost
something dear to them, with it often being their
link to the world of the living. They have nothing
left to lose, and so take out their anger on all other
beings.
■ Attributes: Strength 4, Dexterity 4, Stamina 4;
Charisma 1, Manipulation 3, Composure 2;
Intelligence 3, Wits 3, Resolve 2
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