RIFT is an obscure Discipline – rare in the extreme, born of anguish & remorse, sharpened through tear-streaked centuries of nightly struggle against the most obscene appetites – that allows practitioners of its weird, flagellant art-form to coalesce their Beast into a quasi-living, sentient Umbral Realm bound eternally to their shadow: a sprawling, labyrinthine nightmare-dimension.
Through this monstrous realm, the Damned may walk.
And in this place, other things – ancient things, titanic, hungry and inhuman – soar corpse-pale skies lit by rotting, pulsating black stars, and dive through creaking forests of twisted-iron atrocity rising from endless oceans of blood.
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In the long black centuries between the rise of the Baali from their cursed organ-pit and the ascendance of House Tremere to majestic undeath, it is known that Saulot performed innumerable private pilgrimages to far-flung, moonlit realms in an eternal, fruitless search for the enlightened state whispered of as Golconda.
Some occult scholars claim that, in desperation, the Antediluvian sat silently for several decades at the feet of Shinbutsu-shūgō masters, wreathed in holy incense, the toll of tsurigane and a coil of unending thirst: contemplating the infinite sins of his undying lineage, reflecting upon his Heaven-ordained duty to his Progenitor and seeking to divest himself of all worldly attachment.
If so, it is possible that his incalculable and fathomless meditations produced the first echo of what would come to be known in later millennia as Rift.
Whether this is truth or mere fabrication, students of esoteric history trace the first known demonstrations of the Rift Discipline to a nomadic brood of Malkavians calling themselves ‘Gaki’ – or ‘Hungry Ghosts’ – who hunted the Silk Road during the 8th century. These wandering, blood-drenched emperors of jade & dust claim to have been taught the technique by a wandering Far-Eastern mystic who bore a shining third eye upon his brow & spoke in koan-like riddles about the Ten-Thousand Hells awaiting the Children of Caine.
The Gaki Bloodline
Rumors persist that a true bloodline of Malkavians – or Malkavian Antitribu – eventually emerged from among the far-wandering Gaki coteries, and that the eerie bloodline persists into the modern nights; a minority of Gehenna researchers claim that a cabal of such creatures were active in Tokyo as recently as the 1970s, drifting silently through the long, smog-shrouded neon shadows of that vast metropolis in search of fresh-spilt blood.
If there is any truth to these claims, those of the Gaki Bloodline suffer the full Derangement weakness of their parent clan; in addition, their perceptions are twisted by their hunger: when a Gaki is down to a number of Blood Points lower than her Humanity or Path rating, her world fades into a sinister & ghostly sea of potential victims, immediate physical threats, drifting fog and the whispers of the kumonosu. During this time, she is unable to focus on any other input – such as traffic lights, the distant sound of gunfire or whether she’s standing in an apartment, on the street or in a fetish-club – unless she expends a point of Willpower to shake off the unreal cloak of her hallucinations for the remainder of the scene.
The Gaki possess the Bloodline Disciplines of Auspex,Obfuscate and Rift.
Elder members of the Bloodline are known to have traded extensively in ancient nights with far-voyaging Gangrel of the Silk Road, and often possess some combination of Animalism (for use in controlling the Beast), Fortitude (for use in surviving botched Courage rolls when evoking Rift) and Protean (for general use in traveling the winding paths of the world in safety).
Since that time, the Discipline has vanished and resurfaced repeatedly, passed from master to apprentice; in these Final Nights, it is as likely to be practiced by a Nosferatu neonate dwelling in the gutters beneath a methadone clinic as it is to be wielded by a salon of elder Toreador Antitrubu who make an art of their own grandiose self-destruction.
The technique is very quietly forbidden within the Camarilla, as a pair of recurring themes amongst those who practice the art-form are a fondness for Diablerie and a penchant for experimentation in Dark Thaumaturgy … although knowledge of the art is also – somewhat surprisingly – kept in secret among several coteries of particularly puritanical Josiandevil-hunters.
REQUIREMENTS
Rift may only be taught by another, more-experienced master of the art-form. It cannot be learned from demons, spirits or other non-Kindred tutors. It cannot be gained at Character Creation nor selected as a Caitiff Discipline or Additional Discipline (pg. 494) unless explicitly approved by the Storyteller.
Once a Kindred has a greater number of dots in Rift than she possesses in any other Discipline, she may thereafter instruct herself in the Discipline through meditation; after this time, she no longer requires a tutor.
A Kindred may only possess a total score in Rift equal to one half the total number of points of Humanity she has lost since her Embrace.
Thus, a Kindred may not gain her first dot of Rift until she has lost at least 2 points of Humanity. If she wishes to gain a second dot in Rift, she must have lost at least 4 points in Humanity.
An elder who wishes to gain her sixth dot in Rift must, therefore, have lost at least 12 points in Humanity over her long, blood-splattered unlife.
In addition, upon gaining her first dot in Rift, the practitioner of this art gains the Nightmares Flaw (pg 485). She gains no bonus points of any kind for accepting this Flaw. If she already possesses Nightmares, the novice practitioner of Rift must instead select another Mental Flaw – such as Deep Sleeper or Lunacy – as deemed appropriate by the Storyteller, representative of her new reality: each time she slumbers, she is pulled deep into her own Rift to experience the most grotesque of tortures at the hands of her Beast … and all its victims.
Note that proficiency in Rift is in no way dependent upon a vampire’s current Humanity total: a vampire with a Humanity of 10 could freely learn & utilize five full dots worth of Rift, so long as she had lost at least 10 points of Humanity at some point in her past.
It is about falling into the Abyss. It is about witnessing yourself lose the grand, shadow-draped chess-match against your own ravening Beast in a slow, ugly war of attrition. It is about shame, sorrow & self-reproach. It is about confronting your own subconscious desire to be punished for your sins, watering this garden with blood, and allowing the tangled forest of self-hatred to grow wild, dark & unchecked. It is about accepting one’s own damnation and the personal hell that comes with it, facing-down your worst fear wrought in a storm of ash & flame, and dying – torn into a thousand screaming fragments – over and over and overagain.
It is about what awaits you in the dark, whether at the end of another blood-slick night of terror or at the final, jagged end of a squandered immortality.
On the surface, of course, Rift is about bridging the world of flesh to the nightmare realm, dancing along the weirding way between them with a twist of will & blood, flaunting the crude, limited physics of this concrete universe.
And, up to a point, it is that as well.
For these reasons, tutoring a potential student in Rift is prohibitively difficult.
For one, it is near-impossible for an instructor to gauge how much torment their would-be apprentice has already endured. Has this supplicant to the power you wield already begun to feel her soul & sanity crumble, crawling her way back up with broken fingers from the awful precipice of the gaping, blood-slick pit?
Or is she a mere pretender to such evil?
If she has not yet begun to grow her own Rift & populate the personal hell that she will soon steal-into like a thief, how do you tell an apprentice “go now, and commit atrocities, that you might regret them later?”
How do you remind her that the Beast is ever hungry, that it feasts with cold delight in the deep blackness upon those who would seek to dance around it?
Most Kindred simply do not possess the temperament to master Rift, and it is all but unknown among those who walk a Path of Enlightenment.
SYSTEM
Much like Obfuscate, Rift requires no expenditure of Vitae to activate its power. It requires concentration and cannot be used in Frenzy.
In addition, it is – in theory – quite a subtle power, with few obvious effects visible to the outside observer.
Any use of Rift automatically causes all mundane and electronic recording equipment within line of sight of the practitioner to glitch-out for a split-second; a video-camera cannot capture an image of hell by training on the Damned, instead recording only a few frames of static & distortion.
However, a practitioner of the Discipline must always first attempt a Courage roll whenever she channels the nightmare of her own private damnation; attempting this roll does not require an action, and the Difficulty of this roll is always equal to 4 + the level of the Discipline power to be activated.
DECLARING INTENT
Whenever a Damned chooses to activate any ability of the Rift discipline, she must specify exactly what level of the Discipline she intends to use. She cannot, for example, activate Step Upon the Nightmare Bridge and then – once within her Rift – decide to activate Dance of Unstable Nightmaresunless she immediately attempts an additional Courage roll.
If this roll is unsuccessful, one of the following three things occurs:
the ability fails, as the Damned – at the last moment – draws back in terror from the eternity of suffering she has built for herself, brick by blazing & razor-wreathed brick.
the Damned may expend a point of Willpower, forcing open the gateway between worlds through sheer desperation.
the roll is a Botch, which has special rules noted below.
If the practitioner chooses to force the power of her Rift upon the unsuspecting world in this way, the effects of her Discipline are Obscene, as noted below.
A practitioner of Rift may always choose to voluntarily fail her Courage roll (no roll required), expend her Willpower and unleash her Rift in a wave of Obscenity, if she so desires.
If the Courage roll is Botched, the practitioner is consumed in a wave of horror & nightmare-flame emanating from the Rift bound to her. This deals a number of levels of Aggravated damage equal to the level of the Discipline power to be activated.
This damage may be soaked as normal (via Fortitude).
This damage is additionally reduced by one level for each religious item or icon the Damned carries; these items are destroyed utterly when the raw power of her unleashed Rift tears through her: silver crosses are deformed into unrecognizable twists of tarnish & rust, wooden prayer-beads blaze for a single moment with unholy fire before being reduced to greasy ash, and earrings emblazoned with the Sacred Heart shatter into splinters of smoking ruin with a bitter scream and a waft of brimstone.
The Damned may carry a total number of such items or icons equal to her Humanity score. These items must be worn or carried for at least 24 hours before they may be sacrificed in this way.
Note that religious items carried by the practitioner of Rift must match the faith (if any) of the Damned: atheist Kindred cannot benefit from them at all, and most creatures cannot gain the benefits of both a Star of David and a Holy Rosary at the same time.
Members of the Gaki Bloodline, famously, were the exception to that rule: true Universal Polytheists, they adorned themselves with sacred items from every culture they encountered, practicing as many good-luck & purification rituals as they could learn in an eternal mania to ward-off evil.
Echo of Hells: Upon activating this technique, the practitioner of Rift chooses any one creature who likewise suffers the hunger of an undying Beast; she may communicate silently with that individual for the remainder of the scene.
This creature must be within line-of-sight to the Damned for contact to be established (but see below).
All attempts to communicate with this creature are automatically successful unless the other Damned chooses to block such contact; a Howl of the Devil-Tiger Kuei-jin who speaks only Early Middle Japanese may choose to ignore the alien whispers of a Western undead channeling the screams of her Rift, but their communication otherwise surpasses all language barriers.
If the Damned chooses to communicate with a fellow practitioner of the Rift Discipline who is known intimately to her, this communication may be performed over any distance; she must know the name, face, scent, touch and taste of her partner before communication may be joined in this way.
This technique, at the Storyteller’s discretion, may be used to communicate with creatures including ghouls, as they are subject to Frenzy, as well as Black Spiral Dancers,Nephandi,FormoriandRisen but it cannot – for the most part – otherwise be used to communicate with mortals.
Obscene: If this technique is unleashed as Obscene, all creatures within ten feet of the chosen target hear a cacophony of discordant & hideous whispers emanating from the target for as long as your communication lasts.
Unlike more potent gifts of this Discipline, mere exposure to this technique is not enough to harm flesh.
LEVEL TWO:
Unveil Damnation: By use of this technique, the practitioner of Rift may draw another into her shadow-realm of eternal agony, if only for a moment, forcing her target to bear witness to the vampire’s private hell … and to endure, for the space of a mortal heartbeat, its myriad torments.
This is a fully-immersive psychic onslaught: the victim cannot avoid this experience by averting her eyes, nor by covering her ears and screaming, although many creatures will instinctively attempt to do so.
ON THE TEN-THOUSAND HELLS
It is known that each Rift opens upon a different realm of perfect suffering, each uniquely tailored by the Beast of the Damned to accentuate the fear, shame, violence, frustration, guilt, trauma and horror they have endured … and perpetuated, returned onto them a thousand-fold.
Before a player may gain any levels in the Rift Discipline, she must be able to describe to her Storyteller the basic nature of her particular damnation: one might be a breathtakingly beautiful rain-drenched forest, with a different victim of the Damned crucified upon each tree, through which she is chased in nightmare by the flaming corpses of all those she has Diablerized; another Rift might open into an endless, boiling desert of black sand, pillars of salt, coils of rusted razor-wire and pits of jagged glass shards, watched-over eternally by seven hateful, cataract bio-luminescent spheres roiling across the bruise-colored sky in a chorus of screams.
A Storyteller should work closely with her player to help detail this realm, drawing from the character’s misdeeds, phobias and failures.
This ability functions identically to the Level 2 Presence ability Dread Gaze (see page 194) with the following adjustments:
The Damned rolls Perception + Awareness to determine her success with this ability rather than Charisma + Intimidation.
This is not a Presence ability and is thus not subject to defenses such as Pavis of Foul Presence (pg. 236).
The victim of this technique may immediately attempt a Perception + Empathy roll (Difficulty equal to the practitioner’s current Willpower). If this roll is successful, she gains deep insight into the Nature, Demeanor, psychology and morality of the Rift-practitioner; at Storyteller discretion, this may give the victim an advantage against the Damned in later scenes or allow her to predict the Rift-practitioner’s next move.
Obscene: If this technique is unleashed as Obscene, all creatures within ten feet of the intended target bear witness to the same flash of utter horror … and are thus subject to the effect of the ability (although the Difficulty to terrify these additional targets is doubled from its base; the Damned rolls Perception + Awareness separately for each target). Each target, as normal, may attempt a Perception + Empathy roll to analyze the tormented inner psyche of the Rift-practitioner.
In addition, the initial target of this ability suffers one level of lethal damage from exposure to such horror; the Difficulty to soak this damage is equal to 2 + the level of the Discipline used (see below).
Step Upon the Nightmare Bridge: By use of this technique, the Damned may depart the world and physically enter her own Rift, vanishing as she steps backwards into her own shadow.
The Damned is invisible & intangible while hidden within her Rift, but she may be observed as an eerie, discolored silhouette in empty space by any outside observer scanning the area with Auspex or a similar supernatural perception ability.
She may only carry clothing, keepsakes, one-handed weapons and other small personal items with her when she steps into her Rift in this way; she may not carry other creatures with her, nor anything that requires more than one hand to hold. Any object too large, heavy or bulky to be carried across (subject to Storyteller discretion) is simply dropped at her feet in the world of the living when the Damned steps into her own Rift in this way.
Experienced practitioners of Rift can often instinctively guess what objects are too large to be carried across in this way, and are rarely surprised at being stripped of their held possessions when evoking this technique.
The Damned may choose to leave items within the realm of her private hell and retrieve them later.
At the conclusion of each turn spent in her personal hell, the Damned must succeed at a Courage roll with a Difficulty equal to her Conscience. Upon failing this roll, she returns to the night-lit world of the living. She may always choose to return of her own volition before failing this roll. Returning from her private hell does not require an action.
The Damned is always aware of what occurs directly on the other side of the veil between worlds – in the space she previously occupied – and may gaze out of her personal hell to observe the world beyond without any roll.
The Damned always returns to the living world in the same spot from which she departed, stepping back into the space she previously occupied.
Obscene: If this technique is unleashed as Obscene, the depths of the practitioner’s personal hell are briefly visible for all to see as the Damned steps backwards; all creatures who witness the Damned vanish are subject to the Obscene version of the Level 2 Rift ability Unveil Damnation, as above. In addition, the Damned leaves residue from her private hell on all surfaces with which she was in-contact when this technique is activated, potentially marking the floor upon which she stood with foul rain-water, drifts of ashen rust or tiny shards of gore-caked bone, glass and ceramic tile.
The practitioner of Rift may choose a single target within her line of sight when she uses this Unveil Damnation ability to be the initial or “intended” target of the ability. She must stare directly at that single target when this technique is activated.
LEVEL FOUR:
Dance of Unstable Nightmares: When the Damned exits her Rift, she may choose to reappear in any place in the living world that she can see clearly.
Thus, she might return to the world standing atop a building visible from her previous location, but not on the other side of a locked door.
Obscene:AsStep Upon the Nightmare Bridge, above, except that the Damned additionally brings residue from her private hell with her when she exits that hideous realm, marking her passage in two places.
LEVEL FIVE:
Call-Forth the Majestic Nightmare: When the Damned enters her Rift, an entity from deep within her Rift is pulled into the night-lit world of the living; this creature immediately occupies the space vacated by the Rift-practitioner.
This entity is the true Beast of the Damned made manifest in flesh. Its specific appearance is left to the player and her Storyteller to decide, although it is always visually identifiable as – at least in some way – similar to the Damned who summoned it up from her personal Wheel of Punishment. It also bears an uncanny resemblance to any creature diablerized by the Rift-practitioner.
The entity possesses statistics identical to the Damned, with the following differences:
The entity is always in Frenzy and has a Humanity of 0. If the entity ever leaves Frenzy, it immediately vanishes.
The entity gains all the benefits of Black Metamorphosis (pg 189), Horrid Form (pg. 242), The Form of the Cobra (pg. 210) or a similar physical enhancement effect (such as the Fractura ability of Striga), as chosen by the Storyteller.
The entity is not bound in any way to creatures who hold a Blood Bond over the Damned, nor is it subject to similar emotional restraint or control (as adjudicated by the Storyteller).
The entity will preferentially target anything it sees as a threat to the Damned that created it, and will always attempt to murder anything that attacks it.
Once its safety is secured, the entity turns its abhorrent attentions to the living world. The entity hates the practitioner of Rift who called it forth and seeks to cripple & disfigure all that the Damned holds dear, targeting allies & friends of the Damned if it is able (although it does not attempt to destroy them outright).
In any instance, the entity revels in utter destruction.
When the practitioner of Rift returns to the world, the entity vanishes.
Any blood consumed by the entity is wasted when it vanishes.
Obscene:AsStep Upon the Nightmare Bridge, above, except that the nightmare entity constantly drips (or sheds) matter from the depths of the practitioner’s private hell, leaving a trail of horror as it rampages.
——
Cross the Nightmare Bridge: When the Damned chooses to enter her own Rift, as per the Level 3 technique of this Discipline, she may remain within that nightmare realm for an indefinite period of time (no Courage roll required). She must slumber, as normal, when sunlight falls on the living world beyond, and her thirst grows nightly: there is no blood to drink within the confines of her hell.
If the Damned falls into torpor while beyond the borders of her Rift, she falls backwards out of her own shadow and returns physically to the living world.
She is otherwise free to explore the boundless realm of her eternal damnation as she pleases.
Obscene:AsStep Upon the Nightmare Bridge, above.
——
DEVELOPER’S NOTE:
Unlike the majority of Disciplines, Rift allows access to two distinct Level 5 powers. Access to these two different abilities is treated identically to Elder Disciplines such as Karmic SightandMirror Reflexes (pg. 140-141).
Distend & Evacuate the Nightmare Hoard: By use of this technique, the Damned may deposit any inanimate object held in-hand into her Rift; the object seemingly vanishes, like a card disappearing in a display of slight-of-hand. Only an object that might be transported via Step Upon the Nightmare Bridge may be relocated into the depths of a private hell in this way.
The Damned may likewise draw-forth any object deposited into her private hell.
Obscene: If this technique is unleashed as Obscene, the item enters or exits the Rift in a wave of unhealthy matter from the depths of nightmare, dripping bits of a private hell into the waking world. An item drawn from the Rift in an Obscene way radiates palpable, toxic waves of this energy, and deals 1 level of Lethal damage to any creature (except the Damned) touching it within the next minute. The Difficulty to soak this damage is equal to 2 + the level of the Discipline used (see below).
—–
Sinister Winds of Unstable Nightmare: By use of this technique, the Damned may choose to deposit any waking-world object held within her private hell in a location she can see. Targeting a particularly specific location with the object – such as ‘the small space between my opponent’s glasses and his eyes’ – when the object emerges requires a Perception + Occult roll, Difficulty 7.
Obscene:AsDistend & Evacuate the Nightmare Hoard, above.
LEVEL SEVEN:
Covetous Eyes of the Nightmare Thief: By use of this technique, the Damned may deposit any unattended inanimate object within her line of sight into her Rift. Only an object that might be transported via Step Upon the Nightmare Bridge may be relocated into the depths of a private hell in this way.
Obscene:AsDistend & Evacuate the Nightmare Hoard, above.
Doorway Out of Hell: By use of this technique, the Damned may establish a permanent physical exit from her Rift into the living world, usable only by her. This portal requires only a moment to establish: the Damned must touch an open, bounded doorway or archway of any kind – such as a toriigate or a closet door in the home of her ghoul – and expend a permanent Willpower. The Damned may always choose to exit her Rift through this doorway, rather than returning to the world at the spot she entered her private hell, or at a point in space within line of sight (as per Dance of Unstable Nightmares).
This doorway may not be used to enter the Rift.
The Damned may posses a total number of doorways out of her Rift equal to her Humanity or Path rating. The Damned may dismiss any doorway she has created at any time, from any location, without effort.
Obscene: If this technique is enacted as Obscene, the enchanted doorway leaks hideous drifts of matter & energy from the depths of the practitioner’s personal hell; this miasma marks the area around the doorway, twisting the local environment into something eerie, nightmarish and haunted. Any living creature that dwells within the area surrounding the doorway must succeed at a Willpower roll (Difficulty 7) at the end of each 24 hour period or gain a temporary Derangement; these Derangements stack. All Derangements gained in this way fade when the mortal spends at least 24 hours outside of the environment surrounding the doorway. If this Willpower roll is botched, the Derangement is permanent.
LEVEL EIGHT:
Pull of Nightmare: By use of this technique, the Damned can forcibly draw an unwilling creature into her Rift as she enters; the Damned must first touch the target, requiring a Dexterity + Athletics or Brawl roll if this action is performed in combat. A creature touched by the practitioner when she steps into her own nightmare realm may oppose this pull with a Willpower roll (Difficulty 7); her successes are opposed by the practitioner’s Manipulation + Brawl roll (Difficulty equal to the target’s Humanity or Path rating + 2).
A creature pulled into the practitioner’s Rift in this way is immediately exposed to the effects of a targeted Unveil Damnation; she can attempt to push herself out of the Rift (Willpower roll, Difficulty 6) at the end of each round spent within the nightmare realm. The Difficulty of this Willpower roll decreases by one at the end of each round. If the victim botches a Willpower roll of this type, she gains a permanent Derangement.
The victim is otherwise trapped in a hostile alien environment, alone with the Rift-practitioner. The victim is not aware of what occurs on the other side of the veil between worlds and cannot gaze out of hell to observe the world beyond.
If the Damned chooses to exit her private hell, the victim is immediately shunted back the world of the living. The Damned may choose to deposit the victim in any legal location for her to exit the Rift: she might dump the victim through a Doorway Out of Hell or in any location visible from her current position.
The Damned may choose to exit the Rift in a different location, and she may choose to send her victim back early at any time as a free action.
Obscene:AsStep Upon the Nightmare Bridge, above.
Fling Wide the Embrace of Hell: By use of this technique, the Damned may allow a willing entity access to her private hell. She must expend a point of Willpower while touching her ally; the two may then enter her Rift together. A creature pulled into the practitioner’s Rift in this way is immediately exposed to the effects of a targeted Unveil Damnation.
The Damned may choose, when she returns to the living world, to leave her ally behind – within the Rift – for any length of time, although the nightmare realm does not contain the necessary resources to sustain life: it lacks potable water and edible food, among other amenities.
A living creature held in the Rift must succeed at a Willpower roll (Difficulty 7) at the end of each 24 hour period or gain a temporary Derangement; these Derangements stack. All Derangements gained in this way fade when the mortal spends at least 24 hours outside of the Rift. If this Willpower roll is botched, the Derangement is instead permanent.
A creature brought into the Rift can only be subsequently removed from the Rift by the Damned who brought her in; the visitor must be touching the Damned when the Rift-practitioner exits back to the living world.
The Damned may have a total number of visitors dwelling within her Rift equal to her Humanity or Path rating.
Imprison Within Eternal Nightmare: Whenever the Damned successfully draws a target into her private hell via Pull of Nightmare, the effect is permanent: the victim does not automatically exit the nightmare-realm when the Damned returns to the world of the living, nor does she receive any additional Willpower rolls to push herself free.
The victim may only exit the Rift when the Damned chooses to release her.
Rumors persist, of course, of powerful rescue-parties successfully invading the Rift of a Methuselah, but these tales are likely just that: mere legend.
The Damned may have a total number of prisoners caught within her Rift equal to her Humanity or Path rating.
Obscene:AsStep Upon the Nightmare Bridge, above.
Manifest the Atrocity-Leviathan: The Rift of a true ancient is vast, containing multitudinous continents of horrors, hung like pulsating iridescent tumors in an ever-shifting constellation of depravity, sadism and self-hatred, laced-through with vast coils of razor-wire & city-sized shards of ichor-drenched obsidian.
Things – unholy and undying things, born under no sane stars, armored and adorned with horrid & fleshy scribbles of frothing-mad blasphemies – begin to breed in the shadowed places beneath that kaleidoscope of rotting, rust-caked punishment-houses. By means of this technique, such a monstrosity may be briefly loosed upon the living world.
This ability functions identically to Call Forth the Majestic Nightmare except that the entity summoned-up, rather than possessing statistics identical to the Damned, is something more terrible still.
It is left to the Storyteller’s discretion as to what terror of flesh or spirit could possibly prove more dangerous than an insane 4th-Generation vampire backed into a corner, but the Storyteller is advised to use her most wicked imagination in crafting such a cataclysm … and not to shy away from true cosmic horror.
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If you enjoy this content and would like to see more dark, modern horror game-material by the author, the Bloodlines & Black Magic Kickstarter is going on right now.
Hugest of thanks to John Miętus for his invaluable editing-assistance and development during the creation of this fan-content.
I did some art for my nosferatu boyman Herbert. He had been living a life of isolation back when he first became a nosferatu. But he found something to do and companionship in computers and the blossoming internet. (It is the thing one he has in common with many Nosferatu.)
I like to stay active and engaged in art and the art/vtm community at the moment. So if you have any questions about him, for him or anything else, feel free to ask!
The Sabbat While the “Kindred” (terminology the Sabbat abhor) of the Camarilla hide amid humans and adhere to archaic Traditions, the Sabbat revel in their vampiric essence. They decline to put on the pathetic guise of mere mortals or to be reduced to minions of their elders. In addition, vampires are without any doubt better than mortals. Just as mortals do not consider their food their equal, Sabbat vampires regard mortals as pawns or meals and have scant patience for “Cainites” who impersonate the living. The Sabbat believes vampires are by their definition inhuman. But the Sword of Caine is not an accumulation of blood-soaked maniacs gallivanting around public places in full display. They deny human values as philosophy for their lives, so they have invented their own schools of thought. Sabbat vampires follow an extensive array of Paths of Enlightenment, moral codes that direct the Beast into a confined medium and permit the Cainite to cultivate a way of viewing and acting in the world. The Sabbat not only revolt against acting human, but also against their own tendency toward isolation. They generally band together into packs serving multiple functions: Cain-worshipping cults, combat squads, and political cliques.
