Secrets of the Blood

An exhaustive dissertation on a topic as broad as blood magic would be impossible. Too much esoteric lore has been lost through the ages as reclusive blood magicians met Final Death without ever passing on their hoarded lore to anyone else. But more than that, too many modern blood magicians cannot even agree on what blood magic is sufficiently to allow for a universal understanding of the art’s principles. Historically, Kindred occultists used words like “Thaumaturgy,” “Necromancy,” and “Sorcery” to differentiate their own magic from that of rivals and to occlude their practices from those who might steal their precious lore. In modern nights, the once sharp divisions between the various manifestations of blood magic blur.

A pedant might argue that nearly everything a Kindred does might be considered blood magic. After all, how does a vampire even rise every night, save through the power of their supernaturally enhanced vitae? Even those Disciplines which do not directly require blood to use are still passed from sire to childe, and generally a Kindred cannot begin to learn Disciplines not associated with their bloodline until they have tasted the blood of another vampire whose clan is known for that Discipline.

While most Kindred occultists would never consider Disciplines to be “blood magic” in the conventional sense, understanding the distinctions between Disciplines and blood magic is necessary to understanding exactly what blood magic is and what it is not. Disciplines are inherited supernatural powers passed down through clan lineage. For Kindred of the 8th Generation or higher, each Discipline consists of specific powers which must be learned in sequence. Only elders of the 7th Generation or lower can expand upon that platform by learning powers which can be customized to each elder’s own personality and understanding of the Discipline’s nature. According to Noddist dogma, all Disciplines flow from each clan’s Antediluvian founder (or from the line’s progenitor, in the case of bloodlines) and reflect the interests of the founder and how they evolved to respond to the curse placed upon them by Caine. In short, the creation of expanded Discipline powers is the province of elders, and the creation of entirely new Disciplines is the province of Antediluvians or, at the very least, bloodline progenitors who are typically of very low Generation.

Weaker Kindred chafed against these innate restrictions. While the power of the blood did not permit less powerful Kindred to create true Disciplines of their own, a few scholars discovered, after centuries of effort, the next best thing. By channeling both blood and will in the course of performing ritual activities associated with mortal religious or occult practices, these Kindred learned how to create what can best be described as pseudo-Disciplines: blood-based powers which mimicked the structure of Disciplines, but which are neither inheritable for one’s childer nor amenable to elder-level manifestations. Over time, these pseudo-Disciplines came to be known as blood magic. Inferior to true Disciplines in many ways, the various blood magic paths were never as easy for Kindred to learn as the Disciplines inherent to their clans. Further, they invariably required blood from the user (often in prodigious quantities), and, worst of all, errors by the user in activating these strange powers often caused serious side effects quite unlike the misuse of conventional Disciplines.

However, these limitations were outweighed by powerful benefits. Aside from the obvious advantage of being able to create what is effectively a customized Discipline, the early blood magicians learned that they could also create special rituals thematically connected to any blood magic paths they studied, and unlike the five-tiered Disciplines, there was apparently no limit to the number of rituals a blood magician could learn. To a vampire of high Generation who was typically at the mercy of elder Cainites armed with potent customized Discipline effects, this was an amazing opportunity to even the scales.

Foundational Principles

All forms of blood magic share certain commonalities: basic principles of construction that provide a framework for all would-be blood magicians to shape the art. There are four major principles and several minor principles. The major principles are the principles of blood, will, knowledge, and identity.

The Principle of Blood

The Principle of Blood is the easiest for neophytes to comprehend. Simply put, blood magic is completely dependent on the application of Kindred vitae. No non-vampire can ever work blood magic as it is performed by Kindred. Ghouls who receive appropriate training from blood magician regnants may learn the simplest paths and rituals (though only after years of study), but a mortal not blessed with Kindred vitae can never duplicate the effects of any Sorcery path, even when the path is expressly based on a magical style in which that mortal is an expert. Without exception, every power associated with every blood magic path requires the expenditure of at least 1 point of vitae, and a few powers (and many rituals) require even more.

The Principle of Willpower

The Principle of Will is equally straightforward. Every manifestation of blood sorcery is the result of the vampire focusing and exerting zir will to bring the effect into existence. It is significant that this principle refers to will rather than belief. While many blood magic paths and sorcery schools are implicitly or even explicitly based on archaic religious practices, there is no requirement at all that the blood magician be a believer in the underlying religion. Some practitioners are, such as those Old Skool Anarchs who were adherents of Voudoun or Santeria in life and who adapted those practices to fit the needs of Voudoun Necromancy. But Punk Sorcerers who practice Voudoun Necromancy because its violent and disturbing aesthetics appeal to their personal sensibilities can be just as proficient as those Old Skoolers who are devoted to the Loa. Indeed, there is some anecdotal evidence that it is better to be a non-believer than one of the faithful. Some tales suggest that actual religious devotion to otherworldly powers invoked through blood magic opens the magician up to a heightened risk of possession or some other malefic effect.

Mechanically, the Principle of Will simply means that all activation rolls for blood magic path powers are Willpower rolls. It is impossible for any blood magician to accidentally unleash a blood magic effect (while in frenzy, for example). Likewise, the effect, if successfully produced, will almost never deviate from its creator’s wishes. The vampire might fail to produce any effect at all, and that failure may yield catastrophic side effects — but side effects generally do not cause wild spells or rogue magical manifestations (although some Paths which require the blood magician to traffic with spirits or demons can produce almost any phenomena).

Rather, such disasters target the vampire zirself, specifically through some fracturing of the will that was not strong enough to control the powers it sought to channel. Whereas botched rolls involving Disciplines usually mean that the vampire will be unable to effectively use that Discipline against the same target again for a brief period, botched rolls for blood magic are far more serious and result in catastrophic consequences, even potentially resulting in heavy damage to the Kindred’s psyche (reflected by the loss of temporary Willpower points, or even the loss of a permanent Willpower dot).

For practitioners of Thaumaturgy and Necromancy, that’s bad enough. For occultists who plumb the depths of the more obscure Paths of blood magic, a mistake can be even worse. If a blood magician botches on a roll to activate a Sorcery path, ze suffers some form of short term psychological or physiological defect related to the misapplied path. Each school of sorcery curses its practitioners for their incompetence differently. This backlash usually lasts for the rest of the night, although members of clans intimately associated with a school are free of this particular penalty. The Storyteller is free to impose some other comparable deficiency in place of those described in the sidebar below.

The Principle of Knowledge

The Principle of Knowledge holds that a vampire cannot learn any form of blood magic either intuitively or through observation of another practitioner. Each aspiring magician must actively study the occult lore associated with zir school and develop a deep empirical knowledge of the arcane practices that go into each Path and each ritual. The Principle of Knowledge has its greatest relevance in the area of rituals, as all rolls to enact rituals are Intelligence + Occult. As such, to be a successful ritualist, the vampire must be neither stupid nor unlettered. This principle is also the source of the magician’s need to pick a primary Path. Whichever Path the sorcerer studies first informs zir understanding of all other Paths, and no secondary Path rating can ever exceed their primary Path rating until ze has mastered the primary Path completely.

The Principle of Identity

Finally, the Principle of Identity defines the level of connection that allows the blood magician to properly target zir magic. When invoking the powers associated with most paths, the magician must direct zir attention to zirself or to some personage or thing within zir field of view. For example, it is generally impossible to target someone the magician sees on a live television broadcast with a Path effect, though some Anarchs are able to push against the edges of this limitation by focusing their magic through ritually-prepared CCTV cameras. Indeed, for some Path effects, even line-of-sight is insufficient and the magician must come near the target or even physically touch them.

Rituals allow for greater range, but even they are limited in that the blood magician must supernaturally identify a distant target. In ancient times, this could be achieved by invoking True Names, but the power of such naming has diminished over the centuries, and tonight, only spirits and similar creatures can be bound in such a manner. Many schools of blood magic traffic in ancient lists detailing the True Names of angels, demons, totems, and other spirits, especially the Tremere who have managed to eke the most power out of True Names in the modern nights. For beings of the material world, blood may serve instead. This is especially true for vampires, and a single point of vitae properly incorporated into a ritual can allow the ritualist to strike zir target across any distance. For other rituals, affecting a target at a distance can be achieved through sympathetic magic.

Principles of Sympathetic Magic

The following lesser principles — Contagion and Sympathy are subsidiary to the Principle of Identity. Collectively, they describe what is known as sympathetic magic: the process by which a blood magician may target someone or something beyond their immediate presence.

The Principle of Contagion states that things that were once connected or once part of a single whole retain a link even after they are separated. The stronger the physical or emotional connection was during its existence, the stronger the link after the separation. Thus, when using a ritual against a distant target, it is helpful to incorporate something that was once a part of the target or, failing that, something that was once in the possession of the target. Ideally, the element incorporated takes the form of a point of the target’s blood. Less intimate connections impose a progressively steeper dice penalty on the ritual roll.

Some rituals require a specific level of connection, usually a point of vitae. For rituals which do not specify the level of connection, apply the Difficulty modifiers in the chart below. No combination of Difficulty modifiers can raise the Difficulty above 9 nor lower it below 4. If the Difficulty modifier would normally raise the target number above 9, the ritual cannot be completed with such a limited degree of connection. The Difficulty modifier imposed by the Principle of Contagion may be modified by application of the Principle of Sympathy.

The Principle of Sympathy (also known as the Principle of Similarity) is often summarized by the aphorism that “like produces like.” In other words, two things which are similar in some ways can, through magic, be made to be similar in other ways. The “voodoo doll” fetishes associated with some Necromancy schools are a prime example of this principle — a doll is made to resemble the target of the vampire’s ire, and accordingly, whatever is done to the doll also is done to the person it represents wherever xe may be.

Generally, sympathy and contagion are used in tandem. The vampire must craft the effigy to be used in the ritual with an Intelligence + Crafts roll (Difficulty 8). At a bare minimum, the vampire must at least incorporate the target’s name into the doll’s creation, if only by carving or writing it somewhere on the doll’s body, although clothing or bodily materials taken from the target and incorporated into the doll’s construction are better. Each success on the Crafts roll reduces the Difficulty modifier on the subsequent Intelligence + Occult roll caused by a weak connection (as described under the Principle of Contagion) by 1. However, the successes on this roll cannot modify the Difficulty by more than the vampire’s rating in zir highest blood magic Path, nor can it reduce the penalty imposed by a weak connection below 0.

Principles of Ritual Construction

The following minor principles apply to the construction of rituals. While all of them inform the design of rituals in general, some will play a more important role in the development of a particular ritual than others. Likewise, individual Sorcery schools may find some principles to be more generally applicable than others. For the most part, these principles affect the aesthetics associated with the ritual, i.e. what a Tremere ritual looks like as opposed to what a Punk Sorcery ritual looks like. However, some of them do present optional mechanical rules which can affect ritual casting.

The Principle of Auspicion states that a ritual may be more successful when performed at an auspicious location or time or under otherwise auspicious circumstances. The more complicated these elements make the ritual to enact, the more powerful the ritual itself can be. Thus, a simple ritual might need to be performed at the stroke of midnight. A complicated ritual might need to be performed nude under a full moon at the stroke of midnight on the Winter Solstice. Each school of sorcery has certain elements or tropes considered to be supernaturally favorable for it. Any rituals adapted from other schools should be modified to include the appropriate auspicious elements.

The Principle of Complexity is related to the Principle of Auspicion and holds that the more powerful a ritual is intended to be, the more complex the activities used to invoke the ritual must be. Alternatively, the element of complexity might require the vampire to extend the ritual’s casting over multiple nights or even weeks, or it might require zir to do something objectively simple but which might be situationally difficult (such as “place a lit candle on your bare chest until it has melted completely”). In terms of ritual complexity, a simple ritual might require something as simple as spitting on the floor, while a complicated ritual might require the ritualist to keep a live spider under zir tongue for the ritual’s duration or to perform an incantation over a bowl of vitae every night for 7 nights.

The Principle of Inherency holds that, for purposes of ritual magic, an item known for a specific trait (whether it actually has that trait or not) can bestow that trait on another if the item is incorporated into the ritual. The more difficult it is to find an item with the appropriate trait and to incorporate it into the ritual, the more effective the ritual becomes. A simple ritual might require easily obtainable materials, such as a live spider for Clinging of the Insect or a quantity of nightshade for the Touch of Nightshade ritual. A complicated ritual might require more problematic materials like the ear of a still-living creature in order to allow others to hear the vampire’s astral speech for Whispers of the Ghost.

The Principle of Sacrifice states that the most powerful rituals are those which are fueled by the vampire’s self-sacrifice. While most rituals do not require the expenditure of blood as Path powers do, some simple rituals do require blood, often in considerable quantities. More complicated rituals require more drastic sacrifices, such as the deliberate self-infliction of Aggravated damage. Other extreme sacrifices do not harm the ritualist at all, at least directly. Instead, they risk some degree of moral or psychological damage to the vampire, whether it’s the deliberate infliction of cruelty on an animal for Whispers of the Ghost or the brutal sacrifice of a child necessary for the Innocence of the Child’s Heart ceremony. Generally, an action only counts as an extreme sacrifice if it is the sort of act that would result in a Degredation roll for vampires of Humanity 4 or higher.

Learning (and Subverting) Rituals

For loyal Tremere, rituals are fairly easy to learn... if one’s superiors approve. Under the default rules for Thaumaturgy, a Tremere can essentially learn new rituals for free, but the player must roleplay the experience of learning of the ritual’s existence, requesting and gaining permission to learn the ritual, and actually spending time in-game mastering the procedures associated with the ritual. (The same rules apply for Giovanni and other bloodlines as indelibly associated with Necromancy.) Obviously, simply asking for a ritual is not a viable option for rogue Tremere among the Anarchs and the Sabbat, let alone Thaumaturgists outside Clan Tremere. For such characters (and, with Storyteller approval, for Tremere loyalists who, for whatever reason, have elected to take the extraordinary risk of learning an unsanctioned ritual), the following alternative rules for learning rituals are available.

Acquiring a new preexisting ritual is a two-step process: First, the blood magician must learn that the ritual exists. This requires an extended Intelligence + Investigation roll with a Difficulty of the ritual’s [level + 3]. The total number of successes needed is equal to the [ritual level x 5], with each roll representing 1 week of game time spent consulting with occult sources, poring over musty tomes, and all the other things required in the pursuit of “forbidden lore.” If the character possesses appropriate Backgrounds (such as the Mentor Background — providing the Mentor in question is a fellow blood magician), the player can add the Background rating to the dice pool for each roll.

If the ritual is associated with the blood magician’s school, the next step is to master the ritual. While many rituals seem to be simple affairs to the uninitiated, every single aspect of a ritual must be exactingly reproduced for the magic to function properly. Even Anarch rituals which appear effortless and improvised to onlookers can incorporate dozens of gestures and movements; just because the observer cannot hear any incantations by the sorcerer doesn’t mean ze isn’t thinking a lengthy phrase in Latin, Sumerian, or COBOL as a focus for zir magic. Mastering a ritual requires an extended Intelligence + Occult roll with a Difficulty equal to the [ritual level + 3]. The total number of successes needed is equal to the [ritual level x 5]. Each roll represents a week spent analyzing, memorizing, and experimenting with the ritual, although the character is free to do other things during the same period if ze can devote at least a few hours every night to study. If the player dedicates zir character’s full attention to learning the ritual and doing nothing else except feeding, each roll may represent a single night.

Of course, the preceding rules presume that the vampire wishes to learn and master a ritual associated with zir own blood magic school. Acquiring and mastering a ritual associated with another school requires an additional step, as the vampire must adapt that ritual to fit the practices and themes of zir own school. Or, as the younger vampires would put it, they must “hack” the ritual. This process makes mastery considerably more challenging. The total number of successes needed to adapt and master a foreign ritual increases to ritual level x 10. However, the player may subtract the character’s total number of dots assigned to all of zir blood magic paths from the number of required successes, to a minimum of half the normal number of successes. This reduction represents the extent to which greater fluency with one’s own school makes it easier to adapt foreign rituals to it.