Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition

This article or section is about a topic that is particularly prone to Skub (that is, really loud and/or stupid arguments). Edit at your own risk, and read with a grain of salt, as skubby subjects have a bad habit of causing stupid, even in neutrals trying to summarize the situation.

Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition
Role-playing game published by White Wolf
Rule System	Storyteller System
Authors	Kenneth Hite, Mark Rein·Hagen, Matthew Dawkins, Juhanna Peterson, Martin Ericsson, Karim Muammar
First Publication	2018
Essential Books	Vampire: The Masquerade Core Rulebook

The premier vampire RPG rises once more from its resting place once more. Although subject to many skubtastic debates, this new edition has found popularity with newcomers to the series. This edition is usually abbreviated as VTM V5, or just V5, to differentiate it from D&D 5E.

The rules are lighter now (kinda), gas tank vampires are no more, and as always the clock has edged closer to midnight (AKA Gehenna).

VTM V5 is a tabletop roleplaying game about vampires. Every night they must rouse their blood to animate their dead flesh. They must navigate deadly kindred (vampire) politics both within their own sect and with kindred of other sects. The hunger dice system scales from 0-5, replacing dice in your dice pool. This means that every time you roll the dice you could have a bestial failure or messy critical as your beast pushes you to acts of violence and hunger.

The titular masquerade is the system of secrecy to keep humanity from discovering vampires and wiping them out. A vampire can easily handle one or perhaps several humans under the right circumstances, but many humans prepared with flamethrowers and shotguns would be a struggle. It's even worse if hunters attack during the day, when vampires must sleep. For this reason, most vampires are cautious not to let humans know what they really are.

Modern Fluff Changes

The quick and dirty summary is that the Camarilla has weakened, some clans switched around in the sects, and the Sabbat are fighting Camarilla elders in the Middle East in the Gehenna War. Also, the inquisition is back and now has connections with the alphabet soup agencies because the NSA got into Schrecknet, revealing kindred society to a degree. This led to such events as the Tremere Vienna Chantry getting blown up and the Camarilla forgoing the use of modern technology for sensitive communication. The Second Inquisition believes kindred suffer from "the blank body virus", named for the absence of body heat seen when a vampire walks in front of a thermal camera.

All the above has led to kindred cities being run by much younger kindred than usual. The stranglehold elders had has loosened as they are summoned to the Middle East by a psych-spiritual call known as the Beckoning. There are a lot more thin bloods too, and most full-blooded vampires still don't like them.

The Basics of the Lore

There is more lore further down, this is just a quick primer.

Vampires, or kindred as they call each other, have lived among humanity since shortly after humanity began. Many believe Caine, the brother of Abel and the son of Adam and Eve, was cursed by god and his angels with vampirism as punishment for the first murder and the first lie. Some kindred believe otherwise, such as the Ministry who claim Set was the first of the vampires.

In the modern day, kindred are everywhere and tend to belong to one of three sects, which are hybrid political parties and governments. The Camarilla is the oldest and can be compared to a lawful evil pyramid scheme. The eldest vampires are at the top, and everyone wants to build up a powerbase by embracing (turning) humans to eventually userp the elders. Camarilla cities are ruled by a Prince (used gender neutrally) and their Primogen council. The Primogen Council includes vampires from the most populous clans in the domain and they advise the prince and represent their clan. The Prince usually has a sheriff to enforce his edicts and deal with those that violate the traditions and the Masquerade.

The Anarchs rebelled against the elders and left the Camarilla. Their organization is fairly loose, varying a lot between domains. Usually, the leader of a domain is a Baron, but they rarely act as controlling as a prince. Their purpose is to settle disputes and protect the domain from rival sects.

The third sect is the Sabbat, vampire supremacists. These lunatics believe that they deserve to rule over humanity and abuse them as they wish. Their leaders are called bishops as they lead the sect in a religious manner. Their numbers have been thinned by hunters in modern nights, fracturing the sect into isolated cells. Notably, they perform a ritual called the Vaulderie where they share blood in a communal cup and drink it together, breaking old blood bonds and forming a shallow one with each other. This frees them from their old masters and makes them like each other, at least a little. The Sabbat are infamous for their mass embraces; they embrace dozens of people and bury them in a pit. Those that climb out and survive the night are colloquially called shovelheads and welcomed into the sabbat. The Sabbat wants to kill the Antediluvians, the 3rd generation vampires from before the biblical flood, for betraying Caine by killing the 2nd generation. They worship Caine and refer to themselves as the "Sword of Caine".

There's also the Giovanni, who are the incestuous necromantic vampiric mafia. They used to be an independent clan that was aligned with the Camarilla sort of. Now they're rolled in with the Hecata clan after the big reunion (and some murder) and fully independent again.

Rules

V5 uses a dice pool system made up of D10s. The number of dots you have in skills, stats, and other modifiers are added together. The total is the number of D10s rolled for a test. If you get enough high results you succeed.

The unique part of the new rules is the hunger dice system. This replaces the blood points system (AKA gas tank/mana pool vampires). When waking up each night or using some disciplines you must make a rouse check by rolling a D10. A roll of 6 or higher is a success, and hunger does not increase. If the result is less than 6, hunger increases by one. Hunger ranges from 0-5, but the only way to get to 0 is to feed on a person until they die, otherwise, the minimum is 1. Hunger dice replace a number of dice in each test equal to your current hunger. Depending on the successes and failures in a roll and how much of each come from hunger dice, a beastial failure or messy critical could occur. This could result in giving in to a compulsion or behaving inhumanly, such as biting and starting to feed on someone that you meant to just attack.

In addition, feeding has been codified into a less streamlined system, where a vampire will pick a predator type at chargen. They can obviously feed however they like, and in theory the player can likely go without one, however each one give a plethora of advantages (free merits and a boost in dots to certain disciplines and skills) and disadvantages (several of them come with prey exclusions or the like) that its generally a good idea to take one you're well suited to. Each one is roughly balanced, with the stronger benefits coming with stronger downsides. For example the blood leech type, which requires that the vampire feeds on other kindred exclusively leads to having higher blood potency and an immunity to blood bonds, but comes with the price of being unable to feed on mortals and being viewed with suspicion at absolute best. Meanwhile the Bagger type means you sneak around and feed exclusively on blood bags, which gives you the ability to nourish yourself better on dead blood, but there's probably a reason you stick to sneaking into the hospital.

Some of the attributes have been swapped out (notably appearance, the most useless attribute in wod), the abilities list is trimmed slightly, and morality has been changed, aping the touchstones system from VTR and allowing players to decide the commandments that actually matter to the character instead of choosing between generic humanity or begging the storyteller to allowing them to use a Path of Edgelightenment.

Disciplines work a bit differently now. A standout difference is amalgam powers. They require dots in two disciplines to be accessed. In the wake of this, some disciplines have been reduced to a couple amalgram powers that require dsiciplines the clan has as standard (making serpentis a variant of protean with some presence requirements, Chimestry is now a presence and obfuscate amalgram etc). This has provoked a lot of passionate debate. In addition, there are now normally multiple powers for each level of a discipline that you must choose from (or pick a power from a lower level, and 6+ powers have been scrapped (some wrapped into the upper levels of the discipline, others just purged). As a result the disciplines are all limited to 5 dots, preventing someone from getting every power from a discipline.

Finally, the game has added in loresheets, specific backgrounds that provide a mix of benefits, and represent anything from connections to an influential kindred or organisation to specific bloodline heritage. Uniquely of the backgrounds, they're not a linear progression of buffs (and buying the 2nd level of a loresheet doesn't give you the benefits of the first) and many of them are clan specific, however all their abilities are powerful or give you temporary access to other merits worth more than the dots on the sheet, albeit are often limited to certain situations.

Books

• Core Book: It has the rules, GMing guidance, some statblocks for NPCs, items, coterie creation, etc. Clans: Brujah, Gangrel, Malkavians, Nosferatu, Toreador, Tremere, Ventrue, Caitiff, and Thinbloods.
• Anarch Sourcebook: Anarch lore and rules for playing The Ministry (formerly the Followers of Set).
• Camarilla Sourcebook: Camarilla lore and rules for playing the Banu Haqim (formerly the Assamites).
• Fall of London: Chronicle set in 2012 about the eradication of kindred in London by the Second Inquisition.
• Chicago by Night: Sourcebook for running games in Chicago. Contains the rules for playing Lasombra.
• The Chicago Folios: Even more stuff about Chicago.
• V5 Companion: A free PDF with rules for Ravnos, Salubri, and Tzimisce. Also includes a section regarding how vampires of each clan feel about coteries along with a clan coterie merit available to be purchased at character creation. Section 3 has rules for playing mortals and ghouls. The final section contains errata and rules updates to be included in future printings (but not the upcoming July 2021 Renegade Games reprint, for some reason).
• Cults of the Blood Gods: All about vampire religion. Includes a bunch of existing cults as well as rules for making your own as a GM. Includes rules for the Hecata, the new necromancy clan that was formed by a merger of Giovanni, Cappodician, Nagaraja, and a few others in 2018. They are the last remaining independent clan.
• Sabbat: a book all about running the Sabbat as antagonists. This caused a lot of grognard skub arguments, but it doesn't matter that much. The material in the book can mostly be easily used to run games for Sabbat coteries. The paths aren't what they used to be, so homebrew to taste.

Clans

In the wake of V5's release and the reshuffling of the sects, a number of clans have undergone some revisions, some minor (the tzimisce, barring disciipline spread), others major (the ravnos or salubri). Bloodlines, while theoreteically still there, are mostly scrapped, and the ones that still appear (such as the specific members of the Hecata) are often consigned to loresheets (many old bloodlines have been ported to fan made loresheets by the community).

Banu Haqim

• Antediluvian - Haqim
• Disciplines - Blood Sorcery (get fucked Tremere), Celerity, Obfuscate
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - Vitae Addiction (once you taste a drop, you just can't stop).
• Clan Compulsions - Judgement (if someone goes against their personal ideals they're compelled to punish them).

Following the shitstorm that is the beckoning dragging the elders and the sabbat to the Middle East, the Assimites (really named Banu Haqim, with Assimites being a name that westerners called them) petitioned to join the Camarilla, which the Camarilla needed after the Brujah and Gangrel fucked off in the midst of feeling unappreciated and ignored, so it works out for both of them. In addition, Ur-Shulgi stopping the Tremere curse of vitae allergy is still canon, and they got the last laugh by wiping out the tremere's ability to blood bond (which, in fairness, the Tremere were overdue getting truly slapped down for their bullshit). Otherwise they're still the prime "executioner/assassin" clan, and most are likely to be some kind of law enforcement or even former military in life. Their old signature discipline of Quietus got nixed into blood sorcery, reactions are mixed to positive.

Brujah

• Antediluvian - Troile
• Disciplines - Celerity, Potence, Presence
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs
• Clan Weakness - Prone to frenzy.
• Clan Compulsions - Rebellion (gotta fight whatever the status quo is, even if its a system that works or even benefits them).

Still the same mix of idealist philosophers preaching about politics and entitled kids who wanna fight "the man" for imposing rules without understanding why the rules are there or even an idea of what to replace those rules with. Finally gave up the goose and just joined the Anarchs wholesale, though some still reside in the Camarilla. Still generally a slave to their emotions and will likely never be happy in any system they are a part of, but hey, at least now they can play paintball with 9mm handguns and know they have freedom, while they fight and kill each other every night in gang warfare.

Caitiff

• Antediluvian - None
• Disciplines - Varies (pick 3 at gargen)
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs
• Clan Weakness - No in clan disciplines (though all disciplines cost 6X xp costs) and being considered lesser by most other kindred.
• Clan Compulsions - None.

Not a clan, more the absense of a clan. Through quirk of blood sometimes a newly embraced vampire just doesn't show any traits inherant to their parent clan. Generally considered a mark of shame, they usually get the short end of the stick and are afforded little actual respect. Some try to argue they're purer than other kindred as "Caine had no clan", but this usually ends in the offending kindred getting their teeth kicked in. As a result, many of them join the anarchs, which while a shitshow at times they're often at least less likely to get completely disregarded. As is to be expected, no 2 caitiff are alike. Luckily for STs, with the end of clan unique disciplines and the birth of amalgrams, there are no more "Thaumaturgy, Visissitude and Chimestry" discipline spread caitiff being made, albeit people making vampires emulating another clan to get the unique amalgrams without the clan weakness is still a thing, its just more costly to do so (as it takes 2 discipline slots instead of 1). STs should still feel free to tell those powergamers to fuck off.

Gangrel

• Antediluvian - Ennoia
• Disciplines - Animalism, Fortitude, Protean
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs
• Clan Weakness - After frenzying, they begin to generally appear more bestial (sounding or looking more animalistic); this often fades after some time, but can make them a walking masquerade breech eventually
• Clan Compulsions - Acting like an animal (short tempter, compulsion to snap and fight people and generally being fucked in social situations at times).

The fluff from V20 still holds true, and they have still fucked off the Camarilla in preference to independence, albeit with any clan, exceptions exist. Still your group of nomadic and slightly aloof drifters, probably more so after they left. Funnily, since V5 changed protean, they're no longer the go to "fighters" now, as feral claws no longer do aggravated damage. The various bloodlines that spawned from the Gangrel are still around somewhere, just with bloodlines no longer really a thing, they don't get much of a look in.

Hecata

• Antediluvian - Cappadocius/Augustus Giovanni/Hecate (their Antediluvians gets diablerised a lot)
• Disciplines - Auspex (or dominate), Fortitude, Oblivion
• Primary Sect membership - Independant (kind of a sect of their own, its dumb, see below)
• Clan Weakness - Their Kiss hurts like a motherfucker, looks bad and heals slowly (can trade out for looking like 2 flavours of corpse, or needing to eat flesh as well as drink blood).
• Clan Compulsions - Being morbid and spookily fortelling someones death (telling that someone is sick or their recklessness will catch up with them someday).

After the death/disappearance of Angustus Giovanni, and a 500 year agreement with the camarilla coming to a close, the Giovanni reunited with the Cappadocians remnants (the clan they stole their clan status from), the Lamia (the Cappadocian's assistants) the Samedi (vampires that look like rotting corpses, and implied to be either a Giovanni experiment or a Cappadocian offshoot) and the Nagaraja (a clan of double fucked vampires who eat peoples flesh as well as blood, and happen to have skill in necromancy) to form a weird blend of sect and clan called the Hecata. Necromancy, while rolled into the discipline Oblivion, is still effectively there, albeit they can also access some lasombra powers in the mix. The subsequent ritual and agreement unified their flaw into the giovanni's painful bite, though some still have their old flaws in some manner. People have mixed opinions on both of these changes, and it is often considered to be the most sloppy change that V5 implemented. But hey, at least now you can have a necromantic vampire without having to run them as an incestuous cousin fucker or walking corpse.

Lasombra

• Antediluvian - Lasombra
• Disciplines - Dominate, Oblivion (obtenebration by any other name), Potence
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla (yes, I know)
• Clan Weakness - Their reflections and video images are all distorted and fucked up (but wont hide their identity), also technology reacts weirdly with them
• Clan Compulsions - Being unable to accept they failed at something, if they do they gotta reattempt it to get it right.

The shitshow in the east has caused many Lasombra to get out of the Sabbat and join up with the Camarilla, often delivering their elders as a peace offering. Undoubtably still trying some kind of power play (given the long spanning rivalry with the Ventrue) though the Camarilla is still happy to have them aboard in the wake of their show of good faith (stop laughing). Their old power of obtenebration has been rolled into one of the new disciplines V5 spawned, albeit with the most defining powers (arms of the abyss, hopping from shadow to shadow etc) made into amalgrams. Their bane has also been changed, and now instead of just not casting reflections/images on cameras (a weakness that too many used to their advantage to break into places), now technology is just screwly around them: microphones don't pick up their voice properly and images of them are distorted but still recognisable as them, not to mention security system seem to pick up their weirdness better. As a result, Lasombra often have a ghoul or two doing their phone calls. It does however mean historical Lasombra had a less severe clan flaw prior to modern day.

Malkavian

• Antediluvian - Malkav
• Disciplines - Auspex, Dominate (dementation is here), Obfuscate
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - They all nuts in some form. Some can still function, while others are too far gone and institutionalized.
• Clan Compulsions - Going completely delusional (akin to a break from reality)

Malkavians are still the same crowd of absolute nutjobs, ranging the gamut of mental illness, still running the whole spectrum of typical embraces. Still having annoying players trying to create lolrandom chaotic stupid makavians because "LOL SO CRAZY!!1!". The only real change besides the addition of their compulsion (which isnt really anything special) is the dissolution of dementation as its own discipline, with their more unique powers being rolled into amalgrams for both Auspex (for extrasensory powers) and Dominate (for straight mindfuck abilities). Meanwhile lore wise they changed very little, and haven't done much new of significance or suffered any major setback.

Nosferatu

• Antediluvian - Absimiliard
• Disciplines - Animalism, Obfuscate, Potence
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - Looking fuck ugly, potentially (but not always anymore) being constituted as an automatic masquerade breach when they're seen "au natural".
• Clan Compulsions - Compulsion to acquire secrets.

Nosferatu have changed a little, with their old clan bane going from the old days of Orlock clones and automatic masquerade breeches upon sight, to being disfigured but not to the point of impossibility in many cases (some are still unlucky enough that they can't be seen) though this is more a gameplay thing than a story thing. Hiding their obviously fucked up appearance is now harder for them in addition, getting worse the more powerful their blood is. As for Lore, the sewer rats big information network (ShreckNET) got hacked by the NSA and helped give a large swathe of information regarding vampires to the second inquisition. With no other option, the Nos sadly pulled the plug and started dismantling it, some using their extensive technical prowess to try and purge any kindred presence on the net. They've since taken a huge hit to their credibility as a result, and the information sharing network to keep an eye out for the Nictuku is pretty screwed, though they're still considered very valuable thanks to their expertise and tenancy to aqquire secrets.

Ravnos

• Antediluvian - Zapathasura
• Disciplines - Animalism, Obfuscate (Chimestry is here), Presence
• Primary Sect membership - Independant
• Clan Weakness - Staying in one place for too long leads to them slowly burning like they got hit by the sun, no matter how light tight their haven.
• Clan Compulsions - Being a daredevil and taking the riskiest solution to a problem.

Week of nightmares still happened, and as a result the Ravnos are still basically fucked. The death of Zapathasura has changed the survivours to basically be chased by the sun, and if they stay in one place for more than a couple nights, they start to wake up with aggravated damage. Some live in mobile havens, some setup a bunch of buildings in the same city, and some use their new enforced nomadic lifestyle to stay ahead of kindred threats. Their power of Chimestry has been rolled into obfuscate, using presence as an amalgram, and is generally weaker. As with all the changes, this has been a source of Skub, especially when the chimestry amalgrams are available to the Ministry (due to the required spread being in clan for both). Generally however, the changes to bane and the implementation of their compulsion has at least been met favourably, and goes a long way to stamping out the racism argument that has followed the Ravnos since their inception.

Salubri

• Antediluvian - Saulot
• Disciplines - Auspex, Dominate (Obeah), Fortitude
• Primary Sect membership - Independant
• Clan Weakness - Salubri blood is more addictive to kindred, in addition they have a third eye that weeps vitae when they use a discipline power, making subtle discipline use damn near impossible
• Clan Compulsions - Helping people and easing suffering

The only good guy vampire clan, and they've gone through a number of changes mechanically, if not fluff wise(they are still very similar to what they were, and even after the Anarchs established themselves as their own real sect they still stay in hiding) which many people aren't happy with. For one, their bane is now a reverse Banu Haqim flaw, instead of the old consentual feeding flaw they used to have. In addition, their old ability set of healing people or pulling a soul out to mend it has now been locked to vampires only (the creatures that have pushed them around and shat on them for centuries) and split into amalgrams across their entire discipline spread. Some like that this makes them less "too good for this sinful earth" while others feel it ruins the point of one of the only inherantly "good" vampire clans getting wiped out and goes against their "no good deed goes unpunished" schtick. As always, YMMV.

The Ministry

• Antediluvian - Set
• Disciplines - Obfuscate, Presence, Protean (hello Serpentis)
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs
• Clan Weakness - Extreme light sensitivity, atificial light make it hard for them to do things, and sunlight does more damage depending on how powerful their blood is.
• Clan Compulsions - Tempting people to indulge in sin and break their own tenets

Formerly known as the Followers of set, or the Setites, the clan rebranded as the Ministry (except African and Egyptian kindred), both to shed some of the old reputation and as a transition of their beliefs from trying to awaken Set to believing Set resides within them (given they are of Set's blood and one of the Gehenna scenarios back along had Set already be dead, it may be a reflection of this). Still all about the vice and temptation, they, like the Banu Haqim decided that with everyone invading the middle east and causing the area to become a rampant shitstorm of kindred on kindred violence, they needed protection of a major sect. Despite petitioning to join the camarilla, they were refused and so went with the backup choice of the Anarchs. Serpentis, often regarded as just "protean wearing a wig" has now just been rolled into Protean with their meserise ability now an amalgram between it and presence. Often operating as spiritual enlightenment gurus in coteries, they are normally seen as the "I know a guy" clan (dealing in vice to differ them from the Ventrue). Still seem to be an odd mix of clan and sect, if some Samedi stragglers joining up with their structure is anything to go by.

Thin Blood

• Antediluvian - None
• Disciplines - Thin-Blood Alchemy
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs
• Clan Weakness - Varies (pick at creation)
• Clan Compulsions - None

Much like Caitiff, a thin blood is not really a clan, its more the result of being embraced by a vampire who's too many generations removed from Caine. Like the caitiff, the thin bloods are generally shunned and the eternal whipping boys of kindred society. The Camarilla can and will murder them on sight (or, in kinder places, brand them with a hot iron like cattle), while the Anarchs treatment of them ranges the entire spectrum (like with all things Anarchs) of pity, bullying or even just straight killing them. They don't really have disciplines or the ability to learn them properly, though can still pull off some minor discipline effects if they taste another vampire's blood (a dangerous prospect for obvious reasons). Instead they're giving a discipline called thin blooded alchemy, which allows them to make concotions to counterfeit other clan powers with a few generic abilities like minor telekinesis, levitation or creating a cloud of fog thrown in to not be completely barren of unique, fun shit. They do, however, feel the curse less acutely than full blood kindred in most cases, often not having clan curses, able to eat, drink and fuck to their hearts content and some are even able to walk around in the day without any problems, though alongside that some still have a beast despite having weak blood, heal like a mortal or the inability to grow fangs as the curse doesn't manifest properly. A very common path for thin blooded kindred is either to attempt to become human again (trying the classics of kill the sire and the like) or try to get ahold of a full vampire and commit diablerie, gaining a substantial boost in power at the expense of losing their thin blood merits and taking the clan of their victim in the process.

Toreador

• Antediluvian - Arikel
• Disciplines - Auspex, Celerity, Presence
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - Suffering in "ugly" surroundings (as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, this can take many forms)
• Clan Compulsions - Can become mesmerised by something truly beautiful (whether that is a person, a song or even the rising sun)

Still the same mix of artists and poseurs who don't actually know how to make art but sit around criticising other people, the Toreador have changed little from their mean girls routine in earlier editions, embracing those who are beautiful or the hot new thing and dropping them like a drained corpse the next chance they get. The clan is still sticking by the Camarilla, still giving the Nosferatu shit for being ugly and still getting probably more hate than is entirely fair and still crimminally underestimated.

Tremere

• Antediluvian - Tremere
• Disciplines - Auspex, Blood Sorcery (Thaumaturgy by any other name is suprisingly less bullshit), Dominate
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - Inability to blood bond (fuck yo pyramid)
• Clan Compulsions - Being perfectionists and needing to get something not just done but done "perfectly"

Oh boy, the Tremere. Where do we begin on the almighty slapping down they recieved? Well, it all began when the second inquisition raided the main Chantry in Vienna, wiping it out with a drone missile and shattering the leadership of the clan (jury is out on if Tremere, currently inhabiting Gotrix's body, manipulated events to see this done or if the SI got lucky). Either as a result of that or the Banu Haqim Methuselah Ur-Shulgi deciding to get a little payback for the curse they levelled at his clan, the Tremere's blood bonds to the pyramid were broken, and the clan as a whold were left without the ability to blood bond kindred (ghouls can be bonded, albeit they need to drink more of the blood over a longer period). Between the destruction of their centralised leadership, the beckoning taking many of the elders out of the picture, the Banu Haqim joining the Camarilla (destroying their monopoly on blood sorcery) and becoming persona non grata in many places when the blood bonds broke, the Tremere are now fighting heavily to find any scrap of old occultish lore and have broken into several houses, all opposed. The houses are the loyalists under Karl Schrekt, Carna (quasi paganism with a feminist leaning), Gotrix (implied to be run by Tremere himself inhabiting Gotrix's body) and Ipsissimus (who joined the Anarchs). Good news, this means that there are now Tremere among the anarchs, bad (or better news, depending on if you were a fan of Thaumaturgy being a hundred disciplines in one), blood sorcery paths are all but gone, with most of the lore on different paths scattered to the winds, and the ones who know it not being inclined to share now that their clan structure has been subject to a beatdown conga.

Tzimisce

• Antediluvian - Tzimisce
• Disciplines - Animalism, Dominate, Protean (vicissitude hides here now, along with dominate)
• Primary Sect membership - Anarchs (most still in the sabbat)
• Clan Weakness - Must dwell among something that resonates with them (a particular building, among a certain group of people or even in soil from somewhere they have strong ties to ala Dracula)
• Clan Compulsions - Covetousness (taking things for their "hoard", whether thats an item or sculpting their fingers to match someone elses/stealing someones fingers because they're pretty)

Having undergone something of a reestablishment since V20, pains have been taken to reemphasise the more posessive and "lord of the land" elements of the Tzimisce over the Moreau esque body horror elements. Outside of that however, the Tzimisce are the same as they've always been, and the only real change is their numbers among the Anarchs have increased, though most still reside among the sabbat. Vicissitude is no longer its own discipline, and has been rolled into Protean like many other unique disciplines, amalgramed with dominate to "force the flesh to obey their whim". This has the unfortunate effect of changing the fundamental powerset of the Tzimisce and giving them social disciplines despite the often held line of ruling solely through terror, and does spark some debate.

Ventrue

• Antediluvian - Ventru
• Disciplines - Dominate, Fortitude, Presence
• Primary Sect membership - Camarilla
• Clan Weakness - Can only feed on a certain type of people (alcoholics, 20 year old virgins etc), if not their chosen charge they must spend willpower or vomit it up.
• Clan Compulsions - Taking charge (take charge and force someone to obey your will without using disciplines like Dominate to do so)

Very much the same as they've always been. Same bunch of pricks richer than you and better dressed than you but with the added caveat that they do still run the Camarilla and do their job well, because someone's gotta keep an entire society of predators wearing human faces and backstabbing each other in line. Not to say they're completely dismissive of other kindred and clans, they just know that every gear has its place in the political machine, and will make alliances as necessary to keep things running and to step up in the world. Have a lot of soft power among kine, especially where the business world is concerned, and often embrace among the sucessful (businessmen and politicians are often seen as the best investments). Their bane is still the same but has been expanded, Ventrue are now slightly able to tell if someone is to their taste.

Sects

Still the same sects (ish) but with differences with ann the radical changes in V5.

Camarilla

The Camarilla, long the bastion of kindred society and considering all vampires under their rules, got fucked from several angles at the beginning of V5. The Gangrel had already left after Justicar Xavier wasnt taken seriously about the Antedeluvians. Then the beckoning starts to take their Elders and Princes away, leading to a lot of the old powerbase departing for parts unknown and creating a power vacuum. In addition, when ShreckNET got compromised and the Second inquisition rose up, the camarilla promptly panicked, blamed the Anarchs and banned all electronic communication. Never mind that a lot of Elders used law enforcement or even honest to caine hunters as an attack dog to sic on their rivals, contributing to a lot of the information that the SI had to work with.

Following this, the Camarilla decided to place stricter rules and membership becomes more exclusive, formally banning caitiff vampires in the sect and cracking down harder and harder on the anarchs before Theo Bell, Archon, anarch sympathizer and brujah representative, declared enough was enough and blew Hardestadt, inner circle member and the defacto leader of the camarilla, to pieces with a shotgun at the Conclave of Prague, taking the Brujah and moving most of the clan to the Anarchs.

Despite their powerbase shrinking and the Camarilla becoming more of an exclusive club, several clans petitioned to join in the wake of all the chaos that followed the Gehenna war. The Banu Haqim were granted the ability to join as a clan, and about half the Lasombra defected from the Sabbat and were allowed in on a case by case basis, often trading favours in exchange for entrance. This began in Chicago and will likely continue to be adopted in other areas, assuming the Lasombra don't fuck the place over. The Ministry, formerly known as the Followers of Set, were rejected from joining, so decided to join the sect more likely to appreciate blackjack and hookers.

Between this and the death of the end of the party line that the Antedeluvians are simply myths, the Camarilla of the present is a very different beast, and are arguably regressing to the tactics of the Elders that spawned the first anarch revolt, locking their doors and allowing the Anarchs to bear the brunt of the SI purges while they try to avoid detection and wait out the storm.

Anarchs

Following the Camarilla closing its doors to all but exceptional kindred and the response from Theo Bell, the Anarchs have split off into their own sect proper. The average Anarch city is a mess of gang violence without anyone holding enough power to make Anarchs behave and usually either follows the trend of "the barons are just as bad as the princes" or Sabbat wearing anarchy symbols as the kindred form into gangs and fight nightly for territory, usually both.

Not to say that going Anarch has no benefits. Sure life is tougher and fighting is rampant but night to night you have a little more freedom. The barons generally are slightly better than the Princes of old, and likely wont demand your fealty or gifts of blood so long as you stay out of their way, plus with a slightly more democratic leaning being a complete bastard is discouraged. However, with no obligation to be fair and even less in the way of oversight if you're not popular, you're at the mercy of other vampires and can expect little in the way of actual support or recourse.

Unteathered from the Camarilla, they've come into their own, for better of worse. Thin bloods and Caitiff have, being generally persceuted by the Camarilla, flocked to the Anarchs in the face of the Camarilla becoming even more hostile to them. The Gangrel, originally simply independant, have joined up with the Anarchs too, as did the Ministry and Brujah clans. Heck, even a load of younger Tzimisce have latched onto the sect. They also made some territory gains of their own (retaking California and usurping London and a few other cities).

V5 seems to be intent on building the Anarchs into the proper rivals to the Camarilla in the face of moving the Sabbat out of the limelight and in fairness, a lot of people are okay with it. Many considered the Sabbat to be comically evil and with the depth of a puddle(then again the Anarchs arnt exactly chomsky with fangs). It helps that the unique clans most people wanted to play are no longer consigned to a sect that considers skinning people for the lulz to be a sacred practice. However, there are obviously people who believe that the sect is boring, underwritten and its horseshit that the entireity of vampiric society rapidly changed over the course of a decade when it had stayed mostly stable for so long.

The Sabbat

In the wake of the Beckoning bringing elders all to one place, the Sabbat abandoned their cities and prepared to kick the shit out of the elders, seeing it as a massive buffet. Details on what the Gehenna war looks like are sketchy, but from snippets here and there, its not going well, and attrition rates among the Sabbat are high. Not that majority of them care, but in the wake of this, about half the Lasombra promptly left to join the Camarilla, presumably now fightened of actually doing the thing that their entire sect was born to do.

Presumably there are pockets of Sabbat here and there, the ones who didn't answer the call to war, but the books have completely shifted attention from them. Presumably because being a vampiric shitbag, using disciplines in the open and creating a trail of bodies can and will lead the SI to you, and no matter how badass you are, getting your haven burned down in the middle of the day will probably kill you, or at least ruin your day.

Luckily, running Sabbat isn't too difficult. With the touchstones and tenets system you can spoof most paths, Sabbat ritae have been homebrewed and it isnt too hard to create a plot where they are hanging around (or even run a gehenna war game). You could even do a pre beckoning game if you wish.

Disciplines

Your good old "clan powers" that have been in the game since the beginning, but with a change. In the old days of pre v5, there were far more disciplines, and all bar 4 clans had a unique discipline. Many of them also only had one power per level until you got to level 6 and above One of the biggest (or at least one of the most debated) changes was the devs scrapping unique disciplines and levels 6 and above in favour of turning a lot of signature discipline abilities into amalgrams (combo powers that need 2 disciplines at varying levels to use), shuffling some of the more interesting and thematic upper level powers into lower slots amd providing players with multiple powers to pick from at every level of the power (even in the physical disciplines, which until now were purely one power each that just got better with more dots). While this article is at the risk of overusing skub as a descriptor, there really is no other word for the ensuring reaction to the amalgram change, more so than probably any other changes.

On the one hand, amalgrams were meant as a way to reduce or eliminate the classic problem of people begging to play a specific clan purely for the clan unique discipline and in many cases, does help with that. There has been a shift in the internal logic of the discipline powers from making them a very rigid thing to more of an umbrella for a certain family of varied abilities (obfuscate as perception and sensory fuckery vs "this family of powers helps me hide") with some of the more unique disciplines explained as different ways of using the same toolkit or mutations of the powers by mixing their abilities with others (chimestry is obfuscate + presence to manipulate someones perceptions and then convince them its not fake, while vicissitude is protean + dominate to "command the flesh to obey the kindred's whims").

It also trimmed out a lot of powers that only existed to fill out a discipline spread (a few of dementations powers got axed this way), damn near scrapped others that arguably only existed to make an independent clan special (Serpentis) and prevented others from feeling like 5 different abilities that didn't act as a progression of the same family of powers (Serpentis again, or arguably Quietus). This, twinned with every level having several powers means that even with the exact same discipline sets and dots, no 2 characters will likely have the same abilities.

However with the limit of "only 5 dots in any power" and the fact that several more unique discipline abilities can take up a large chunk of the discipline its been rolled into, can leave some players feeling rather limited, and if you wanted say, good amount of vicissitude but also wanted to purchase Earth Meld, you're gonna either lose out on a vicissitude power somewhere along the way or blow your level 5 slot on it. Plus the issue of several amalgram requirements being held by several clans at once (both the ministry and ravnos can use chimestry while Valeran is usable by the tremere) and some people citing that now there is no reason to pick certain clans over others or that the loss of the discipline as a unique discipline takes away from the identity of the clan. Plus as is typical for VTM, the balance is a complete mess with some powers broken and some total shit.

Animalism

• Blood resonance: Animal blood
• Held by: Gangrel, Nosferatu, Ravnos, Tzimisce

As should be expected, Animalism is your bag of abilities that pertains to messing around with animals. As most animals can tell there's something off about kindred this can be very useful for not setting off alarm bells and helping a vampire go incognito. Has the usual mix of talking to animals, commanding them or even possessing them, as well as some powers that pertain to the beast.

Auspex

• Blood resonance: Phlegmatic
• Held by: Hecata, Malkavians, Salubri, Toreador, Tremere.

Your typical "ESP" toolkit. Takes the form of better senses, seeing unseen stuff (vampire disciplines that are normally hidden), moves onto auras and goes into psychometry, full telepathy and the like. Strangely, while most disciplines had several powers shuffled into lower levels, many of auspex' most signature abilities (aura reading and spirits touch) went up a level.

Blood Sorcery

• Blood resonance: Sanguine
• Held by: Banu Haqim, Tremere.

Thaumaturgy mixed with Quietus. Even with amalgrams and the birth of multiple powers per discipline level, the days of the Thaumaturgy path whore tremere are over. Rituals still exist for a number of abilities, however the discipline as a whole is more focused on manipulating vitae for a variety of effects and less on being straight magic jury rigged to run on vitae.

Celerity

• Blood resonance: Choleric
• Held by: Banu Haqim, Brujah, Toreador.

Your vampiric super speed and dexterity based powers. No longer stupid broken after v5 realised finally that giving people a discipline that allowed you to attack extra times a turn is busted in combat. Focuses on a mix of extremely refined dexterity (deadshot accuracy or perfect balance) and maneuvering powers (your flash style super speed, up to and including running up surfaces or on water).

Dominate

• Blood resonance: Phlegmatic
• Held by: Lasombra, Malkavians, Salubri, Tremere, Tzimisce, Ventrue.

Still the same old "stare into their eyes and command them" mind control power. One of the most common disciplines now, and an amalgrim for a fair few disciplines. Fuck about with memories, give people commands they must follow or even implant a directive deep into their minds and build an army of sleeper agents. Makes people obedient but dumb robots, unlike presence which turns people into slavishly loyal devotees.

Fortitude

• Blood resonance: Melancholic
• Held by: Gangrel, Hecata, Salubri, Ventrue.

Probably once one of the most underwhelming "basic" powers, fortitude has been revamped into an actual discipline tree instead of an expensive and medicore power that was often dismissed until you accidentally pissed off a gangrel. Ties into the vampires nature as an unchanging monster. Obviously deals with soaking damage, but also has abilities that adds resilience for mind control, prevents the user from being knocked down or even make weapons shatter against you. Also where the healing powers of the salubri went (amalgrimated with Auspex).

Obfuscate

• Blood resonance: Melancholic
• Held by: Banu Haqim, Malkavians, Nosferatu, Ravnos, The Ministry.

Obfuscate, despite being expanded to include other trickery, is suprisingly still very focused on its regular powerset. Majority of powers have to do with things like hiding and decieving people into thinking you're either not there or you're someone else at higher levels, perfect for the Nosferatu, and also include things like obfuscating items or turning the interior of a place into a maze by warping the layout in their perceptions. V5 ended up slotting the chimestry abilities into this discipline, using presence as an amalgram.

Oblivion

• Blood resonance: Void (the lack of resonance)
• Held by: Hecata, Lasombra.

The powers of Obtenebration plus Necromancy rolled into one discipline. In one of the more controversial changes to the lore junkies, the old obtenebration powers now deal almost entirely with the realm of the dead as opposed to the psuedo-alive shadow realm of previous editions. Like blood sorcery, Oblivion contained a plethora of rituals, mostly surrounding the more necromantic side of the disicipline. Really feels like 2 disciplines slapped into one set, with one side dealing with shadow manipulation and one dealing with affeceting the dead or channeling entropy itself, on the bright side it's still really easy to seperate them. Uniquely of all disciplines, it can cause stains the more you use it as the unnatural power taints the user.

Potence

• Blood resonance: Choleric
• Held by: Brujah, Lasombra, Nosferatu.

Like Celerity and Fortitude, Potence now has powers at each level, creating a mix of powers that pertain to combat prowess and some that are more traversal or utility based (the power to jump higher and further or climb walls by punching handholds). This is also now one of the more important combat disciplines again, with the 5 dot power (fist of caine) the only way to do unarmed aggravated damage with the nerf to protean's "Feral Claws".

Presence

• Blood resonance: Sanguine
• Held by: Brujah, Ravnos, The Ministry, Toreador, Ventrue.

The velvet glove to Dominate's iron fist, presence allows the vampire to turn people into their slavish devotees and uber fans. Unlike Dominate, it doesn't strip the free will from the target, allowing for the thrall to use their own initative when doing your bidding. It also tends to affect crowds vs dominate's single target focus (but is more about pulling on emotions than it is crushing down someones free will). This does come with the double edged sword that overuse on subjects can turn them into obsessive stalkers who can and will murder each other for your attention.

Protean

• Blood resonance: Animal Blood
• Held by: Gangrel, Ministry, Tzimisce.

Vampire transformation powers of various different stripes. Transform your eyes to see in the dark, fuse with the earth to escape the sun, become an animal or turn into a cloud of mist to sneak into places that arent completely air tight. Notably, feral claws, a power that has been a staple of combat vampires forever, has had the aggravated damage dealing to kindred element stripped out, making it less of an auto include. This is also where Serpentis and Visissitude ended up going.

Thin Blood Alchemy

• Blood resonance: Varies (depending on the recipe).
• Held by: Thin Bloods

Cooking by the book. Thin bloods can't learn disciplines due to the curse being too weak to allow for these changes, however what they do have is thin blood alchemy, more akin to a list of rituals and potion brewing to allow for the user to produce and counterfeit a number of effects. Most of it is recipes to mimic other discipline powers, however some basic abilities (change someones body, minor displays of telekinesis or flying) are thrown in too. As its not a native power of "the vitae" it doesnt progress like a regular discipline, and requires the thin blood to research, experiment or get the recipe from another source (and can become plot points for long spanning chronicles on and of themselves), albeit it does require set up beforehand (you generally cant just say "I brewed the levitation potion" just because you need to escape to another building from the roof). There are 3 ways to run the power, mixing the ingredients yourself in a cauldron, drinks mixer or whatever else the user wants to use, drinking all the ingredients yourself to mix them in your own body or force feeding someone the ingredients and feeding on them. Not usable by vampires, making it the closest thing to a "clan unique discipline" in V5.

The Second Inquisition

Basically, government agencies and some churches all over the world know some things about kindred. They think vampirism is a virus and call kindred "blankbodies" because they produce no body heat. The Second Inquisition destroyed the Vienna Chantry not too long ago, destroying the blood bond pyramid of the Tremere and fracturing the clan. The inquisition also got into Schrecknet, so the Camarilla has forbidden the use of electronic communication for discussing anything kindred-related. The Anarchs use burner phones and cover their tracks like spies.

Ghouls and Revenants

Humans that drink vampiric blood enough times form a blood bond to the vampire they drink from and become a ghoul. They remain human and normal looking but their aging slows dramatically and they gain some superhuman healing. They can also learn disciplines.

Revenants are humans born to generations of ghoul parents.

Who Writes V5 and other WW Games Now

Paradox Interactive bought White Wolf in 2015. White Wolf lost their independence and writing privileges in 2018 after they wrote in one of the V5 books that vampires were causing the real-world ongoing murders of homosexual Chechens. Now Paradox does all writing for 5th edition WoD games in-house, and all work for older editions and CoD is done by Onyx Path.

External Links

• VTM News Page
• World of Darkness wiki