Draft3

[+/-] Path of Humanity

Humanity
V20 Core, pg 311

Let’s make one thing clear: just because a vampire follows the Path of Humanity doesn’t mean she is a friendly, congenial saint. Vampires are predators by nature, and Humanity only gifts them with the ability to pretend they’re not. It is an internal charade that protects a Kindred from herself, much as the Masquerade protects vampires from the mortals outside.

Unfortunately, the very nature of existence as a vampire is anathema to one’s Humanity. As the centuries wear on, the Beast takes hold, and Kindred become less and less concerned with the wellbeing of the kine (after all, they’ll die eventually, anyway). As such, characters are likely to lose Humanity over the course of the game.

Mortals also typically follow the Path of Humanity, though this is largely out of ignorance: They don’t know they can be anything else. As such, this mechanical system for morality rarely comes into play for them. Certainly, some mortals — rapists, murderers, and the like — have low Humanity ratings, but they have no Beast roiling within them, as do the Kindred. It is possible for a vampire with a high Humanity rating to be more humane than some mortals are!

Points Description X Monstrous Horrific Bestial Cold Unfeeling Distant Removed Normal Caring Compassionate Saintly

Path Rating Moral Guidelines 10 Selfish thoughts 9 Minor selfish acts 8 Injury to another (accidental or otherwise) 7 Theft 6 Accidental violation (drinking a vessel dry out of starvation) 5 Intentional property damage 4 Impassioned violation (manslaughter, killing a vessel in frenzy) 3 Planned violation (outright murder, savored exsanguination) 2 Casual violation (thoughtless killing, feeding past satiation) 1 Utter perversion or heinous acts

[+/-] The Path of Blood

The Path of Blood
V20 Core, pg 316

style="width: 300px" Ethics of the Path
Faithfully follow the teachings of Haqim.
Mortals are beneath the notice of vampires. Feed from them only when necessary.
Lose no opportunity to obtain Kindred blood of any Generation. The power of the Blood shall ensure the clan’s victory.
Withstand the Beast’s fury — failing to master oneself results in lessened prowess.
Seek knowledge that may aid the Clan in its war on the cursed spawn of Khayyin.
Extend the glory of Haqim’s cause to other Kindred. Should they refuse, use them to further your own journey back to Khayyin’s grace.

Nickname: Dervishes
Virtues: Conviction and Self-Control
Bearing: Resolve. Followers of the Path of Blood know the seriousness of their task and are incredibly dedicated to it. Their aura modifier affects Willpower rolls.
Basic Beliefs: This Path is practiced almost exclusively by the assassins of Clan Assamite, although only vampires who demonstrate true loyalty to the Clan learn its harsh code. The founding principle of this Path explains that the children of Caine (or Khayyin, as the Assamites refer to him) are wicked failures, fit primarily to bring the brood of Haqim (the Assamites’ name for their own Clan founder) closer to “the One,” a state of mystical transcendence. Haqim instructs his childer to salvage or strike down Khayyin’s other childer to destroy the taint they inflict on the world.

Assamites on this Path follow two basic precepts. First and foremost, the Clan seeks to convince other Kindred of their flawed, cursed nature, and thus convert them to the service of those on the Path. Kindred as a whole are a blight upon the earth, and only by upholding Haqim’s righteous code can they redeem themselves. Should vampires resist attempts at conversion, the Assamites kill them. Before they were cursed, Assamites would diablerize their victims, using the blood of the fallen to lower their Generations and thus return to Haqim’s bounty. Now, unable to drink the blood of other vampires, they instead collect blood from vampires as payment, using that to follow Haqim’s directives until the night when the curse upon them can be lifted. Although they are not inherently psychotic murderers, Assamites on the Path of Blood place little value on the unlives of other Kindred, and must have good reason not to slay most vampires with whom they come in contact. Vampires on this Path pose a serious threat to other Kindred around them, and do not frequently associate with non-Assamite Kindred. Blood is blood, however, and Assamites are not so fatuous as to disregard the value of the vast web of Kindred society.

Few young Assamites follow this Path or even know of its existence — Clan Assamite conspires to keep its beliefs secret from most other Kindred of the world. Hundreds of years ago, the Assamites’ bloodthirsty ways united all other Children of Caine against them, and they are loath to face the concerted opposition of Khayyin’s bastard brood again. As such, only the most accomplished and able Assamites learn this Path’s tenets.

Path Rating	Moral Guidelines	Rationale
10	Killing a mortal for sustenance	Human blood is nourishing to the body, but the murder of lessers is poison to the soul.
9	Breaking a word of honor to a Clanmate	Solidarity is important to the Assamites’ holy cause.
8	Refusing to offer a non-Assamite an opportunity to convert	The childer of Khayyin are accursed and must be saved.
7	Failing to destroy an unrepentant Kindred outside the Clan	Those who do not accept Haqim’s teachings forfeit their unlives.
6	Succumbing to frenzy	Haqim teaches ascendance, not indulgence.
5	Failing to pursue the lore of Khayyin	To oppose one’s enemies successfully, one must learn all about them.
4	Failing to demand blood as payment	Other members of the Clan may benefit from such vitae, no matter how diluted.
3	Refusal to aid a more advanced member of the Path	To act selfishly is to fall into the snares of Khayyin’s pawn.
2	Failing to tithe blood	Haqim has decreed this as paramount to his childer’s cause.
1	Acting against another Assamite	This is treason to the Path and the Clan.

Path of Blood, Post-Curse - Sidebar
V20 Core, pg 318

If you are playing an Assamite who is not under the effects of the Tremere ritual (and thus, using the weakness listed in the sidebar on p. 428), the Path of Blood demands that the Dervish must diablerize Kindred when they have the opportunity instead of sharing their payments of blood with the Clan. As such, the 4 rating for the Hierarchy of Sin is replaced with “Failing to pursue lesser blood,” and the 2 rating is replaced with “Failing to take an opportunity to lower one’s Generation.”

[+/-] The Path of Bones

The Path of Bones
V20 Core, pg 318

Ethics of the Path
Study death in all its permutations.
Determine when death occurs; define it.
Search for a purpose for death and the life that prefaces it.
Quantify the differences of death by various causes.
Achieve a comfort with death and unlife — distinguish between damnation and salvation.
Hasten death’s arrival, should it seem to be unnaturally delayed.

Nickname: Gravediggers
Virtues: Conviction and Self-Control
Bearing: Silence. The Gravediggers, accustomed as they are to long hours of quiet study and contemplation of the grave, radiate the stillness of death. The bearing modifier applies to rolls involving Stealth and attempts to go unnoticed.
Basic Beliefs: The Path of the Bones, it is believed, grew out of a warped code upheld by the morbid vampires who sired the Giovanni: Human, Kindred, or otherwise, every being sooner or later ends up in death’s arms. The most ardent followers of this Path espouse “giving oneself over to the comprehension of life’s inevitable end.” Vampires who follow this Path seek the knowledge of precisely what death is: Is it simply the end of life? The transition of the soul to what lies after life? Is it the end of the soul’s desire to exist? These questions haunt the followers of the Path of the Bones each night.

Many vampires believe that the Path of the Bones is a degenerate Path that encourages followers to participate in all manner of murder and deviance. Those who uphold the Path and those who are familiar with it, however, know that it involves itself with a pursuit of life’s — and unlife’s — meaning. Followers of the Path seek to understand death’s nature and purpose, and thus the roles individuals play in the greater scheme of the world. Mortality is inevitable, except for vampires, who have somehow managed to cheat the cycle.

Kindred nature, however, is generally outside the avenues this Path explores. It is truly a scholar’s code, as the Kindred who follow it forsake even their own comfort to advance their understanding of mortality’s mysteries. These Kindred are not necessarily cruel — they merely value comprehension more than human life.

At its simplest, the Path of the Bones seeks to define not only what death is, but also its meaning to those who have escaped it. It is a Path of knowledge and power, and many who support it learn to wield great influence over the living and dead alike. Many among the Path become quite erudite in the ways of ghosts, but even these odd beings fail to answer many of the Gravediggers’ questions — what, for example, happens to a ghost that resolves its psychic struggle or discorporates into the void?

Path Rating	Moral Guidelines	Rationale
10	Showing a fear of death	Fear inhibits learning.
9	Failing to study an occurrence of death	Refusal to learn indicates refusal to understand.
8	Accidental killing	There is no opportunity to gain insight.
7	Postponing feeding when hungry	Denial of the self serves no greater purpose.
6	Succumbing to frenzy	The Beast is irrational, and emotion serves little to advance understanding.
5	Refusing to kill when an opportunity presents itself	Experimentation proves theory, and without proof, there is no conclusion.
4	Making a decision based on emotion rather than logic	Vampires are dead; so, too, are their emotions.
3	Inconveniencing oneself for another’s benefit	Death is inevitable; what meaning does easing another’s doomed discomfort have?
2	Needlessly preventing a death	One must not prevent the cycle, but should learn from it.
1	Actively preventing a death	Such emotional ties befit humans, not Kindred.