Clan Backgrounds

Children of Osiris

Many Children of Osiris are loath to embrace new childer, to give a human the potential to become such a monster. Though the elders understand that to combat the truly evil undead, that the Children of Osiris must remain a strong and prosperous Clan. The Children primarily look for people of accomplishment or strong moral character in selecting a childe, people who have helped others with their lives, made great sacrifices, or helped make the world a better place. The acolytes also have a distaste for cutting short mortal lives before they have run their course, so many choose older candidates for the embrace - men and women who have lived most of their lives and who could still continue their good work if they were allowed more time. This also sometimes extends to people who have had terrible accidents or are suffering from terminal diseases. There is not one particular set of skills that the acolytes look for, making their Clan relatively diverse in ability if unified in ideology. A potential sire will usually try to get to know the human to be embraced before the final choice is made, and will slowly try to gauge if the person would agree to become a vampire or if they would react well to gaining so much power.

Gargoyles

Gargoyles almost always select candidates for the embrace based on two criteria, the physical prowess of the human and the hardship that human has endured. Gargoyles believe that those who have been enslaved or persecuted, as the Clan itself was in its early days, become mentally stronger and more determined to fight oppression as a result. Also, as dedicated warriors of the Sabbat, they look for people of great physical strength and toughness as well. Since their rise to Clan status in the middle ages, the Gargoyles have selected their progeny from among those most downtrodden classes, slaves, oppressed minorities, conquered peoples, or the desperately poor. Unlike many other Clans, they do not spend a great deal of time trying to study or test the target of an embrace. They merely find a candidate which strongly fits the criteria of having been oppressed and who has great physical ability, though some more discerning or thoughtful Gargoyles also look for mortals who are loners or have few friends and family so that their disappearance won't be a problem. As many within the lower classes of society tend to have a poor education, that is reflected in Gargoyles as well. In many first world nations, Gargoyles have begun to select gang members as potential childer - people who have faced hardship on the bottom rung of society, who have experience fighting and combat, who understand the value of loyalty, and who won't be missed by most of humanity.

Baali

The Baali choose mortals for the embrace who have shown themselves to be highly competent manipulators. Lawyers, politicians, con men, lobbyists, pimps, captains of industry, investors, leaders of organized crime, pornographers, and many others. Essentially, the target must have shown his ability to successfully interact with people, make great fortunes, and must have very few scruples. Often the Baali choose long time business associates who they have seen the competence of first hand. Most candidates for the Baali embrace are middle aged, old enough to have proven their ability and build up a sizable fortune, but not so old as to significantly decline physically or to lose their hunger for power. The Baali of a single city must get together and discuss the candidates, deciding together which is best. When the decision is made, they then select which Baali among them will perform the embrace. The potential childe is then approached, offered a choice to become a vampire or continue on as if nothing had happened - most agree to become a vampire, those who refuse are usually ghouled so that they can continue to be useful but wont talk to other humans about the Baali.

Lamia

Before a mortal is embraced into the Lamia Clan, she must spend many decades as a ghoul proving her competence, learning valuable skills, and serving the Clan. The Lamia usually select young women in their teens or twenties who have made great accomplishments as well as shown determination, intellect, and the ability to work hard. These girls are usually highly accomplished students, child prodigies, women who own small businesses, or who have distinguished themselves with some kind of activism or other activity. Mental abilities are most sought after, but physical and social skills are desirable as well. The Lamia favor young candidates who show potential, girls who they can mold into their ideal vision of the perfect Lamia. As a ghoul, the candidate will be taught the Clan's ideology, trained in a variety of combat skills, and her talents will be utilized in serving the goals of the Clan and her domitor. Only a minority of candidates are ever embraced, the others either lose their lives in service of the Clan or fail to distinguish themselves and remain ghouls indefinitely. Over the course of decades of being a ghoul servant, these candidates are gradually drawn away from their lives as mortals - becoming more and more distant from friends and family while they make new friends or contacts that serve the interests of the Lamia Clan.

Lhiannan

The Lhiannan are Clan of priests and mystics, each coven leading a group of mortal followers in the Clan's ancient religion. New childer are almost always selected from among the Lhiannan's cult following and embraced by the head of the coven. The embrace is often given as a reward for long and faithful service, as well as competence and natural talent. The Lhiannan also believe in using magical divination to determine a mortal's potential - sometimes such divination causes them to reject seemingly perfect candidates or embrace subpar ones. Members of a Lhiannan's cult are almost always rural people or those with a great love or knowledge of nature and the wilderness, but aside from these qualities they can be from all walks of life - rich or poor, educated or illiterate, male or female, strong or weak. They can all find a place with the Lhiannan, though the vast majority of Lhiannan as well as their mortal followers are of European ancestry. Despite their diversity in some regards, most cult followers and especially those who are considered for the embrace tend to be intelligent, willing to think introspectively, and have a strong sense of spirituality. Most candidates for the embrace are either on the older side for mortals or have spent time as a ghoul before being embraced, as time and loyalty of service is often a big factor in selecting a childe.

Samedi

The Samedi view themselves as a Clan of scholars and scientists of a sort, whose area of focus is death and the dead. Because of this, the Samedi almost always choose intellectuals and academics for the embrace. They also prefer loners and eccentrics, people who don't fit in with society or even their colleagues, for such individuality will suit them well in the Clan of death. They also prefer to select people who have had experience with death, either those who are dying, people who have witnessed much death and suffering, and even those who have caused many deaths. A cold hearted or detached view towards death is a big plus as well. In a city with Samedi, the right to embrace usually goes to the most senior Samedi, though sometimes elders take turns with the embrace. A newly embraced Samedi spends many years as an apprentice to his sire before being released. This involves not only helping the sire as a research assistant, but learning Necromancy from him as well as Obfuscate and establishing a method for getting blood on a regular basis without threatening the Masquerade - vital skills for a creature as hideous as the Samedi. New Samedi childer usually abandon their mortal lives entirely, they are dead to the world of mortals.

The Sybarites

To the Sybarites, the embrace is more of a love affair than a calculated political move. A Sybarite will become enchanted with the musical ability of some mortal and then if the potential sire has enough influence and political sway to embrace the childe, then she does. If not, then she will frequently ghoul the mortal and keep her around for a future embrace. The childe can come from any sort of background as long as she has the ability to sing beautifully, though youth and physical beauty is often valued as well though the Sybarites don't like to admit it. What other skills the childe might have often doesn't matter to the Sybarites, so young Sybarites have a diversity of skills and abilities or lack thereof. A Sybarite sire will keep act a mentor, friend, lover, or patron for a variable amount of time - which usually ends with one or both vampires tiring of each other, usually the sire tires of the childe as a childe who wishes to leave may find herself blood bound. The sire teaches the childe in the ways of the Camarilla and introduces her to important vampires or mortals, though some sires may not perform this duty to the childe's satisfaction. The most common influence new childer may have is in the mortal world, as they all have wonderful singing ability and many will use this to gain fame and fortune. It is the duty if the sire to prevent the childe from becoming too famous though, as fame threatens the Masquerade.

Kiasyd

The Kiasyd usually choose childer from their Revenant families, most often the Ascania or Muiredaigh. These are old and noble families, their blood and ancestry is pure. The childe will have served the Clan as a ghoul for decades or even centuries and proven his competence, honor, and obedience. Such a childe often has a skewed view of the world, having grown up in extreme wealth, taught at home by tutors, known of vampires and the supernatural from a young age, and in the case of the Ascania, has been very isolated from the world of humans. These young Kiasyd have a great knowledge of mysticism and the world of vampires for childer, it is their knowledge of the mortal world which is more lacking and which may never improve. A newly embraced childe lives under the reign of his sire indefinitely, until he becomes powerful enough to gain his own domain or the sire dies or enters torpor - though on the plus side the sire is duty bound to protect the childe and instruct him in all necessary skills to thrive as one of the undead. These Revenant childer often have access to great wealth, have excellent if somewhat archaic educations, and have good social skills if not familiarity with human culture. Those childer who are not embraced from Revenant families also tend to come from wealthy or highly accomplished human families and are frequently chosen for their achievements in business, politics, or academia. In such cases, the mortal is usually turned into a ghoul and given a trial period of a century or so to prove themselves before being embraced. It usually takes non-Revenants a bit longer to earn respect as a Kiasyd than the former Revenants do. Virtually every Kiasyd is of European ethnicity, even those not belonging to a Revenant familiy. In recent years, some younger and less conservative sires, often in cities with less Kiasyd presence, have embraced accomplished mortals a bit more liberally without the long testing period. They have done so to allow the Clan to have a closer connection to the modern world. These childer know about computers, telephones, modern corporations and laws - extremely important skills to survive in the 21st century. Unfortunately, embracing such childer has backfired in some cases as the childer reject the Clan's traditions and values.

Salubri

The Salubri are scholars and philosophers, so that is who they embrace. They look for mortals with the ability to think outside of the box, to diverge from the mainstream of society, who are unwilling to conform. This leads to all sorts of unusual individuals becoming Salubri, from fringe political activists, to professors, to religious fanatics, to autodidacts of all kinds. The Salubri also embrace for brilliance, for those whose minds are truly exceptional even if they haven't necessarily accomplished anything - for there is great potential in such people. A Salubri will usually befriend the mortal, getting to know him and having discussions about philosophy, science, morality, religion, poetry, and any other number of intellectual topics. After years of such a friendship, if the Salubri finds the mortal not only worthy but interesting enough to be a companion, then the childe is embraced and becomes the student of the Salubri. A new Salubri will always have some sort of knowledge, intellectual ability, or unique ideas that distinguish him from most humans. The Salubri like Renaissance Men as well, and it's not uncommon for the childer to have other unique skills such as combat experience, great charisma, or virtually any other random experience or ability that unusual people tend to gain.

The Brotherhood of Blood

Blood Brothers embrace for combat ability only. They do not care about a human's class, intellect, morals, race, education, or any other quality but the ability to kill. When the Blood Brothers need to replace a slain member of a hive, they embrace the most skilled warrior that they can find within the next week. They often target military personal, police officers, martial artists, athletes, gang members, members of paramilitary groups, hit men, terrorists, or gun enthusiasts. Childer are virtually always male. When a childe is embraced by a hive of Blood Brothers, his individuality melts away. He forget values and friends he had in life or those memories become a hazy blend with the thoughts of the rest of the hive. Who the childe was is dead and gone, what he becomes is one of the Blood Brothers. The childe's personality shifts to become like that of the rest if the hive, his desires become the desire for the amaranth - they do not even retain their mortal appearance.

Brujah

The Brujah are not nearly so picky with their embrace as are the other scholarly Clans. They see the human form as a pupae stage for vampirism, one in which the qualities of the mortal aren't really an accurate predictor of the quality of the vampire. So when choosing a childe, the Brujah picks a mortal who seems literate and not obviously retarded or deformed, but aside from that, the choice is largely random. This means that Brujah childer come from all walks of life, they are more diverse in background than almost any other Clan. Brujah sires spend time trying to indoctrinate the young childe in the ideology of the Brujah, though the blood itself is partly responsible for the slide away from emotions. If the childe seems unable to grasp the concepts or resists, the Brujah slays the childe and starts over with a new one. Brujah childer are encouraged to abandon friends and family from their mortal life, in many cases childer are ordered to slay them by the sire as proof that they have detached themselves from love and friendship. They also usually liquidate their possessions so that the wealth can be used to further the goals of the Clan or the sire.

Ahrimanes

Ahrimanes almost always select their childer from among humans living a tribal exist or close to it. The main regions of influence for the Ahrimane are Africa and Latin America - where they look for potential childer in poor villages and deep jungles, in search of people who still follow the old traditions and believe in or venerate spirits. For the most part, Ahrimanes don't have that much interest in embracing childer and creating competition, though they feel highly motivated to do so when they encounter a individual with a true connection to spirits. Sometimes such individuals are shamans or witch doctors in little villages, other times they are mad hermits living on their own in the deep wilderness, sometimes they are just random villagers with untapped potential. Virtually all Ahrimanes are of African or Native American ethnicity as well, very few whites are embraced into the Clan. Occasionally, an urban dweller has some special quality that attracted the attention of the Ahrimanes, but it is rare and even city dwellers with such spiritual potential are seldom seen by a Ahrimane - though it is becoming more common as traditional tribal lifestyles disappear. Ahrimane childer seldom have any substantial wealth or education, most are illiterate and have only the skills they will have learned in their villages such as hunting, weaving, primitive farming, etc. Some childer stay with their people, others abandon them and become nomadic hunters in the forests and jungles.

Nagaraja

Although the Nagaraja fear their own childer, often using them as slaves or cannon fodder against enemies, they still select mortals for the embrace more carefully than many other Clans. The typical Nagaraja sees himself as a sort of demi-god, a superior being, and to share his blood with an inferior human specimen is an abomination. They want skilled servants, not incompetents. Also, despite treating their childer as slaves, those slaves are also companions to the Nagaraja and even these cruel vampires need company from time to time. Most childer embraced by the Nagaraja fall into one of two categories: soldiers or companions. Soldiers are selected for their martial prowess, along with intellect and competency, officers are preferred over privates, which are what ghouls are for. Companions are chosen for intellect as well as special or interesting qualities which are appealing to the sire, such as a good education, social skills, beauty, artistic talent, etc. In both cases, the Nagaraja look for mortals with a cruel or sadistic streak, as those without such a quality would not survive well as a Nagaraja. Personal wealth and influence is another factor Nagaraja look for in a childe, someone who appreciates culture and the finer things in unlife. Nagaraja usually teach their childer some of their Disciplines, but not too quickly, they want a childe who is useful but not overly powerful. Nagaraja give their childer no choice, they embrace mortals they want to have as servants, there is no ability to say "no."