Parameters considered (scenario 2)

“God is mysterious, but hell is efficient and lingers; inescapable, inhaling and exhaling in that darkness when your eyelids seal.”

In the end times, the Eldest will gather the Clan unto itself, sparing only those whose talent has the strength to stand on its own without depending upon the master’s brush to complete its work. So say the Old Clan. To them, Vicissitude is a crutch preventing true enlightenment; a cheat bypassing genuine comprehension of the intricate frailties of living matter; a crude tool lulling one to lassi-tude as a lover’s delicately-sighed assistance encourages co-dependent reliance upon him. The Eldest gave the Clan Vicissitude in order to separate the wheat from the chaff by design; through the ease it

provides, the perfect tool weakens the skill of the artist and the art. The Tzimisce have grown brittle, pathetic, homogenous, un-creative, unsophisticated, and inferior.

Their obsessive, crippling addiction to Vicissitude stunts their growth in di-minishment of the Clan. The fools cannot see to grasp their birthright, for fear of dropping the bottle.

According to Old Clan lore, before Enoch was swept from the fir-mament by the wrath the Deluge wrought, the Eldest, in his wandering, found a well. Around the well he found a city in veneration to entities who, like he, enshrouded themselves in the bowels of the earth, possessed of a horrific grace rivaling his own. The city’s kine cried out in forbidden tongues against him, but the language therein supplied only succor and soothed the Eldest. Their rituals he found wanting, their depravities and atrocities no more than children dressing in the cloth of their parents’ emulation. He educated them, and was in turn enlightened.

Infused with this new wisdom, the Old Clan guided by the Eldest bored deeply into the heart of the Carpathians; there the Eldest caged, bound, and tamed the demon Kupala, crucifying the spirit to the Clan and shackling it to his will. Cleverly, by intent of the Eldest, the demon found purchase in the Antediluvian and spread itself through his blood — only the Old Clan was spared the indignity. Taking their cues from the master with fervor, they researched,

catalogued, and subjugated Hell’s minions. Applying the awareness gleaned from dissecting the plucked fruit from the Qlippothic tree to elevate their crafts, careful never to imbibe the bitter juice it offered, inevitably their studies crossed paths with the Molochim, and the two entwined like lovers long lost.

In the eyes of the Old Clan, their kinsmen have not the clarity of vision to see the lesson of the master, adrift in bowed

supplication to the manipulations of his pet, Kupala. They are the medium exercising the Eldest’s own grand and beautiful project.

They are not his students; they are his art, blind to their true purpose, and unworthy of his teachings. It is the Tzimisce’s dominion to rule,

not to serve. The Tzimisce are the seeds of Caine the farmer planted in the Earth, and each Tzimisce must carve themselves into their land, individually.

All Clans have their place in the pecking order: the Ventrue garden-ers guide the kine, the Lasombra shepherd Caine’s get, and the Tzimisce, by right, are the land and rule it — all who tread upon it belong to them. Hell and all divine fugitives, from Namtaru’s fallen to

the outcast kine of Eden and Caine’s

cursed children, are broken only to render them a better bend before the Tzimisce.

Over the course of millennia, the Old Clan has silently borne witness to the single greatest failing of their deca-dent, Vicissitude-laden Clansmen: hypocrisy. For all their pontificated cawing about evolution, they cannot adapt.

Their desperate clinging to staid pantomime, ceremony, and the tradition of the Voivodate nearly destroyed them in their war with the Tremere. Following that, their an-tiquated values found no shelter from the modernizing world around them. Their fiefdoms no longer protected them from the constant progressive fury of the kine’s flowering scientific expansions. The superstitious fear they had erected their kingdoms upon were walls made of sand when faced with the wonders of the steam engine, the telephone, and the computer. Thrust out by an inferno of irony they could not contain, the Tzimisce are now the ones naked, hiding, and afraid of the kine. The Old Clan smile when reflecting on the poetic symmetry in the Eldest’s ever-blossoming composition.

Relations between Tzimisce are inadvertently held to-gether by a loose confederation of independent Eastern European Old Clan Tzimisce adhering to the Tradition of Hospitality in an effort to combine their forces to form the Oradea League in opposition to the Sabbat. The Old Clan pity the main Clan, recognizing them as vessels of the Eldest and not individuals in their own right — speaking at them, rather than to them in meetings, regarding any interactions as a means of direct communication with the Eldest.

As the central core of the Order of Moloch, the Old Clan carry on the Eldest’s example, spending the bulk

of their time and enormous resources on the capturing and enslavement of demonic entities and the hunting and destroying of infernal Cainites for the Tal’Mahe’Ra.

Old Clan Tzimisce are facilitators who lead and com-mand by example, taking no interest in political games or maneuverings and ignoring “official” designated roles in their dealings with others. Many would see their lack of respect for established bureaucracies as shortsighted, ego-driven, and stemming from an impractical nature with no appreciation for structure. Quite the opposite is true;

their lack of care in contrived hierarchies is an arrogance derived out of inability to see anything for them to respect.

Titles are words: calling a duck a chicken does not grant it the ability to cluck. The Old Clan, in essence, is above such concerns. Leaders lead because it is intrinsic to their being, it is what they do, and it is no more a matter of choice than instinct.

Stereotypes

Bahari: The dissonance in the gravitas of your compre-hension does not mean it is not so. Any fool can know, and those who know, do. The point is to understand.

Those that understand, teach.

Harbingers of Skulls: Gratitude is the key to unlocking all doors.

Nergali: We know who controls the Ivory Tower. A sewer drain rejects nothing and accepts everything.

Order of Moloch: The housekeeper’s irony: others notice only when it is not done.

Tal’Mahe’Ra: It is important for the left hand to know what the right hand is doing. Always bite the hand that feeds you and extend it to the other.

Maeghar

“Keep moving. Do not grow attached. You cannot lose what you do not have.”

The Maeghar were never a bloodline. Most share no common ancestry with each other, and many do not even hail from the same Clan. They are merely a collection of accidents, a mixture of blood and fae-blooded wyrd that should never have been possible. There is no kinship here, no sense of shared destiny. So when the Middle Ages drew to a close, the Renaissance picked up, and the Kiasyd began disappearing as one of their lot sought to rule alone, the Maeghar did not fight back. They did not speak out; they did not resist. They simply packed their belongings and left both disputed territory and their old name behind.

If Cainites have a disenfranchised class, the Maeghar is one of them.

A typical Maeghar stays nowhere for long, has no possessions to speak of other than a single, most-cherished collection, and has ties to neither humans nor other Cainites.

She drifts from one place to another,

become so profound that she has lost her connection to the living and now focuses solely on the world of ash and death, and even here she remains a fleeting visi-tor whose light touch hovers between re-ality and illusion.

Often, she will find herself with a wealth of eclectic knowl-edge, picked up as tidbits here and there.

The Maeghar has since found their way to the Tal’Mahe’Ra. They might not be interested in the Sect’s ideology (this depends on the individual Maeghar), but the two are a very good match in the practical sense. The True Black Hand offers the Maeghar a way to remain disconnected from the world at large yet have a modicum of backup, whilst she brings a unique combination of knowledge and power to the table. More importantly, though a Maeghar might visit Enoch, her

willingness to travel makes her a perfect representation for the

Sect in the world.

Sobriquet: Relics, Lost Butterflies

Appearance: Each Maeghar is as unique as the circumstances that l e d to her conception. She fits no mold, no stereotype. Yet every Maeghar car-ries a physical mark that exposes the wyrd lying at her core. This mark can be subtle, like snow white skin and ebony hair, or obvious, like having six arms. Sometimes, this mark can lead to the purchase of a Flaw or Merit, such as Eerie Presence (V20 p. 495) for porcelain skin or Ambidexterity (V20 p. 482) to represent

extra limbs.

Haven and Prey: A Maeghar embraces her disen-franchisement, easily traveling from one location

to the next and finding abandoned buildings with uncanny ease. That is not to say that her possessions are little, as she typically owns a large collection of small items, perhaps to compensate for her inability to connect to (un)living beings. These

collections are often disturbing, such as finger bones, the teeth of children, or pieces of tat-tooed skin. The occasional Maeghar might even collect something more ephemeral,

such as broken dreams.

A Maeghar seems to have no favored prey, and her victims are as unique as she herself. The nearness of a warm human body disconcerts her though, leaving her to drain her victim and drink his blood from a cup. If she is particularly fussy, she might skin her victim first to prevent

blood touching the dirty skin as it pours out.

The Embrace: A Maeghar herself rarely Embraces. She feels little need for companionship, so why should she curse another with her existence? If she does Embrace, it’s usually because the childe has a very specific skillset that suits her purposes. When that purpose is met, the childe is either destroyed or set free.

There is no consistency to which childer are killed and which released, as some Maeghar might see freedom as a reward for good services, whilst others view blessed death as such. To create another Maeghar, a sire must embrace a fae-blooded mortal. If she does not, the resulting childe is always a Caitiff, since he lacks the unique spark to become a Maeghar.

Clan Disciplines: Mytherceria or Necromancy (player’s choice), plus two others from sire’s Clan Disciplines.

Weaknesses: Due to her fae-marked physique, rolls to recognize the Maeghar as otherworldly are at -1 difficulty.

Secondly, her fae heritage makes her vulnerable to cold iron: not only do weapons made from cold iron inflict aggravated damage to her, but such damage triggers an immediate roll to avoid either frenzy or Rötschreck as befitting the context. Lastly, a Maeghar feels such revulsion at feeding from a warm, smelly, and sweaty human that she must drain her victim’s blood in a clean container before consuming it. This restriction does not apply when feeding from vampires.

Organization: A Maeghar is an independent creature who values her solitude. Should she meet another of her kind, both engage in a non-committal, albeit exceedingly

polite, discourse to determine if the other party is inter-ested in exchanging information or boons. If so, the two take it from there. If not, both continue on their way with no hard feelings. Recognizing the need for some form of support in a dark and dangerous world, many Maeghar have fallen in with the Tal’Mahe’Ra and will provide services to that Sect.

Stereotypes

Camarilla: Lofty ideals and pretenses. Such a thin veneer.

“All Cainites are Kindred?” We know better.

Kiasyd: Not our fight. Give Marconius and his brood a wide berth. Do not even let them know you exist, and you’ll be fine.

Nagaraja: We might learn a lot from these powerful necromancers. If only their feeding habits weren’t so revolting.

Old Clan Tzimisce: Oh yes. Very polite. Good grasp of etiquette. An appreciation for the fineries of life. I wonder if he’s interested in my collection of human eyes?

Sabbat: Stay away. Not only are they unmannered and crass, but this is Marconius’ playground.

Tal’Mahe’Ra: A collection of old relics steeped in death.

Yes, this will do nicely for us.

True Brujah: Scholars. Excellent academics. Just a tad boring, but they are forgiven for that.