Blood Sorcery (VTM)

For a general overview of vampire magic, see Blood Magic (VTM)

Blood Sorcery
Pronounce	bluhd - saw·suh·ree
Nicknames	A Kind of Magic, Thaumaturgy, Quietus
Clans	Tremere, Banu Haqim

Blood Sorcery refers to the magic performed by vampires, fueled by religious or occult practices and the power of Cainite vitae.

Overview

The Tremere maintain that Blood Sorcery, or “Thaumaturgy” as they call it, was their invention. The Banu Haqim claim that their version, “Quietus” was their blood right long before the Tremere became vampires. Other clans make the same statements. While its origins are murky, the dreaded nature of Blood Sorcery is not. Few Kindred trust the wielders of a power that can manipulate the vitae in their veins and turn Blood into poison.

Unlike other Disciplines, which can be easily learned by the vampire, practitioners of Blood Sorcery require teachers. The Tremere once relied on their pyramidic clan hierarchy to arrange tutelage for neonate apprentices, while the Banu Haqim stress the sire-childe relationship as being the best form of mentorship. These nights, many a Child of Haqim washes up in Europe or America far from their sire, and with the Pyramid broken Tremere neonates frantically search through moldy tomes and palimpsests for scraps of true lore. Genuine masters of this Discipline develop their own Rituals, though many guard them from others, revelling in the mystery surrounding their unknown cache of abilities. To practice Blood Sorcery is to twist one’s own Blood into submission. Any form of this power reminds a vampire that they’re far from human, as no mortal could wield magic in this way.

Mechanics

Standard Powers

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  • Corrosive Vitae: Altering the properties of some of their own Blood, the user can make it highly corrosive to dead substances, able to corrode most items down to steaming sludge, given enough time and Blood shed
  • A Taste for Blood: By tasting a drop of blood, the user can discern certain basic traits of the one to whom it belongs
  • Shape of the Sanguine Sacrament: Allows the vampire manipulate their (or someone else's) blood, to form intricated images, such as a simple message or a geometrical shape.
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  • Extinguish Vitae: The user can intentionally remove the unlife-giving properties of some of the Blood in another vampire, stoking their Hunger as the victim’s inner reserves curdle into impotence
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  • Blood of Potency: The vampire can concentrate their Blood, increasing its potency temporarily
  • Scorpion’s Touch: The vampire can transmute some of their Blood into a paralyzing poison, capable of affecting mortals and vampires alike
  • Transitive Bond: The user is able to extend the Blood Bonding properties of their vitae, enabling it to retain its ensnaring properties when stored, or even when present in the body of a ghoul.
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  • Theft of Vitae: Through mystical means, the vampire opens a wound in a major artery of a mortal victim, blood shooting out through the air in a stream toward the open mouth of the user.
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  • Baal’s Caress: The vampire can transmute their Blood into an extremely aggressive poison, lethal to mortal and Kindred alike
  • Cauldron of Blood: This gruesome power lets the user boil the blood of a victim in their own veins, causing massive damage and excruciating pain
  • Reclamation of Vitae: This power allows a vampire to reclaim Blood that has been yielded to create ghouls, reclaiming that which has been given.

Rituals

Blood Sorcery is a special Discipline in that it both confers powers, like other Disciplines, and also unlocks the ability to perform Rituals up to and including the level the user holds in the Discipline. Its regular powers seem comparatively weak, but the versatility of the Rituals more than compensates, assuming the user can learn them. Learning new Rituals requires both experience and time. Expect a Ritual to take at least the square of its rating in weeks to learn - and its resonance is blood from human occultists, sorcerers, and cult leaders, as well as hemophiles and bibliophiles.

While Powers tend to be quick and powered by a combination of vitae and the vampire's will, rituals include other elements relevant to the sorcerer's paradigm – sacrifices, mystical ingredients, magical tools and the like. Rituals typically require greater time and preparation, but can have long-lasting effects and range in power from trivial to history changing.

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  • Blood Walk: An advanced version of A Taste for Blood, the caster is able to learn even more information about another Kindred from their vitae.
  • Bloody Message: This ritual allows the vampire to write a message in blood, unto a UV bathed mirror. That message then appears for a recipient on another reflective surface, recalled by the vampire, which then clears upon being read.
  • Beelzebeatit: This ritual causes lower-order living creatures to find the ritual area repellent.
  • Clinging of the Insect: Gives the caster the ability to cling to walls like a spider. 
  • Coax the Garden: Allows the caster to manipulate plant life, to their defense.
  • Craft Bloodstone: Creates a Bloodstone, a magical tracking device. 
  • Dampen the Fear: Temporarily subdues the caster's fear of fire. 
  • Enrich the Blood: This ritual increases the potency of human blood, allowing Kindred to slake their Hunger from a smaller quantity of blood.
  • Herd Ward: This rituals allows the vampire to protect their herd, from poachers.
  • Letter Ward: This ritual is used by Tremere, when they want to make sure the missives they send are protected.
  • Unseen Underground: Turns the caster invisible for a time, when they are underground.
  • Wake with Evening's Freshness: Allows the caster to freshly awaken from torpor during the day as if it were already evening.
  • Ward Against Ghouls
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  • Calling the Aura's Remnant: Allowing the vampire to speak with a corpse's aura (not their ghost)
  • Communicate with Kindred Sire: Creates a telepathic link between a childe and their sire.
  • Enhance Dyscrasia: This ritual allows many vampires to feed from a mortal with a Dyscrasia, without killing the vessel.
  • Eyes of Babel: The caster gains the ability to read and speak any language known by their target.
  • Illuminate the Trail of Prey: Allows the caster to perceive the past whereabouts of an individual through a glowing trail. 
  • Ishtar's Touch: The caster turns a dose of their own vitae into a narcotic, 'truth-serum' like substance that leaves a victim more suggestible and vulnerable to mind-affecting Disciplines like Presence and Dominate.
  • Truth of Blood: Creates a potion capable of discerning lies from truth in a statement.
  • The Shroud of Silence: Used by the Banu Haqim, this ritual creates a shroud of impenetrable silence centered in a room.
  • Ward against Spirits
  • Warding Circle against Ghouls
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  • Bladed Hands: Physically sharpens the caster's hands.
  • Bloodless Feast: This ritual creates an elixir that holds a human sacrifice's Resonance or Dyscrasia (if any), but also makes any vampire who drinks it, more vulnerable to diablerie.
  • Communal Vigor: Based on sanguinary properties similar to the Vaulderie, this Ritual allows a Pack Priest to share their Blood Potency with their pack, while strengthening their own ability to keep those packmates in line.
  • Dagon's Call: A Banu Haqim ritual that ruptures the blood vessels of a victim from afar who has previously came into contact with the caster's vitae. 
  • Deflection of Wooden Doom: Causes a stake about to pierce the heart to shatter. 
  • Essence of Air: Creates a potion that grants the user limited flight abilities. 
  • Eyes of the Past: Recalls events in the caster's mind about past events that took place in their location up to five years prior.
  • Fire in the Blood: A non-lethal ranged version of Cauldron of Blood. 
  • Firewalker: The caster increases the target's resistance to fire.
  • Galvanic Ruination: This Ritual violently disrupts electrical currents in the area, shorting out or fusing all wiring in the vicinity.
  • Gentle Mind: Increases the frenzy resistance of the target's mind. 
  • Haunted House: Causes a vampire haven to appear haunted. 
  • Herd Ward: This rituals allows the vampire to protect their herd, from poachers.
  • Illusion of Peaceful Death: Restores wounds on a corpse (at most half-unexsanguinated) to conceal evidence of an unnatural death. 
  • Illusion of Perfection: Conceals the caster's appearance into that of a nondescript individual, similar to the Obfuscate ability Mask of a Thousand Faces.
  • One with the Blade: The caster enchants a dedicated weapon with immunity to rust and dulling almost as if it were a ghoul, as long as it remains within their possession. If stolen, it ages and becomes able to perform Aggravated damage on its original enchanter. 
  • Sanguine Watcher: Summons a rat familiar out of Kindred vitae. 
  • Sleep of Judas: Creates a drug that can incapacitate a kindred.
  • The Unseen Change: Forces a Garou into their Lupus form.
  • Ward Against Lupines
  • Warding Circle against Spirits
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  • Defense of the Sacred Haven: Wards a haven against the sun itself.
  • Eyes of the Nighthawk: Allows the caster to possess a carnivorous bird.
  • Incorporeal Passage: Allows the caster to pass freely through solid objects and become immune to physical damage. 
  • Innocence of the Child's Heart: Conceals the caster's Kindred aura from Auspex. 
  • Protean Curse: Transforms the target into a bat. 
  • Rending the Sweet Earth: Reveals the presence of a Protean Earth Meld user.
  • Ward Against Cainites
  • Warding Circle against Lupines
  • Web of Hunger: Web of Hunger is an extension of the Extinguish Vitae power. Instead of controlling a single person’s vitae slowly and corrosively draining vitae from multiple targets.
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  • Creatio Ignis: Allows the caster to coat their arms in vitae and light them on fire, being magically protected from the flames.
  • Eden's Bounty: Allows to caster to drain blood from creatures within a nearby area.
  • Escape to True Sanctuary: The caster creates two circles that act as a one-way portal from one point to another.
  • Heart of Stone: Turns the caster's heart into stone, making them immune to stakes but completely numbs their sense of emotional and social awareness.
  • Shaft of Belated Dissolution: Enchants a stake with enough power to kill a vampire upon contact with their heart.
  • Simulacrum Gate: A time-consuming and elaborate Ritual, this colossal undertaking allows the construction of a distance-defying portal allowing multiple vampires to cross vast distances in mere moments.
  • The Ritual of Transferring the Soul: The Ritual of Transferring the Soul is a 5th level combined Blood Sorcery ritual and Oblivion Ceremony that usually requires two Kindred participants: one who knows the requisite level of Blood Sorcery, and another who is versed in Oblivion. It is possible for a single Kindred who possesses both Disciplines to perform the ritual alone.
  • Warding Circle against Cainites

Gallery

Visceral Absorption

Protean Curse

References

Level 1 Powers

Level 2 Powers

Level 3 Powers

Level 4 Powers

Level 5 Powers

Level 1 Rituals

Level 2 Rituals

Level 3 Rituals

Level 4 Rituals

Level 5 Rituals