Clan Gangrel

Read Blood and Smoke for an exploration of the Gangrel mindset and relationship with the Beast. Our notes below give an idea of how they will function socially and politically within Dark Metropolis.

Please bear in mind that these are still early notes and are not set in stone, especially as more setting information becomes available from White Wolf. However, we do not anticipate deviating from these notes drastically when we run Dark Metropolis.

Clan Gangrel

Adapt and Survive

Mask: Confident, adaptable survivalists who dominate their surroundings

Dirge: Control-freaks desperately hiding the constant struggle against their feral Beast

Who Are They?

If the Gangrel know one thing, it’s how to survive in any situation. To evolve. Gangrel have lived in the Norwich greater metropolitan area for years, and they have been changed by the landscape, and changed it in turn.

Consummate survivors, they are the rulers of the concrete jungle. They admire their country cousins, survivors of the forests and wild lands, but look down on any neonate who tries to ape that feral attitude while living in the city.

Just like their feral cousins, they are obsessed with territory. In order to be Recognised within the Clan, you must own territory, whether you have stolen it, negotiated for it from a Regent, or tamed unclaimed land.

What Do They Want?

Dominance - over their surroundings, over their own fates, and over those who would threaten their survival. 

Where Did They Come From?

Everyone knows that they came from the forests, from the wilds, and the modern world spring up around them. But instead of simply watching, they became part of the world and made sure that it grew into something they could use.

After the previous Prince was killed in the extensive World War II bombing of the Metropolis, the current Prince Lockwood seized power through charisma, a smart plan, and allies - all power blocs respected by her Clan. She has shaped the city itself as any Gangrel would, with her own territory being entirely renovated, cultivated and gated off as one of the most desirable neighbourhoods in the Metropolis.

What Do They Do?

Students of the science of herds and feeding grounds, they consider part of owning a territory to be shaping it to best serve them.  They are social scientists and property magnates. Their domains are carefully managed farms, often planned with precision and moving almost like clockwork. The Gangrel take a long view - they don’t just focus on feeding themselves for one night, they build themselves an environment that means they can continue to feed in the most sustainable way. It’s the difference between giving someone a fish and teaching them to fish.

They are smart, tough, refined when they need to be, violent when the situation calls for it, and above all they need to move confidently through any situation. They must show no doubt in front of the other Clans. Many refuse to show doubt even amongst their brethren.

The Gangrel more than any other Clan will raise fists to one another, issuing challenges, showing displeasure, showing dominance, or honing each other’s skills. But if you are taking territory from a fellow Gangrel, then any method is acceptable - backroom deals, inspiring revolt, violence, or smarts - so long as it works. They are highly critical of anyone who is bestial or savage, because it indicates a lack of self control, a lack of self knowledge, and a demonstration that someone is not ready to survive in the Metropolis.

To frenzy is to admit that the Beast is stronger than you are. A Gangrel would never seek to reject or suppress their Beast, but they cannot let it control them. Many Gangrel seek out private lives in which they can indulge their darker, more bestial sides, seeking to exhaust their Beast under controlled circumstances. This is a weakness, of course, and of course no Gangrel could ever have such a weakness...

High Court and Low Court

The Gangrel of the High Court enjoy an elevated presence and respect from the influence of their Prince. She insists on separating her Gangrel blood from her Invictus status, however, and lets the Gangrel dictate their own personal policies and politics.

More powerful Gangrel enjoy and seek out stability and order, because they and their allies are the ones who can assert it. Stability is good for the Herds, and neonates who threaten that are quickly crushed: any who survive are worthy of at least a little respect.

In the Low Court, Gangrel try to squeeze every last drop of possible respect or power they might get from being the Prince’s Clan, from being tough, or smart, or knowing the city’s streets. Some work together in packs, some work with members of other Clans to share each other’s strengths, and others trust only themselves and their Beasts.

Development Notes

The Gangrel have always been the ones you can’t kill, but in the Metropolis, that means something very different. We’re interested in exploring the impact of living in an extremely urbanised environment on a Clan that is classically seen as ‘sleeping in a field’.

In Blood and Smoke, the Gangrel’s Beast no longer affects their mental capacities, and we are interested in further exploring how that affects their survivalist attitude. Instead, their Beasts lie closer to the surface than it does with other Clans. Obviously this can be a great strength for a Gangrel who needs a physical boost, but we want to be able to explore the risks inherent in giving up control on such a fundamental level, and how that can impact someone’s long-term plans for survival.

Questions to think about with Gangrel characters

Who were you in life? How did you lose your mortal life to your sire, and how does that affect how you approach your Requiem?

How do you shape your environment? Do you own territory - if so, how did you gain it?

If you don’t have territory of your own, how are you planning on gaining it - through favours or betrayal, manipulation or violence?

How do you strike the balance between your Beast and your self-control?

Clan Daeva

Read Blood and Smoke for an exploration of the Daeva mindset and relationship with the Beast. Our notes below give an idea of how they function socially and politically within Dark Metropolis.

Please bear in mind that these are still early notes and are not set in stone, especially as more setting information becomes available from White Wolf. However, we do not anticipate deviating from these notes drastically when we run Dark Met.


Clan Daeva
Gone But Not Forgotten

Mask: Rebellious Pariahs, Noble Firebrands
Dirge: Hurt and Needy Outcasts, Attention Seekers

Who Are They?

The Daeva are the disenfranchised firebrands, the Kindred who have to fight for every inch, a clan riven by internal tensions and rejected by the Court. In a Court that values self-control, the Daeva are dangerously emotional, viewed as slaves to their attachments rather than masters of them. They find it more difficult to rise through the ranks, and those that do make sure to demonstrate self-control. The ones that rise are always seen by the Court as ‘good for a Daeva’. To their own clan, they are traitors who reject their natures, called ‘pragmatists’ by those who like them and ‘sycophants’ by those who don’t.

What Do They Want?

Recognition by the Court. Failing that, solidarity as they party in the liminal places. Many of them encode a big ‘fuck you’ into everything they do: though the Court can sweep them into the gutters, they’ll make damn sure it won’t forget them. What’s worse than being rejected? Being ignored.

Where Did They Come From?

Clan Daeva used to have more respect in Norwich, though they were always regarded with suspicion, like children who might do something stupid at any time. Roughly fifty years ago the dangerous obsessions of a few older Daeva with a group of Kine caused a serious risk to the Masquerade and rifts between members of the Court. The details are not talked about much these days, out of respect for the Elders, who were well thought of at the time, but the members of the Court saw it as a confirmation of what they already believed of the Daeva: they were narcissists and addicts who cared more for their own pleasures than for the Masquerade and the safety of other Kindred.

The Daeva Elders who had been involved in the incident went into voluntary torpor, acknowledging that they had become too attached to their food, and the Ancilla found that the Court became an unwelcoming place for them. Those with higher status were shunted out of their positions and the Daeva fell from grace.

Many left the city, outraged at being treated so, and those who stayed had to make a choice: work to prove to the Court that they were stable enough (and un-Daeva enough) to be trusted, denying their passions, or rebel.

What Do They Do?

While there has never been an out and out rebellion among the Daeva (most of them are smart enough to know that the other clans have too much to lose in helping them, and they can’t take on the Prince’s support network alone), they have used every opportunity to show how little they care about the system.

However, they also need to survive day to day, so they form alliances and do jobs for other Kindred. They find that even if they swear they don’t need anyone, they just hate feeling ignored, and if they allow themselves to be shut out of the system completely, they will almost certainly be forgotten.

Whether buying into the system for mainstream acceptance or as a statement of rebellion, very few Daeva are completely apolitical. Even those who reject the system wholesale, the fringe cases, are vocal in their raging and make sure the lapdog Kindred know what they’re missing.

Of course, being rejected by other Kindred just makes it all the sweeter when you can control the Kine with a bat of your lashes. Most Daeva have links to the mortal world, if nothing else because their feeding makes them...attached...to their victims. They’ll generally keep away from other Kindred’s Regencies for feeding and socialising. However, some of them deliberately go head to head with High Court Kindred in the mortal world, because Kindred influence can only go so far in stopping them. Maybe it’s because the Daeva are so used to humans falling at their feet to please them, but members of the clan seem to take it as a personal affront when other Kindred dismiss them.

They live on the fringes, in storm tunnels, in barren bits of the city paying way over the odds for rent to their Regent. But they always make something of it. Push them down, they come back up and make you wish you’d gone down there with them. They have turned the storm tunnels into their personal playground. They’ve taken a deserted warehouse Haven and made it a highly illegal, highly desirable nightclub. It’s not velvet ropes and champagne fountains: it’s industrial chic and raw, bleeding edge fashion. It’s pirate cinema and counter culture. They’re trendsetters who refuse to walk the runways and MCs who operate best on no budget and a legal grey area. Somehow, they’ve taken their banishment and turned it into a fashion statement.

High Court and Low Court

There are very few High Court Daeva. Those that have made it to the top almost exclusively distance themselves from the behaviour of their clan mates, though they do not necessarily reject them on a personal basis. They are still often fiercely loyal within the clan and see themselves as ‘doing it for the clan’ as well as for themselves - they frame themselves as pragmatists who cater to Elders because they have a long term view. Some of them walk the fine line between clan and city, but others are proud of their compromise. The exceptions to this rule are those who could not avoid having positions within the court, or when the Daeva clan as a whole has decided to force someone into a position.


Within the Low Court, they often profess confidence and power they don’t have, using their social dominance in the Kine world as a way of making up for their lack of status in the Kindred one. They play favourites and know the value of helping people out when they’re in a pinch. They don’t keep track of who owes whom (who has the time?) but a bit of give and take maintains their position.

Development Notes

Clan Daeva are traditionally the high society darlings who throw the best parties and know all the best people. We wanted to see how they would do as underdogs, as people with everything to lose. We also liked the paradox of the Daeva who can treat humans as vessels for blood and attention with barely a thought but who couldn’t just Majesty their way into court positions.

We wanted the Daeva to be desperate and raw, because when the Daeva fall from grace, they turn it into a rebellion and pretend it was their idea all the time. There’s still space for the traditional Daeva among those who still want to have court positions (the ‘pragmatists’), but they are rare and face prejudice from their own clan, as well as the already-existing prejudice against their clan as a whole. We were careful to make their rejection of the system highly political - just dropping the mic and walking out doesn’t make the game any fun.

Questions to think about with Daeva characters

Why did you come to a place that so clearly hates you?
Was it really your best, or only, option?
Or do you just like a challenge?
Are you willing to put aside your clan for status, or willing to put aside status to be true to your clan?
If your character is a rebel, what statement are they making?
If your character is a pragmatist, how do they justify going along with the system?
How do they deal practically with growing attached to those they feed from?
Do they feed on a few people to keep control over their attachments or spread their feeding widely to avoid any one strong attachment?
Who or what do they care about? When Daeva care, they do so passionately.
Do they try to keep the things they love separate from their life, denying themselves to protect their loved ones?
Or do they enjoy the things they hold dear while they last and risk losing them?

Welcome to the Metropolis

Welcome to our first official blog post for Shades of Norwich: Dark Metropolis, direct from the keyboards of the ST team to you. We've put together a concept document for the setting and system of the game, described in very broad terms. You may know some of this already, whether it’s from word of mouth or our pitch at the very start of the Dark Metropolis planning process, but there’s plenty of new information in there too.

And we’re also announcing our next set of information shots: over the next two weeks, we’ll be posting the pitches for clans and covenants in Dark Metropolis on this blog, with development notes. We’re going to release these one per day for five days (we get the weekends off!), two weeks in a row. This is partly so we don’t swamp you with information in a single blog post and partly so that each clan and covenant can have the spotlight it deserves.

We’ve done some interesting things with the clans and covenants as set out in Blood and Smoke and we’re excited to see what stories you decide to tell with them. Be aware that some of these might be a little different to what you’ve come to expect from Vampire games - we wanted to really dig into what we found interesting about these groups.

Setting

“The higher the buildings the lower the morals.” – Noël Coward

Shades of Norwich: Dark Metropolis is set in an alternative history where Norwich is a thriving modern metropolis, second only to London in its population, wealth, innovation and commerce.

Throughout the Medieval period, the profitable wool trade meant that Norwich formed strong trade links with Northern Europe and the city grew almost as quickly as the rapidly expanding city of London. During the Nineteenth Century, the discovery of natural gas deposits under the Broads meant that Norwich embraced the Industrial Revolution and adapted to a rapidly changing world. The bombing raids of World War Two targeted the city and destroyed much of it, but, with a little Kindred influence, Norwich grew from the rubble into a gleaming metropolis. Adaptability and innovation became the watchwords of the city, but as the glass and steel towers rose higher, the streets grew meaner. Those who can't charm their way into penthouses fight just to survive in tenements and council estates.

The Prince, Anastasia Lockwood, took over following the death of her predecessor during the bombing raids of WWII and like the city, she is a consummate survivor, an urban predator. The covenants keep to their founding principles, but the clans take a less traditional approach. Who is up and who is down? It changes every night, but disfavour can last for decades. And some Kindred are sore losers.

There’s always the aspiration of moving from the Low Court to the High Court. The neonates don’t get to play in the High Court, but the Elders know the value of a good minion, and favour from a High Courtier can net a profit in the Low Court. Maybe someday you’ll even make it, and then it’s a whole different ball game. But for now, you’re among your own kind, the dregs and the bottom feeders, the scavengers craving the scraps from the boss’s plate. It’s not an excuse to relax, though: for a start, that snarling Beast in your blood wants out, and the Prince values self-control highly. And of course, there are plenty who want to cause trouble. Round here, you need allies to watch your back, patrons to scrape you some status, and enemies. Because what’s the point of a one-sided game?

The city is carved up into seven Regencies that are institutions in their own right, with powerful Elders controlling their human herds. It’s a hefty price to rent from the great and the good, but worth it to survive. Blood is power round here. Or you can hunt in the Rack, with the other outcasts who can’t make their own way. Of course, there are untamed areas of the city, places with lower populations or distant from the thriving commerce of the city centre, but beware of making them too appealing a prospect, or you might find yourself defending a place that wasn’t great to start with. None of them are good options but that’s how things go when you’re low on the food chain.

The countryside is a law unto itself, theoretically under the Prince’s rule but largely ignored by the Kindred of Norwich. Vampires who venture outside the bounds of the city are likely to come under scrutiny from the Sheriff or Hounds. No-one sets up house out there if they want to play in the city’s political games, and if you don’t want to play, why are you here?

System

Shades of Norwich: Dark Metropolis uses the rules from Blood and Smoke: the Strix Chronicle, part of the World of Darkness 2nd Edition. We’re going to be sticking to the rules as written in the Blood and Smoke and God Machine books, but with some minor modifications to adapt it into a live game. If you’re familiar with Vampire: the Masquerade or Vampire: the Requiem, please be aware that Blood and Smoke makes some significant changes to the setting and rules.

Dark Metropolis is designed to be a low level vampire game in which the player characters have all been Embraced within the last ten years and are still very much unknowns, interacting with vampire society through the Low Court. The Elders, on the other hand are mostly part of the High Court, which has its own rules and etiquette. The game has a city populated by NPC vampires who vie for power, meaning the player characters can make themselves useful to higher-ups to gain influence. The idea is that player characters can access low level positions of responsibility within the Low Court, but if they ever achieve the lofty heights of the High Court, the character becomes an NPC and the player starts a new story.

Norwich is a bigger city in this setting, but one of the themes of Dark Metropolis is the concept of scarcity of resources and territory. Both are vitally important in getting a foothold in the city, because blood is difficult to get in large amounts, but renting a part of someone’s Regency will cost. On the other hand, hunting in other people’s domains will be very dangerous and trying to gentrify an unclaimed bit of the city is an uphill struggle and will attract competition. Survival relies on tactics, economics, and building links with other Kindred.

We are striving to create a game founded on the principles of co-operative out of character experiences, where players discuss and negotiate what outcome of a conflict would be most fun for everyone involved. We will be encouraging out of character openness about things that might affect other player characters so that every player feels their character’s story is being told in the most interesting way. While Vampire is about predators warring over hunting grounds, whether literal or figurative, the idea is always to tell a story together. For all the talk of ‘you win or you die’, the way people win this game is by collaborating on a mutually awesome experience.