Sabbat Setting Merits and Flaws

Sabbat Morality Merits

SBM NOTE: These Merits and Flaws are not generally availiable to PC concepts without explict permission from the Storyteller.

Common Paths (1 point merit)

• Caine, Cathari, Death & the Soul, Feral Heart, Honorable Accord, and Power & the Inner Voice

Uncommon Paths (2 point merit)

• Orion, Night, Metamorphosis, and Lilith

Sabbat Setting Merits

Black Hand Membership (2 point merit)

A character with this merit is a member of the Black Hand. Typically, a character begins as an Agent of the Hand. Players do not have to purchase any further merits to advance within this order, but it is recommended that Storytellers limit such advancement as per the bounds of their chronicles’ stories. Each member of the Black Hand is branded with the mark of a black crescent moon on the palm of the right hand. The link is a sympathetic link to the Seraphim, and can be used to call an operative to duty, to warn agents in the field, or to destroy a member of the Black Hand who has been compromised.

You have a +3 bonus to resist Telepathy and other powers that directly pull information from your mind. This bonus does not apply to challenges stemming from powers that indirectly pull information from your mind, such as the various powers of Dominate or Presence. You gain the innate status Branded at the start of each game.

Executioner (1 point merit)

Most members of the Sabbat are vicious monsters, but your actions are reputed to be among the most depraved, the most violent, or the most reprehensible. This reputation is well-deserved. You receive a +1 bonus to test pools involving the Intimidation or Streetwise skills. If you frenzied when someone takes more than one step directly away from you, you can make an immediate Physical attack on that character without expending an action. You can only use this effect during an everyman round, but it may be provoked more than once during an everyman.

Fanatic (2 point merit)

Your faith in Caine is unshakable, no matter how bad things seem. When you are on the Injured wound track, you receive a +3 bonus to your initiative. When you are on the Incapacitated wound track, you gain an additional +3 bonus to initiative (+6 total).

Inquisition Membership (2 point merit)

A character with this merit is a member of the prestigious Inquisition: either a Judge or a Knight Inquisitor. Players do not have to purchase any further merits to advance within this order, but it is recommended that Storytellers limit such advancement as per the bounds of their chronicles’ stories. Every member of the Inquisition possesses an iron reliquary, gained with this merit. An Inquisitor’s iron reliquary is her badge of office, each one given directly by the Regent. Physically, a reliquary is a stylized version of the Sabbat symbol, forged of iron. It can be held and wielded like a dagger or sword, and it often incorporates sharp spikes or cutting surfaces. Each reliquary is unique, and reliquaries of slain Inquisitors are destroyed.

So long as you possess your iron reliquary, you have a +3 bonus to resist all infernal powers (such as Daimoinon), powers granted by demonic abilities or compacts, or effects granted by infernal-related merits. You also gain a +3 bonus to Dodge based defensive test pools against demons and characters who possess any of the above powers, merits, or effects. You gain the innate status Purified at the start of each game.

Keeper of a Sacred Text (1 point merit)

You own a copy of one of the following sacred texts of the Sabbat: The Book of Nod, The Erciyes Fragments, The Ubar Chronicles, The Gospels of Irad & Adah, or The Codex of the Damned. While you possess this merit, you gain a free Lore specialization, which may go above the Lore specializations you are allowed. This free specialization must be in something relevant to the text you own, such as Sabbat Doctrine, Quotes of Caine, or The Cainite Heresy. Further, you receive a +5 bonus anytime you’re called upon to make a challenge using that Lore specialization. Lastly, you receive Anointed as an innate status at the beginning of each game.

Pack Player (3 point merit)

Your pack is the most important thing in your existence, so much so that you will do anything for its members. When you attack a character who has inflicted damage on a packmate (within the last three turns) with whom you have a vinculum rating of at least 3, you receive a +3 bonus to your Physical attack test pool. Additionally, once per turn when you are fighting alongside a member of your pack, you can use a simple action to move five steps, so long as you are moving to the side of someone in your pack with whom you have a vinculum of at least 3.

Revelator (3 point merit)

One per hour, you can use your simple action to loudly and clearly proclaim your faith in Caine and advocate the beliefs of the Dark Church. For the remainder of that turn, your maximum Blood expenditure rate is increased by 5. Your expenditure rate returns to normal at the beginning of the next turn.

Sanctified (1 point merit)

You have a certain quality of faith that inspires others. So long as she is faithful to the precepts of a ritus, this character receives a +2 to her ritae test pool as the primary initiator of that ritae. If that ritus is successful, the participants regain all spent Willpower. If she is an assistant to the primary initiator of a ritae, she lends a +2 bonus (instead of a +1) to any test required to cast the ritus.

Scholar of the Sword (1 point merit)

You have studied the various ritae of the Sabbat at great length, and you have the talent and aptitude to master them more thoroughly than most. You may choose one additional ritae (Auctoritas, Faction or Ignoblis) per dot of the Rituals background.

Volatile (1 point merit)

You are extremely savage and explosive, even for the Sabbat. While this instability may frighten others, it benefits you — and you relish the moments when you get to unleash your Beast. When you enter frenzy, you immediately regain a Willpower. You can only gain this bonus once per combat scenario.

Zealot (1 point merit)

You are consumed with dedication to Caine, the ritae, and to the sect. Yours may be a quiet fervency or a loud, constant declaration, but in either case, you have a greater belief than most, so much so that you feel you can almost sense the Dark Father’s will. The failure of a ritual causes you a tangible, physical ache: an inner wound caused by someone’s lack of faith. When you participate in a ritus that fails, you can make a static challenge (Mental + Occult test pool) with the Storyteller (difficulty rating 6) to determine exactly how many ritual participants suffered from a lack of faith (but not whom).

Setting-Specific Flaws

Crisis of Faith (2 point flaw)

You are not generally one of the unfaithful. You may be well educated in the ritae, and even ordained and capable of performing them for gatherings of Sabbat. But when bad things happen (the loss of a packmate, a critical defeat, or some personal setback), you must make a static challenge with your Storyteller (there is no retest, and no difficulty). If you lose or tie this test, your character becomes unfaithful for the purpose of performing or participating in any Auctoritas Ritae. This effect lasts for two games or one month (whichever is longer), as your character struggles with this crisis of faith.

Mistrusted (1 point flaw)

Because of something in your character’s history, either the Hand or the Inquisition (or both) has a good reason to be suspicious of you. As part of their duty to the Sabbat, they harass you, keep track of you, and generally spread their suspicions about you to the rest of the sect, causing you no end of trouble. Your maximum fleeting status is 1 less than usual while you have this flaw. This penalty adds to that imposed by any status ban.

Soul Shard (3 point flaw)

You diablerized someone, and that spirit was strong enough to remain permanently active within your soul. It fights you constantly, and you can never be sure that its sentience isn’t influencing your actions. When your body is wounded, this spirit leaps upon the weakness and fights your control. While it tears at you from the inside, you must marshal your inner resources, lest the spirit forever take control. If you ever take enough damage to reach the Incapacitated wound track or beyond, you cannot spend Willpower until you are once more healed to the Injured wound track (or better).

Tenuous Loyalty (3 point flaw)

The monstrousness and inhumanity of the Sword of Caine horrifies you. The only reason you’re loyal is because of the vinculum — and most people know it. Your behavior is extremely unpredictable, and your emotional state is precarious. If you do not have a 3-point vinculum with at least three other Sabbat members, you cannot utilize the standard free retest for your Archetype, and you must spend 2 Willpower the first time you spend a Willpower to retest during a game session.

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Merits and Flaws

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