It starts with prehistory, putting the Antediluvians' Second City in Egypt, then goes through the pre-dynastic period and the conflict between Osiris and Set and the creation of the Osirian League, then into the Pharaohs, the Alexandrian conquest of Egypt, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Arabs, and so on right through to the present day. How much was any of this necessary? What is this going to do to provide a hook for the GM to create a game or a plot around? Is this just wasting word count? The guaranteed death sentence for the creation of vampires without permission is one of the reasons why, in my games, most Caitiff are killed by their sires, in order to hide their crimes.Cairo by Night starts with almost fifty pages of history, and while I was reading it I kept wondering what the author was trying to accomplish. If they choose honor, their Caitiff child is allowed to drink their blood and is allowed to commit diabolorie in front of the entire court. If they choose dishonor, a Blood Hunt is called and anyone may drink their blood and commit diabolorie. When their sire is discover, their sire is sentenced to death for breaching the traditions and is given one of two choices: they may die dishonorably or they may die honorably. If they screw up badly, they and their trainer are staked and buried in a local graveyard (waste not, want not).Ĭaitiff members of the Camarilla still suffer social difficulties until their sire is discovered. If the Caitiff manages not to screw up too badly, they are given membership in the Camarilla. Caitiff are given probationary membership in the Camarilla when they are discovered and are given to a local vampire, usually one the local Prince wants to punish, for training for a year. Within my games, I generally have the Camarilla see it as more of a 'sins of the father' rather than a 'sins of the child' situation.
A caitiff who has survived long enough to know what being one means is probably beyond the point where he can lie to anyone about it. They have no idea what's going on and no one has told them. There is a reason that the overwhelming majority of caitiff die their first night. So when you start telling other vampires you're anything other than a caitiff, assuming your sire told you the names of any clans other than his own, at best he won't immediately tell everyone you're lying so he can use it as blackmail information. Well, now you have a new problem that your sire knows you're a filthy caitiff and he has no intention of sticking his neck out for you. Now you probably know a little bit more about the vampiric condition than the average caitiff. Maybe your sire was grooming you to be his childe before your embrace went wrong and you just kind of didn't manifest your intended clan's qualities. Someone stake this caitiff and leave it on the roof for me! I need to find my ghoul and have him get the caitiff-bleach! How do you do that without letting it slip you don't have a clan? How do you even set about doing that if no one's told you that there are clans? Half the time the conversation goes something along the lines of-Įlder: So whelp, what clan do you belong to?Įlder: Now I have to have the carpets scrubbed. How do you find out the clan names without any of the other vampires telling you. The ones that do would probably be hard-pressed to actually name any of the clans. Few even know that that's something they should lie about. Most Caitiff don't understand Camarilla politics well enough to keep up the lie. Have you tried not telling anyone you are a Caitiff? That should help with the prejudice.That rarely ends well.