Physical Back to Top
Long Fingers (1-pt Merit)
Your fingers are hideously long and spidery, perhaps with extra joints, or rubbery like the tentacles of a squid. You gain one extra die on all rolls involving fine coordination or grappling.

Piscine (1-pt Merit)
You are unusally comfortable underwater and vastly prefer swimming to walking. You receive a -1 difficulty to all Physical dice pools related to underwater movement. This Merit is particularly common among canal- or harbor-dwelling broods of Nosferatu and the occasional aquatic Gangrel.

Supple Joints (1-3-pt Merit)
You are unusually lithe. For one point you reduce the difficulty of all Dexterity rolls involving body flexibility by two (such as escaping restraints or contorting through tight spaces). For three points, you can bend most joints backward, dislocate others at will and perform feats of contortion impossible for a human body (such as turning your head to look straight back). You can escape most restraints and slither through small spaces automatically, although the Storyteller may require a roll for extreme feats.

Bloat (1-5-pt Merit)
You can store more blood than your generation should allow. Every point invested in this Merit increases your maximum blood pool by one, although it does not increase the rate at which you can process or expend vitae. When you exceed your normal limits, your skin blushes red as though burned, or visibly bulges, giving you a grotesque visage (lose one die from all Appearance-based pools while in thise state). Other Cainites (and beings with heightened senses) can smell the blood trying to squeeze past your pores with a successful Perception + Alertness roll (difficulty 7). This can incite frenzy in hungry vampres.

Heart of Bone (1-5-pt Merit)
Your heart is protected by a sheath of leathery cartilage or warped bone. For every point invested in this Merit, you gain one extra soak die to resist staking attempts or other attacks intended to pierce the heart. These soak dice do not protect against other forms of damage.

Feeding Tongue (1-6-pt Merit)
Your tongue extends to inhuman lengths as a bizarre instrument of feeding. It may be delicate and forked like a serpent's or a monstrous cartilaginous spike, but the effect is the same. You can extend your tongue six inches per point invested in this Merit, and may drain blood or inflict aggravated damage without clinching your prey (as long as you are within range). Unlike traditional feeding, your tongue does not engender the pleasure of the Kiss. Such feeding is more like a giant mosquito plunging a dagger-sized needle into flesh and siphoning blood fast enough to collapse veins.

Immune to Disease (2-pt Merit)
You are preternaturally resistant to disease and may freely gorge on infected blood without risk of becoming a carrier. Only magical disease can afflict you, and you gain an extra die to resist these unnatural maladies. Few Cainites with such resistance are aware of their gift.

Maw (2-pt Merit)
Unlike other vampires, you have a distended maw filled with jagged, knifelike fangs. Your bite inflicts an extra die of damage, and you may drain one extra blood point each turn when feeding. Unfortunately, your teeth are obviously inhuman and cannot retract. Unless you keep your mouth closed, you suffer +2 difficulty on all Social rolls not involving Intimidation.

Retractable Wings (2-pt Merit)
A vampire with this Merit may take an action to extend or retract her wings. Retracted wings collapse and fold tightly against the body, allowing the character to move through tighter spaces and maneuver unencumbered. Only Gargoyles and other vampires with wings may puchase this Merit.

Unmarred Face (2-6-pt Merit)
Even if your body is a leprous husk of pustules or monstrous chimera of fused animals, your face remains eerily pristine. So long your face is the only part of you that is visible, your effective Appearance rating is one dot for every two points invested in this Merit. Nosferatu characters with this Merit suffer worsened deformities in other parts of their bodies, gaining at least one physical Flaw for which they gain no points (as well as the undying scorn of their clanmates). Obviously, this Merit is useless (and not permissible) to characters without serious full-body deformity of some kind.

Blood Connoisseur (3-pt Merit)
With a single whiff or tasted drop, you can learn much about a given sample of blood. Your refined palette can even detect the presence of foreign substances or taint. Whenever you analyze a sample, roll Perception + Alertness (difficulty 6). Each success allows you to glean one fact about the blood, such as its potency, freshness, species, or wheter it has been poisoned or contaminated with disease. If multiple successes are spent learning a single fact, additional details may be unveiled at Storyteller discretion. Note that this Merit does not confer preternatural awareness like the Rego Vitae power A Taste for Blood. Characters who have never tasted arsenic or Lupine blood cannot recognize either -- although they may discern such samples as poisoned or non-human. In no case may characters discern supernatural properties like clan or generation. As always, the Storyteller determines what information a character may learn.

Foul Humors (3-pt Merit)
Your flesh and blood tastes bilious or outright putrescent. Anyone who bites or feeds from you must make a Willpower roll (difficulty 5 plus the number of health levels inflicted or blood points consumed). Those who fail spend the next turn choking, retching or gagging. Any fool who actually attempts to drink you dry (such as in preparation for diablerie) must make three consecutive Willpower rolls at difficulty 9 to succeed. If any of these checks fail, the feeding vampire spends the rest of the scene vomiting his entire blood pool in a fountain of tainted gore.

Batagia (4/7-pt Merit)
Leathery wings fold into your body like a bat or flying squirrel, hanging flaccidly like a tattered cloak when not in use unless hidden beneath bulky clothes. Although you cannot actually fly, you may glide for short distances at your normal walking speed with the aid of updrafts or strong wind. Characters with this Merit cannot have an Appearance greater than 2, and most suffer from the Monstrous Flaw). A few dedicated infernalists and seriously misshapen Gangrel occasionally manifest a more potent version of this Merit, conferring strong bat-like wings extending more than five yards from tip to tip. Characters with the seven-point version can fly at speeds of 20 miles per hour and perform aerial maneuvers with their Athletics, although they cannot carry objects heavier than half their own weight. Wings of this size can fold back like an elaborate cape, but they cannot be concealed without supernatural methods. Gargoyles cannot purchase any form of this Merit.



Mental Back to Top
Ability Apitude (1-pt Merit)
YOu are particularly gifted with one Ability. Perhaps you are divenely inspired blacksmith or a peerless scholar of law. Within your specific apitude, reduce all difficulties by two. Characters may purchase this Merit more than once, but Storytellers should feel free to veto any selections that seem too powerful or unbalanced, especially combat Abilities.

Sanguine Lucidity (1-pt Merit)
In satiation you find sanity. Whenever your blood pool is completely full, you do not suffer the effects of any derangements. As a result, you often gorge in the futile hope that you can silence your inner demons forever. This Merit cannot suppress a Malkavian's core derangement, although it may alleviate additional madness. Sane characters may purchase this Merit, although they do not learn of their resistance unless they gain a derangement.

Flock (3-pt Merit)
You feel strong ties of kinship with a specific community of mortals. The difficulty to resist frenzy is always two less than normal where you flock is concerned, enabling you to better withstand the lure of their blood and forgive their trespasses. If you do succumb to frenzy, you may spend one Willpower point to recognize members of your flock as friends. As long as these individuals stay out of your way and do not directly provoke you, you may ignore them for the duration of the rampage. This Merit is often coupled with the Prey Exclusion Flaw. Storytellers should feel free to disallow any communities deemed unbalancing or too inclusive.

Enlightened (5-pt Merit)
You have detached yourself from the War of Princes and taken the first step on the bitter journey to Goldconda. The difficulty of all Virtue rolls is two less than normal. Characters must ascribe to the Virtues of COnscience and Self-Control and have a Road rating of 8 or higher to purchase or retain this Merit. If you ever fail to meet these conditions, you lose your way and the benefits of enlightenment. Storytellers should feel free to inflict automatic degeneration on characters who abuse this Merit.



Social Back to Top
Adopted Into Grace (1-pt Merit)
Despite your lineage, you have been accepted by local members of the High Clans as a noble, or at least worthy of respect. Unfortunately, your own clanmates see you as a pretentious toady. The difficulty of all Social rolls involving other Cainites who know of your reputation increases or decreases by 1, depending on which class you are interacting with. Characters must have at least one dot of Status to purchase this Merit. The benefits of this Merit only extend as far as the character's reputation -- seldom more than a single city.

Harmless (1-pt Merit)
You are well known to the Cainites of your city as ineffectual and useless. While this estimation may seem insulting, it also keeps you safe. No one considers you a threat, and so no one feels the need to dispose of you. If you start acting in a way that demonstrates you are competent and no longer harmless, others' reactions to you will swiftly change.

Alternate Identity (1-5-pt Merit)
You have established a false persona that stands up to scrutiny and investigation. The quality and detail of this face depends on the number or points invested in the Merit. For one point, your identity is new or intended for casual use only. At two points, it takes determined effort to reveal your ruse. For three points, your identity is widely known and respected. For five points, you can even deceive the most paranoid elders. Although the difficulty of any Investigation to determine your true identity equals your Alternate Identity rating +5, it is up to you to actively maintain your persona. Characters with more than one false face must purchase this Merit multiple times.

Network (1-5-pt Merit)
You have an impressive web of contacts and agents that extends beyond a single city. Better still, they serve you skillfully and subtly beneath the notice of the High Clans, making you far more formidable than you appear. Your Network reaches one extra city per point invested in this Merit. Upon arriving anywhere in the bounds of your Network, you gain access to your full rating in Allies, Contacts, Herd and Retainers at the rate of one dot per night (although obviously, any Retainers thus gained are not initially ghouls, wheter or not the Retainers in your home city are). You may aslo communicate with agents in other cities via correspondence, although they can olny serve the role of Contacts. This Merit is most common among Followers of Set and Nosferatu.

Pretender to the Blood (1-pt Merit)
You have successfully passed yourself off as a member of the High Clans, at least locally. As such, you receive acceptance from the aristocracy and suffer none of the stigma associated with you actual ancestry. You can expect terrible retribution if your ruse is discovered.

Scarred (1-pt Merit)
Wheter a result of battle wounds or religious practices, your body is heavily adorned with scars. These scars do not interfere with your movements or sensation, nor are they ugly enough to reduce your Appearance. However, anyone who beholds you recognizes you as someone intimately familiar with pain and violence. You reduce the difficulties of all Intimidation rolls by two. As a rule, town drunks are less inclined to quarrel with you and most individuals will assume you know how to fight (whether or not you actually do). This Merit also reflect branding, tattooing or other rarer markings at Storyteller discretion.

Former Magus (2-pt Merit or Flaw)
In life you were a mage, able to reshape creation with the force of your will. That power is lost to you now, replaced with the curse of Caine. Yet you have not sundered all ties to your former Fellowship. If this trait is a Merit, a few of your mystical associates still talk to you. They probably won't give you access to their libraries or let you into their sanctums, but they pass along informaion from time to time and exchange favors when it suits them. If this trait is a Flaw, your former associates view you as a liability. They might not actively hunt you  (unless you also take the Enemy Flaw), but they regard you as a monster and traitor and treat you accordingly. This trait is extremely rare outside of Clan Tremere.



Supernatural  Back to Top