The Path of Veille

Thaumaturgy

Introduction

The Path of Veille was the first customized path of thaumaturgy created by Criaâr. His Sire, Gustacio, of the Clan Tremere, didn't feel it necessary to make of his little Corax Abomination pet, a full Tremere. Criaâr was then a Bâtard. His Corax Gifts lost, he tried to win back his powers, by using his Blood to replace his lost Rage and Gnosis. When he met Alexis, who had the same concerns about the Supernatural Phenomenon in Paris, the two Kindred decided to raise the powers of the Veilleurs. The new thaumaturgic path of the Corax was interesting, but they had difficulties in making it work. It was Meryt-Neith who found the solution: Veille had to be a Thaumaturgical Path, and she used her own Hekau thaumaturgy to optimize it; She already had some rituals in mind that she could merge with those of Criaâr to become a true path of Hekau magic.

Criaâr became a Veilleur, and his unique path, Veille, became the first path of the Hekau thaumaturgy of the Veilleurs (watchmen).

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Sentir le Dangereux

This is a danger sense. Enemy Ways is more than just a heightened (and reasonably accurate) sense of paranoia. Instead, it provides solid information on what immediate peril the caster faces. This is the first skill Criaar brought to the path.

System: The roll entails a difficulty of 4 and a cost of 1 blood point. With a successful Perception + Occult roll the Caster can pick up hints as to the nature of enemies in the area. Usually the caster who uses this discipline successfully can pick out the number and type of his opponents; with five or more successes sometimes more can be learned.

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Percevoir le Surnaturel

Difficulty: 5 Cost: 1 Blood point, 1 oz of silver shavings

The duty of the Veilleurs is to find supernatural threats. Use of this discipline ability reveals if supernatural abilities have been used in the vicinity and what nature those abilities are based in. Thaumaturgy results in a swirling mass of silver shavings, discipline use coalesces in an 'omega' mark on the spot of it's use. Sphere usage becomes a star-burst, Gifts the mark of a leafy branch. Necromancy becomes a silver skull marking.

System: The difficulty is 5 and the thaumaturge expends 1 point of blood. The caster invokes the power and throws the silver in the air. If the spell succeeds it coalesces as stipulated above.

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Clairvoyance Radiale

The magician is able to extend her perceptions: She is now able to use another one. Directed by the Veille's Sense, she extends his consciousness to her surroundings, to see what's happening around her.

This power is an unsubtle one: It's near impossible to look precisely at objects, or to read normal-sized texts with the 360°: It's like if you tried to read with your peripheral vision (Try it, you will see! I heard that people with partial blindness of the central vision could learn to read with peripheral vision: So a new Knowledge should be created for this kind of reading...).

System: The player rolls at a difficulty of 6 and expends 1 point of willpower; the power lasts a scene. If the Path roll to use this Path is botched, this power still works, albeit in a very twisted way (see after). The magician must use a Willpower point, and remember how many successes she made in the Veille Path Roll (Remember that additional successes can be bought with Vitae):

Successes Veille Effects 1 360� Vision 2 M.D. at 4 meters 3 M.D. at 8 meters 4 M.D. at 16 meters 5 M.D. at 32 meters

Note: M.D.: Movement Detection.

When a distance is given, the magician can detect the movements of human-sized objects up to this distance, even if some obstacle hides it from direct view. A greater object (Crinos Garou?) would be seen at the next category's distance, and a tinier (cat?) would be seen only at the precedent category's distance. Should the category be the first (1: 360� Vision), then the Veilleur isn't able to see the Movement of this object. The Veilleur must at least make two successes to use Movement Detection.

For example, the magician make 3 successes: She can, then, see in a 360°. . .(more precisely, in a 4πr2 steradian solid angle) Vision, and can detect human sized movements up to eight meters, no mater the obstacles. A cat's movement would be detected at 4 meters, and a Crinos Lupine's at 16 meters. If the magician had only 2 successes, she would see human-sized movement at 4 meters, Crinos' at 8 meters, and would not see a Cat-sized movement at all (but can still see the cat through the 360� vision). If the magician had only 1 success, she would not be able to see any movement behind obstacles, even if a silent truck was about to destroy the wall just behind her!

This power doesn't work for objects who/which doesn't move, but any moving object who stops will still be visible for 1 turn (the Veilleurs calls it a Trace).

It was said before that the Trace that shows the magician that something is moving couldn't be seen with more precision. In reality, someone using Auspex will be able to see it more precisely by a Perception+Veille roll (Difficuly 8 if the magician Veilleur is trying to discern if this little thing in the Trace is a firearm, for example!).

Veille's Sense is a power that lasts one Scene, and failure to active it means no other try can be done until the end of the Scene. It's also compatible with other Disciplines/powers: Someone who can see in the darkness (Protean **) and who can see in 360 degrees (Veille ***) can combine the two powers to see in the darkness in 360�.

Should a Botch occur in the Path Roll to active this power, or in any Auspex roll while this power is active, then the power goes awry: Any Danger Sense, sensitive Veille, or Auspex power will be lost for the night: Interferences are created by the Botches, and give a lot of random informations (noise), instead of real ones. The magician can have, then, a lot of Danger Sense alerts, when there is no reason, or see random Auras in anything she looks at when using Auspex **, or even believe half the statements made by that annoying Anarch to be lies.

If there is too much movement around him, the magician will have to use 1 Willpower point to continue concentrating in all those confusing Movements.

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Cercle D'emprisonnement

Difficulty: 7 'Cost: 1 blood point, 2 willpower

This Ritual is used to hold offenders in place. The caster begins chanting the binding names of magical beings, interweaving them while throwing salt at the subject. If the power works a circle of power snaps into place around the subject, cutting them off from any magic energy nearby. Veils, obfuscate, Arcane, Chimerstry, and gifts collapse with it's activation.

System: The caster rolls Intelligence + Occult with a difficulty of 7. It takes 2 successes to hold a supernatural in place. Straight mortals are unaffected. After the initial 2 successes, the caster begins a contested willpower roll to hold the subject in the circle. Should a caster win the contest, the subject will be bound until sunrise.

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Inquisition de L'esprit

Difficulty: 7 Cost: 1 blood point, 2 willpower

The caster begins a physical and psychic torture of the subject. Success breaks the mind of the subject, revealing all that they know.

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Veiller Rituals

Veiller's Telepathy

Difficulty: 8 Cost: 1 blood point per person contacted

This ritual is similar to the simplier Convocation, as it calls to every magician mastering this Path. But the contact is not an empathic calling, but a 1 telepathic contact between the caller and any magician mastering this Path whose name is known. The caller choses how many people will be contacted. Every thought expressed is heard by every person contacted, so no whisper can be sent to one person without the others contacted people hearing it.

System: See Convocation. Note that a similar Ritual was created thousands years ago by Meryt-Neith to call her Knights to her. Now that the Ritual found its true Hekau Path, its cost, Level and Difficulty decreased drastically.

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