Night of the Red Heart

Back to Level 5.

Neonates whisper that Tremere elders can utterly destroy their enemies with but a sample of vitae. Although little is ever that simple, some truth lies behind the dread rumor. With Night of the Red Heart, a thaumaturge can send his enemies shrieking in terror, slay them outright or force a confrontation.
the thaumaturge needs only a quantitative sample of the victim's blood. Over the course of an entire night, the caster chants the syllables of the ritual continuously. After the first iteration of the ritual (which takes about 10 minutes), the victim suddenly feels a foreboding sense of dread. Whenever the subject faces the caster, he realizes that a ritual is in progress to slay him - and that he must either escape its power or else find and interrupt the caster by following the preternatural knowledge imparted. Once the ritual ends at sunrise, if the victim is within its range, he spectacularly crumbles to ash in a matter of seconds.
In addition to the victim's blood, the caster must have an effigy of the victim that he has carved himself from bone, rotten wood harvested at midnight or stone from the grave of a faithful priest's headstone.
System: Although extremely potent, Night of the Red Heart is not an all-powerful ritual. Chances are, as soon as it begins, the victim will either flee the city or else hunt down the caster. Because there are no holds barred - death or failure - this likely means that the victim will not stop until he can destroy the thaumaturge. Should the caster manage to complete the ritual with a full point of the victim's blood, though, the hapless subject collapses to Final Death.
The player rolls for the ritual's success as soon as casting begins - if the roll fails, then the ritual will not work and the victim will feel nothing (although the caster doesn't necessarily know this.) The player must also expend one Willpower point to continue the casting for the duration of the entire night, and if the ritual is stopped or interrupted in any way, it fails.
Night of the Red Heart has a limited range. Popular lore holds that the rite works "for seven leagues beyond the accursed's haven"; scientific thaumaturges credit the rite with a range of 30 to 35 miles. Regardless, the subject can immediately tell if he has managed to escape the ritual's range, because the sense of dread vanishes - but if he returns while the ritual remains in progress, he once again comes under its influence. Note that although the subject can tell if he manages to escape the ritual's range, the caster does not know this; it's possible to cast Night of the Red Heart upon someone who's not in range, without knowing that the ritual will fail.