Cowing the Beast
The wildest range of human or animal pales beside the unholy, God-cursed Beast of the Children of Caine. A Cainite with Cowing the Beast can use that fact to his advantage. He has little difficulty causing the heart of a man or animal to grow faint at the very sight of him. With a modicum of effort, he can cause an opponent to run shrieking into the distance or collapse into a gibbering heap.
If the target suffers from fear-driven derangements, she is likely to succumb to them, as the sight of a vampire using Cowing the Beast drives the Discipline's target into paroxysms of terror. Nosferatu and some Gangrel pass the secret of using this ability to soothe an opponent's Beast rather than dominate it. Those who do so refer to the ability as Song of Serenity. (To learn this Song of Serenity effect, the character must simply find a teacher and spend a few nights learning it. It is an effect inherent to Cowing the Beast that many Cainites do not realize they can unlock. There is no additional experience cost.)
As with many aspects of a Cainite's existence, the use of Cowing the Beast involves a harrowing loss of control to the vampire's own Beast, if only for an instant. The character cuts loose for a moment, letting his Beast terrify his target's inner animal nature. Those Cainites who are not on the Road of the Beast are likely to be rather unsettled by this display themselves, as their rational natures must momentarily give way to a rush of power and hatred.
System: When the character uses Cowing the Beast, the player should roll Manipulation + Intimidation (or Manipulation + Empathy, if using the Song of Serenity variant), at a difficulty of 7. This action is exclusive. The character cannot engage in combat, run, or create works of art while activating the Discipline. the character must earn a number of successes equal to the target's Willpower. If doing so takes more than one turn, then the Discipline becomes an extended test, and it succeeds as soon as the character collects that many successes. Failure means that the character loses all collected successes. A botch means that the target's Beast is forever beyond the character's control.
A successfully cowed mortal or animal is so intimidated that she cannot engage in any form of struggle and may even refuse to move unless the Cainite orders her to do so. The victim will not even defend herself unless her player makes a Willpower roll. The player of a cowed character cannot spend or regain Willpower. she should roll Willpower (difficulty 6) every night until she accumulates as many successes as the vampire's Willpower. The effect then lifts. The Song of Serenity has the same game system effects, but it makes the victim utterly listless.
Cainite's Beasts cannot be cowed with this ability, but the Storyteller may permit characters to use the Song of Serenity variant to pull a vampire out of a frenzy. Should the character earn three or more successes, the frenzied target may attempt to pull herself out of the frenzy, using the same difficulty as the stimulus that pushed her into it.
