New Devotions: Ventrue Way of the Autarch (nWOD VTR)

The Way of the Autarch is sometimes referred to as the Path of Blood and is, like the Way of the Martinet and the Way of the Tyrant, focused on dominance through the direct imposition of one's will upon others. Due to the use of Vitae as a focus for the vampiric Beast, these powers are sometimes mistaken for Cruac or other forms of blood magic.



Blood Mastery
(Animalism •••, Dominate •)
Action: Reflexive.
Cost: 1 Willpower
If this character uses a power of Dominate against a subject that has ingested at least a point of their blood they receive a +2 on rolls to use their powers against that subject. This benefit stacks with the benefits of Blood Ties.
Further, if the target retains at least a point of the character's blood in their system they receive no resistance roll.
This power costs 18 experience points to learn.

Call of Blood
(Animalism •••, Dominate •••••)
Action: Reflexive.
Cost: 1 Willpower point and 1 point of blood from the target, whether this has been ingested by the vampire or is contained externally.
Upon activating this power the user may subject the target to any power of Dominate they possess without need to have eye contact with the target, be heard by the target, or even see them.
This power costs 24 experience points to learn.

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These powers came out of a conversation about oWOD "Tremere Vampires" in Requiem. While the Tremere Lich from Mage the Awakening is an interesting take on the concept, the splintering of Thaumaturgy into Cruac, Theban Sorcery, et al is certainly far more balanced than the old "omnidiscipline," and much of the order of the Tremere structure can be found in the Ordo Dracul, there is an appeal to a Tremere "clan." Some would argue that the Mekhet most fully fit that role as written, but there was always a through-line of contesting for obvious temporal power with the Ventrue and Lasombra that breaks with the Mekhet mold and falls directly into the Ventrue wheelhouse.
While these powers still lean heavily on the concept of "Animalism as mastery of the Beast" it rather abandons "Beast as the supernatural subconscious" for "Beast as the seat of Vampiric Power." This isn't an enormous leap past either established cannon, let alone writeups I'd done for Devotions of the other Ways. What I have endeavoured to do, however is stick to using Animalism to amp up control powers and not allow it to become a general "vampiric metamagic"ability.