Ghoul Game Mechanics

Game Effects of Being a Ghoul

Becoming a ghoul changes a mortal’s life undeniably. Some see that change as a blessing, while others call it a curse. Some naïvely consider it the first overture of true trust and reliance between themselves and their regnants, while others recognize it as the first step into a quagmire of dependency and cruel false-love. To some, it’s an escape from a drab life of dead passions and dreams forever out of reach into a modern-gothic world of decadent bliss and unimagined powers.
Despite myriad opinions on the subject, though, no single black-and-white alternative truly epitomizes the experience. Every alternative contains a seed of bitter truth, and if a mortal remains a ghoul long enough, he’ll come to recognize the validity in each position. Becoming a ghoul introduces a host of damning consequences to a mortal’s life, but it also confers a range of powers of which most mortals cannot even conceive. Granted, Ghouls’ powers rarely rival those of the undead, but in some ways, the price they must pay for their dread blessings makes for a lighter burden than even the most humane Kindred must bear.

Body and Blood

For all the importance of the Blood to a ghoul, the physical blood itself is fairly insignificant. The ghoul must drink the crimson liquid to partake of the power it bestows, but it simply flows down into his stomach and is processed just as any other liquid would be. It doesn’t enter his circulatory system or flow through his body when he spends Vitae, as Vitae does in a Kindred body. The Vitae doesn’t bestow extra Health on a ghoul, nor does it magically increase the amount of blood coursing through his heart. All it does is impart a measure of the Kindred Regnant’s damnation, which is actually made possible by the expenditure of the Willpower point.
Nothing physically happens to the ghoul’s body when he spends his Vitae to activate a power, though one can sometimes see a faint lurid fire burning deep within his eyes when he does so. None of his own blood evaporates (which would cripple him instantly with the bends if it did), nor does he lose any Vitae if he starts bleeding from open wounds. By that same token, a vampire cannot gain access to another Kindred’s Vitae by drawing off the blood of that Kindred’s Ghouls, nor can another ghoul maintain his unnatural state by bleeding a fellow thrall — though a desperate, unhinged ghoul might not know that or care. Also, a ghoul’s blood is no different in terms of what an elder vampire of high Blood Potency needs to survive. If mortal blood is no longer sufficient, a ghoul’s blood isn’t either, no matter how much Vitae that ghoul has in his system.
The only supernatural effect that Vitae has on a ghoul’s body that makes him demonstrably different from the mortals around him (other than the respite from aging) is its effect on his aura. A ghoul’s aura looks much like any other mortal’s aura, though it’s likely to be shot through with deep red and bright green and somewhat weak and muted (see Vampire p. 120). Yet if one looks closely enough with Aura Perception, one might notice veins in the ghoul’s aura that are as pale as a vampire’s aura normally is. The distinction of a pale streak in a weak and muted aura is an especially fine one, though, levying an additional –2 penalty to the user’s Aura Perception roll.
Finally, at no point may a ghoul have more Vitae than he has dots of Stamina, and no ghoul can spend more than one Vitae in a single turn, no matter how old he is or how potent his Regnant’s blood is. Also, a ghoul is aware of how close to depleting his Vitae Resources he is at all times.

Blood Ties

The Blood consumes a ghoul’s life. It keeps him from aging, it heals his wounds, and it gives him power. It also helps him love his Regnant if he’s not particularly inclined to do so at first. Yet for the wonders it bestows, the Blood asks a price that every ghoul is obligated to pay. That price comes in the form of Blood Addiction and The Vinculum.
As with any mortal, Blood Addiction is instant and permanent for a ghoul, and it can only be resisted, not defeated. After the first time a person drinks Vitae (whether or not that’s the draught that turns him into a ghoul), resisting the temptation to do so at the next opportunity becomes physical rather than academic. For the character to resist, the player must succeed on a Resolve + Composure roll. Each time he gives in, he incurs a cumulative –1 penalty to subsequent resistance rolls. When the penalty turns the standard roll into a chance roll, the Addiction becomes total and resistance becomes all but impossible. In fact, a dramatic failure on the resistance roll even inflicts a derangement.
Understanding the nature of Vitae Addiction — perhaps from painful experience — many regnants use it against their new Ghouls. They feed their enthralled servants Vitae as often as they can safely do so, normally once per night, to smash the ghoul’s resistance to bits as quickly as possible. (If the vampire doles out just the bare minimum of a single Vitae per month, the ghoul might be able to work up his nerve enough to resist and rebel in the interim.) Working up such an intense Blood Addiction so quickly in a ghoul can be problematic, though. A deeply sprung addict isn’t the most competent bodyguard or lawyer or financier, after all, and the Regnant always risks some other vampire tempting her ghoul away with offers of more frequent hits of the Blood. Yet if the ghoul’s only purpose is to be a doting, biddable plaything, breaking his will with a rapid escalation of Addiction isn’t beyond the pale. Otherwise, waiting for a deep-rooted Addiction to take hold in a ghoul’s mind is just a matter of time anyway.
Despite all its intensity, however, a Blood Addiction can be knocked back if a ghoul is willing to undergo a grueling “rehabilitation.” If a ghoul can work up the nerve to forgo the Blood long enough, he’ll no longer be a ghoul, and his body will start to rapidly age to catch up with his current chronological age at a rate of one year per day. This experience isn’t a pleasant one, but it does have one benefit. If the ghoul can endure it for 25 full days (equivalent to 25 years) and survive, he cures his Addiction completely. That goes only for the period of rapid re-aging, though. If the character had been a ghoul for less than 25 years (and thus would go through less than 25 days of rapid aging), he is plain out of luck. Not even surviving a full 25 years after that period will cure him.
Keep in mind also, that resisting the lure of Vitae does take the edge off the craving. Each successful Resolve + Composure resistance roll adds a +1 bonus to future rolls (or cancels out a lingering –1 penalty). An exceptional success even resets the penalties to 0. Yet while that rule (from Vampire, p. 158) applies just as much to Ghouls as other mortals or Kindred, the odds are stacked against Ghouls in the long run and their regnants know it.
Blood Addiction notwithstanding, most Kindred regnants also enthrall their ghoul servants with The Vinculum as quickly as they can. Doing so takes only three consecutive nights, and each step afflicts a ghoul with an ever-increasing love and trust that the Regnant is under no obligation to return. The third time a ghoul drinks his Regnant’s blood, be it on the third consecutive night or the night of the third month of his Vitae upkeep, his player must roll Stamina + Resolve – his Regnant’s Blood Potency. (He may not spend Vitae for a +2 Stamina bonus on this roll, as using the Blood’s damning power to resist the effects of its own damning power is patently counterintuitive.) Should this roll somehow achieve an exceptional success, The Vinculum remains partial and not quite so consuming as it could become next time. Just as with a Blood Addiction, the odds are against a ghoul being able to hold out forever against a full Vinculum to his Regnant. The only real way to hold off a full Vinculum to a single Regnant is for a ghoul to continuously sustain himself with Vitae from an unending line of different Kindred. (Rogue Ghouls who have turned into vampire-hunting guerillas often attempt to sustain themselves thus.) A ghoul can have any amount of partial Vinculums to any number of different Kindred until the one fateful night he’s forced to take that third drink from one Kindred and he succumbs at last. The only up-side to that event is that any partial Vinculums he might have accrued up to that point are all washed away.
A ghoul may also attempt to break his Regnant’s Vinculum if he can somehow go for 50 years without tasting that Kindred’s Vitae again. (The player may then attempt a Resolve + Composure roll to break the bond.) Days spent rapidly aging after one ceases to be a ghoul count as years toward this total, as do any years a ghoul manages to survive after the rapid-aging period ends. It’s even possible for a blood-bound ghoul who’s been horribly mistreated to snap his Vinculum all at once, though his ability to do so depends on his specific circumstances. For that reason, most Kindred regnants don’t abuse their servants too horribly for too much of the time. The Kindred have learned from hard experience that the power of The Vinculum goes only so far without at least some veneer of real emotional connection backing it up.
(See pp. 160-162 of Vampire: The Requiem for more information on The Vinculum.)

Taste of Family

A ghoul’s palate can never be as refined as a vampire’s, but Ghouls can learn to discriminate between subtle varieties of Vitae that are very closely related to his Regnant’s. When a ghoul tastes Vitae, his player may make an Intelligence + Occult roll (which receives a +2 bonus if the ghoul is using Heightened Senses). If he’s successful, the ghoul can tell whether the Vitae is his Regnant’s own blood or comes from certain members of his immediate “family.” That is, he can tell if the Vitae belongs to his Regnant’s sire or one of his Regnant’s childer. The ghoul must be subject to a full Vinculum to his Regnant in order to be able to do this, and his palate becomes no more discerning than that. He couldn’t tell which of his Regnant’s childer’s Vitae he was tasting, for instance, nor could he recognize the Vitae of a stranger from the same clan. Even other Kindred co-sanguineous with his Regnant remain a mystery to him. Furthermore, a ghoul’s blood doesn’t carry the family’s “flavor,” regardless of how strong his Vinculum is to his Regnant. Therefore, a Kindred couldn’t taste it to try to figure out who the ghoul’s master is.

Benefits of Ghoul Blood

While not so varied or flexible, the tools at a ghoul’s disposal are comparable to what their Kindred masters inherit at the moment of their own death. What a ghoul lacks in outright power is made up for by the ability to feel real emotions (if tinted and subverted by the Vinculum), the ability to heal without Vitae as well as with it, and the ability to walk in the sunlight. Meanwhile, she exceeds all other mortals through the gruesome wonders of the Blood. In brief, those wonders include the cessation of the aging process, access to the Disciplines of her Regnant’s clan, the ability to enhance Physical Attributes and the ability to heal some wounds instantly. Ghouls also need not spend Vitae to rise each night, so they can conserve what’s in their systems until they really need it.

Living Stasis

When a mortal becomes a ghoul, his body ceases to age and enters a kind of living stasis. A ghoul child doesn’t grow up or mature. A pregnant woman doesn’t normally carry to term (it’s possible; see p. 89 for more information). A character who’s going bald doesn’t get any more bald, nor does an adolescent in the midst of puberty ever escape his awkward and hormonal stage — though he’s no longer subject to growth spurts. Wounds incurred before or after the change continue to heal naturally, as that process isn’t a function of aging per se, and mundane illnesses such as chicken pox or the common cold run their course naturally. More serious diseases that might be in progress, such as multiple sclerosis, cancer or Parkinson’s disease, freeze in their tracks alongside the aging process, growing no worse.
Of course, the ghoul must still eat, drink, breathe and sleep lest he starve to death, suffocate or otherwise ruin himself, but other than that, the Vitae sustains him.

Physical Augmentation

One of the more useful powers Ghouls receive is the ability to augment their Physical Attributes with Vitae, much like vampires can. For every Vitae a ghoul makes his body burn, he may increase a physical dice pool by two dice for one turn. He can reflexively increase Strength, Dexterity or Stamina pools thus.
Spending Vitae to boost an Attribute task doesn’t grant actual additional dots in the given Attribute, however. A ghoul cannot spend Vitae for extra Stamina and expect to receive two extra bonus Health dots as a result, even for just one turn. The extra Stamina dice would, for instance, help the ghoul withstand the effects of a contact poison just long enough to deliver one last message to her Regnant, though. They would aid in rolls to activate various Stamina-based Discipline powers as well.

Healing Wounds

Ghouls heal damage naturally over time just as normal mortals do. (See p. 175 of the World of Darkness Rulebook for more information.) In this respect, at least, they have an advantage over their regnants in that they don’t have to gravely injure other human beings (by feeding) to make themselves better. If they can rest safely, time will heal all wounds. Yet even on the periphery of the Danse Macabre, time and peaceful rest are rare luxuries.
Fortunately, Ghouls can also spend their Vitae to heal themselves instantly, much as vampires can. In a single turn, a ghoul can spend one Vitae reflexively and heal two Health points of bashing damage. The sensation is cool and soothing as bruises fade or minor scrapes seal themselves as good as new. Should his wounds be more severe, he could instead reflexively heal one Health point of lethal damage for one Vitae. Doing so is far less pleasant, as bones fuse where they lie and muscles, nerves and skin stretch and melt back together without an iota of anesthesia. It can be an incredibly painful process, and should a ghoul not take the time to properly clean, dress and set his more serious wounds, he could be asking for more trouble than the unnatural Healing set out to solve.
Where this Healing capacity can seem truly miraculous, though, is in Healing aggravated damage. Normally, mortals heal aggravated damage at a rate of one point per week, but Ghouls can heal a single Health point of aggravated damage in just two nights — as quickly as a vampire can do. Doing so is no easy proposition, though, as Healing such a grievous injury costs five Vitae over the course of those two nights. A ghoul need not spend all five Vitae at once, which is fortunate, but he must have access to that Vitae. A ghoul can have only as much Vitae in his system at a time as he has dots of Stamina, so only the hardiest and toughest Ghouls are likely to have enough Vitae on hand to heal a single aggravated point of damage. A lesser ghoul must rely on the generosity of his Regnant and hope that his Regnant doesn’t simply dispense with him instead. And that covers only one point of aggravated damage. Healing an aggravated wound completely leaves a wicked scar to remember the trauma by, but it restores full functionality to the damaged body part — even an eye or a reproductive organ.
In addition to this Healing ability, Ghouls are also exempt from the Incapacitation rule on p. 173 of the World of Darkness Rulebook as long as they have Vitae within their bodies. Normally, a mortal who has bashing damage marked in his rightmost Health box is subject to reflexive Stamina rolls that determine whether he remains conscious. Not so for a ghoul. It’s not until his damage is upgraded such that a lethal wound fills that box that the ghoul collapses on the verge of death. Even then, however, he retains the wherewithal to reflexively spend a Vitae to repair that last lethal wound. This capacity might not make him a superman who can take on an army of hooligans, but he could rise from death’s door long enough to hit the emergency switch that locks his Regnant in her panic room. Of course, when the character’s rightmost Health box is marked with an aggravated wound, nothing can save him.
Likewise, Ghouls are no less susceptible to diseases, chemicals or toxins than regular mortals are. The anti-aging effects of the Blood put on hold the progress of any congenital conditions that would have affected them in later life, but even Vitae cannot cure cancer or magically un-infect a careless ghoul with herpes. Nor can it protect the ghoul servants of a Morbus from the contagion brewing in the vampire’s every drop of blood. (A ghoul can use her Vitae to boost a Stamina roll to withstand the effects of chemicals or disease, though.) The stasis effect of being made a ghoul even halts the progress of any serious medical condition toward which the ghoul has a genetic predisposition. Yet with the most persistent chemicals or pathogens that affect Ghouls after the first ingestion of Vitae, it’s only a matter of time before the ghoul succumbs.

Using Disciplines

Of course, the most multifaceted and broadly appealing benefit that comes from being a ghoul is the ability to use vampiric Disciplines. As soon as he’s first made a ghoul, the character gains an automatic dot in the physical Discipline that’s in-clan for his Regnant. As per the template provided in this book, a ghoul character also receives a second dot of a Discipline from his Regnant’s in-clan selections. That second dot can be the second in his physical Discipline or the first dot from another Discipline.
Once a ghoul has learned these basic Discipline abilities, developing them into more formidable powers is a different story. A ghoul character must have a teacher for every dot of a Discipline that he intends to learn, even if the Disciplines in question are in clan for his Regnant. What’s more, the experiencepoint cost for increasing the number of dots he has in a Discipline is double what a Kindred character would pay. Developing the physical Disciplines is somewhatmore natural, in that the character need not have a teacher for every additional dot, but the experience cost is still double. Regardless, he must still be taught the first dot in those physical Disciplines that are not in clan for his Regnant.
If the ghoul’s Regnant is a member of a bloodline, all of his Bloodline Disciplines count as in clan for the ghoul’s purposes as long as the Regnant enthralls the ghoul after becoming a member of the bloodline. Should the Regnant form or join a bloodline after he’s enthralled a ghoul, the ghoul doesn’t immediately share in the same in-clan benefit. While a Kindred can force the mystical nature of his own Vitae to change, it’s harder to pass that change down to his Ghouls through the Blood. The change overtakes a ghoul much as a Vinculum would. Over three successive nights, the Regnant must feed the ghoul his Vitae and spend a single point of Willpower each time. (The ghoul cannot achieve the same effect by spending his own Willpower.) The Regnant can either induce the change slowly over the course of three months during the ghoul’s regular Vitae upkeep (as long as the Regnant spends the Willpower and not the ghoul), or he can force the change to take place in three whirlwind nights. Only after those three feeding sessions have occurred do the in-clan costs for the extra bloodline Discipline apply to the ghoul (assuming the master even intends to teach the ghoul the new tricks).
Ghouls use Disciplines exactly the same way that Kindred do, paying the same costs listed in Vampire: The Requiem (with their players making the same rolls). They can even learn Crúac and Theban Sorcery if they can find willing teachers and somehow accrue the necessary Covenant Status. The only Discipline- style powers that Ghouls cannot ever use are the tiers of The Coils of the Dragon. Those powers are designed to specifically deal with aspects of the vampiric condition, and Ghouls simply aren’t vampires. Any other Discipline power, however, relies only on the willingness of the Regnant to teach it or the ghoul’s ingenuity in somehow forcing a vampire to teach it (not to mention the grossly inflated experience- point costs). And yes, if it need be said, that means that Ghouls can learn the one- to five-dot applications of those Disciplines — everything from Feral Whispers to Convocation of Hotoke.
Although nothing is technically forbidden except The Coils of the Dragon, the idea of Ghouls using Disciplines raises certain logistical rules questions that must be addressed. The specific powers from the core Vampire rulebook that raise questions are listed here with page number references. If a power from that book is not listed here, assume that it works just the same way for a ghoul user as it would for a Kindred user. (The functions of Discipline powers from other Vampire supplements are left to Storyteller discretion.)
Animalism
•••• Subsume the Lesser Spirit (p. 117)
When a ghoul uses this power to take over the body of an animal, he cannot do so for nearly as long as a vampire can. While he’s out of his body, his body falls into a state that’s so near death as to be almost indistinguishable, such as when a person falls into deep icy water and remains submerged for a long time. If he remains in this state for too long, his body will die, snapping his animating spirit back just in time to be dragged on to whatever final reward awaits. The ghoul may remain outside his body for no more than 15 minutes per dot of Stamina he possesses.
••••• Leashing the Beast (p. 118)
As the ghoul doesn’t actually have a Beast, he can’t make himself a target of this power. Otherwise, it functions normally.
Auspex
••••• Twilight Projection (p. 123)
As per Animalism 4, the ghoul can’t remain disconnected from his body indefinitely. He may use this power for 15 minutes per dot of Stamina he possesses. After that, his body dies and takes his soul with it.
Cachexy
•• Contaminate (p. 249)
The disease that the ghoul user spreads must be a communicable one with which he is currently afflicted. To contaminate the object in question, the ghoul character must literally bleed out the equivalent of the one Vitae he must spend, thus inflicting one point of lethal damage on himself.
•••• Plague-Bearer (p. 250)
The disease that the ghoul user spreads must be a communicable one with which he is currently afflicted, as per Contaminate. He need not literally lose any blood, however, when he spends Vitae for the effect.
Dominate Keep in mind that a Regnant can use any Dominate power except Conditioning on a blood-bound ghoul without the need for eye contact. In addition, Ghouls cannot use any Dominate power at all on Kindred. Ghouls can affect mortals, other Ghouls and possibly Lupines and mages with Dominate, but a factor of the Willpower the Regnant must initially spend to create the ghoul imparts a subconscious protection against being Dominated by his lowly servant.
••• The Forgetful Mind (p. 126)
A ghoul cannot restore original memories that have been stolen or re-written by an application of Dominate used by a vampire. A ghoul user can write new memories in over those memories, but he cannot undo the damage a vampire has done. Remember also that having the Unobtrusive Merit grants a +1 to the ghoul victim’s Resolve for purposes of resisting this power.
•••• Conditioning (p. 127)
Ghouls with this power can recognize when someone is trying to use it on them. Also, all successes on the activation roll are doubled when a vampire is using the power on one of his thralls, regardless of whether that thrall can use the power herself.
••••• Possession (p. 128)
As per Animalism 4 and Auspex 5, the ghoul can remain outside his own body for only 15 minutes per dot of Stamina he has at a time. After that, his body dies and takes his soul with it.
Majesty
Like Dominate, Majesty doesn’t work on Kindred targets when Ghouls use it. It works just fine on any other sort of target against which a vampire or ghoul would try to use it.
•••• Summoning (p. 130)
Summoning works at any point of the day during which a ghoul uses it, and it ends at sunrise.
Nightmare
• Monstrous Countenance (p. 133)
This power works just fine on humans and other Ghouls, but it doesn’t work on vampires. The Kindred have to co-exist and deal with the Beast every night, and there’s nothing within a ghoul that this power can reveal that rivals the Beast’s ferocity.
••• Eye of the Beast (p. 134)
The same proviso holds true here. A ghoul can show another ghoul, a mortal or some other creature an affected shadow of the Beast with this power, but any Kindred knows the difference. Vampires are unaffected by Ghouls’ uses of this power.
Obfuscate
•• Mask of Tranquility (p. 136)
Ghouls don’t invoke reactions tied to the Predator’s Taint in the first place, so this power doesn’t affect that aspect of their lives. It does, however, hide the telltale veins in their aura that give away their ghoul condition. When this power is active, a ghoul’s aura looks no different from any other mortal human’s aura.
Protean
• Aspect of the Predator (p. 138)
Ghouls don’t invoke reactions tied to the Predator’s Taint, so this power doesn’t affect that aspect of their lives. They can adopt a likeness of the Beast with this power, however, though doing so is a dangerous gamble. When this power is active, the ghoul character has an effective Blood Potency of 0 and he invokes the Predator’s Taint in the same circumstances under which a Kindred would. (See Vampire, p. 168.) Granted, having an effective Blood Potency of 0 means that the ghoul will always react as if in Rötschreck and the vampire will always react in a frenzy if either cannot control himself, but such is a ghoul’s existence. The benefit of this power is that a ghoul can use it to tell at a distance if a stranger is a vampire or not (i.e., whether that stranger invokes the reaction or not). The power has no effect between two Ghouls, even if they are both using it at the same time.
•• Haven of Soil (p. 138)
A ghoul with this power cannot use it indefinitely. He can remain interred for 15 minutes per Stamina dot he possesses, after which he dies. When that happens, his body congeals back into its normal shape at the surface of the material with which he has blended, but it remains composed of that material and part of that material thereafter. While he’s blended (and still alive), Morality is the trait rolled to determine his awareness of his surroundings.
•••• Shape of the Beast (p. 139)
When a ghoul uses this power, he becomes a living, breathing animal. Since his intelligence is still human, though, all Animalism powers are still useless against him.
Crúac
If a ghoul character is going to have Crúac, his player must purchase it at character creation. In order for the ghoul to have learned Crúac, the player must purchase at least one dot of Covenant Status (Circle of the Crone) at character creation. (Justifying such a thing is usually a significant enough bar to entry in and of itself.) The first dot of Crúac must be the second Discipline dot a ghoul gets at character creation as per this book’s new ghoul template.
For every Vitae a ghoul character spends to activate a Crúac ritual, he must also bleed out the equivalent amount of blood from his own body (inflicting one lethal wound per Vitae required). A ghoul’s Vitae isn’t in his blood exactly, but the nature of the rituals demands a blood sacrifice nonetheless.
•• Cheval (p. 143)
Since a ghoul who is “riding” another’s senses enters only a trancelike state rather than a torpid near-death state, he can use Cheval for as long as a vampire could.
•• Hydra’s Vitae (p. 143)
If a ghoul uses this ritual, he turns his own blood into deadly poison just as a Kindred user would. Unlike a Kindred user, however, he then subsequently dies, as he has just turned his own blood into deadly poison. As long as that blood remains in his body, however, it retains its poisonous quality.
•••• Blood Price (p. 144)
When a ghoul uses this ritual on a vampire, its effect steals actual Vitae (not just mortal blood) and transfers it to the ghoul. The ghoul can use this Vitae for his monthly upkeep, but he must spend his own Willpower when doing so. This power also works when used on a ghoul, but it only steals actual Vitae that a ghoul takes from his Regnant or another vampire.
••••• Blood Blight (p. 145)
A ghoul afflicted by this ritual suffers the damage and loses the Vitae normally, but no physical blood in his body is consumed.
Theban Sorcery
If a ghoul character is going to have Theban Sorcery, his player must purchase it at character creation. In order for the ghoul to have learned Theban Sorcery, the player must purchase at least one dot of Covenant Status (Lancea Sanctum) at character creation. (Justifying such a thing is usually a significant enough bar to entry in and of itself — more so, even, than with Crúac and The Circle of the Crone.) The first dot of Theban Sorcery must be the second Discipline dot a ghoul gets at character creation.
• Blood Scourge (p. 146)
When a ghoul character performs this ritual, he must literally slash his wrist and bleed out the blood that makes up the Whip. Doing so inflicts one point of lethal damage per Whip he creates (the maximum of which is equal to his dots in Theban Sorcery). This “damage” doesn’t actually harm the ghoul until the duration of the effect has expired (after a number of turns equal to the number of successes on the activation roll) and the Whip turns to dust.
• Vitae Reliquary (p. 146)
A ghoul cannot create a Vitae Reliquary, as his blood isn’t the physical seat of his Vitae, but he can use the Vitae stored in a reliquary that someone else created for his monthly upkeep. He must spend the necessary Willpower point himself.
Devotions
Ghouls aren’t barred from learning Devotions, but they must be taught each one. That is, they cannot simply figure Devotions out on their own even if they have the requisite Discipline combinations already. Furthermore, the experience-point costs listed for Devotions in Vampire are doubled for Ghouls. Finally, a ghoul cannot use any Devotion that consists of Dominate or Majesty on a Kindred victim.

Optional Game Mechanic
Optional Rule: The Thrill and Reluctance

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Think About it for Second...

No Kindred in his right mind is going to teach a ghoul any of the more powerful or versatile applications of the various Disciplines, no matter how loyal, skilled and useful that ghoul has been. A ghoul with Body of Spirit? Preposterous. A ghoul with Conditioning? You have to be kidding. How would a vampire hope to control such a powerful ghoul?
Then again, if a vampire is willing to teach a ghoul to wield such incredible power, how powerful must he already be himself if he’s not worried about what the ghoul will do with it? How nigh unto completely unhinged would such a vampire have to be? And what, exactly would he intend for that ghoul to do with those powers? Does he intend for that ghoul to go out and dispose of with his vampire rivals while he watches from afar? Does he have more than one such ghoul?

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