The Invictus - Coteries
Ambition is not a vice of little people. —Michel de Montaigne
The genteel lords and ladies of the Requiem, night’s aristocracy, pride themselves on their long and estimable history and on their ability to govern effectively. While The Invictus does show an admirable degree of integration, its members are far more varied than they let other covenants know. The covenant’s overarching goals — power and dominion over the Kindred — are abundantly clear to anyone watching the covenant’s nightly maneuvers in the Danse Macabre, but the goals of its coteries, the real agents of Invictus’ agenda, are myriad, varied and often hidden. That’s the way The Invictus likes it. For tactical reasons, The Invictus (the covenant) does not like to reveal what The Invictus (the tapestry of interwoven coteries) is doing. The appearance of pluralism impairs the covenant’s ability to present a unified front and undercuts the impression of The Invictus as a monolithic and unwaveringly successful institution.
The face of The Invictus, the one it lets be seen, is a mélange of the faces of those in the apex positions of Kindred society: the powerful and experienced Invictus Prince, the crafty Invictus Primogen, the influential Invictus Priscus. The irony, of course, is that these old, powerful figures make up a small minority of the First Estate’s membership. For every wellknown and obvious Invictus Prince giving the organization a face, there are 10 coteries of younger Kindred acting as the covenant’s eyes, hands and daggers.
Belonging to an Invictus coterie means helping oneself to the grudging respect of most other covenants, but it also means serving the covenant’s hierarchy like a slave for decades in hopes of being found worthy to advance in the organization.
Serving The Invictus as part of a coterie is an inescapable part of being a member of the covenant. From the covenant’s perspective, being a member of The Invictus is a privilege, and the privilege is a reward for loyal service. An Invictus vampire who refuses to join a coterie is considered highly suspicious and, probably, a loose cannon waiting to go off. Teamwork and fulfilling one’s role in the chain of command are crucial to The Invictus strategy. Any vampire who can’t master them has no future in the First Estate.
Kindred of The Invictus swear oaths of fealty to Princes and other authority figures, and they carry out the will of their superiors until such night that they are the superior and have vassals of their own offering pledges of fealty. Neonates and young ancillae are commonly gathered into coteries and used as “knights errant” to accomplish those tasks that are deemed important to the covenant, but not worth the direct attention of its ancilla or elders. It gives young coteries a taste of Invictus politics, keeps younger Kindred from falling to idleness and lets them get a bit of experience under their belts while advancing the covenant’s agenda. Older ancillae have attained a degree of experience and sophistication through their work for the First Estate and are more likely to take up the role of “idle nobles.” Such nobles must have earned the right to attend to their own business through their prior work for the covenant, and they must continue to pay proper tribute to the Prince and elders of the domain upon request — unless The Invictus directly opposes that Prince and his regime. Always, similar oaths bind these ancillae to elders of The Invictus itself, occasionally making for split loyalties that covenant elders demand favor them. These ancillae nobles are usually well versed in the covenant’s politics, however, and have no problem flattering, ingratiating themselves and serving their elders as needed — as long as such behavior furthers their personal agendas.
And so the neonates and ancillae of The Invictus gather into orderly coteries night after night, doing as they’re told and furthering their covenant’s myriad local goals.
Paying dues is not just a matter of persistence, but of performance as well. At every level, the covenant provides its members with ample means to weed themselves out of the running. This one proves herself too violent. That one proves himself incompetent with money. The other shows himself incapable of maintaining order in his coterie. Each successive hoop the Kindred jumps through is a little narrower than the one before it, and with each success, the rewards are greater. For the neonates and ancillae of the covenant, coteries are the social environment in which they prove their mettle. For the elders, coteries are the petri dishes in which they conduct their experiments in Kindred governance.
As a unit, the coterie also provides Kindred with a means of coming to terms with unlife that’s safer — both for the vampire and those around her — than letting individuals run around alone. In the absence of a group’s moderating influence, a solitary Kindred is prone to more extreme behavior. Temptation and anger, occasionally catalyzed by boredom, can get a grip on a lone vampire far more easily than one who is part of a coterie. Experience has shown such Kindred to be more likely to fall prey to petty temptations, threaten the well-being of other Kindred and generally make rash decisions more than those in coteries, who have the advantage of a group’s tempering influence — a crucial advantage to those who want to sustain their Humanity over the centuries.
The Invictus values experience in its members. It does not aim to be an institution of purely inherited lordships. Power is too precious to be given to those who do not understand how to earn it through diligence and wield it with discretion. Members of The Invictus must prove themselves worthy of the power and authority invested in them in their night-to-night comportment. Even the most self-serving elder knows when a favored childe is incompetent to take over in his absence, and in most cases, such a childe is more likely to meet an unexpected demise than progress any further through the covenant’s ranks. The best way a neonate in The Invictus can rise through the hierarchy is to gain experience, and the safest way to gather experience in the cutthroat world of the Kindred is within the confines of a coterie. Therefore, an elder may ask his childe to take care of some of his less taxing business, including monitoring stock portfolios, soliciting potential mortal pawns or representing his interests at a meeting of some sort. This introduces the childe to the realities of The Invictus, but in a relatively safe way that (probably) doesn’t put the neonate (and his coterie) at risk.
The Invictus also places a premium on a Kindred’s ability to cooperate with her fellows. Those who understand the intricacies of power realize early on that ruling is more than issuing edicts, it is the fine art of motivating those of lesser Status to carry out one’s will and, ideally, to do so with enthusiasm. A leader who is unable to do that is no leader at all, but, rather, a figurehead and, likelier than not, a target. Elders, then, advance Kindred according to their ability to function in the context of a coterie, and woe betide the vampire who prefers his own company. A vampire who insists on being a loner, a maverick or a rebel clearly does not have what it takes to rise to the position of prominence. The same goes for those who prove themselves incapable of functioning effectively in a coterie.
Membership in an Invictus coterie is a balancing act. Those Kindred who stick out too much, especially for the wrong reasons, are more likely to be considered questionable choices for promotion in the covenant. Those who are too quiet to make some kind of a name for themselves never bring themselves to the notice of others and never get considered in the first place. As many Invictus elders and ancillae have counseled their childer, “It’s the middle path that takes one the farthest through the night.”
The grooming of Invictus vampires begins early. Fledglings are counseled to choose their coteries carefully, lest their images be marred by association with Kindred of poor lineage or scurrilous behavior. Within The Invictus, it is a common practice for sires to place their childer into coteries, so Invictus vampires whose sires are also members of The Invictus are more likely to be assigned to a coterie. On the other hand, a character who leaves his sire’s covenant to join The Invictus has more latitude in choosing his own associates. The more powerful or prestigious vampires of The Invictus have the luxury of placing their childer into coteries with other powerful Kindred. Once so placed, a neonate is expected to interact effectively with her new coterie and reflect well on her sire. Sires take note when a childe fails to do either. Worse, so do the other elders.
A Kindred abandoning her assigned coterie with any but the most compelling reasons (the coterie was plotting the Diablerie of the city’s elders, for example) had best be leaving the covenant at the same time, because she will quickly find her opportunities for advancement within The Invictus considerably thinned. Her sire will probably not be inclined to go out of his way to do her any more favors. Within the First Estate, a childe’s actions reflect strongly on her sire (and vice versa), and a childe who defects from the covenant is one of the greatest embarrassments an Invictus member can suffer.
What the elder gets from the young Kindred is relatively straightforward, but what the younger vampires get from the older varies a great deal. Sometimes the coterie members benefit from easy access to the elder they’re sworn to, other times the elder provides them with a commitment of Resources or a competent servant of some sort (equal to Retainer ••• or better). However it turns out, the elder almost always gets the better end of the bargain.
How a particular elder comes to accept the services of a particular coterie can be a convoluted tale in itself. Sometimes the elder simply needs vassals because his operations have expanded or his old vassals have been disgraced or promoted or met a grisly end. Alternatively, he might take on the coterie as a favor to a colleague, a Mentor or his sire. A coterie’s experience with its liege depends largely on the elder’s reasons for taking on the coterie. An elder who really needs the Kindred in question is likely to treat them better and be more assiduous in helping them advance than one who sees them as a burden taken on as a favor.
Elders judge coteries according to a range of criteria. A well-rounded coterie is generally most sought after because such coteries can be assigned to any task, whereas a martially inclined coterie, for example, is good only for breaking bones. This can change depending on the state of the city, of course. An elder who is involved in lots of touchy diplomatic work might be more inclined to go for a socially adept, diplomatic coterie than a generally competent one.
A truly accomplished coterie might find itself the object of a kind of bidding war, with elders offering increasingly enticing rewards for servitude. A coterie in this position might find itself shocked at the money, power and privilege thrown in its direction, and it can get very flattering, but once the group pledges its loyalty to one elder, it had best be prepared to weather the ire of those other elders left standing.
The three types of oaths the coterie can take include the Oath of Service, the Oath of Defense and the Oath of Fealty. A demanding title-holder or elder is likely to expect a coterie to swear an Oath of Fealty to her, but a more relaxed elder, an elder who already has her bases covered, or one who simply isn’t that concerned about such things, might allow a coterie to serve in some lesser capacity.
Expecting more from an arrangement of this sort is considered both unwise and unseemly. An elder who wants more from the coterie should ask for a more binding oath. Breaking an oath of this sort — by “forgetting” to perform the promised duties or getting sidetracked with some other business — is held to be rude, disrespectful and possibly scandalous, but not particularly serious or criminal. A coterie that breaks an Oath of Service is often punished by an Invictus Harpy or other public figure, who gleefully drags the coterie’s reputation through the dirt. The offended elder might even dismiss the coterie and refuse the group all further aid. Breaking even an Oath of Service could impair the coterie’s reputation enough to impede its advancement through the covenant’s ranks.
The Oath of Defense stipulates two things. First, the coterie taking such an oath will do everything possible to return to the side of its lord in times of conflict, danger or upheaval. This could mean abandoning other duties and gracefully accepting the consequences for doing so. In return, the coterie is able to call upon its liege for much weightier matters than a mere Oath of Service would entitle them to. Second, the coterie is obliged to be attentive to any potential threat to its lord and to inform her immediately of any manner of plot, scheme or conspiracy against her.
Because the Oath of Defense requires the liege to have absolute faith in the loyalty of the vassal, rare is the elder who will accept an Oath of Defense from a coterie that has ever broken any other kind of oath.
Breaking an Oath of Defense is considered an unforgivable breach of trust. Someone to whom such a coterie has sworn and broken the oath might push for a blood hunt or otherwise call for the Final Death of her betrayers. Characters might survive the experience, but they’ll need to keep a very low profile and find protection soon thereafter, most likely with another covenant (provided the new covenant wants the oathbreakers…). Furthermore, if the liege meets Final Death because the characters defaulted on their oath, other dutiful elders of The Invictus who know about the forsaken bond will likely make sure that the characters are hunted to the extent of their influence.
Oaths of Defense do offer a few ways to circumvent them. At the lord’s wish, they can lapse entirely, which occasionally happens as a coterie falls from favor or the sworn Kindred wishes to disassociate himself with them. If the Kindred to whom the oath is sworn ever forms a Vinculum to one of the Kindred in the coterie, the oath is considered null as well, as the peculiarity of the resulting relationship would call the validity of the oath into question. Finally, any Kindred of greater Status than the lord to whom the oath is sworn can cancel the oath, but only if the coterie so sworn instead transfers its oath to that Kindred instead.
Only under tremendously dire circumstances would an elder approach the members of a coterie asking them to swear an Oath of Fealty. An elder who’s already familiar with a coterie’s work and ethics might, at the most, casually mention in conversation that he’s looking for a coterie to Mentor in exchange for service, but even that might be perceived as overstepping bounds by more hidebound members of the First Estate. Invictus tradition stipulates that a coterie must humbly approach an elder whose vassals they wish to be. The elder then asks how the Kindred wish to serve him and informs them of what he’s willing to do for them in exchange. If both sides are satisfied with the terms, the formal ceremonies are scheduled. Should one or both sides not like the terms, tradition indicates that negotiations may take place between the two parties. If that is not sufficient to resolve differences, both parties are free to go their separate ways, and no harm is done — at least theoretically. Some wouldbe lieges grow vindictive when coteries approach them and then reject them when their offers aren’t sufficient. Likewise some coteries have turned subtly hostile to elders whom they have perceived as arrogant, demanding or thrifty with their beneficence.
A coterie swearing the Oath of Fealty to a lord is likely to be kept quite close to that lord. They operate in whatever capacity he desires them to, from valets to account managers to assassins. The relationship between lord and vassals can become very intense, and many lords resort to The Vinculum with their vassals, so they can be sure that their trust is well placed.
A coterie is likely to swear an Oath of Fealty if their liege is uncommonly powerful, or if they’re expecting an unusual degree of assistance from her.
Unlike other oaths, the Oath of Fealty is sworn for only a year or a decade at a time. At the end of that period (agreed upon before the oath is sworn), both the liege and the vassal coterie have the option of rethinking the agreement. The elder can dismiss the coterie, ask more of it or promise more compensation. For its part, the coterie can ask for more compensation or stipulate any other changes it wants made before agreeing to another term of duty.
As with the Oath of Defense, breaking an Oath of Fealty is grounds for immediate and severe retribution. Given the amount of gravity with which The Invictus imparts its oaths, anything less would defy its principles.
Whole hierarchies of oaths underpin the nightly functioning of the Danse Macabre. A neonate might be in a coterie sworn to serve an ancilla, who has, in turn, sworn an Oath of Fealty to an elder (or some powerful figure in the city hierarchy). The Kindred, of course, have rules for how such things work. A coterie functioning under an Oath of Service is not obligated to turn its own servants to serving its lord, but a coterie that has sworn an Oath of Defense or of Fealty is. In times of conflict, entire chains or cascades of oaths can be called into play that had theretofore been kept entirely secret. This is one of many reasons that Kindred of other covenants are hesitant to take action against Invictus elders. It may appear that they are attacking a single elder (no small feat in its own right), but in reality they are warring on that elder, any Kindred who has sworn an Oath of Defense or Oath of Fealty to her, and a cavalcade of subordinate Kindred who have sworn such oaths to them (and so on). Therefore, a vampire who thinks he’s making war on one elder might find that he faces the entirety of The Invictus’ local might.
An average night could find such a coterie attending (or putting on) a masquerade ball in Elysium, gossiping with a Regent, plotting to undermine another coterie’s social standing or making the rounds of the Rack’s best dance clubs. Other coteries sometimes find social coteries The Invictus hopelessly frivolous, but who says the Requiem always has to focus on the Danse Macabre?
Daeva, Ventrue and exceptionally social Mekhet are the primary members of such coteries, but Nosferatu are also common members due to their ability and willingness to provoke responses from other Kindred.
Coteries, then, are tasked with three overarching goals, summed up in three tenets held dear to The Invictus.
The Invictus Must be Respected.
The coterie must respect the authority and hierarchy of the First Estate. While a certain degree of treachery is acceptable (and even shows initiative), the ancient feudal notion of honor has a high place among The Invictus. Hierarchy serves a purpose, and those seeking to threaten the hierarchy jeopardize both The Invictus’ honor as well as its ability to function. Invictus Kindred might commiserate about their place in the covenant, but rarely are they so disrespectful as to malign the covenant itself.
The Invictus Must Maintain Order.
Kindred nature is not such that self-rule is sufficient to the task of maintaining order. In the absence of order and civility, Kindred society will break down, the Masquerade will be abandoned, and the kine will band together to destroy them. As foremost among the covenants, The Invictus must take upon itself the responsibility for maintaining order, leading by example when it can, and claiming positions related to the praxis when available. In the minds of many Invictus Kindred, the First Estate equates to the city’s prevailing governmental structure (even though the facts don’t always support this outlook).
The Invictus Must Protect its Flock Lest it Lose its Ability to Exploit it.
Wolves and poachers abound among the Kindred. The survival of The Invictus depends on the mortals they manage and exploit. Kindred who interfere with The Invictus’ dealings with mortals, or interfere with the mortals they deal with, might find themselves struck down with extreme prejudice as an example of what happens to those who meddle where they ought not.
Those coteries that further these goals are rewarded. Those that do not often linger interminably among the lower ranks of the covenant’s Status tiers. There might come times when a coterie has no idea if it’s doing the right thing or not until it achieves (or is denied) recognition. Key to the covenant’s functioning is rank.
Invictus coteries commonly observe a rigid hierarchy determined by age, power, experience and, on occasion, lineage. This last factor comes into play often if all members of the coterie are neonates or otherwise too inexperienced to have a track record of their own. A coterie comprising only neonates might be assigned a degree of “interim hierarchy” based on their sires’ standing in the covenant until the members of the coterie sort themselves out through their own individual conduct and effectiveness.
It rarely takes long for the members’ strengths and weaknesses to assert themselves, and coteries rarely maintain the hierarchy initially imposed upon them. Strong, driven leaders quickly differentiate themselves from followers, lickspittles and cowards. Those with power outshine those without. Likewise, those with guile and power outshine those possessing power alone.
And the group’s mentors smile as the long race for dominance begins.
Rank within a coterie is determined by the coterie’s mentors, if it has one or more, and it is neither fixed nor absolute. Intra-coterie rank isn’t ironclad so much as it’s a strong suggestion. Ignoring rank (through any kind of rudeness or disrespect, for example) isn’t heresy, but it is considered a breach of etiquette, with all the social consequences implied thereby. A Kindred is free to ignore rank at any time (for example, a quartus may refuse to perform a small favor for the secundus), but doing so could get him noticed by the coterie’s “overseers.” Being noticed too many times is likely to result in loss of rank or some other mild punishment meted out by members of the covenant whose job it is to enforce such things.
Despite appearances to the contrary, being the ranking member of a coterie is not all about being deferred to and coddled. Every right has a responsibility tightly bound to it. Ranking members are expected to comport themselves as exemplary representatives of Invictus at all times. Much of the decision-making falls to the primus, for example. The primus is expected to be a role model for the rest of her coterie. Subordinate members might be forgiven small trespasses, but the higher one’s rank is, the fewer mistakes the covenant is willing to overlook. A primus who makes a particularly noteworthy blunder — showing disrespect to an elder, losing a large sum of money on an ill-considered investment, straining the Masquerade, alienating a crucial mortal pawn — will quickly find himself the lowest ranking Kindred in his coterie. The secundus will then be promoted to primus, and the formerly lowest ranking member now has power over the individual to whom he used to pander.
The primus enjoys small benefits from his position, but he earns them every night. Responsibility for the coterie’s nightly behavior is his. If the coterie goes astray — if a member of the coterie frenzies in public, if the coterie endangers the Masquerade, if the coterie offends (or kills…) an important Kindred in the city’s own Status hierarchy and doesn’t cover its tracks well enough — the consequences fall on his head. Invictus elders are often strongly inclined to blame a coterie’s failures on either the primus’ faulty judgment (for leading his coterie astray) or incompetent leadership (that proved insufficient to convince the coterie to carry out his will). At times, elders might insist that a particular Kindred stay in the primus position even if he’s screwed up so badly that he would normally go to quintus (or “septimus”).
On the other hand, a successful primus is every elder’s darling. The more a Mentor is known as the patron of a successful primus, the better his social standing is. The better the sponsor’s social standing becomes, the more he’s willing to do for the upwardly mobile primus. The more rewards a primus gleans, the more he has to reward his coterie with. Better feeding grounds, better assignments, larger mortal herds, more investment funds and more capable retainers are all common gifts for a successful primus. If the primus chooses not to share those rewards with her coterie, she’s likely to find that her team has discovered a knack for finding trouble — a knack that disappears once she cultivates a little generosity.
Wise coteries (and the primus in particular) quickly learn not to screw over their lower ranking members, because circumstances often see fluctuations in a coterie’s internal hierarchy, particularly in the group’s first few years together. Given the static nature of Kindred society, a coterie can reasonably be expected to stay together for several decades, so the sooner the members of that coterie learn to play nice together, the better off they’ll be in the long run.
Competition is another source of change within a coterie. Members of the coterie are expected to jockey for position within the coterie. Not doing so indicates a lack of ambition, and The Invictus has no place for those lacking ambition. A primus who rests on his laurels might find himself the new secundus, while a member who lags too far behind the rest of his coterie might be demoted to a less prestigious coterie or punished by a disappointed Mentor for not meeting the covenant’s demand for excellence. At the same time, there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to enhance one’s standing in the coterie. Quietly but regularly outperforming the rest of one’s coterie is one way to gain notice from The Invictus power structure, though it’s limited by the observation power and possible apathy of those watching the coterie’s efforts. A Kindred who does so on a regular basis might expect to remain primus of her coterie for a long time. Alternatively, she might be reassigned to a more prestigious coterie (should such a coterie be deemed to need new blood).
Some coteries are unusually competitive. Such groups constantly struggle to outdo (or undermine) one another in an effort to gain the rank of primus. Members of a coterie might misbehave, make their primus look bad in front of the group’s Mentor or, if things get bad, deliberately botch a task assigned to the coterie. The sabotaging member will suffer, but the primus takes the brunt of the covenant’s displeasure.
Another tactic popular among the upwardly mobile is shedding light on the failings of a peccant coterie mate. Behavior that cleverly reveals the deficiencies of another member of the coterie is considered perfectly acceptable, provided it’s done tactfully, as it makes the coterie stronger in the long run. (It also teaches object lessons to those Kindred who don’t hide their shortcomings effectively.) Anonymously sending evidence of another coterie member’s blunder (photographs of her in frenzy in front of mortals, for example) is a perfect example of this kind of tactic, as is having “a sober word” with a rival of that coterie’s Mentor.
Anything that blatantly undermines coterie cohesion — frequent insubordination, belittling or demoralizing one’s own coterie or undermining the coterie’s legitimate goals in any way — is self-fulfilling prophecy. The definition of “blatantly” differs from domain to domain, though.
If infighting becomes too fierce and the coterie becomes unable to function well because of it, elders might take steps to rectify the situation. Such steps include severe disciplinary action (public flogging or sending a member into torpor), adding or removing members or having the coterie spied upon to determine the source of its disciplinary problems.
Particularly traditional mentors of The Invictus look well upon coteries that show a bit of public scorn for other covenants (occasionally excepting the Lancea Sanctum). It sets a precedent and reinforces The Invictus’ position. Depending on the scorned covenant, this could potentially cause a diplomatic ripple, but First Estate elders are notorious for defusing those situations by denouncing such acts in public and then rewarding them privately. Anything the coterie has said is out, and its subtle corrosive effect will linger far longer than the memories of the masses of Kindred.
That said, it often feels, as Marx did, that religion is the opiate of the masses. When its own membership is involved, however, its thoughts on religion change. While subtle, a pronounced bias against spirituality and religiosity occasionally surfaces within the First Estate. It is fine for other covenants to expound on their bizarre theories of morality, spirituality and concepts of an afterlife, but members of The Invictus who subscribe to any of that could find themselves looked down upon. The First Estate is about ruling here and now, not some theoretical, theological other place.
This antagonism toward religion is due largely to the First Estate’s old (but growing) rivalry with The Lancea Sanctum. When the Camarilla splintered centuries ago, the Spear took its blood magic with it, vowing to use it to Dominate the other covenants. To this night it has failed. In fact, the secular nature of the modern age has shaken The Lancea Sanctum to its core, and the elders of The Invictus appreciate the disparity.
In the modern nights, a few hard-line Invictus Kindred would love nothing better than to see the zealots of The Lancea Sanctum fall by the wayside and become a footnote in Kindred history. One tactic they take is to beat the zealots to the punch and infiltrate religious (or at least Christian) institutions before the Sanctified can establish themselves. This makes churches one of the most hotly contested prizes in the modern nights.
Clever Invictus coteries garner influence within churches whenever possible. Not only can large churches be just as profitable as any other business venture (and sometimes even more so), they provide the coterie with another means of nudging the mortal Herd and determining the attitudes of the kine on a large scale. While a church is a somewhat harder nut for Kindred to crack, The Invictus has its own ways of overcoming that problem. Among other things, clergy — especially the supposedly celibate ones — are easy prey for Daeva seducers and blackmailers. Ventrue can bend wills to their own. Skulking Mekhet and Nosferatu can eavesdrop on confessions, and even Gangrel can be the proverbial fly upon the wall.
The tangible power of the mortal Herd is often overlooked or, worse, disparaged by Kindred of the other covenants with the exception of the Carthians. Kindred who do so seem to forget that the Tradition of the Masquerade exists out of necessity lest the kine overwhelm the Damned and scourge them from their domains.
Like air to men or water to fish, mortal influence is transparent to many vampires, who are so busy reveling in their position at the top of the food chain or indulging their own petty politics that they forget about it. Yet The Invictus remembers.
The First Estate has had centuries to fine-tune its strategies, and many of those revolve around the immense permeability and utility of mortal institutions.
All but the oldest Invictus coteries have at least a member or two who are able to interact with mortals with little difficulty. Should it come to pass that a coterie grows too withdrawn to comfortably pass among the Herd, it might be forced to delegate a good deal of its business dealings to younger Kindred (perhaps their childer). Knowing the untrustworthiness of their own kind, however, most elders put this milestone off as long as possible.
Immersion in the Herd brings many rewards to Invictus coteries. The kine are needy creatures, and Kindred often possess exactly what mortals think they want.
The First Estate knows mortal society, and it knows what channels it likes to go through to achieve its goals. It chooses the wealthy and those who manage wealth as their mortal agents. Bankers, investment brokers, corporate raiders, financial advisors, decadent scions of wealthy families and high-level executives are all ripe for the picking. These are The Invictus’ first-tier cat’s-paws. With the money and power these individuals provide, the covenant can buy influence in any other sector of mortal society it needs to.
To foster its sizeable investment in mortal affairs, esteemed Invictus mentors train the covenant’s coteries in the techniques of influence management from their earliest nights. Charm and money are the covenant’s two major strengths in this regard, but it doesn’t shrink from using other methods to control mortals when necessary.
One of the most insidious ways a Kindred can use these techniques is to gain access to increasingly powerful individuals just by saying, “Introduce me to your superiors.” Such tactics allow a coterie to start out manipulating lower-ranking mortals and then work their way up to the highest echelons of power.
The following are the most popular among the coteries of the First Estate.
A coterie comprising favored childer of Invictus elders might be granted access to some higher-powered influence as a gift (or a test), but most coteries start with nothing and need to establish all of their influence on their own.
Influence not only needs to be cultivated and groomed, it needs to be defended as well. Young coteries often find that once they’ve successfully established their mortal influences, other Kindred are eagerly waiting to reap the benefits of their work. A coterie might find its mortals subjected to Vinculums, coerced into serving another or even killed by another Kindred (or coterie) trying to advance her own mortal pawn. This last is rare, though. Killing influential mortals almost assuredly leads to reprisals, investigations and violations of the Masquerade.
One advantage young Kindred and coteries do have is that, as childer of modern times, they perceive Resources of which elders and ancillae remain unaware. “New economy” companies, prestigious boutique agencies, cutting-edge lounges and nightclubs all serve as examples of these kinds of opportunities. A small press agency that handles a handful of high-profile clients might give fledgling coteries access to the kind of credentials formerly offered only by long-established management companies.
Kindred with good reputations at the hot club of the month have just as many opportunities to rub elbows with the wealthy and powerful as those elders who belong to the longest-lived of social clubs. Power and money still exist to be cultivated and taken. Only their sources vary.
Charm
The Ventrue clan is often the most powerful in individual Invictus domains, and so it happens that many of their tactics are also the tactics of the covenant they shepherd. The Ventrue and Daeva alike are adept at getting what they want through sheer charm or force of will. They’ve had decades to perfect their social skills. They captivate, intrigue and fascinate mortals as a matter of habit, sometimes without even intending to. Given time, any coterie can learn these skills. Even vampires know that mortals are more drawn to honey than to vinegar, so they use their allure and their charm at least as often as criticism and threats. Even if mortal employees find “the boss and his weird cronies” a bit disconcerting, they often find themselves moving closer to them, wanting to be near them, wanting to serve them just the same. This allure, by itself, is often enough to get favors done, contracts signed and the coterie’s will carried out.
Combined with the powers of certain Disciplines, personality grants a coterie a huge degree of latitude when dealing with mortals. Many Invictus coteries claim at least one member with Majesty and often more. Given the pressure placed on Invictus Kindred to operate subtly, even Gangrel and Nosferatu members show at least some rudimentary knowledge of this Discipline.
Cold. Hard. Cash.
As a covenant, The Invictus is outrageously wealthy. It has money; mortals want money. It’s a perfect arrangement for the coteries of the First Estate.
Without necessarily intending to or even being aware of it, mortals broadcast their financial Status to the world. The shoes he wears, the neighborhood he lives in, the accent he speaks with, the car he drives, what he drinks, where he dines and how much he tips all provide clues to the health of a mortal’s finances. Kindred pick up on those clues without even trying. A mortal who’s worried about the next credit card statement, tuition payment or hospital bill is easy pickings.
Money talks and mortals listen. For Kindred, the allure of Vitae surpasses all other wants. Simple greed often goes abandoned in favor of more visceral desires yet money pours into the coffers and Swiss bank accounts of the undead almost unbidden. Over the course of decades, a savvy vampire can easily accrue vast fortunes through clever investments. The First Estate as a whole probably controls billions of dollars. No one vampire controls more than a sizable fraction of that, but many members of The Invictus are quite wealthy personally, and they know how to spread around their wealth to great effect. And mortals, if it need be said, will do almost anything for money.
A thousand dollars is nothing to the average Invictus coterie. To some poor slob trying to make his insurance payment so he can get a vasectomy so he doesn’t have to worry about having another kid, it’s the world, the thing for which he would do anything at that moment. When the amounts get larger — 5,000 dollars, 10,000, 100,000 — there’s very little mortals won’t do. Joe Bureaucrat will never make more than 40 grand a year working at the DMV, but if the pale chick is willing to pay him a substantial fraction of that for letting her into the office late at night and making her five fake licenses (an hour’s work at most), who’s he to say no? If the state really cared about fake licenses, they’d pay him better, right?
Invictus coteries wield wealth like a weapon. They do not do their own dirty work, they pay others to do it for them. The typical modus operandi for an Invictus covenant is that mortal cat’s-paws are used whenever possible, especially when the deeds to be done are… untoward. Certainly, a Kindred’s superior abilities might be needed from time to time, and certain knowledge is best kept from the eyes of the living. It’s far wiser, however, to pay mortals to do the things mortals do then sit back and enjoy the dividends than it is for the coterie to do its own ugly deeds and grunt work. Private investigators, bounty hunters, stock brokers, lawyers, thugs and petty bureaucrats are all easy acquisitions for a shrewd coterie, and they can be worth their weight in gold to those needing their expertise or assistance. They also make convenient screens and buffers against breaches of the Masquerade, and they’re an excellent means of conducting business beyond the view of prying eyes that the coterie can’t otherwise avoid. The Kindred also feel a certain degree of schadenfreude when they tell their lessers, “I’ll have my man look into that for you.”
Few tools are as useful as money for getting mortals to do what you want. Services, information, substances and musthave items are all for sale to coteries with enough Resources. For the coterie involved, cash is the most tedious solution to most problems. Doling out bribes gets repetitive, but it’s too effective not to do.
Experienced Invictus Kindred often maintain that true loyalty cannot be bought on a one-time basis. One-time lump sums elicit appreciation, but not loyalty. A coterie using the same agent repeatedly, however, can cement a pawn’s allegiances with an ongoing financial arrangement. Bonuses, bribes and monetary “tokens of appreciation” are all time-tested tools in the arsenal of The Invictus. Freely giving a mortal small gratuities, over and above sums agreed upon for services rendered, is like Throwing a Bone to a loyal dog. It motivates the pawn to come back for more, and more and more. Doing so on a regular basis also makes them much less likely to betray the coterie for a single bribe. A foe offering a mortal a $1,000 bribe to squeal on his Invictus employers won’t elicit much of a response if the coterie has been paying him $400 a month for several years. Any mortal pawn crucial to an Invictus coterie’s activities knows full well which side his bread is buttered on. Not only can the coterie probably count on such an ally to refuse the bribe, but he might have enough savvy to feign ignorance to the would-be bribe giver and inform the coterie of what happened as soon as possible — all because he expects to be rewarded handsomely for his loyalty.
All the Lonely People
The World of Darkness is a scary, lonely place. Awkwardness and fear isolate individuals and keep them from reaching out to others. People watch television because the world outside scares them so much they don’t have any friends of their own. They jerk off to Internet porn because getting real sex is too genuine, too much trouble and too dangerous. Loneliness equals safety.
Enter the coterie.
Vampires are what mortals dream about: powerful, sexy, Aloof. This makes lonely mortals prime targets for Kindred. Despite their sometimes disturbing appearance, vampires seem to have everything the mortal could want: money, sex, connections, power… Mortals have been known to tell vampires everything about what they do — at the office, at the newspaper, in the morgue or at the nuclear plant — just for a few evenings of companionship. Buying a mortal a few drinks, asking some strategic leading questions, and then listening attentively, nodding from time to time, can get an Invictus vampire more information than he’d even expected. Particularly seductive or manipulative Kindred have been known to trade companionship or sex for trade secrets, birth certificates, death certificates, authentic drivers licenses, stock market information, political campaign strategies, hopes, fantasies and, of course, blackmail material.
Exploiting Need
Mortals sometimes land themselves in the nasty predicament of really needing something. A coterie that can provide such a mortal with what she needs will find itself with a handy debtor. The exact nature of the need varies, but money, love and addictive drugs are all common needs that a savvy coterie might use to clinch a mortal’s service.
Coteries use two different approaches to exploiting mortal need. Those using the hunter approach advocate looking for mortals who are already in need and exploiting them. Kindred who use the farmer approach seek out a suitable mortal and cultivate an exploitable need in him that the Kindred will then be able to use like a handle. Hunting requires putting in the effort to find a mortal with a suitable need that the coterie can meet. Farming is easier but requires a longer term of cultivation. (It’s also less ethical and might require a degeneration check when its efforts come to fruition.)
Hypothetically, say an Invictus coterie needs the mayor’s ear because he’s about to pass an ordinance that will close all clubs and bars at midnight, making it harder for the city’s Kindred to feed. A coterie using the hunter approach would likely do some reconnaissance to see if anyone in the mayor’s immediate circle needed something it could provide in exchange for counseling the mayor against such a rash move. Doing so might require an Investigation, Larceny or Streetwise roll or funds to hire a private investigator.
A coterie that subscribes to the farmer approach would be more inclined to “accidentally” run into the mayor’s daughter at a club and ask if she likes to party. From there they can give her a “free sample” of a popular designer drug to get her started on her way to Addiction. They might take blackmail photos in the same evening. Even if she’s not “that kind of girl” Dominate and Majesty go a long way, though clever Kindred hardly need Disciplines for this kind of operation. Mortals are eager to be led, and vampires are happy to lead them. Once the coterie has brought the daughter under its sway, it then withholds the drug until she puts serious pressure on her father to change his mind.
Satisfying the mortal’s need is rarely difficult. Money is easy to come by for Invictus coteries, for example, as are drugs and other ready vices. Individuals whose need is for another person can be trickier. If the mortal is pining for a particular beloved — a man obsessed with his brother’s wife, a gay man in love with a straight man, or a woman who would do anything to get her ex-husband back — strategic use of many Disciplines can usually get the needy one what he or she is craving, at least a few times.
Mortals who allow themselves to need something this badly are not good candidates for long-term tools. It takes a certain self-destructive bent to become this obsessive in the first place, and that self-destructive tendency can turn around and bite the coterie in the ass. Furthermore, some needs can be fulfilled only once (like the guy who just wants to have sex with his brother’s wife one time), after which point they have no ability to motivate. Of course, at that point there are other tactics a coterie can use.
Blackmail
For gaining solid, long-term cooperation from mortals, nothing beats a good camera and a thorough mastery of Dominate. A single explicit photograph of the right corporate board member can go a long way toward pushing a coterie’s municipal agenda toward fruition. Kindred have little difficulty acquiring blackmail evidence on mortals who won’t cooperate any other way. Most Kindred find it easy to convince mortals to commit deeds they would never commit on their own, and once these activities are captured on film (or videotape), there’s little the target can do to refute appearances. A coterie might use blackmail tactics against a priest who was about to preach against “the supernatural threat,” or a doctor who was about to put too much information into a death certificate. Anyone with Status to lose is a perfect candidate for blackmail. The lower an individual’s place in the mortal hierarchy is, the less effective blackmail is.
Blackmail tactics are not the way for a coterie to win friends, but it does influence people, and a coterie in a tight position can fall back on quick and dirty tactics like blackmail all too easily.
Threats
Sometimes, the old ways work best. While not subtle or good for ongoing situations, threats of violence can yield results that nothing else will. While many Kindred fancy themselves civilized, several prefer the blunter instruments of force and coercion. Particularly when time is short, the more subtle means of persuasion can go out the window. These tools are effective in the short term, but rarely longer, as fear has a relatively brief shelf-life and rapidly degrades into resentment against the feared party or parties. On rare occasion, threats can facilitate the coterie’s business, but only with individuals the coterie is unlikely to encounter ever again. A coterie in a situation where results, not loyalty, are important, might indeed unleash the coterie’s Gangrel, Nosferatu or cruel Daeva on the object of its ire, but situations where such behavior is appropriate should be few and far between.
The Vinculum
The thralldom brought about by The Vinculum sways mortals to do things that nothing else will. An enthralled mortal will side with her Kindred domitor against her family, against social pressure and against the law. The Vinculum evokes from thralls an utterly sycophantic loyalty, particularly when the thrall is treated well. Invictus coteries are loath to use The Vinculum to manage their mortal assets, though, for myriad reasons. First and foremost, resorting to The Vinculum is sometimes seen as acknowledging defeat, admitting that the mortal in question is immune to manipulation through any other means. Such admissions of incompetence might be fine for coteries affiliated with other covenants, but The Invictus expects more sophistication from its members.
That said, under pressure from other Kindred, a coterie might find that it has no choice but to subject certain key Contacts or crucial influence brokers to The Vinculum to keep them from falling prey to other vampires who might try to “poach” a group’s influence. If one of the city’s gangs is experiencing a string of successes that place it at the apex of the city’s underworld, no doubt someone among The Invictus wants that gang to answer to her. Submitting the gang’s leader(s) to The Vinculum is going to be the safest way to make sure that that Kindred controls that gang. Otherwise, other covenants are going to offer more money, make graver threats and the like until the mortal capitulates. Only The Vinculum cuts off the possibility of another coterie taking control of that mortal. It’s a lock on pawns that Kindred use both hesitantly and strategically.
A coterie that subjects a mortal to The Vinculum for this reason usually follows up by launching a concerted offensive against the party or parties who forced it to use The Vinculum. In this way it makes sure that such tactics aren’t called for again.
There’s another reason The Invictus is sparing in its use of The Vinculum. The Invictus has noted that certain other Kindred, mages, Lupines and some witch-hunters can detect its use in mortals, which can cause… problems that The Invictus is happier avoiding.
Ghouls
For their closest servants, those they have to trust (such as the caretaker of their haven) Kindred commonly use Ghouls. Ghouls have a number of drawbacks, not the least of which is that Kindred Vitae sometimes causes Ghouls to become somewhat unhinged. But the combination of The Vinculum that eventually develops and the thirst for Vitae make for powerful leverage.
Ghouls are great for retainers or even for brute-force tactics, but Kindred don’t make Ghouls a regular part of their business deals or influence brokering. It’s simply too great a liability, especially as Kindred Vitae becomes more potent and the Vitae on which they can slake their thirsts becomes scarcer. That said, there are times when Ghouls are the best tools for the job.
Even the most useful mortal pawns can age and die. This can sometimes pose a problem, especially for Invictus coteries that dislike such change and upheaval. Ghouls have the advantage of longevity over normal mortals. A coterie might be inclined to turn mortals into Ghouls as a way to keep certain talented functionaries — lawyers, bookkeepers, private bankers and the like — around longer than their natural spans would permit.
Not only does creating a ghoul increase the tool’s value by extending its life, but its loyalty is also assured. If the vampires absolutely, positively have to trust a pawn (as they must those performing their daylight business), more often than not that individual will be a ghoul.
Ghouls kept by a coterie are easier to maintain than those kept by individual Kindred. Even one ghoul can be a drain on a Kindred’s Vitae, but a coterie can keep two or three Ghouls properly fed without being unduly taxed. On the other hand, when a Vinculum eventually does form, the ghoul might suddenly become resistant or even obnoxious to other members of the coterie. Many Ghouls maintained in this regard are “short-term investments,” that is, individuals the coterie needs now but not for much longer.
Elders
The Invictus’ frequent interaction with mortals often has the welcome side effect of staving off degeneration and helping to maintain functional levels of Humanity. High Humanity increases a vampire’s waking hours and minimizes the length of Torpor, giving high-Humanity elders a more noticeable presence among the Kindred overall. This grants The Invictus something of an advantage over covenants that don’t work well with mortals (such as the Lancea Sanctum). Much of the power wielded by the First Estate comes from its many elders — the big guns and power players of the Kindred world. Invictus coteries often have more frequent and cordial relations with their elders than most Kindred do, and they can use this advantage in the veiled nightly conflicts of the Kindred world.
In addition, it is common knowledge among the Kindred that an unusually high percentage of Invictus vampires are on very good terms with their elders (as represented in the game mechanics by the low cost of the Mentor Merit for Invictus characters). A coterie might find itself at an impasse with another Kindred until they reveal that they are all the protégés of Octavio the Seneschal, at which point negotiations favor them.
While Invictus coteries often do have an advantage over other vampires in the form of their access to elders, it is an advantage that many are loath to call upon. Name-dropping is a fragile form of power, and one that reminds a coterie that it is too weak to meet its objectives without falling back on another’s power or reputation. The elder in question might not appreciate it either.
Members of an Invictus coterie might ask an elder to intercede on their behalf with a ranking member of the domain’s hierarchy, or they might gain an audience with the Prince because of their elder’s influence.
An Invictus coterie with good relations with its elders can often simply go over the heads of others in the same age bracket to get things done. The coterie might not have enough clout to have the Regent’s childe investigated for Diablerie, for example, but an elder (especially a Primogen or a Priscus) might. If the coterie is on particularly good terms with the elder in question, it might not even have to promise her anything in return.
Alternatively, an enemy might believe he has all of a coterie’s forces tied up (through legal wrangling or other tactics), only to find that it was his influence that was being tied up as the full weight of an elder’s influence comes down on him like a hammer, costing him money, standing in his covenant or the city and possibly even his Haven. This would likely benefit the elder more than the coterie as she would undoubtedly help herself to the spoils of war, but the coterie would have the pleasure of seeing an enemy crushed.
Tradition
More effective with other Invictus Kindred than those of other covenants, calling upon tradition can weaken an opponent’s position politically. For vampires, static creatures who eschew change, tradition is a weightier matter than it is for mortals who can change their minds or establish new traditions more easily. If a long-standing precedent exists establishing that only a domain’s Prince may have more than two progeny in the city at one time, The Invictus coterie would most likely assert that such a policy must surely be in place for a good reason. To claim otherwise would be an insult to the wisdom of all the Kindred who came before and agreed on this matter.
The reason that The Invictus is so tradition-bound, of course, is that it probably established many of The Traditions common in modern Kindred domains in the first place. If The Invictus wants to change tradition, it calls doing so “bringing Kindred society into the modern age.” If any other covenant wants to change a tradition, The Invictus calls it radicalism.
Influence
Whereas The Lancea Sanctum think of mortals as nothing but food, and Carthians see them as comrades, The Invictus thinks of mortals as tools — and powerful ones at that.
In many domains, Invictus coteries often wield more mortal influence than those of any other covenant (with the possible exception of the Carthian Movement), and it makes them formidable opponents. Members of other covenants might have access to strange blood magic and powerful Kindred Allies, but only an Invictus coterie can have its enemy arrested (or shot) by mortal police, have the enemy’s Haven condemned and slated for demolition and have her Ghouls murdered by the local crime boss, all with only three quick phone calls.
The Vinculum
While it’s rarely called for among mortals, a coterie that needs to keep other Kindred in line might be somewhat more amenable to using The Vinculum. Many of the tactics used to manage mortals either aren’t applicable when dealing with other Kindred or simply don’t work well enough to rely on them. Crude though it is, The Vinculum works. As it does with mortals, The Vinculum reduces the thrall to an emotionally dependent slave. Why compete with an adversary when you can enslave her and have her cater to your every whim?
As effective as it is, The Vinculum is rare between Kindred. No one wants to subordinate himself to another unless there’s no getting around it.
Still, Kindred aren’t stupid. Most vampires recognize the symptoms of a Vinculum when they see them, so it’s not like the blood bond is the be all and end all of control. Enslaving a key member of Kindred society might come with certain social rewards, though, especially if the thrall is known for being a foe of The Invictus.
Force
The Invictus uses force as a last resort, but it does use force if order is breaking down. The First Estate portrays itself as having both gravitas and discipline. After all, someone has to keep fractious Kindred in line. When vampires question or ignore the weight of tradition and the debt of fealty, The Invictus might call upon its coteries to deal with the problem. The elders and Inner Circle members of the First Estate are willing to ignore ethical lapses, lying, double-dealing and an array of other behavioral defects, but anything that disorders the Kindred world, imperils The Traditions or threatens the existing model angers The Invictus. And The Invictus has a long history of destroying those who anger it.
Consequently, Invictus coteries have an edge over some of their peers in other covenants. Threats might be enough to keep rogue Kindred in line, but failing that, the coterie might invoke The Invictus’ responsibility to maintain order. At the very least, that provides the coterie with a plausible cover story, and it might be enough to capture the interest of more powerful figures (such as the Judex).
Given how much of an Invictus coterie’s time is spent making nice with mortals, it’s not uncommon for the more aggressive members of a coterie to get a little rambunctious from time to time. Invictus coteries might resort to forceful tactics merely as a way to keep those members satisfied and quiescent.
A coterie might resort to violence if an elder sends it to put down an elder from a rival covenant, as a show of force in a city where the Masquerade had been violated too many times or if The Invictus as a whole were making a play for dominance in a domain.
That said, The Invictus is neither blind nor stupid. Elders of the covenant might want to hoard power, but they show coteries of young vampires as much respect as necessary and trust them with more responsibility than they would otherwise, in order to maintain or grow its membership base.
Expedited advancement through the covenant’s ranks is especially common in many American cities, for example, where childer of Invictus members regularly leave the First Estate for the Carthians or other covenants. America is the land of instant gratification, and neonates who still possess their mortal reckoning of time are not interested in serving the covenant for 50 years before gaining some tiny measure of respect from their higher ups in the covenant. Scions of the covenant have compromised by giving young coteries more responsibilities to shoulder than they would get otherwise. Doing so serves to advance them through the ranks faster. This approach poses risks to both the elders and the fledgling coterie, but given the First Estate’s difficulty in North America, it’s unavoidable.
Conversely, in the Old World, where history goes back further, where echoes of the feudal system are still resounding and sovereignty is properly respected, even neonates are inclined to take a longer-term view of advancement. Many young Kindred are not just willing, but eager to serve The Invictus until such time as they rise to the top of the heap, be it decades or centuries. Advancement in such places is slow, but it’s more comfortable for the elders and probably less risky for young Kindred.
Regardless of the speed of advancement, young coteries are largely put to the same uses.
At the elder level, many Invictus members reach the very highest levels of the Kindred power structure. Many elder coteries need to flex or reconfigure themselves to accommodate their members’ ranks. If one member of the coterie becomes Prince or Regent, for example, she will almost certainly have little time to participate in the coterie’s business. That said, the coterie as a whole might be plunged into whole new levels of politics as the Prince decides to make the members of her coterie into Regents of their own tenurial domains. The first step taken by most Invictus Kindred when attaining a major position of power is to reward the members of their coteries. Not to use the power of a new office to do so is a faux pas of catastrophic proportions and would likely result in extremely embittered former coterie-mates.
The face of The Invictus, the one it lets be seen, is a mélange of the faces of those in the apex positions of Kindred society: the powerful and experienced Invictus Prince, the crafty Invictus Primogen, the influential Invictus Priscus. The irony, of course, is that these old, powerful figures make up a small minority of the First Estate’s membership. For every wellknown and obvious Invictus Prince giving the organization a face, there are 10 coteries of younger Kindred acting as the covenant’s eyes, hands and daggers.
Belonging to an Invictus coterie means helping oneself to the grudging respect of most other covenants, but it also means serving the covenant’s hierarchy like a slave for decades in hopes of being found worthy to advance in the organization.
Serving The Invictus as part of a coterie is an inescapable part of being a member of the covenant. From the covenant’s perspective, being a member of The Invictus is a privilege, and the privilege is a reward for loyal service. An Invictus vampire who refuses to join a coterie is considered highly suspicious and, probably, a loose cannon waiting to go off. Teamwork and fulfilling one’s role in the chain of command are crucial to The Invictus strategy. Any vampire who can’t master them has no future in the First Estate.
Kindred of The Invictus swear oaths of fealty to Princes and other authority figures, and they carry out the will of their superiors until such night that they are the superior and have vassals of their own offering pledges of fealty. Neonates and young ancillae are commonly gathered into coteries and used as “knights errant” to accomplish those tasks that are deemed important to the covenant, but not worth the direct attention of its ancilla or elders. It gives young coteries a taste of Invictus politics, keeps younger Kindred from falling to idleness and lets them get a bit of experience under their belts while advancing the covenant’s agenda. Older ancillae have attained a degree of experience and sophistication through their work for the First Estate and are more likely to take up the role of “idle nobles.” Such nobles must have earned the right to attend to their own business through their prior work for the covenant, and they must continue to pay proper tribute to the Prince and elders of the domain upon request — unless The Invictus directly opposes that Prince and his regime. Always, similar oaths bind these ancillae to elders of The Invictus itself, occasionally making for split loyalties that covenant elders demand favor them. These ancillae nobles are usually well versed in the covenant’s politics, however, and have no problem flattering, ingratiating themselves and serving their elders as needed — as long as such behavior furthers their personal agendas.
Psychology
Those Kindred who expect to rise to the top of The Invictus hierarchy find themselves facing something of a conundrum. Most members of the covenant are intently focused on furthering their own goals, their own well-being and their own agendas. “I” is the operative word in every sentence uttered by an Invictus vampire. The overall goal of membership in the covenant is to acquire power and, hopefully, to ascend to any one of a variety of Kindred positions, whether in the covenant’s local hierarchy or the overarching domain itself. That said, there’s no progressing through The Invictus’ ranks without proving that one can work well with others. When looking at the structure of The Invictus, one thing becomes quite clear: The most basic element of the First Estate is not the individual, but the coterie. Even the greatest lord’s power is much diminished if those sworn to him won’t lift a finger for his cause. Only in groups do Kindred possess enough importance, enough substance, to be noticed by the great and terrible Invictus. Members of the First Estate who insist on going solo often find themselves written off and forgotten as eccentrics by those in positions of power unless they take some bold action to distinguish themselves from the rabble. While this is possible, it is also extremely difficult and commensurately rare. And so it is in groups, then, that the vast majority of Invictus Kindred make their way through the Requiem and attend to the business of their covenant. For self-obsessed creatures like the Kindred, this is no mean feat.Paying Dues
No vampire pledges himself with The Invictus without the goal of one night wielding immense power and influence as a mighty elder among the Kindred. Even the rawest neophytes of the First Estate take comfort that being a veritable serf among The Invictus carries more prestige than being a lapdog for any other covenant. The interwoven melodies of power and prestige are at the core of The Invictus’ siren song. Within the First Estate, however, the reality is that a tiny fraction of those who join will ever wield the kind of power they dream of. The Invictus’ membership comprises 10 Kindred for every position of real power in the covenant and its domains. The current elders know this, and they offer younger Kindred occasional tastes and flashes of the power that could one night be theirs — perhaps commanding a handful of coteries or even being Prince for an hour or two. Then they remind them that before they can attain those lofty heights of power, they have to pay their dues. To do otherwise, the elders say, would be unjust to those who have striven long for their position and would almost certainly result in power falling into the hands of the unworthy — a state of affairs The Invictus will not allow. Once elders have given the young a glimpse of the glories of power and informed them of the hoops they’ll need to jump through before they can wield that power, the rest is up to the ambition of the young Kindred. Those who don’t like the odds may leave the covenant, but most take their chances and side with The Invictus. After all, what is a decade (or two or three…) of paying dues compared to long centuries of power and the respect of one’s fellow Kindred?And so the neonates and ancillae of The Invictus gather into orderly coteries night after night, doing as they’re told and furthering their covenant’s myriad local goals.
Paying dues is not just a matter of persistence, but of performance as well. At every level, the covenant provides its members with ample means to weed themselves out of the running. This one proves herself too violent. That one proves himself incompetent with money. The other shows himself incapable of maintaining order in his coterie. Each successive hoop the Kindred jumps through is a little narrower than the one before it, and with each success, the rewards are greater. For the neonates and ancillae of the covenant, coteries are the social environment in which they prove their mettle. For the elders, coteries are the petri dishes in which they conduct their experiments in Kindred governance.
As a unit, the coterie also provides Kindred with a means of coming to terms with unlife that’s safer — both for the vampire and those around her — than letting individuals run around alone. In the absence of a group’s moderating influence, a solitary Kindred is prone to more extreme behavior. Temptation and anger, occasionally catalyzed by boredom, can get a grip on a lone vampire far more easily than one who is part of a coterie. Experience has shown such Kindred to be more likely to fall prey to petty temptations, threaten the well-being of other Kindred and generally make rash decisions more than those in coteries, who have the advantage of a group’s tempering influence — a crucial advantage to those who want to sustain their Humanity over the centuries.
The Invictus values experience in its members. It does not aim to be an institution of purely inherited lordships. Power is too precious to be given to those who do not understand how to earn it through diligence and wield it with discretion. Members of The Invictus must prove themselves worthy of the power and authority invested in them in their night-to-night comportment. Even the most self-serving elder knows when a favored childe is incompetent to take over in his absence, and in most cases, such a childe is more likely to meet an unexpected demise than progress any further through the covenant’s ranks. The best way a neonate in The Invictus can rise through the hierarchy is to gain experience, and the safest way to gather experience in the cutthroat world of the Kindred is within the confines of a coterie. Therefore, an elder may ask his childe to take care of some of his less taxing business, including monitoring stock portfolios, soliciting potential mortal pawns or representing his interests at a meeting of some sort. This introduces the childe to the realities of The Invictus, but in a relatively safe way that (probably) doesn’t put the neonate (and his coterie) at risk.
The Invictus also places a premium on a Kindred’s ability to cooperate with her fellows. Those who understand the intricacies of power realize early on that ruling is more than issuing edicts, it is the fine art of motivating those of lesser Status to carry out one’s will and, ideally, to do so with enthusiasm. A leader who is unable to do that is no leader at all, but, rather, a figurehead and, likelier than not, a target. Elders, then, advance Kindred according to their ability to function in the context of a coterie, and woe betide the vampire who prefers his own company. A vampire who insists on being a loner, a maverick or a rebel clearly does not have what it takes to rise to the position of prominence. The same goes for those who prove themselves incapable of functioning effectively in a coterie.
Membership in an Invictus coterie is a balancing act. Those Kindred who stick out too much, especially for the wrong reasons, are more likely to be considered questionable choices for promotion in the covenant. Those who are too quiet to make some kind of a name for themselves never bring themselves to the notice of others and never get considered in the first place. As many Invictus elders and ancillae have counseled their childer, “It’s the middle path that takes one the farthest through the night.”
The grooming of Invictus vampires begins early. Fledglings are counseled to choose their coteries carefully, lest their images be marred by association with Kindred of poor lineage or scurrilous behavior. Within The Invictus, it is a common practice for sires to place their childer into coteries, so Invictus vampires whose sires are also members of The Invictus are more likely to be assigned to a coterie. On the other hand, a character who leaves his sire’s covenant to join The Invictus has more latitude in choosing his own associates. The more powerful or prestigious vampires of The Invictus have the luxury of placing their childer into coteries with other powerful Kindred. Once so placed, a neonate is expected to interact effectively with her new coterie and reflect well on her sire. Sires take note when a childe fails to do either. Worse, so do the other elders.
A Kindred abandoning her assigned coterie with any but the most compelling reasons (the coterie was plotting the Diablerie of the city’s elders, for example) had best be leaving the covenant at the same time, because she will quickly find her opportunities for advancement within The Invictus considerably thinned. Her sire will probably not be inclined to go out of his way to do her any more favors. Within the First Estate, a childe’s actions reflect strongly on her sire (and vice versa), and a childe who defects from the covenant is one of the greatest embarrassments an Invictus member can suffer.
The Oaths of The Invictus
Invictus coteries are expected to swear loyalty to one elder, usually the Prince, if the Prince is an Invictus member, but any member of the covenant is appropriate. If, through some result of politics, The Invictus holds no important seats in a city, coteries might swear their allegiance to any First Estate elder or even an experienced ancilla. Two of the three oaths are matters of great pomp and circumstance at their swearing, with all involved Kindred dressed in full regalia and performing ceremonial rites established centuries ago during the age of the Camarilla. These rituals often take hours, with the covenant’s elders watching as the pledging vampire makes a long speech in which he swears his oath in the most verbose manner possible, followed by the elder accepting the pledge, also in lengthy, formal terms. After that, the elder is congratulated on his new vassal and the vassal passes through a greeting line of all important Invictus elders and ancillae in the city, ostensibly so they can pass on wise or inspiring bon mots, though that does not always prove to be the case.What the elder gets from the young Kindred is relatively straightforward, but what the younger vampires get from the older varies a great deal. Sometimes the coterie members benefit from easy access to the elder they’re sworn to, other times the elder provides them with a commitment of Resources or a competent servant of some sort (equal to Retainer ••• or better). However it turns out, the elder almost always gets the better end of the bargain.
How a particular elder comes to accept the services of a particular coterie can be a convoluted tale in itself. Sometimes the elder simply needs vassals because his operations have expanded or his old vassals have been disgraced or promoted or met a grisly end. Alternatively, he might take on the coterie as a favor to a colleague, a Mentor or his sire. A coterie’s experience with its liege depends largely on the elder’s reasons for taking on the coterie. An elder who really needs the Kindred in question is likely to treat them better and be more assiduous in helping them advance than one who sees them as a burden taken on as a favor.
Elders judge coteries according to a range of criteria. A well-rounded coterie is generally most sought after because such coteries can be assigned to any task, whereas a martially inclined coterie, for example, is good only for breaking bones. This can change depending on the state of the city, of course. An elder who is involved in lots of touchy diplomatic work might be more inclined to go for a socially adept, diplomatic coterie than a generally competent one.
A truly accomplished coterie might find itself the object of a kind of bidding war, with elders offering increasingly enticing rewards for servitude. A coterie in this position might find itself shocked at the money, power and privilege thrown in its direction, and it can get very flattering, but once the group pledges its loyalty to one elder, it had best be prepared to weather the ire of those other elders left standing.
The three types of oaths the coterie can take include the Oath of Service, the Oath of Defense and the Oath of Fealty. A demanding title-holder or elder is likely to expect a coterie to swear an Oath of Fealty to her, but a more relaxed elder, an elder who already has her bases covered, or one who simply isn’t that concerned about such things, might allow a coterie to serve in some lesser capacity.
The Oath of Service
The least binding of the oaths sworn by Invictus coteries, the Oath of Service loosely binds a group of Kindred to carry out their lord’s will on a nightly basis. The connection forged by an oath of this sort isn’t particularly deep, more akin to the bond between employer and favored employee. Such oaths are deliberately undemanding, allowing the lord to pursue his agenda, albeit casually, through the actions of the coterie without burdening the group excessively. A coterie serving an elder in this way might expect to attend to one or two issues of its lord’s business at that liege’s will, but otherwise its time is its own. These duties might include acting as a courier, meeting with a lawyer or banker on the elder’s behalf, overseeing a business interest or similar duty. Elders might expect this sort of oath from more established coteries of ancillae with whom they have an almost collegial relationship. The elder understands that the ancillary coterie has an agenda of its own and grants the group time to pursue it once business has been attended to.Expecting more from an arrangement of this sort is considered both unwise and unseemly. An elder who wants more from the coterie should ask for a more binding oath. Breaking an oath of this sort — by “forgetting” to perform the promised duties or getting sidetracked with some other business — is held to be rude, disrespectful and possibly scandalous, but not particularly serious or criminal. A coterie that breaks an Oath of Service is often punished by an Invictus Harpy or other public figure, who gleefully drags the coterie’s reputation through the dirt. The offended elder might even dismiss the coterie and refuse the group all further aid. Breaking even an Oath of Service could impair the coterie’s reputation enough to impede its advancement through the covenant’s ranks.
The Oath of Defense
The Oath of Defense is an emergency oath that comes into play only if the coterie’s lord is in danger and summons them or if the coterie members learn of plans against their lord. It is not unheard of for a coterie to swear an Oath of Service to one elder and an Oath of Defense to another. A coterie may not swear an Oath of Defense to more than one lord. Invictus Princes and other high-ranking elders of the covenant, who already have enough sworn Kindred (and don’t need any more Oaths of Service), almost always have nascent coteries swear Oaths of Defense as a matter of course. Almost a type of “stealth oath,” the Oath of Defense is quiet and unobtrusive in the coterie’s night-to-night activities. It’s obvious whom a coterie is serving openly, but no one knows whom a coterie is sworn to defend, if anyone at all. Finding out to whom a coterie has sworn an Oath of Defense is often a means of finding out where that coterie’s true loyalties lie. An Oath of Defense is a contingency arrangement that might never even be invoked. Decades might pass without the lord ever calling on this oath, but when he does call, the coterie is expected to drop anything else it might be doing and come to his defense immediately.The Oath of Defense stipulates two things. First, the coterie taking such an oath will do everything possible to return to the side of its lord in times of conflict, danger or upheaval. This could mean abandoning other duties and gracefully accepting the consequences for doing so. In return, the coterie is able to call upon its liege for much weightier matters than a mere Oath of Service would entitle them to. Second, the coterie is obliged to be attentive to any potential threat to its lord and to inform her immediately of any manner of plot, scheme or conspiracy against her.
Because the Oath of Defense requires the liege to have absolute faith in the loyalty of the vassal, rare is the elder who will accept an Oath of Defense from a coterie that has ever broken any other kind of oath.
Breaking an Oath of Defense is considered an unforgivable breach of trust. Someone to whom such a coterie has sworn and broken the oath might push for a blood hunt or otherwise call for the Final Death of her betrayers. Characters might survive the experience, but they’ll need to keep a very low profile and find protection soon thereafter, most likely with another covenant (provided the new covenant wants the oathbreakers…). Furthermore, if the liege meets Final Death because the characters defaulted on their oath, other dutiful elders of The Invictus who know about the forsaken bond will likely make sure that the characters are hunted to the extent of their influence.
Oaths of Defense do offer a few ways to circumvent them. At the lord’s wish, they can lapse entirely, which occasionally happens as a coterie falls from favor or the sworn Kindred wishes to disassociate himself with them. If the Kindred to whom the oath is sworn ever forms a Vinculum to one of the Kindred in the coterie, the oath is considered null as well, as the peculiarity of the resulting relationship would call the validity of the oath into question. Finally, any Kindred of greater Status than the lord to whom the oath is sworn can cancel the oath, but only if the coterie so sworn instead transfers its oath to that Kindred instead.
The Oath of Fealty
The most absolute of The Invictus oaths, an Oath of Fealty binds the coterie to serve its lord without fail or question. Swearing fealty to an elder leaves no room for a coterie to swear any lesser oaths to another elder. It presumes and supercedes the Oaths of Service and Defense, and it incorporates the additional stipulation that the coterie will proactively and independently seek to work in its lord’s best interest in all ways. Coteries swear an Oath of Fealty to a powerful liege might find themselves in the very thick of elder politics, which is generally very educational, but it is also unlikely to leave the coterie with much time to pursue its members’ own agendas.Only under tremendously dire circumstances would an elder approach the members of a coterie asking them to swear an Oath of Fealty. An elder who’s already familiar with a coterie’s work and ethics might, at the most, casually mention in conversation that he’s looking for a coterie to Mentor in exchange for service, but even that might be perceived as overstepping bounds by more hidebound members of the First Estate. Invictus tradition stipulates that a coterie must humbly approach an elder whose vassals they wish to be. The elder then asks how the Kindred wish to serve him and informs them of what he’s willing to do for them in exchange. If both sides are satisfied with the terms, the formal ceremonies are scheduled. Should one or both sides not like the terms, tradition indicates that negotiations may take place between the two parties. If that is not sufficient to resolve differences, both parties are free to go their separate ways, and no harm is done — at least theoretically. Some wouldbe lieges grow vindictive when coteries approach them and then reject them when their offers aren’t sufficient. Likewise some coteries have turned subtly hostile to elders whom they have perceived as arrogant, demanding or thrifty with their beneficence.
A coterie swearing the Oath of Fealty to a lord is likely to be kept quite close to that lord. They operate in whatever capacity he desires them to, from valets to account managers to assassins. The relationship between lord and vassals can become very intense, and many lords resort to The Vinculum with their vassals, so they can be sure that their trust is well placed.
A coterie is likely to swear an Oath of Fealty if their liege is uncommonly powerful, or if they’re expecting an unusual degree of assistance from her.
Unlike other oaths, the Oath of Fealty is sworn for only a year or a decade at a time. At the end of that period (agreed upon before the oath is sworn), both the liege and the vassal coterie have the option of rethinking the agreement. The elder can dismiss the coterie, ask more of it or promise more compensation. For its part, the coterie can ask for more compensation or stipulate any other changes it wants made before agreeing to another term of duty.
As with the Oath of Defense, breaking an Oath of Fealty is grounds for immediate and severe retribution. Given the amount of gravity with which The Invictus imparts its oaths, anything less would defy its principles.
Fulfilling the Oath
An elder may “lend” a coterie bound by Oaths of Service or Fealty (but not Defense) to another vampire in the same way that he can lend access to his feeding grounds. This is done, usually on a temporary basis, as a sign of favor to an ally or subordinate. A loaned coterie serves its temporary master just as it would its regular lord, with the understanding that any attempt to turn the coterie against its original master immediately nullifies the arrangement.Whole hierarchies of oaths underpin the nightly functioning of the Danse Macabre. A neonate might be in a coterie sworn to serve an ancilla, who has, in turn, sworn an Oath of Fealty to an elder (or some powerful figure in the city hierarchy). The Kindred, of course, have rules for how such things work. A coterie functioning under an Oath of Service is not obligated to turn its own servants to serving its lord, but a coterie that has sworn an Oath of Defense or of Fealty is. In times of conflict, entire chains or cascades of oaths can be called into play that had theretofore been kept entirely secret. This is one of many reasons that Kindred of other covenants are hesitant to take action against Invictus elders. It may appear that they are attacking a single elder (no small feat in its own right), but in reality they are warring on that elder, any Kindred who has sworn an Oath of Defense or Oath of Fealty to her, and a cavalcade of subordinate Kindred who have sworn such oaths to them (and so on). Therefore, a vampire who thinks he’s making war on one elder might find that he faces the entirety of The Invictus’ local might.
Types of Coteries
All coteries are not created equal. It’s possible for a coterie to change from one type of coterie to another, but that’s unusual, primarily because the function served by a coterie is determined by the makeup of that coterie. A coterie composed entirely of Daeva and Ventrue will probably not be a part of a law coterie, while a coterie of three Gangrel, a Mekhet and a Nosferatu is unlikely to be a very adept social coterie. That said, even the static nature of Kindred allows for some change as the group gets more skills under its belt. A coterie that begins its time together as hired muscle roughing up mortals could yet wind up acting as ambassadors, Harpies or the Inner Circle itself.Social Coteries
These groups gather to monitor the Kindred social scene. They’re often affiliated in one way or another with a domain’s Harpy, possibly sworn to him if he’s a member of the First Estate. They might be composed of the city’s social elite, busybodies or just ardent connoisseurs of gossip.An average night could find such a coterie attending (or putting on) a masquerade ball in Elysium, gossiping with a Regent, plotting to undermine another coterie’s social standing or making the rounds of the Rack’s best dance clubs. Other coteries sometimes find social coteries The Invictus hopelessly frivolous, but who says the Requiem always has to focus on the Danse Macabre?
Daeva, Ventrue and exceptionally social Mekhet are the primary members of such coteries, but Nosferatu are also common members due to their ability and willingness to provoke responses from other Kindred.
Law Coteries
The Invictus doesn’t expect proper behavior from Kindred, it demands it. To maintain order, The Invictus puts together law coteries (occasionally called posses) intended to lobby for changes in local policy. Occasionally, such coteries serve the will of the Sheriff, especially when the Sheriff is a member of The Invictus or the covenant is closely tied to the city’s prevailing political power. Law coteries might be dispatched to investigate a Kindred’s disappearance, to “neutralize” vampires who have become revenants or, more generally, to beat down any Kindred who’s disturbing the peace as The Invictus (or their lord) sees it. In some Invictus domains, law coteries take the place of a Sheriff and his Hounds. Kindred of all clans are evenly represented in law coteries, but Gangrel and Nosferatu tend to form a large portion of such groups.Cover-Up Coteries
Comprising Kindred with influence in the media and law enforcement as well as the social graces to be effective, cover-up coteries are dispatched when the Masquerade has been breached to a potentially catastrophic degree. Their job is to destroy evidence of the breach and convince the public that nothing happened that was in any way out of the ordinary. Violent conflicts between covenants keep these coteries busy. On a given night, such a coterie might need to explain to the police or media how a violent thug was hit by a hail of bullets and still ran off into the night, how a woman threw a sewer lid at a police car a quarter of a block away or destroy a videotape of a group of strangely pale, shadow-faced individuals performing a bizarre blood ritual. Ventrue, Mekhet and Daeva often make up the majority of such coteries.Reconnaissance Coteries
Travel outside cities is neither easy nor common for the Kindred, but sometimes it’s important for The Invictus to know what’s happening at the perimeter of the city lights. In those cases, it assembles a coterie to venture out and report back. Some of these coteries don’t make it back, but those that survive more than a mission or two are considered quite valuable. Such coteries include members of any clan, but Gangrel and Mekhet are almost always well represented.Knightly Coteries
Coteries of young Kindred pay their dues to The Invictus by performing the covenant’s nightly business, whatever that happens to be at the moment. A very general excuse for a coterie, knightly coteries are usually the result of swearing an Oath of Service or Fealty to an Invictus elder. In some cases it might mean working against the other covenants as the group is sent out to spy on or undermine Carthians, prevent The Lancea Sanctum from recruiting or similar goals. By the same token, it could mean carrying out a blood hunt, tracking down an elder’s rogue ghoul or seeing to it that the Masquerade is not ruined in a trouble-prone neighborhood. These coteries function as the knights-errant of the First Estate, and whatever the covenant needs done, they do.Equitte Coteries
Experienced coteries often seek activity of more import than serving as pages and squires for covenant elders, and they often have the power or Resources to buy back their relative autonomy with tribute. These so-called “idle coteries” have mastered the basics of the Requiem and now have time to further their own agendas. Outside of feeding and reflecting well on the First Estate, there’s little such coteries need to do. They often spend a great deal of time in Elysium, quietly making alliances, consolidating their social standing and nurturing ambitions of various sorts. Equite coteries (from the Latin origin of the word, indicating a freeman able to equip himself with a horse and armor to serve in the cavalry) are expected to forgo their own agendas if circumstances require it. The more powerful the coterie is, the more powerful an elder needs to be to call it back into active service, but any coterie can be called back to service by the city’s ranking Invictus elder. (The Prince or other ranking city figure can do so as well if he is not a member of The Invictus.)Philosophy
Invictus coteries are driven by one overriding impetus: making a place for themselves in the organization. The elders of the covenant understand that well, of course, so they have harnessed the goals of the covenant to the drives of its coteries. Coteries gain recognition, responsibility, power and prestige from furthering the goals of the First Estate.Coteries, then, are tasked with three overarching goals, summed up in three tenets held dear to The Invictus.
The Invictus Must be Respected.
The coterie must respect the authority and hierarchy of the First Estate. While a certain degree of treachery is acceptable (and even shows initiative), the ancient feudal notion of honor has a high place among The Invictus. Hierarchy serves a purpose, and those seeking to threaten the hierarchy jeopardize both The Invictus’ honor as well as its ability to function. Invictus Kindred might commiserate about their place in the covenant, but rarely are they so disrespectful as to malign the covenant itself.
The Invictus Must Maintain Order.
Kindred nature is not such that self-rule is sufficient to the task of maintaining order. In the absence of order and civility, Kindred society will break down, the Masquerade will be abandoned, and the kine will band together to destroy them. As foremost among the covenants, The Invictus must take upon itself the responsibility for maintaining order, leading by example when it can, and claiming positions related to the praxis when available. In the minds of many Invictus Kindred, the First Estate equates to the city’s prevailing governmental structure (even though the facts don’t always support this outlook).
The Invictus Must Protect its Flock Lest it Lose its Ability to Exploit it.
Wolves and poachers abound among the Kindred. The survival of The Invictus depends on the mortals they manage and exploit. Kindred who interfere with The Invictus’ dealings with mortals, or interfere with the mortals they deal with, might find themselves struck down with extreme prejudice as an example of what happens to those who meddle where they ought not.
Those coteries that further these goals are rewarded. Those that do not often linger interminably among the lower ranks of the covenant’s Status tiers. There might come times when a coterie has no idea if it’s doing the right thing or not until it achieves (or is denied) recognition. Key to the covenant’s functioning is rank.
Hierarchy
Not only does a general sense of rank exist between First Estate coteries, but members of coteries are ranked as well, all the better to keep its members in a constant state of striving.Invictus coteries commonly observe a rigid hierarchy determined by age, power, experience and, on occasion, lineage. This last factor comes into play often if all members of the coterie are neonates or otherwise too inexperienced to have a track record of their own. A coterie comprising only neonates might be assigned a degree of “interim hierarchy” based on their sires’ standing in the covenant until the members of the coterie sort themselves out through their own individual conduct and effectiveness.
It rarely takes long for the members’ strengths and weaknesses to assert themselves, and coteries rarely maintain the hierarchy initially imposed upon them. Strong, driven leaders quickly differentiate themselves from followers, lickspittles and cowards. Those with power outshine those without. Likewise, those with guile and power outshine those possessing power alone.
And the group’s mentors smile as the long race for dominance begins.
Rank within a coterie is determined by the coterie’s mentors, if it has one or more, and it is neither fixed nor absolute. Intra-coterie rank isn’t ironclad so much as it’s a strong suggestion. Ignoring rank (through any kind of rudeness or disrespect, for example) isn’t heresy, but it is considered a breach of etiquette, with all the social consequences implied thereby. A Kindred is free to ignore rank at any time (for example, a quartus may refuse to perform a small favor for the secundus), but doing so could get him noticed by the coterie’s “overseers.” Being noticed too many times is likely to result in loss of rank or some other mild punishment meted out by members of the covenant whose job it is to enforce such things.
Despite appearances to the contrary, being the ranking member of a coterie is not all about being deferred to and coddled. Every right has a responsibility tightly bound to it. Ranking members are expected to comport themselves as exemplary representatives of Invictus at all times. Much of the decision-making falls to the primus, for example. The primus is expected to be a role model for the rest of her coterie. Subordinate members might be forgiven small trespasses, but the higher one’s rank is, the fewer mistakes the covenant is willing to overlook. A primus who makes a particularly noteworthy blunder — showing disrespect to an elder, losing a large sum of money on an ill-considered investment, straining the Masquerade, alienating a crucial mortal pawn — will quickly find himself the lowest ranking Kindred in his coterie. The secundus will then be promoted to primus, and the formerly lowest ranking member now has power over the individual to whom he used to pander.
The primus enjoys small benefits from his position, but he earns them every night. Responsibility for the coterie’s nightly behavior is his. If the coterie goes astray — if a member of the coterie frenzies in public, if the coterie endangers the Masquerade, if the coterie offends (or kills…) an important Kindred in the city’s own Status hierarchy and doesn’t cover its tracks well enough — the consequences fall on his head. Invictus elders are often strongly inclined to blame a coterie’s failures on either the primus’ faulty judgment (for leading his coterie astray) or incompetent leadership (that proved insufficient to convince the coterie to carry out his will). At times, elders might insist that a particular Kindred stay in the primus position even if he’s screwed up so badly that he would normally go to quintus (or “septimus”).
On the other hand, a successful primus is every elder’s darling. The more a Mentor is known as the patron of a successful primus, the better his social standing is. The better the sponsor’s social standing becomes, the more he’s willing to do for the upwardly mobile primus. The more rewards a primus gleans, the more he has to reward his coterie with. Better feeding grounds, better assignments, larger mortal herds, more investment funds and more capable retainers are all common gifts for a successful primus. If the primus chooses not to share those rewards with her coterie, she’s likely to find that her team has discovered a knack for finding trouble — a knack that disappears once she cultivates a little generosity.
Wise coteries (and the primus in particular) quickly learn not to screw over their lower ranking members, because circumstances often see fluctuations in a coterie’s internal hierarchy, particularly in the group’s first few years together. Given the static nature of Kindred society, a coterie can reasonably be expected to stay together for several decades, so the sooner the members of that coterie learn to play nice together, the better off they’ll be in the long run.
Competition is another source of change within a coterie. Members of the coterie are expected to jockey for position within the coterie. Not doing so indicates a lack of ambition, and The Invictus has no place for those lacking ambition. A primus who rests on his laurels might find himself the new secundus, while a member who lags too far behind the rest of his coterie might be demoted to a less prestigious coterie or punished by a disappointed Mentor for not meeting the covenant’s demand for excellence. At the same time, there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to enhance one’s standing in the coterie. Quietly but regularly outperforming the rest of one’s coterie is one way to gain notice from The Invictus power structure, though it’s limited by the observation power and possible apathy of those watching the coterie’s efforts. A Kindred who does so on a regular basis might expect to remain primus of her coterie for a long time. Alternatively, she might be reassigned to a more prestigious coterie (should such a coterie be deemed to need new blood).
Some coteries are unusually competitive. Such groups constantly struggle to outdo (or undermine) one another in an effort to gain the rank of primus. Members of a coterie might misbehave, make their primus look bad in front of the group’s Mentor or, if things get bad, deliberately botch a task assigned to the coterie. The sabotaging member will suffer, but the primus takes the brunt of the covenant’s displeasure.
Another tactic popular among the upwardly mobile is shedding light on the failings of a peccant coterie mate. Behavior that cleverly reveals the deficiencies of another member of the coterie is considered perfectly acceptable, provided it’s done tactfully, as it makes the coterie stronger in the long run. (It also teaches object lessons to those Kindred who don’t hide their shortcomings effectively.) Anonymously sending evidence of another coterie member’s blunder (photographs of her in frenzy in front of mortals, for example) is a perfect example of this kind of tactic, as is having “a sober word” with a rival of that coterie’s Mentor.
Anything that blatantly undermines coterie cohesion — frequent insubordination, belittling or demoralizing one’s own coterie or undermining the coterie’s legitimate goals in any way — is self-fulfilling prophecy. The definition of “blatantly” differs from domain to domain, though.
If infighting becomes too fierce and the coterie becomes unable to function well because of it, elders might take steps to rectify the situation. Such steps include severe disciplinary action (public flogging or sending a member into torpor), adding or removing members or having the coterie spied upon to determine the source of its disciplinary problems.
Particularly traditional mentors of The Invictus look well upon coteries that show a bit of public scorn for other covenants (occasionally excepting the Lancea Sanctum). It sets a precedent and reinforces The Invictus’ position. Depending on the scorned covenant, this could potentially cause a diplomatic ripple, but First Estate elders are notorious for defusing those situations by denouncing such acts in public and then rewarding them privately. Anything the coterie has said is out, and its subtle corrosive effect will linger far longer than the memories of the masses of Kindred.
Religion
The Invictus loves religion as an institution because it provides the covenant with another tool with which to manipulate others. Mortals crave miracles to banish the tedium of their own lives, and they find hope in the notion that their great reward must certainly be better then the corrupt hell that is the World of Darkness. Members of The Invictus are happy to stage a miracle every now and then as long as doing so keeps its coffers full and its flock in line. Religion is a major influence on the mortal Herd, and the First Estate would be rash indeed to overlook such a source of power.That said, it often feels, as Marx did, that religion is the opiate of the masses. When its own membership is involved, however, its thoughts on religion change. While subtle, a pronounced bias against spirituality and religiosity occasionally surfaces within the First Estate. It is fine for other covenants to expound on their bizarre theories of morality, spirituality and concepts of an afterlife, but members of The Invictus who subscribe to any of that could find themselves looked down upon. The First Estate is about ruling here and now, not some theoretical, theological other place.
This antagonism toward religion is due largely to the First Estate’s old (but growing) rivalry with The Lancea Sanctum. When the Camarilla splintered centuries ago, the Spear took its blood magic with it, vowing to use it to Dominate the other covenants. To this night it has failed. In fact, the secular nature of the modern age has shaken The Lancea Sanctum to its core, and the elders of The Invictus appreciate the disparity.
In the modern nights, a few hard-line Invictus Kindred would love nothing better than to see the zealots of The Lancea Sanctum fall by the wayside and become a footnote in Kindred history. One tactic they take is to beat the zealots to the punch and infiltrate religious (or at least Christian) institutions before the Sanctified can establish themselves. This makes churches one of the most hotly contested prizes in the modern nights.
Clever Invictus coteries garner influence within churches whenever possible. Not only can large churches be just as profitable as any other business venture (and sometimes even more so), they provide the coterie with another means of nudging the mortal Herd and determining the attitudes of the kine on a large scale. While a church is a somewhat harder nut for Kindred to crack, The Invictus has its own ways of overcoming that problem. Among other things, clergy — especially the supposedly celibate ones — are easy prey for Daeva seducers and blackmailers. Ventrue can bend wills to their own. Skulking Mekhet and Nosferatu can eavesdrop on confessions, and even Gangrel can be the proverbial fly upon the wall.
Methodology
The First Estate is not inclined to spend its time seeking power through mystical means. It does not fear the strange magics of the covenants that use them. It’s not that The Invictus doesn’t see the power of blood sorcery — on the contrary, it has seen the power of Crúac, Theban Sorcery and The Coils of the Dragon on many occasions. Rather, it is quite sure that it has something better.The tangible power of the mortal Herd is often overlooked or, worse, disparaged by Kindred of the other covenants with the exception of the Carthians. Kindred who do so seem to forget that the Tradition of the Masquerade exists out of necessity lest the kine overwhelm the Damned and scourge them from their domains.
Like air to men or water to fish, mortal influence is transparent to many vampires, who are so busy reveling in their position at the top of the food chain or indulging their own petty politics that they forget about it. Yet The Invictus remembers.
The First Estate has had centuries to fine-tune its strategies, and many of those revolve around the immense permeability and utility of mortal institutions.
Observing the Masquerade
The Invictus relies on Humanity even as it makes the most of its vampiric nature. It operates in the world of mortals, seeks inroads into mortal institutions and surrounds itself with mortal operatives. It has no time for gratuitous monstrosity. The coteries of the First Estate, then, often feel obligated to make themselves as compatible with mortals as possible. High Humanity scores allow a vampire to maintain a more human appearance and get an earlier start on her night’s work. A lawyer might understand the need to meet at 8:00 in the evening, but a Kindred who can meet only after midnight is more likely to have difficulty keeping up appearances. For this reason, then, Invictus coteries are strongly urged to closely monitor their behavior. What this means, among other things, is that high-Humanity vampires are given more duties pertaining to the mortal Herd, and those who have let their Humanity slip, are relegated to the background when the coterie is dealing with kine. (This is one of the reasons elders need coteries of young Kindred to do their work for them. Many elders have lost so much of their Humanity that they can no longer convincingly pass among mortals.) Likewise, a coterie’s lower Humanity vampires take care of the coterie’s dirty work so the rest of the members don’t have to sully their hands. In the eyes of The Invictus, it’s a very practical division of labor.All but the oldest Invictus coteries have at least a member or two who are able to interact with mortals with little difficulty. Should it come to pass that a coterie grows too withdrawn to comfortably pass among the Herd, it might be forced to delegate a good deal of its business dealings to younger Kindred (perhaps their childer). Knowing the untrustworthiness of their own kind, however, most elders put this milestone off as long as possible.
Tactics
Even in the modern nights, The Invictus remembers the martial aspects of its aristocratic past. It understands the necessity for intelligent, dependable tactics. The covenant does not just push its coteries into interaction with mortals unguided. It teaches its coteries, through mentors and example, how to deal with the mortal world, lest every coterie have to reinvent the wheel for itself. First Estate elders have used many of the same techniques for centuries, and they pass the ones that work best along to their childer. Likewise, a covenant of vampires won’t last long if it can’t manage others of its kind. The First Estate knows how to manage Kindred nearly as well as mortals.Masters of the Herd
The First Estate considers the mortal world its rightful dominion. So habitual is this assumption throughout The Invictus that suggesting otherwise would likely elicit a response of either puzzlement or laughter. Over the centuries, The Invictus has embedded itself in certain key mortal institutions like a barbed hook. Were it to cease its interference in those areas now, the most infested of them would be temporarily Crippled until enterprising mortals (or rival Kindred…) moved to fill in the power vacuum. The covenant’s presence in mortal affairs is far from pervasive, however, and The Invictus works its will through layer upon layer of middlemen. Yet it does have influence with corporations whose stock they own, with authorities they bribe and with priests they blackmail. It doesn’t control the mayor, but it might make suggestions to her husband at a fund-raiser or her advisors through intermediaries at a council meeting. Its influence is by no means direct or absolute. Rather, it is a gestalt effect of a thousand strategic bribes, favors and threats. This methodology of misdirection has served the covenant well. Applying strategic nudges here and there has brought The Invictus to the position it holds in the modern nights, and it finds that position quite comfortable indeed.Immersion in the Herd brings many rewards to Invictus coteries. The kine are needy creatures, and Kindred often possess exactly what mortals think they want.
The First Estate knows mortal society, and it knows what channels it likes to go through to achieve its goals. It chooses the wealthy and those who manage wealth as their mortal agents. Bankers, investment brokers, corporate raiders, financial advisors, decadent scions of wealthy families and high-level executives are all ripe for the picking. These are The Invictus’ first-tier cat’s-paws. With the money and power these individuals provide, the covenant can buy influence in any other sector of mortal society it needs to.
To foster its sizeable investment in mortal affairs, esteemed Invictus mentors train the covenant’s coteries in the techniques of influence management from their earliest nights. Charm and money are the covenant’s two major strengths in this regard, but it doesn’t shrink from using other methods to control mortals when necessary.
One of the most insidious ways a Kindred can use these techniques is to gain access to increasingly powerful individuals just by saying, “Introduce me to your superiors.” Such tactics allow a coterie to start out manipulating lower-ranking mortals and then work their way up to the highest echelons of power.
The following are the most popular among the coteries of the First Estate.
Tools: Selection, Care and Maintenance
Selecting mortals to manipulate is one of the skills that Invictus coteries learn early in the Requiem. The Kindred cannot simply plug in to some vast network of human agents waiting for their orders. Mortals must be picked carefully and groomed. Young Kindred don’t usually have easy access to powerful established figures. Their elders have likely tied up those influences long ago, and making moves on them will likely result in dire consequences for the fledgling. A neonate’s best bet is to find a mortal with potential, seal a relationship of some sort, and then “nudge” him toward success. Over the course of 10 years, a vampire can guide a motivated mid-level manager to the CEO spot, a beat cop to the police commissioner’s seat or a savvy journalist into the editor-in-chief position with the local paper.A coterie comprising favored childer of Invictus elders might be granted access to some higher-powered influence as a gift (or a test), but most coteries start with nothing and need to establish all of their influence on their own.
Influence not only needs to be cultivated and groomed, it needs to be defended as well. Young coteries often find that once they’ve successfully established their mortal influences, other Kindred are eagerly waiting to reap the benefits of their work. A coterie might find its mortals subjected to Vinculums, coerced into serving another or even killed by another Kindred (or coterie) trying to advance her own mortal pawn. This last is rare, though. Killing influential mortals almost assuredly leads to reprisals, investigations and violations of the Masquerade.
One advantage young Kindred and coteries do have is that, as childer of modern times, they perceive Resources of which elders and ancillae remain unaware. “New economy” companies, prestigious boutique agencies, cutting-edge lounges and nightclubs all serve as examples of these kinds of opportunities. A small press agency that handles a handful of high-profile clients might give fledgling coteries access to the kind of credentials formerly offered only by long-established management companies.
Kindred with good reputations at the hot club of the month have just as many opportunities to rub elbows with the wealthy and powerful as those elders who belong to the longest-lived of social clubs. Power and money still exist to be cultivated and taken. Only their sources vary.
Division of Influence
Some coteries have found that letting each member of a coterie specialize in one particular sphere of mortal influence works quite well. Instead of each member knowing a person or two involved in trucking or law enforcement or whatnot, one member manages all of the coterie’s influence with the media. Another takes care of all interactions with dock and warehouse workers, a third has a number of Allies in the police department and so on. This allows each member to maximize her familiarity with one sphere of influence and optimize her effectiveness in those circles. The potential drawback of this approach is that losing a member can cripple a coterie. This contingency is usually addressed through slight redundancy. Each member of the coterie has a sphere of influence that he specializes in and another for which he’s something of an understudy. That way, even if the coterie loses a member, it won’t be denied access to a particular sphere of influence entirely.Charm
The Ventrue clan is often the most powerful in individual Invictus domains, and so it happens that many of their tactics are also the tactics of the covenant they shepherd. The Ventrue and Daeva alike are adept at getting what they want through sheer charm or force of will. They’ve had decades to perfect their social skills. They captivate, intrigue and fascinate mortals as a matter of habit, sometimes without even intending to. Given time, any coterie can learn these skills. Even vampires know that mortals are more drawn to honey than to vinegar, so they use their allure and their charm at least as often as criticism and threats. Even if mortal employees find “the boss and his weird cronies” a bit disconcerting, they often find themselves moving closer to them, wanting to be near them, wanting to serve them just the same. This allure, by itself, is often enough to get favors done, contracts signed and the coterie’s will carried out.
Combined with the powers of certain Disciplines, personality grants a coterie a huge degree of latitude when dealing with mortals. Many Invictus coteries claim at least one member with Majesty and often more. Given the pressure placed on Invictus Kindred to operate subtly, even Gangrel and Nosferatu members show at least some rudimentary knowledge of this Discipline.
Cold. Hard. Cash.
As a covenant, The Invictus is outrageously wealthy. It has money; mortals want money. It’s a perfect arrangement for the coteries of the First Estate.
Without necessarily intending to or even being aware of it, mortals broadcast their financial Status to the world. The shoes he wears, the neighborhood he lives in, the accent he speaks with, the car he drives, what he drinks, where he dines and how much he tips all provide clues to the health of a mortal’s finances. Kindred pick up on those clues without even trying. A mortal who’s worried about the next credit card statement, tuition payment or hospital bill is easy pickings.
Money talks and mortals listen. For Kindred, the allure of Vitae surpasses all other wants. Simple greed often goes abandoned in favor of more visceral desires yet money pours into the coffers and Swiss bank accounts of the undead almost unbidden. Over the course of decades, a savvy vampire can easily accrue vast fortunes through clever investments. The First Estate as a whole probably controls billions of dollars. No one vampire controls more than a sizable fraction of that, but many members of The Invictus are quite wealthy personally, and they know how to spread around their wealth to great effect. And mortals, if it need be said, will do almost anything for money.
A thousand dollars is nothing to the average Invictus coterie. To some poor slob trying to make his insurance payment so he can get a vasectomy so he doesn’t have to worry about having another kid, it’s the world, the thing for which he would do anything at that moment. When the amounts get larger — 5,000 dollars, 10,000, 100,000 — there’s very little mortals won’t do. Joe Bureaucrat will never make more than 40 grand a year working at the DMV, but if the pale chick is willing to pay him a substantial fraction of that for letting her into the office late at night and making her five fake licenses (an hour’s work at most), who’s he to say no? If the state really cared about fake licenses, they’d pay him better, right?
Invictus coteries wield wealth like a weapon. They do not do their own dirty work, they pay others to do it for them. The typical modus operandi for an Invictus covenant is that mortal cat’s-paws are used whenever possible, especially when the deeds to be done are… untoward. Certainly, a Kindred’s superior abilities might be needed from time to time, and certain knowledge is best kept from the eyes of the living. It’s far wiser, however, to pay mortals to do the things mortals do then sit back and enjoy the dividends than it is for the coterie to do its own ugly deeds and grunt work. Private investigators, bounty hunters, stock brokers, lawyers, thugs and petty bureaucrats are all easy acquisitions for a shrewd coterie, and they can be worth their weight in gold to those needing their expertise or assistance. They also make convenient screens and buffers against breaches of the Masquerade, and they’re an excellent means of conducting business beyond the view of prying eyes that the coterie can’t otherwise avoid. The Kindred also feel a certain degree of schadenfreude when they tell their lessers, “I’ll have my man look into that for you.”
Few tools are as useful as money for getting mortals to do what you want. Services, information, substances and musthave items are all for sale to coteries with enough Resources. For the coterie involved, cash is the most tedious solution to most problems. Doling out bribes gets repetitive, but it’s too effective not to do.
Experienced Invictus Kindred often maintain that true loyalty cannot be bought on a one-time basis. One-time lump sums elicit appreciation, but not loyalty. A coterie using the same agent repeatedly, however, can cement a pawn’s allegiances with an ongoing financial arrangement. Bonuses, bribes and monetary “tokens of appreciation” are all time-tested tools in the arsenal of The Invictus. Freely giving a mortal small gratuities, over and above sums agreed upon for services rendered, is like Throwing a Bone to a loyal dog. It motivates the pawn to come back for more, and more and more. Doing so on a regular basis also makes them much less likely to betray the coterie for a single bribe. A foe offering a mortal a $1,000 bribe to squeal on his Invictus employers won’t elicit much of a response if the coterie has been paying him $400 a month for several years. Any mortal pawn crucial to an Invictus coterie’s activities knows full well which side his bread is buttered on. Not only can the coterie probably count on such an ally to refuse the bribe, but he might have enough savvy to feign ignorance to the would-be bribe giver and inform the coterie of what happened as soon as possible — all because he expects to be rewarded handsomely for his loyalty.
All the Lonely People
The World of Darkness is a scary, lonely place. Awkwardness and fear isolate individuals and keep them from reaching out to others. People watch television because the world outside scares them so much they don’t have any friends of their own. They jerk off to Internet porn because getting real sex is too genuine, too much trouble and too dangerous. Loneliness equals safety.
Enter the coterie.
Vampires are what mortals dream about: powerful, sexy, Aloof. This makes lonely mortals prime targets for Kindred. Despite their sometimes disturbing appearance, vampires seem to have everything the mortal could want: money, sex, connections, power… Mortals have been known to tell vampires everything about what they do — at the office, at the newspaper, in the morgue or at the nuclear plant — just for a few evenings of companionship. Buying a mortal a few drinks, asking some strategic leading questions, and then listening attentively, nodding from time to time, can get an Invictus vampire more information than he’d even expected. Particularly seductive or manipulative Kindred have been known to trade companionship or sex for trade secrets, birth certificates, death certificates, authentic drivers licenses, stock market information, political campaign strategies, hopes, fantasies and, of course, blackmail material.
Exploiting Need
Mortals sometimes land themselves in the nasty predicament of really needing something. A coterie that can provide such a mortal with what she needs will find itself with a handy debtor. The exact nature of the need varies, but money, love and addictive drugs are all common needs that a savvy coterie might use to clinch a mortal’s service.
Coteries use two different approaches to exploiting mortal need. Those using the hunter approach advocate looking for mortals who are already in need and exploiting them. Kindred who use the farmer approach seek out a suitable mortal and cultivate an exploitable need in him that the Kindred will then be able to use like a handle. Hunting requires putting in the effort to find a mortal with a suitable need that the coterie can meet. Farming is easier but requires a longer term of cultivation. (It’s also less ethical and might require a degeneration check when its efforts come to fruition.)
Hypothetically, say an Invictus coterie needs the mayor’s ear because he’s about to pass an ordinance that will close all clubs and bars at midnight, making it harder for the city’s Kindred to feed. A coterie using the hunter approach would likely do some reconnaissance to see if anyone in the mayor’s immediate circle needed something it could provide in exchange for counseling the mayor against such a rash move. Doing so might require an Investigation, Larceny or Streetwise roll or funds to hire a private investigator.
A coterie that subscribes to the farmer approach would be more inclined to “accidentally” run into the mayor’s daughter at a club and ask if she likes to party. From there they can give her a “free sample” of a popular designer drug to get her started on her way to Addiction. They might take blackmail photos in the same evening. Even if she’s not “that kind of girl” Dominate and Majesty go a long way, though clever Kindred hardly need Disciplines for this kind of operation. Mortals are eager to be led, and vampires are happy to lead them. Once the coterie has brought the daughter under its sway, it then withholds the drug until she puts serious pressure on her father to change his mind.
Satisfying the mortal’s need is rarely difficult. Money is easy to come by for Invictus coteries, for example, as are drugs and other ready vices. Individuals whose need is for another person can be trickier. If the mortal is pining for a particular beloved — a man obsessed with his brother’s wife, a gay man in love with a straight man, or a woman who would do anything to get her ex-husband back — strategic use of many Disciplines can usually get the needy one what he or she is craving, at least a few times.
Mortals who allow themselves to need something this badly are not good candidates for long-term tools. It takes a certain self-destructive bent to become this obsessive in the first place, and that self-destructive tendency can turn around and bite the coterie in the ass. Furthermore, some needs can be fulfilled only once (like the guy who just wants to have sex with his brother’s wife one time), after which point they have no ability to motivate. Of course, at that point there are other tactics a coterie can use.
Blackmail
For gaining solid, long-term cooperation from mortals, nothing beats a good camera and a thorough mastery of Dominate. A single explicit photograph of the right corporate board member can go a long way toward pushing a coterie’s municipal agenda toward fruition. Kindred have little difficulty acquiring blackmail evidence on mortals who won’t cooperate any other way. Most Kindred find it easy to convince mortals to commit deeds they would never commit on their own, and once these activities are captured on film (or videotape), there’s little the target can do to refute appearances. A coterie might use blackmail tactics against a priest who was about to preach against “the supernatural threat,” or a doctor who was about to put too much information into a death certificate. Anyone with Status to lose is a perfect candidate for blackmail. The lower an individual’s place in the mortal hierarchy is, the less effective blackmail is.
Blackmail tactics are not the way for a coterie to win friends, but it does influence people, and a coterie in a tight position can fall back on quick and dirty tactics like blackmail all too easily.
Threats
Sometimes, the old ways work best. While not subtle or good for ongoing situations, threats of violence can yield results that nothing else will. While many Kindred fancy themselves civilized, several prefer the blunter instruments of force and coercion. Particularly when time is short, the more subtle means of persuasion can go out the window. These tools are effective in the short term, but rarely longer, as fear has a relatively brief shelf-life and rapidly degrades into resentment against the feared party or parties. On rare occasion, threats can facilitate the coterie’s business, but only with individuals the coterie is unlikely to encounter ever again. A coterie in a situation where results, not loyalty, are important, might indeed unleash the coterie’s Gangrel, Nosferatu or cruel Daeva on the object of its ire, but situations where such behavior is appropriate should be few and far between.
The Vinculum
The thralldom brought about by The Vinculum sways mortals to do things that nothing else will. An enthralled mortal will side with her Kindred domitor against her family, against social pressure and against the law. The Vinculum evokes from thralls an utterly sycophantic loyalty, particularly when the thrall is treated well. Invictus coteries are loath to use The Vinculum to manage their mortal assets, though, for myriad reasons. First and foremost, resorting to The Vinculum is sometimes seen as acknowledging defeat, admitting that the mortal in question is immune to manipulation through any other means. Such admissions of incompetence might be fine for coteries affiliated with other covenants, but The Invictus expects more sophistication from its members.
That said, under pressure from other Kindred, a coterie might find that it has no choice but to subject certain key Contacts or crucial influence brokers to The Vinculum to keep them from falling prey to other vampires who might try to “poach” a group’s influence. If one of the city’s gangs is experiencing a string of successes that place it at the apex of the city’s underworld, no doubt someone among The Invictus wants that gang to answer to her. Submitting the gang’s leader(s) to The Vinculum is going to be the safest way to make sure that that Kindred controls that gang. Otherwise, other covenants are going to offer more money, make graver threats and the like until the mortal capitulates. Only The Vinculum cuts off the possibility of another coterie taking control of that mortal. It’s a lock on pawns that Kindred use both hesitantly and strategically.
A coterie that subjects a mortal to The Vinculum for this reason usually follows up by launching a concerted offensive against the party or parties who forced it to use The Vinculum. In this way it makes sure that such tactics aren’t called for again.
There’s another reason The Invictus is sparing in its use of The Vinculum. The Invictus has noted that certain other Kindred, mages, Lupines and some witch-hunters can detect its use in mortals, which can cause… problems that The Invictus is happier avoiding.
Ghouls
For their closest servants, those they have to trust (such as the caretaker of their haven) Kindred commonly use Ghouls. Ghouls have a number of drawbacks, not the least of which is that Kindred Vitae sometimes causes Ghouls to become somewhat unhinged. But the combination of The Vinculum that eventually develops and the thirst for Vitae make for powerful leverage.
Ghouls are great for retainers or even for brute-force tactics, but Kindred don’t make Ghouls a regular part of their business deals or influence brokering. It’s simply too great a liability, especially as Kindred Vitae becomes more potent and the Vitae on which they can slake their thirsts becomes scarcer. That said, there are times when Ghouls are the best tools for the job.
Even the most useful mortal pawns can age and die. This can sometimes pose a problem, especially for Invictus coteries that dislike such change and upheaval. Ghouls have the advantage of longevity over normal mortals. A coterie might be inclined to turn mortals into Ghouls as a way to keep certain talented functionaries — lawyers, bookkeepers, private bankers and the like — around longer than their natural spans would permit.
Not only does creating a ghoul increase the tool’s value by extending its life, but its loyalty is also assured. If the vampires absolutely, positively have to trust a pawn (as they must those performing their daylight business), more often than not that individual will be a ghoul.
Ghouls kept by a coterie are easier to maintain than those kept by individual Kindred. Even one ghoul can be a drain on a Kindred’s Vitae, but a coterie can keep two or three Ghouls properly fed without being unduly taxed. On the other hand, when a Vinculum eventually does form, the ghoul might suddenly become resistant or even obnoxious to other members of the coterie. Many Ghouls maintained in this regard are “short-term investments,” that is, individuals the coterie needs now but not for much longer.
Among the Fiends
Kindred of The Invictus are past masters of games that use mortals as pawns, and their power over mortals grants them an unquestionable edge in their dealings with other covenants (with the possible exception of the Carthians). Many of the tactics The Invictus uses to sway mortals can also be used to bring Kindred into line, but many of the more obvious ploys a coterie might use against mortals (such as using Disciplines to obtain evidence for blackmail) are transparent to other Kindred. Still, The Invictus has many ways to convince others to capitulate to their requests, and the tactics the First Estate uses against other Kindred are different from those they use to sway mortals.Elders
The Invictus’ frequent interaction with mortals often has the welcome side effect of staving off degeneration and helping to maintain functional levels of Humanity. High Humanity increases a vampire’s waking hours and minimizes the length of Torpor, giving high-Humanity elders a more noticeable presence among the Kindred overall. This grants The Invictus something of an advantage over covenants that don’t work well with mortals (such as the Lancea Sanctum). Much of the power wielded by the First Estate comes from its many elders — the big guns and power players of the Kindred world. Invictus coteries often have more frequent and cordial relations with their elders than most Kindred do, and they can use this advantage in the veiled nightly conflicts of the Kindred world.
In addition, it is common knowledge among the Kindred that an unusually high percentage of Invictus vampires are on very good terms with their elders (as represented in the game mechanics by the low cost of the Mentor Merit for Invictus characters). A coterie might find itself at an impasse with another Kindred until they reveal that they are all the protégés of Octavio the Seneschal, at which point negotiations favor them.
While Invictus coteries often do have an advantage over other vampires in the form of their access to elders, it is an advantage that many are loath to call upon. Name-dropping is a fragile form of power, and one that reminds a coterie that it is too weak to meet its objectives without falling back on another’s power or reputation. The elder in question might not appreciate it either.
Members of an Invictus coterie might ask an elder to intercede on their behalf with a ranking member of the domain’s hierarchy, or they might gain an audience with the Prince because of their elder’s influence.
An Invictus coterie with good relations with its elders can often simply go over the heads of others in the same age bracket to get things done. The coterie might not have enough clout to have the Regent’s childe investigated for Diablerie, for example, but an elder (especially a Primogen or a Priscus) might. If the coterie is on particularly good terms with the elder in question, it might not even have to promise her anything in return.
Alternatively, an enemy might believe he has all of a coterie’s forces tied up (through legal wrangling or other tactics), only to find that it was his influence that was being tied up as the full weight of an elder’s influence comes down on him like a hammer, costing him money, standing in his covenant or the city and possibly even his Haven. This would likely benefit the elder more than the coterie as she would undoubtedly help herself to the spoils of war, but the coterie would have the pleasure of seeing an enemy crushed.
Tradition
More effective with other Invictus Kindred than those of other covenants, calling upon tradition can weaken an opponent’s position politically. For vampires, static creatures who eschew change, tradition is a weightier matter than it is for mortals who can change their minds or establish new traditions more easily. If a long-standing precedent exists establishing that only a domain’s Prince may have more than two progeny in the city at one time, The Invictus coterie would most likely assert that such a policy must surely be in place for a good reason. To claim otherwise would be an insult to the wisdom of all the Kindred who came before and agreed on this matter.
The reason that The Invictus is so tradition-bound, of course, is that it probably established many of The Traditions common in modern Kindred domains in the first place. If The Invictus wants to change tradition, it calls doing so “bringing Kindred society into the modern age.” If any other covenant wants to change a tradition, The Invictus calls it radicalism.
Influence
Whereas The Lancea Sanctum think of mortals as nothing but food, and Carthians see them as comrades, The Invictus thinks of mortals as tools — and powerful ones at that.
In many domains, Invictus coteries often wield more mortal influence than those of any other covenant (with the possible exception of the Carthian Movement), and it makes them formidable opponents. Members of other covenants might have access to strange blood magic and powerful Kindred Allies, but only an Invictus coterie can have its enemy arrested (or shot) by mortal police, have the enemy’s Haven condemned and slated for demolition and have her Ghouls murdered by the local crime boss, all with only three quick phone calls.
The Vinculum
While it’s rarely called for among mortals, a coterie that needs to keep other Kindred in line might be somewhat more amenable to using The Vinculum. Many of the tactics used to manage mortals either aren’t applicable when dealing with other Kindred or simply don’t work well enough to rely on them. Crude though it is, The Vinculum works. As it does with mortals, The Vinculum reduces the thrall to an emotionally dependent slave. Why compete with an adversary when you can enslave her and have her cater to your every whim?
As effective as it is, The Vinculum is rare between Kindred. No one wants to subordinate himself to another unless there’s no getting around it.
Still, Kindred aren’t stupid. Most vampires recognize the symptoms of a Vinculum when they see them, so it’s not like the blood bond is the be all and end all of control. Enslaving a key member of Kindred society might come with certain social rewards, though, especially if the thrall is known for being a foe of The Invictus.
Force
The Invictus uses force as a last resort, but it does use force if order is breaking down. The First Estate portrays itself as having both gravitas and discipline. After all, someone has to keep fractious Kindred in line. When vampires question or ignore the weight of tradition and the debt of fealty, The Invictus might call upon its coteries to deal with the problem. The elders and Inner Circle members of the First Estate are willing to ignore ethical lapses, lying, double-dealing and an array of other behavioral defects, but anything that disorders the Kindred world, imperils The Traditions or threatens the existing model angers The Invictus. And The Invictus has a long history of destroying those who anger it.
Consequently, Invictus coteries have an edge over some of their peers in other covenants. Threats might be enough to keep rogue Kindred in line, but failing that, the coterie might invoke The Invictus’ responsibility to maintain order. At the very least, that provides the coterie with a plausible cover story, and it might be enough to capture the interest of more powerful figures (such as the Judex).
Given how much of an Invictus coterie’s time is spent making nice with mortals, it’s not uncommon for the more aggressive members of a coterie to get a little rambunctious from time to time. Invictus coteries might resort to forceful tactics merely as a way to keep those members satisfied and quiescent.
A coterie might resort to violence if an elder sends it to put down an elder from a rival covenant, as a show of force in a city where the Masquerade had been violated too many times or if The Invictus as a whole were making a play for dominance in a domain.
Stages
Invictus coteries go through stages that roughly correspond to the ages and levels of experience of the Kindred who make up the coterie.Neonates
Young Invictus coteries are in an odd position. They are considered full plenipotentiaries of the First Estate when dealing with other covenants, which puts them far ahead of young coteries of other covenants. Yet within the power structure of The Invictus itself, they are obviously at the bottom rung of the order’s hierarchy. The First Estate’s elders watch them with a mixture of admiration and wariness. They are too inexperienced, too rash, too gullible, too violent and too anything else nervous elders can think of when looking for excuses to deny power and responsibility to young coteries. The more established members of the covenant might not even try to hide this attitude, depending on the availability of and need for new blood.That said, The Invictus is neither blind nor stupid. Elders of the covenant might want to hoard power, but they show coteries of young vampires as much respect as necessary and trust them with more responsibility than they would otherwise, in order to maintain or grow its membership base.
Expedited advancement through the covenant’s ranks is especially common in many American cities, for example, where childer of Invictus members regularly leave the First Estate for the Carthians or other covenants. America is the land of instant gratification, and neonates who still possess their mortal reckoning of time are not interested in serving the covenant for 50 years before gaining some tiny measure of respect from their higher ups in the covenant. Scions of the covenant have compromised by giving young coteries more responsibilities to shoulder than they would get otherwise. Doing so serves to advance them through the ranks faster. This approach poses risks to both the elders and the fledgling coterie, but given the First Estate’s difficulty in North America, it’s unavoidable.
Conversely, in the Old World, where history goes back further, where echoes of the feudal system are still resounding and sovereignty is properly respected, even neonates are inclined to take a longer-term view of advancement. Many young Kindred are not just willing, but eager to serve The Invictus until such time as they rise to the top of the heap, be it decades or centuries. Advancement in such places is slow, but it’s more comfortable for the elders and probably less risky for young Kindred.
Regardless of the speed of advancement, young coteries are largely put to the same uses.
Ancillae
The Invictus’ expedited weeding-out program sees to it that by the time a coterie reaches the ancilla stage it is worthy of bearing nearly any responsibility given to it by the covenant. With only occasional supervision from elders, coteries of ancillae are trusted with the guidance and grooming of younger coteries and growing the covenant’s holdings. By this time, many Kindred are likely to be taking positions of power in the domain’s hierarchy and a coterie might be expected to support a member in his work for the domain. An Invictus Sheriff might need the aid of a Whip in the coterie. A Harpy on good terms with the covenant might need informants. A Ventrue Regent might need attendants or advisors. These are all roles for which coteries of ancillae are ideally suited.Elders
This is where the long decades and centuries of struggling up the pyramid finally come to fruition. Not only do these lords of the Danse Macabre have the power of their own blood and Disciplines to draw upon, theirs is also the immense wealth that comes from decades of shrewd investment, as well as unsurpassed influence at every level of the mortal world from neighborhood drug dealers to corporations to powerful city officials. Almost all old Invictus coteries can call upon extended networks of informants, enforcers and agents. Add to that the coteries of younger, up-and-coming Kindred who have sworn Oaths of Fealty to them, and elders have a great deal of power that they can bring to bear on anything they consider a problem.At the elder level, many Invictus members reach the very highest levels of the Kindred power structure. Many elder coteries need to flex or reconfigure themselves to accommodate their members’ ranks. If one member of the coterie becomes Prince or Regent, for example, she will almost certainly have little time to participate in the coterie’s business. That said, the coterie as a whole might be plunged into whole new levels of politics as the Prince decides to make the members of her coterie into Regents of their own tenurial domains. The first step taken by most Invictus Kindred when attaining a major position of power is to reward the members of their coteries. Not to use the power of a new office to do so is a faux pas of catastrophic proportions and would likely result in extremely embittered former coterie-mates.
…For each and all of which I make homage and fealty with hands and with mouth to thee my said lord and elder and to thy successors, and I swear upon these four gospels of God that I will always be a faithful vassal to thee and to thy successors and to our esteemed Prince in all things in which a vassal is required to be faithful to his lord.
— From an Invictus oath of fealty
— From an Invictus oath of fealty
Type
Alliance, Generic
Ruling Organization
What Advancement Means
The goal of any Invictus member is advancement, but what does that mean? Basically, any Kindred who shows herself worthy of promotion will be granted more responsibility, greater access to those in power, and more responsibility for the protection and growth of the covenant’s resources. Upon successfully resolving some bit of the First Estate’s business, a member of the Invictus might find herself granted control of a business front (the value of which she is expected to increase), some representative of mortal influence (whom she is expected to groom and advance so that he can serve the covenant better) or even a coterie of neonates (whom she is expected to mentor into competence). In theory, every significant success in the pursuit of the First Estate’s goals should result in more responsibility and authority within the covenant. Given the realities of the Requiem, however, ranging from inattentive elders to webs of politics to glass ceilings that hold back a Kindred for reasons that are never explained — that advancement might or might not come to pass.Elders, for their part, want to advance their own childer. Not only does it add to one’s prestige to have a respected childe, but it allows an elder to delegate some of his own responsibility to another. An elder who cannot further the advancement of his childe runs the risk of losing that childe to the schemes of another elder or to another covenant altogether if promotions are too few or far between. An ancilla might find that her own advancement up the Invictus hierarchy comes to a standstill if she proves unable to effectively mentor her own childer.
Storytelling the Oath of Defense
The effect that the Oath of Defense is designed to simulate is that some of the best Storytelling experiences are about dilemmas. The characters certainly don’t have to swear an Oath of Defense to an elder, and if they don’t think they can fulfill their duties, then they shouldn’t. They might be drawn to do so by the benefits it provides, though, even as they hope that they never have to fulfill their obligation. If they do have to honor the oath, the chronicle can take a turn when their loyalties become public, and more interesting still if they find themselves defending their liege against someone they think of as an ally. As such, if they don’t honor the oath, the chronicle takes a whole new twist as the characters try to survive the consequences of their own dishonorable actions. The damned-if-youdo, damned-if-you-don’t situations provide an emotional charge to what would otherwise be simply a physically dangerous conflict.Tribute
An Invictus equite coterie is free to pursue its own goals so long as it pays tribute in some way to the highest ranking member or members of the covenant in its city. In a domain with a minimal Invictus presence, this might mean a minor token tribute of some sort to a First Estate Priscus or the like. A short-term Oath of Service or an oath to defend her honor might suffice, for example. In a city with a powerful Invictus presence, it could mean paying tribute to a half-dozen hierarchical superiors — and not with token tribute, either.The more Invictus elders there are in a city, the more tribute a coterie pays, and the accumulated tribute can add up very quickly. In strong Invictus domains, so-called “equite” coteries might find themselves working just as hard to come up with tribute as they did on charges delivered directly from feudal lieges. Still, while it costs more in tribute for an equite coterie to dwell in a domain where the First Estate is strong, the benefits are also greater. The characters have more reflected status, more elders to act as mentors, more underthe-table kickbacks from the powers that be, and less likelihood of being harassed by members of other covenants.
The exact nature of tribute paid by a coterie is determined through private negotiations between the coterie and the elder or elders in question. Mortal influence, feeding vessels and the ever-popular “favors to be named later” are common forms of tribute. A coterie with significant financial resources might simply be able to pay for its autonomy with cash. Coteries that acquire a windfall of some sort, particularly powerful artifacts with a history behind them, might receive offers to waive tribute indefinitely in exchange for turning over the item in question.
In the course of negotiations, a wise coterie always seeks to minimize the tribute it pays its elders while maximizing the benefits it receives from its membership in the covenant. Elders, of course, benefit from the exact opposite situation. Generally speaking, the more tribute elders can demand from younger coteries, the more rewarding it is for them to be at the top of the heap. That said, there is a dynamic working in favor of the young coteries of which they may not even be aware. To wit, coteries need to feel that they’re getting the better end of the bargain, or at least a fair bargain with regard to the tribute they pay and the benefits they receive in return. A coterie that is not benefiting sufficiently from the tribute it pays is not motivated to increase its covenant’s presence in the city. A coterie that feels it’s getting the better end of the bargain with its elders will be driven to increase the local Invictus presence. In theory, a coterie that feels it’s doing well is more likely to do all it can to strengthen and expand the city’s Invictus presence. The stronger the covenant is, the more they benefit.
On the other hand, a coterie that feels its getting ripped off by the elders of its covenant will want to keep its own covenant weak lest it have to pay even more tribute for even less benefit. What’s more, the notion of tribute is an open one. An equite coterie — or any Invictus Kindred, really — can make its own tribute demands of other Invictus members. Obviously, doing so rarely works if a coterie or Kindred is so brash as to demand tribute from its superiors. On the other hand, in a city with many Invictus Kindred, a coterie might be able to rest on its laurels a bit by getting involved in the affairs of Kindred with less status. Even in a city with few Invictus Kindred, that means the coterie has less distance to travel before it can start making demands of tribute. Granted, these demands come to rest on the shoulders of fewer providers, but, as always, a balance must be struck.
The Privileges of Rank
Talk of a hierarchy within a coterie is all well and good, but it doesn’t clarify what advantage there is to being higher in the hierarchy than another. For coteries that keep track, and it’s mostly young or casual coteries that do, there are minor advantages to being higher in the pecking order and minor disadvantages to being lower on the scale. In practice, the benefits of rank are trivial in a modern context, but such is the way things have always been done, and much is made of it among elders. However disdainful or critical individuals are of the system, their disdain seldom keeps them from participating in the Invictus’ own, private Danse Macabre.Invictus coteries often express ranking with a Latin numbering system. The primus is the highest ranking vampire in the group, followed by the secundus, the tertius, the quartus and the quintus, and on down the line (sextus, septimus, octavius) for as many individuals as need be. A common joke in Invictus coteries is that an especially disgraced member is the septimus (in a coterie of five), and “septimus” has become young Invictus slang for, “You get to hide the bodies.”
The exact benefits and drawbacks of coterie position vary from domain to domain, but the following discussion cites a few examples.
Higher-ranking Kindred may ask small favors of those beneath them and expect to have them granted. Examples of this might include borrowing small items from the subordinate, small acts of deference toward the ranking member like opening doors or pulling out chairs, or handling small annoyances that the ranking member doesn’t want to be bothered by (finding a good lawyer who will meet after nightfall, driving duty, etc.). A ranking member of a coterie can ask any subordinate member to be his second in a conflict. The primus can ask favors of all other members of the coterie, the quintus (in a five-Kindred coterie) cannot ask favors of the others and expect to be taken seriously. If feeding occurs in a group situation, Kindred in a coterie slake their thirsts in order of rank. The coterie’s quartus and quintus might find themselves going hungry a lot if there’s not time for everyone to feed in a night, so it’s often in the interest of the lowest ranking members to have feeding fodder waiting for ranking members as early in the evening as possible to avoid going hungry and possibly risking the Wassail. This is imperative for unusually large coteries comprising six or more members.
Should the coterie wind up with a windfall of any sort (a victim’s cash, an adversary’s blood dolls, the new feeding territory’s best strip…), the primus gets the pick of the trove, followed by the secundus and subordinate members in order of rank.
Her Management
At their core, nearly all Invictus coteries are about managing a herd. More often than not that herd comprises kine, but experienced Kindred might be put in charge of managing younger Kindred or even managing other covenants through the strains of the Danse Macabre. Herd management, simply defined, is making others do as you want them to do, through whatever means necessary.Extremely subtle coteries might do this simply by managing the motives and opportunities of their chosen herd. If members of a coterie provide their target with both a goal and a motive to push it through the goal, they can be reasonably certain of getting the results they want without ever involving themselves personally. Telling a mortal, “You’ll get the ten thousand dollars when you bring me the report on Terrell & Swain,” is much easier and less dangerous than breaking into the T&S headquarters. This is the ideal that Invictus coteries strive for because it’s powerful, subtle and poses no threat whatsoever to the Masquerade. All other forms of manipulation are secondary, but the Invictus is adept at those tactics, too.
Night to Night: Neonates
Neonate coteries have the least control over their own nights. In pursuit of advancement, they’re likely to find themselves serving under oaths to ancillae and elders in small ways that pose no threat to the coterie but expose the group to new facets of the Requiem. Alternatively, the powers that be in a city might think of them as disposable, especially if the coterie has a history of behavioral problems. On a night-to-night basis, a coterie of Invictus neonates might find itself…- investigating reports of a new, unacknowledged Kindred in the city
- charming mortals into service
- orchestrating complex power plays in order to acquire new or greater influence in the mortal world
- carrying messages, summonses or invitations to ancillae or elders of other covenants
- ejecting Kindred of another covenant from Invictus territory
- “neutralizing” a mortal threat to one of the covenant’s (or the covenant’s allies’) favored influences
- locating the haven of a problematic Kindred of another covenant
- learning the finer points of the Danse Macabre from a mentor
Night to Night: Ancillae
The ancillae usually compose the bulk of Invictus membership. Potentially on the brink of being elders themselves, they have more experience and power than neonates, but they have yet to become institutions in the way that elders often do under the responsibilities of City, Covenant and Clan Status. In the course of an average night, a coterie of Invictus ancillae might find itself…- grooming and building mortal influences for the next stage of their careers, thereby increasing and extending their usefulness
- conducting a meeting with a mortal banker, stockbroker or financier to shepherd its investments and protect them from hostile influences
- making an appearance at Elysium to hobnob with the city’s luminaries
- adjudicating a feeding grounds dispute between two Invictus neonates
- searching for a Lupine or mage suspected tobe at large in the domain
- undermining the efforts of a rival coterie to gain positive notice from the covenant’s scions
- stealing influence from Kindred of another covenant
- daring the space between cities to consolidate Invictus efforts in another domain
Night to Night: Elders
At least at first glance, the nightly games of the Invictus’ elders are the subtlest of all. That’s because they have the most to lose. They have not made it as far as they have by making rash mistakes, and they’re not likely to make any move that puts their unlives, their empires or even their mortal influence at risk. They’re playing for the highest stakes, including a monopoly on the city’s influential mortals, the covenant’s future in a particular domain and positions among the Inner Circle. Failure could be disastrous not only for them but, in some cases, for the covenant as a whole.On a nightly basis, a coterie of Invictus elders might find itself…
- systematically undermining the mortal influence of another covenant in preparation for a power grab
- issuing a formal declaration of war on another covenant in the domain
- meeting with the Prince, Primogen or Prisci to negotiate favorable terms for the covenant’s members
- appearing at Elysium in full formal regalia to attend to domain business
- forming bloodlines or broods of their own, or studying unique Disciplines
- making preparations before a member enters a long torpor or welcoming back a member who’s just coming out of a long torpor
- calling in favors from the city’s media outlets in order to squelch a major breach of the Masquerade
- attending a production of Madame Butterfly with the mayor and her family