VTM: Bloodlines Lore Revealed

[Tessera]

Copied over from the members-only section of the board. Regular board members... please refrain from responding here and direct your responses to the original topic, please. This thread is intended for public awareness amongst non-members, as pretentious as that may appear on the surface.



Okay, let's cut through some bullshit. Or maybe even a lot of bullshit regarding Bloodlines lore and the debates surrounding it.


One of the reasons that White Wolf sanctioned VTMB... despite the numerous conflicts between VTMB lore and the remainder of WoD lore... is because VTMB is set within a time line that so far has not existed within the remainder of WoD lore. Now don't jump at me... just read the rest of this lengthy but (hopefully) interesting post, please. C'mon, please just take a few minutes and actually read this post with an open mind. Please try. This has never been a board for the shallow, short attention span, hopelessly adolescent "TL;DR" crowd. We've always prided ourselves on that fact. And I am definitely sticking my neck out with this post.

So let's prove it and give me the benfit of a doubt, as well as your patience and interest...

Because you see, Bloodlines is a game which is far, far deeper in its depth and sophistication than most average players realize. It is truly brilliant, if you take the time to delve into its depths.

Brian Mitsoda... if by any wild chance you are reading this, then I would love to have the opportunity to have an e-mail exchange with you. Errrm... as one fantasy/horror writer to another, that is. Sssh... relax. I don't want anything from you... I promise... because my life is going splendidly. I just bought a new ranch in SoCal and everything is peachy. Well, except for my electric bill. But I would love to do what H.P Lovecraft used to do and conduct some harmless, casual discourse with fellow kindred spirits (heh). Could be fun, dude. What..? HEY... no, I'm not gay... in fact, I'm so hetero that it frightens other heterosexuals. You should see them... grabbing their crotches and running into the night. Especially the girls who actually believed me when I said that the brass headboard was... oh shit, nevermind. And it frightens homosexuals even more, but for reasons that only they understand. Well okay -- I understand why, but I'm judiciously side-stepping that can of worms. Ummm... because I have already delved deeply into adolescence at this point. Fuck... have I blown this overture already...? I really didn't mean to. Honestly. So chill out. dude. No hidden agenda here. It's just that truly intelligent people are often difficult to connect with on the internet. And even if you do, half the time they're hopeless head cases. Or they believe that their professional standing/credentials somehow prohibit them from being normal and amiable human beings. Well, you strike me as being at least a little left of center, and more than the sum of your resume. Wanna take a chance..? I think you might be pleasantly surprised, if you elect to reach out and respond to one of your most ardent fans. Hey... I can hope. Your writing style is so similar to my own that I'm beginning to think that we may have been twins, separated at birth. Well anyway, dude... I am always available (to everyone) at tessera@tessmage.com

But anyway....

VTMB is set within a time line that we hope will never exist... The Final Nights. Gehenna, to put it succinctly.

Remember all of those debates about whether or not the cabbie in Bloodlines is actually Caine, the Dark Father..? Well, guess what..? HE IS.

Now, how can that be..? Traditional WoD lore states that Caine will remain hidden from his Childer until the dawning of Gehenna, does it not..? I don;t wish to divert this topic into being yet another cabbie/Caine debate (we already have another thread for that), but I do wish to point out that Bloodlines is NOT exactly coherent with any of the WoD lore which existed prior to the release of the game. No... Bloodlines is a game which elected to swing into the left lane of the WoD freeway, and take the fast route to The End Of Days.

So then... what exactly is the "correct" canon for the end of days..?

Rather straightforward, actually. Caine will come out of hiding and... for the first time in thousands of years... make his physical presence known. he may or MAY NOT elect to feed upon the blood of his Childer. The lore says that he will do exactly that... but it also says that Caine has free will and may decide upon some other path. Just as he did when he defied the arch-angels and escaped from the Land Of Nod, only to wind up siring the entire race of the Kindred. Caine is not a robot... that is my point. Just because "god" says it must be so, that doesn't mean Caine is listening. Thanks to his curse, Caine has become almost as powerful as Satan and he absolutely has the capability of defying his own curse.

Why am I saying all of this..?

I am saying it because on several VTMB boards, I have seen the same tired old debates being waged ad nauseum for years and years. Caine can't do this... Caine can't do that. The cabbie can't be Caine, because Caine isn't allowed to so-and-so. These can't REALLY be the Final Nights, because Caine hasn't such-and-such yet.

Wrong.

Listen to me, fellow Kindred. It's really him. It's really here. It's really Gehenna. These are really The Final Nights. The Dark Father has returned... but....

...but he is once again defying "god."


Imagine that I'm an all-powerful being named "god." And I've written a bunch of edicts in stone. So of course, those edicts absolutely MUST come true, right..?

No... WRONG.

Did this "god" write an edict which demanded the murder of Adam's son Abel..? No, he did not. Did it happen anyway..? Oh yes... Caine smashed Abel's head in, with the jawbone of a donkey. he murdered his own brother, due to overpowering feelings of envy and hatred... much to the HORROR of this "god." So clearly, "god" and his supposed canonical edicts are open to violations.

Overwhelmingly powerful human emotional drives are capable of defying "god" and his hierarchy.

Caine is not bound by canon.

God loses, because Caine has free will. And the power to use it. he has already proven it... lore and canon be damned. The precedent has been set, by Caine himself.

When does Bloodlines take place..? I'll tell you where...

It takes place right this minute. Inside your head. And out there... on the streets. The darker the street, the more evident it is. The deeper the pit, the more rapidly its bottom recedes from you. The more you cling to canon, the deeper that pit becomes... because...

...because nothing is written in stone. Caine is holding the scribe by the throat. Not "god." Not the "angels." Not the Elders.

Caine. He has the power to avert Gehenna. What was intended to be a curse has instead proven to be the most powerful evolution that Mankind has ever been given. The power to defy "god" and his machinations. The power to truly... more so than any normal mortal entity... be completely self-determinate.

When is Bloodlines set..? In October of 2004. And Caine is here... out in the open... and behaving quite differently than the canon prescribes. Does Caine care what the canon prescribes..? Yes and no... he is bound to take it into account, but he is also empowered to carefully and judiciously alter it.

I submit to all of you that Caine is not evil. I submit that Caine is actually the salvation of not only the Kindred, but also of the Kyne. And in Bloodlines, he is intent upon proving that statement to be true.

That is why White Wolf sanctioned Bloodlines. The game establishes an entirely new time line... one in which Gehenna is upon us, but may be diverted by none other than Caine himself.

As for the player character..? How do we fit in..? Why are we so unbelievably powerful, given the 5th to 7th generation that we supposedly belong to..?

Our stats say that we're 5th generation. Possibly 6th or 7th. But our individual feats are totally inconsistent with anything short of a third-generation Antediluvian. How can this be..?

Shut up and grab your much-revered rule books. Now research the actual feats which our character accomplishes within Bloodlines. Now tell me how it is even remotely possible for a 5th to 7th generation Kindred to accomplish even half of those feats... even if he or she had every possible break..?

Let me save you some time, because I have already researched it. It isn't possible. And it is in fact the battle with Ming Xiao which seals that reality in stone. It is not physically possible for a 5th to 7th generation Kindred to defeat a third generation (which is what Ming Xiao is) Keui-Jin priestess. That bitch is a thousand years old and yet, we tore her tits off. Not even Jack could do that.

The only answer would be pure speculation. But I believe it is because we were chosen by Caine. I believe that our sire was... and I really mean this... sired by Caine himself and instructed... no, ordered... commanded... to sacrifice him/her self in order to sire a Prodigal Childe. Nay... a Destiny's Childe, in every sense of what that term means. Look at the seemingly incongruous power that our character wields..!!! Only a week old... and yet, we can utterly annihilate the most powerful Keui-Jin in the city..?! We can turn the 200-year-old, 5th Generation Prince and his Nagloper Sheriff into toast..?! Not even Smiling Jack could do that... and Jack is 600 years old. Just as one often finds within the mythology of the Bible... or Greek mythology, for that matter... our sire was commanded to Embrace an innocent. A babe in the woods. An uncorrupted soul. A vessel for a new type of Kindred... a being of pure, unspoiled incarnation... of innocent and untainted blood and spirit. No, no... not some kind of half-assed anti-Christ... but more of an anti-Adam or anti-Eve. A righteous vessel, to put the lie to "god's" curse upon Caine and his Childer and show that even from the most accursed and unpromising soil, a single rose can still bloom... surrounded by the ashes of the Fallen.

Bloodlines takes place during the time when Caine will attempt to lead his progeny back to their stolen Humanity. Whether or not he will succeed, we will never know. But that is my take on the entire Bloodlines time line.

PS -- please pardon any typos or grammatical errors within this post. It's late and I wrote this post verbatim.... off the top of my very tired head.  



Tessera is not only the author of the True Patch Gold Edition, but is also an avid, long-time Bloodlines player... who enjoys spirited discussions and debates surrounding this truly unique RPG. This post was a response to one such discussion, down in the members-only Bloodlines area of this board. On this board, we are blessed with a truly intellectual and sophisticated group of expert VTM: Bloodlines players... in fact, they are the most sophisticated Bloodlines players that I have ever seen on any forum board, bar none. Seriously. And I have never ceased to be impressed with their insights and devotion to this truly one-of-a-kind RPG masterpiece.

[mouser9170]

Here's a question about this Bloodlines lore stuff (and yet another reason I'm glad WW/CCP did away with 'generations'):

If you - or anyone else in the game, let's say the Prince - is a 5th generation vampire, that would mean his sire was 4th generation. That, in turn, would mean his sire would have had to have been embraced by an Antediluvian. Yet Beckett claims that no one he has ever met has actually met an Antediluvian, meaning Beckett (who has unearthed more 'vampire lore' than anyone) has never met a 4th generation vampire.

Which makes not only the 3rd, but the 4th generation notably absent from the game world (maybe they are the 'dusty old elders' hiding in tombs).

IIRC, the game text files have you as an 8th generation, but the number isn't actually used for anything.

[Tessera]

Not absent from the game world... just absent from Beckett's personal experience.