Multi-Participant Rituals

Where a ritual requires more than one person to be present, it will include it in the description. A ritualist can also choose to include additional participants to create a greater effect. Every multi-participant ritual must be led by a Lead Ritualist. This character must know the ritual being cast. Any tests required will use this character’s stats as a starting point.

Additional participants can be of two types:

  • Additional Ritualists: any character with a Ritual Discipline who is not needed for the ritual and who knowingly and willingly participates in a ritual counts as an additional ritualist. Additional ritualists add benefits according to the following table, although this may vary by ritual:

    1 Additional: 1 benefit
    3 Additional: 2 benefits
    6 Additional: 3 benefits

  • Acolytes: any character without a Ritual Discipline who is not needed for the ritual and who knowingly and willingly participates in a ritual counts as an acolyte. Having a group of acolytes (at least one dot of Thralls in size) to support the ritual produces 1 benefit.

The specific benefits that a ritual gains from having additional ritualists or acolytes are defined in the description of each individual ritual. Some rituals may be designed only to work as a multi-participant ritual in which case the effect is likely to be stronger as a result, while other rituals may scale based on the number of individuals involved.

Where characters are involved in a multi-participant ritual which may have an unexpected and/or undesirable effect, then the ST Team will make a Mental + Occult check for all those involved. The ST team will then consult any player whose check was successful so they can decide what they may wish to do before, during or after the ritual. The ST team may also consult any who fail if the unexpected elements are obvious and then only on what they wish to do during (if possible) or after the ritual is concluded.

Multi-Disciplinary, Multi-Participant Rituals

All Ritual Disciplines are united in their use of vampire blood as power, so Additional Ritualists do not need to possess the Ritual Discipline the Lead Ritualist is using. However, combining different intrinsic ritual frameworks is a complex act. Therefore, any such ritual must add a Quality from a Ritual Discipline known by these Additional Ritualists.

For example, Fatima bin Faisal bin Hassan wishes to cast the Dur-An-Ki ritual Read the Book of Truth with the help of Hekat Forktongue, who is a practitioner of Akhu. Read the Book of Truth already requires participants enter a trance state, so Fatima decides to add the Akhu Quality “Defiling” by having all the practitioners enter the that state through a particularly depraved orgy that forces each of them to test for loss of Road.