Chapter IV: Rituals

OOC: The details contained about the ritual is for player use.  The IC details is more of a how the rituals work than the details of how to cast them.  The easiest use of this section is to counter the rituals.  Knowing that a blue silken cord around the casters neck means something, a wooden splinter under the tongue, the Blood Contract binds the caster as well as the signatory, that the blood offered with Principal Focus makes you steps bound to the caster are all powerful tools.

In this Chapter you will find the following rituals:

- Pavis of Foul Presence

To combat the powers of the Presence Discipline, you tie a blue silken cord around your neck while intoning the Pavis of Foul Presence.  Until the next sunrise, you are defended against Presence powers.  This ritual is completely unknown outside the Tremere clan, who keep it as a powerful secret in their wars of vampiric influence.

Thaumaturgy Ritual, Pavis of Foul Presence (Va.3.6.06)
When a Presence power is used on the ritualist, she may elect to activate the ritual reflexively after the challenge.  If the ritualist won the challenge to resist the Presence power used against her, the Presence user is affected by the power instead.  If the ritualist failed the challenge, the Presence power is simply nullified.  Pavis of Foul Presence cannot be used on Presence powers that do not directly target the thaumaturge (such as Majesty).  The casting is dispelled after a single use.

- Deflection of the Wooden Doom

The wooden stake is the bane of all vampires, but Deflection of Wooden Doom protects against such attacks.  You must sit in a circle of wood for a full hour to cast this ritual.  When completed, you place a tiny splinter of wood under your tongue.  As long as the splinter remains there, or until the next dusk or dawn, you are protected.  The first stake to impale your heart mystically crumbles to dust, at which point the ritual ends.  The stake must actually enter your body for this ritual to work - a stake simply held near you is unaffected.

- The Burning Blade

Thaumaturgy Ritual, Burning Blade [New Camarilla] (Va.3.5.03)
This ritual can only be used on melee weapons.  The caster spends at least three Blood Traits to cast the ritual.  At any time during that session, she may then wound herself with the weapon to activate the power until the end of that scene.  When activated, the weapon flickers with an unholy green flame, inflicting aggravated wounds.  The ritual ends prematurely if, after activation, the number of times the weapon inflicts damage ever equals the number of Blood Traits spent in the casting.
 

- Principal Focus of Vitae Infusion

Concentrating the power of your blood, you cause your own vitae to sink into a small object.  With a touch and a mental command, you can later cause this object to break down back into a pool of your own blood.  You can imbue an object between the sizes of a dime and a loaf of bread with a single Trait of your own blood, at which time the object becomes slightly reddish and slick.  Alternately, you can use the Principal Focus of Vitae Infusion to craft an object of your blood that responds to the touch of another individual, as long as that individual is present during the casting of the ritual.  Of course, since your own blood must be used, the subject risks the blood bond.

Thaumaturgy Ritual, Principal Focus of Vitae Infusion (Va.3.5.09)
After breaking down the ensorcelled object, it becomes a pool of the caster's blood.  To utilize this blood, a character will need to ingest this blood.  As listed on page 106 of Laws of the Night: Revised, only three Traits of blood may be consumed in a turn.
 

- Bone of Lies

By enchanting a mortal finger bone as a Bone of Lies, you bind the soul of the skeleton to the bone.  Then, whenever someone holds the bone, the taint of any lies that they speak is drawn into the finger bone, which blackens it as the spirit within becomes corrupt.  The bone must be at least 200 years old, and it must be steeped in at least 10 Traits of blood during the casting of the ritual - all of the blood is mystically absorbed.  Thereafter, whenever someone knowingly speaks a lie while holding the bone, it darkens noticeably and forces the subject to speak the truth immediately.  Each lie so negated uses one of the Blood Traits in the bone; when all 10 are used, the bone is blackened and useless, home only to a dark spirit twisted by lies.

- Blood Contract

By spending three nights in the writing of a contract with your own blood, you create an unbreakable bond between yourself and any one signatory.  You use two Blood Traits to make the contract - one to write it, and one for both parties to sign it.  The Blood Contract enforces compliance of both parties to the literal terms listed.  Should either party break the terms of the contract, the individual immediately suffers enough aggravated health levels of damage to fall into torpor, and this damage cannot be resisted in any way.  The only way to finish the contract is to fulfill its terms or to physically burn it.

OOC: ST Contact information: aaronbryant74 @ sbcglobal.net