Mind's Eye Theatre - Vampire The Requiem.pdf - RoseRed

a target. Everyone watches TV instead of talking to their neighbors. Churches, clubs and
other social groups merely give people a chance to hide from the world together, with a few
people who think like them.
• Madness: In a mad world, why not go mad yourself? Insanity takes many forms in the
World of Darkness. Sometimes it’s obvious, like the bag lady talking to herself as she roots
through the dumpster, or the junkie ranting through his withdrawal on a street corner. Some
forms of madness hide themselves, like the affable family man who molests his daughters.
Other lunacies grow from isolation and fear, such as fanatical racism or other forms of bigotry.
Many people seek escape through the temporary madness of drugs.
THEMES
This is a world in which virtue cannot count on a foreordained triumph. In fact, most of
the evidence suggests that virtue hasn’t got a chance. The only question left would seem to
be whether the world will choke and die on its own corruption, or just grind on the same
vicious round forever — a horrible ending, or horrors without end.
Most people have given up. They merely want a little comfort in the short life allotted to
mortals. Only blind fanatics seem to care about the world’s future, and they would rather cast
the world into fi re than bend one inch on their ideologies. The few people who achieve real
power have chosen to reign in Hell instead of struggling to make the world a better place.
As a race, the Kindred fall in that last category. In some ways, their unnatural state gives
them great power. In other ways, it makes them weaker than the mortals they prey upon.
Deep down, they know this. If the mortals give in to despair, why would the Damned hope
they could make a difference?
Regardless of clan, covenant or setting, the players’ characters face this choice between
striving for virtue or surrendering to vice. The choice doesn’t have to be stated openly, but it
lies at the heart of The Requiem. Can the characters strive to become something more than
monsters? Especially when they know that sometimes they must fail? “Doing the right thing”
is diffi cult from within the Requiem. Often it is dangerous. Sometimes it’s hard to tell exactly
what the right thing is. Nevertheless, they may achieve heroism during their tragic unlives by
struggling to fi nd courage, compassion or other virtues within themselves.
Within that broad theme of moral choices and their consequences, you can develop a variety of
other themes for your chronicle. A theme gives your chronicle a central idea that organizes your
stories and ties them together. This isn’t a “moral to the story” — nothing so cut-and-dried. A good
theme is a question. The characters supply their own answers, through the choices they make as
they react to the situations you present. Suitable themes for Requiem chronicles include:
• The Danse Macabre: Kindred existence is a ghastly, undercover war of each against all,
with power over mortals as both weapon and prize. Young vampires struggle to gain some
power and security despite the greed of their elders; the older vampires struggle to keep the
power they’ve acquired and gain more, to use against their own rivals. Young and old are
both willing to betray other Kindred of their age in order to better their own position, striking
alliances of convenience.
Can the characters avoid the Danse Macabre, or must they participate for their own survival?
Can they escape the vicious cycle of needing still more power to deal with the enemies they
made through their past gambits? Can they use their power for virtuous ends? Do virtuous
ends even exist in the World of Darkness? Most importantly, can they trust each other, or
will they betray each other for the sake of individual power?
• Bound by Invisible Chains: The Requiem brings power and freedom from mortal laws
and limitations… or does it? Many Kindred believe they are the undying masters of the night,
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mind’s chapter eye four: theatre: storytelling requiem