The Temptation of the Beast
Source: https://vamp.bynightstudios.com/vampire/library/thetemptationofthebeast
The Beast is calling, scratching at the door. It is hungry, eager, tempting, twisting a vampire's perceptions. It whispers, "murder is justified, even necessary." "Here's one who deserves it." "That one's better off dead." A little here, a little there, the Beast chisels away at a vampire's ethics and reason until something snaps — and the vampire's Humanity degrades.
In the end, all vampires are supernatural beings, animated corpses that subsist by preying on others. They are a pestilence, and they exist only by harming others. Further, vampirism reduces an individual's capacity to feel positive emotions, slowly wearing away the individual's compassion, empathy, and ability to recognize good from evil. These things are all cast aside by the curse that brings a vampire back from death. With human drives and desires twisted by a raging Beast that demands survival at any cost, vampires must cling to their beliefs. If they lose this tenuous thread, the Beast will win, and the original personality of the vampire will be utterly destroyed. The vampire will enter a frenzied, incredibly violent state known as wassail, and she will never return to lucidity.
Fledglings thrust into undead society often cling to the trappings of their mortal lives. Their original belief systems become guides, reminding them which actions are right and which are wrong, even when the vampire can no longer instinctively tell the difference. This ethical code is known as one's Humanity: the semblance of living according to positive moral values and principles. By clinging to these innate guidelines, a vampire can fight against the Beast and retain her sanity.
However, a vampire cannot ignore the fact that she is a monster. Even a vampire with a high Humanity rating feels the Beast inside, scratching at her spirit and demanding blood. As a vampire's Humanity erodes, she becomes jaded and blasé. She may even actively pursue progressively depraved acts in order to feel anything at all. With little memory of her Humanity to guide her, a vampire's behavior becomes callous in the extreme, utterly degenerate and monstrously predatory. She becomes a beacon of evil, and those nearby – undead and mortal alike – actively feel disconcerted, as something alien and terrible moves among them.
System Rules
Gaining Beast Traits
Every time your character commits a sin, you gain temporary Beast traits equal to the level of the sin. It is possible to mitigate the number of Beast traits your character gains when committing a sin by making a degeneration challenge.
Note: Beast traits are cumulative. Over the course of an evening, you might gain 2 Beast traits for one sin and 1 Beast trait for a second sin. In this case, you have a total of 3 Beast traits. * It's difficult for the undead to remain saintly. Characters with Humanity 6 gain 1 Beast trait when they break the law or when they harm another character. Even minor injuries, such as feeding, count as harm.
Level of Sin
1 Harm Another: You've significantly harmed another individual physically, mentally, or financially in a way that will take weeks for the victim to recover. For example, you may have broken a mortal's arm, inflicted a point of aggravated damage on a vampire, or severely damaged a mortal's livelihood.
2 Permanent Injury: You've harmed another individual in a way that will take the victim years to overcome (if ever). For example, you may have ripped a mortal's leg off, left a vampire staked and buried, or driven someone permanently insane.
3 Killing: You've killed another individual.
4 Multiple Murders: You've killed more than one individual.
5 Heinous Acts: You've committed inhuman acts that cannot be excused. For example, you may have brutally tortured your victim or committed diablerie.
Awarding Beast Traits and Paths of Enlightenment
It is important when assigning Beast traits to characters on alternative Paths of Enlightenment that the Storyteller review the tenets of the path to verify that said Beast traits are assigned correctly.
Beast Traits and Combat
When a character commits a sin outside of combat, she gains Beast traits as described above. During a combat scene, the Storyteller should not slow down the action by running multiple degeneration challenges. Instead, the Storyteller should track the most severe sin committed by each character, assign Beast traits accordingly, and resolve degeneration challenges at the end of the combat scene.
Degeneration Challenge
When a vampire commits a sin, she may attempt to feel remorse to mitigate the loss of Humanity. The test pool is Mental + Willpower with a standard difficulty rating (10) +1 per level of sin. For example, if Suzie broke her victim's finger for information (level 1 sin), her difficulty for the degeneration challenge is 11 (base 10 + 1 for the level of the sin). If the Storyteller feels that the actions triggering the degeneration challenge were justified due to circumstances or the greater good, she may reduce the difficulty by up to 5 points. However, this should be rare, as struggling against the Beast and taking the high road is a major
theme in Vampire.
If the degeneration challenge succeeds, reduce the number of Beast traits gained by 1 point. Characters on Humanity cannot reduce the number of Beast traits gained when committing diablerie.
Beast Traits
As a vampire commits sins, she accumulates Beast traits. These Beast traits indicate her Beast's current control over her actions. When triggered with the proper stimuli or motivation, the Beast attempts to take over, trying to force the vampire to frenzy.
While under the effects of frenzy, a character may take any sort of action or challenge as per usual (Physical, Social, or Mental) but all of the character's actions must be bent towards the motivation of her frenzy. You may use Auspex to find new victims, Dread Gaze to force your enemy to flee, or Obfuscate to hide from a terrifying foe. If a vampire spends an entire day sleeping, her Beast is lulled back into relative quiescence and all her Beast traits fade.
Source Book: MET - VTM - Core Book