From: gbrent@rsc.anu.edu.au (Geoffrey Brent)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.storyteller
Subject: Re: On the Mnemosyne (was Re: Bindusara and his pursuers)
Date: 16 Jul 1996 06:08:19 GMT

>|> line...' This is a clear descreption of Obfuscate, Auspex and Domiante
>|> respectively, known since the Convention of Thorns as the Clan Disciplines
>|> of Clan Malkavian.

>Pick three Disciplines from the main book that are better for gathering
>information.

Thaumaturgy ? Dominate is great for interrogating those of later
generation, but it's useless against elders, and hence not much fun in
researching early Kindred history. OTOH, Thaumaturgy can be VERY useful
in examining evidence. And if you can catch one of the Mnemosyne, you
can use Thaumaturgy to find out what clan they're _really_ from ;-)

>Malkavian's aren't typically obsessed. Judging from the clanbook and most
>people's PC's, they fall into the happy madman category. Their derangements also

The Clanbook lists several different stages of madness that Malkavians
can go through. I suspect most people go for the happy, giggling madman
because playing other brands of mental illness is usually either
extremely taxing or extremely depressing. Often both. Also, pranking is
heavily encouraged by Clan Malkavian, but that's more a clan culture
thing than a direct identifier of each vampire's madness.

As I understand it, the purpose of pranking is to cause confusion and
shock, and hence to make people re-examine their understanding of the
universe. 

>Since when do Malkavians *go* insane? Or fear madness? If the author is a

A lot of them do. For all the justifications they give about how it
helps see the world in a new way, and so on, and so on, a lot of people
- including some Malkavians - find madness a very terrifying thing. The
average schizophrenic, for instance, would usually give almost anything
to be freed of it.

        Geoffrey Brent
-- 
        (gbrent@rsc.anu.edu.au)