From SuspireWiki
So you want to play a good Invictus?
This document isn’t meant to be an end-all, be-all document to Invictus playing, because everyone has their own style of roleplay, and opinions of how things work. Instead, I’m going to try to make this into a general document for what’s expected of your character within the Invictus, and how you, the player, can better project that “Invictus” feel for your character, rather than projecting the “Young vampire with money!” feel that so many characters wind up inadvertently projecting (when it’s not what they’re trying to do).
One more thing... This document also assumes you have a pretty good grasp on the Invictus lexicon, and the Invictus titles of Esteem, Function and Tribute, as well as already knowing the differences between types of Invictus Sworn Oaths from the Invictus covenant book. So if you don’t you probably should read up on that book, and have a glance through our supplemental character-aids section for the Invictus covenant.
Let’s get it started.
Contents |
The History! The Invictus is all about the History! Don’t forget it!
Invictus characters, all of them, should have one night of the year which they can exclaim as “their” night. It was the night when they joined the Invictus formally. That one night, the Manumission, where the subject of note, of distinction and worth was them. Think about it, how often do Kindred have parties thrown in their favor outside of Princes? Exactly. It is a big deal. Think about that night for your character. How did it go? Was it all according to plan? Did your character scuffle through the Manumission? Was your character a golden childe who was later snubbed during the gifting ceremony of the after-party by a jealous rival? Remember, all of these things can develop the personality of your character over it’s years.
So your character became an Invictus! Hurray! Now let’s think about what happened afterwards. When was the first time they took an Oath? Was it a normal Oath of Service to see if they were capable of fitting into the patronage system? Was it one of the most serious Oaths of Fealty, and if so, why was your character so special as to skip to Fealty without first proving themselves under Service? How did it go?
You might think that your first Oath isn’t a big deal, but think about a person’s mentality. Your first time doing something is almost always the most memorable. This wouldn’t be any different for your Invictus character.
It’s important to develop the history steps for your character, so that you know how your character might better react to the present and future.
The Devil is in the Details
There is absolutely no covenant in Vampire the Requiem that this is more true for. The Ordo Dracul has the structured scientific method, but that is a method that’s designed for the express purpose to get rid of the guesswork. The Invictus formality is absolutely not so cut and dry.
Familiarize yourself with the codes within the codes.
Some people only have their characters wearing flowers, gemstones and the like during parties and Invictus meetings. This is okay, but this is a document about how to play a good Invictus, remember?
A good Invictus takes pride in flowering pretty much everything they can in their night to night games.
Having a bad night? Want everyone in society to know? Place a flower on your lapel. Don’t be afraid, on the reverse side of this coin, to check every time you see an Invictus Kindred on social code.
Remember that there’s more than just flowers that can determine moods and hidden languages. There are also colors in general and gemstones which have their own hidden meanings. On top of that, the Invictus has it’s very own lingo to master as well.
This is why the Invictus social system is so structured as it is. You could send someone a rather beautiful necklace, but completely forget about the inherent possible meanings of such a gift and completely send the wrong message.
Though many of you might not have seen “The Tudors” series, some of you have. In Season one, when Henry is still chasing after Anne, she sends him a small gift of a simple looking boat, with a dangling diamond in the front of it. The scene revolves around his looking at the boat, then coming to the conclusion of what she truly means with it’s gifting. This is a representation of what actually happened. Here is a brief explanation:
- It was a symbolic jewel, a small pendant with a picture of a maiden in a boat, tossed upon the waves. While this may seem an almost childish gesture today, in Tudor England the message of such a gift was clear and it was anything but juvenile. The symbolism of the boat meant Anne was asking Henry to protect her from the storms of life. The best way for a man to do this for a woman was to marry her. The carefully chosen jewel gave Henry the spur he needed, and over the next six years he turned the religions and laws of England upside down to make Anne his wife. Quite something for a small golden boat. (from The secret language of jewellry)
This is very similar to the idea behind many Invictus gifts. Remember, Invictus as a covenant is old, though the Kindred inside of it may not be. They are not above or beyond these little tokens (or insults!) to make the nights of the Requiem pass by with subtle, all too subtle, references.
Letters, letters, letters. God, so many letters!
Let me preface this section by saying this: letters are a lot of work. How many times have you typed up an email that’s about three, maybe four sentences long and shipped it out without a second guess to it? Probably lots. Now realize that this is really just a modern thing.
Before the time of abbreviated electronic letters, there were lettergrams, mails and hand-delivered enveloped letters. Think about your grandparents. Even on the rare possibility they use email, think about how much they write in them. There’s a very distinct difference in mentality between now and then (or for Invictus, now and then).
So the point I’m getting to is, letters were and are important, and should not be glossed over. But as a player, you probably don’t want to spend all your damn time writing up letters every time your character wants to drop off some small amount of cash payment or some other minor detail which really could be summed up in about a line or two of an email or text message.
So what is to be done?
Do what a lot of people tend to do when they first create their characters, or the first time they send out one of these payments or boon notations: create a form letter and save it for the future. That way, when you’re ready to do that again in said future, you already have a template which you can add to or remove from without the stress and time necessary to type up a whole huge letter to accompany.
Oh, you thought that was it about letters? Not quite, little grasshopper. Come back here.
Guess what? Just as there’s many flowers, gemstones and colors which represent various things, so to is there types of character letters. There’s formal (the most normally used), ultra formal, familiar and The Fuck-Up letter type. You have to keep all of that in mind too when you’re writing a letter.
Something that isn’t mentioned in that guide just linked to you, is the apology letter. You could group it into the “fuck up letter” place, but it should bear mentioning that this should also apply to other circumstances. An example of this may be when you’ve been beaten in a non-final-death Monomacy, for instance. You’ve been beaten and thrashed, but you’re now alive, and you want to maintain at least some shred of your honor and face, so what do you do?
You write an apology letter to the victor.
You congratulate them on their win, and offer them in good faith what they’ve already won and probably something else to show that you won’t harbor any further ill-will towards them, and that they won fair and square as per the great and longstanding Traditions of the Invictus. This of course doesn’t have to be true, you probably hate their guts still! But it’s not about what you feel within the Invictus, it’s about what to project. They probably know you still hate their guts, too, but propriety is funny like that. When an enemy shows throat, the onus becomes on them to show restraint as is proper. Overkill and excess is crass.
The Invictus mentality and how they project themselves in person.
By now you’ve probably got a grasp of the mentality of the Kindred inside of the Invictus covenant. But this document is trying to cover all aspects of the mentality for a good stock Invictus character.
Let’s hit some bullet points about Invictus characters in general and perhaps some dispel some myths at the same time.
You can expect an Invictus character to...
- Be snide and condescending.
- Be easily offended.
- Overreact to minor things.
- Extort boons and blackmail anyone they can.
Semi-Myth #1: All Invictus are snide and condescending.
Invictus hold themselves with propriety and tend to expect those around them to do the same. This is where, in general, the snobbishness of the Invictus gets confused. There are some socialites who embody the snideness to which most Invictus get credited, of course, and it isn’t even frowned on by the covenant in general.
However, there is a point where snobbishness becomes crass, and while those socialites might go over the edge, just as often, other Invictus are plenty happy to set them in their place concerning it.
- “What a horrible dress, you should fire your seamstress.” “Did you get that at a department store?”
- A nearby aid to the victimized party comes over.
- “Why Madam Fortineau, how good to see you tonight.” “It must have taken you forever to get into that gorgeous dress.” “...But it’s a shame that you so easily shed it for the Mister Librettist.”
Remember, being the lords of the night is hard. Step across that line and other Invictus are just as happy to one-liner you with that amazing sense of politesse.
Being polite doesn’t also mean being nice.
Semi-Myth #2: All Invictus are easily offended.
Like with #1, Invictus tend to expect those around them to have the same sense of propriety when they are around as they would expect in all of their other company. This leads to some individuals thinking that the Invictus are thin-skinned people who get offended at OMG Everything.
Truth is, most Invictus don’t even think twice about correcting another, and give even less thought to trying to gain from the situation. When you come from a covenant that is known for being fantastically wealthy the idea of someone being too poor to afford apology simply doesn’t occur to them. Arguably, a very “high brow” mentality on the poor is more that they’re simply too lazy to make the proper adjustments or earn enough so that they can.
Remember, Invictus are kind of space cadets. They’re from a society which simply doesn’t care what the hell your problem is with the way they address each other, or their corrections as to your proper discourse. They think you’re uneducated and perhaps even a philistine. Society thinks you are beneath them.
Semi-Truth #3: All Invictus overreact to minor things.
Okay, this one is fun. It’s probably mostly truth, but not because they’re thin-skinned as mentioned already above in #2. The Invictus simply, as a whole, don’t have a conscience when it comes to gaining power.
One of their main teachings to their people is this: The purpose of power is to achieve more power. They’re not really overreacting because they’re offended. They’re overreacting because they want you in debt to them.
That’s pretty much the short and long of it.
Truth #4: All Invictus extort boons and blackmail anyone they can.
Well... yeah.
Though this has mostly been addressed in #3, the important thing here is “anyone they can”. They’ll try to get you if they can get away with it. That’s why some groups, particularly the Carthian Movement, have adopted the belief that Invictus simply are undead monsters with no conscience for their fellow-Kindred.
And for some - perhaps even a greater number than some - Invictus, that’s completely true. If you’re an avenue to power that they’re after, you become part of their game of collecting thrones and crowns.
And as Cersei Lannister (written by George R.R. Martin) said best, “When you play a game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground.”
If you're not a Lord or an acting Vassal, you’re not really an Invictus at all.
It’s true, and you would almost think it would be common sense, but any Invictus who is not under oath, or holding someone else is essentially an outcast of the covenant. Other Invictus have no desire, nor feelings of good-will to help you. You’ll be on your own, and to those outside the covenant who are wanting to knock an Invictus down a peg or two (because any Invictus worth their salt will, in fact, have enemies) you’ll become like a prime cut of meat.
Immediately after the Manumission, almost every single Invictus will scramble to be beholden to someone. They, and everyone else knows, the honeymoon only lasts a couple nights. You need protection through patronage, it’s as simple as that.
Contrary to the erroneous belief that immediately swearing Oath of Fealty to the first Invictus you come across after the Manumission, or after joining a new city, brings you favor... it actually more often makes you look aspiring to everyone else. After all, you’re jumping the line with your presumption that you deserve Fealty (as the Lord generally has to give you something) and you’re so above swearing an Oath of Service.
Remember, the Invictus is both a meritocracy and a society for propriety. You don’t want to get the reputation as the gung-ho line-cutter in the Invictus. The Invictus prize dependability over occasional spurts of brilliance. They’d prefer a well-oiled, never-late-to-the-station, never-breaks-down but slightly slower locomotive over a super-bullet-train that has a penchant for breaking down on the tracks infrequently even if it moves at warp speed. That’s the Invictus mentality.
So if you want to be a good Invictus, you’d better find yourself in some kind of Oaths. Minor ones, major ones... it doesn’t matter. It is an unspoken crime to be outside of the patronage system, even for a few nights at a time.
And now you know.
I hope this helps you in your desire to play a good Invictus. Remember, the Invictus is almost alien in mentality to most of us young folks, and so it takes a good deal of extra thinking and effort to pull one off winningly. Good luck on playing your Kindred of Quality.