Sunday, June 21, 2009

The Horror of Ventrue

A while ago, I talked about the Horror of Setites, quoting a post I'd made to the owbn-st list. Well a few days ago on the ventrue ooc list (owbn-scepter-ooc) I posted about what I consider to the be the Horror of playing Ventrue.

To me the core on Ventrue horror, at least based on the fiction and the clanbook is that we are The Man. We are the government. We are the elite few in control of the society. It's the horror of the boot stamping on a human face forever, of royalty abusing the commoners, of fear of those in power, and power corrupting. It's treating people like chess pieces. Hell, our signature PC from the clan novels had a feeding preference for rape victims, so he dominates somebody to rape a person so he can feed. That's Ventrue horror.

I'm not sure that's wrong, but thinking about it there is another element I may have failed to talk about. The horror is not just that the Ventrue are monsters who devalue individuals, who think of others as less then them. Part of the horror is that people want Ventrue in charge. They want safety and security, and if that means putting monsters who think of them as pawns in charge, all they ask is those monsters act like leaders and politicians. a Kind word, a good speech, even a smile and a nod, and Kindred will go and die for the Ventrue.

People want leaders they can love and politicans they can believe in. They will submit to the illusion of compassion in a leader.

And that too is part of the horror of Ventrue. That people obey and follow them, not out of fear, but out of the will to submit.