Paying a blood price - the economics of Vitae in the Dark Metropolis

Blood (or “Vitae”, as most vampires call it) is the single most important thing in the unlife of a Kindred.  It lets you wake up from the death-like slumber that overtakes you every day, it knits your wounds closed when you are injured, and fuels many disciplines and devotions.  A lack of Vitae is a terrible thing, leaving a vampire on edge and more easily influenced by their Beast.  Go too long without blood, and you’ll sucumb to frenzy or fall into the nightmare sleep of torpor.

So, unsurprisingly, every vampire wants to make sure they can get Vitae when they need it.  Some rent feeding grounds from the city’s Barons, carefully cultivating these good spots to hunt so they can take what they need at their leisure.  Of course, this comes at a price in either Sang (see our post on the Blood Bank) or favours, and means that your enemies know where to find you.  Others build herds around themselves, select groups of humans they can easily feed from who crave the sensations of the Kiss.  But these come with their own problems, and can stress the boundaries of the Masquerade if taken too far.  And as a last resort you can take to the city’s streets to hunt yourself a vessel, but either you need to seek permission or make sure you don’t get caught in someone else’s territory...

Whatever the case, Vitae drives Kindred society, particularly in the Low Court.  The High Court have had time to build their resources, chose the best feeding grounds for themselves, and carefully indoctrinate their herds, so can maintain the illusion of being above such petty concerns as where their next meal is coming from.  It’s rare that any Low Court Kindred has that luxury.

Vitae in the game

Times are tough in the Low Court of the Dark Metropolis, and the starting Vitae rules reflect that.  At the start of each game, every PC gets just 1 Vitae automatically.  However, there are a number of ways of improving on this:

• Renting a Feeding Ground (as represented by the Merit of the same name) gets you its dot rating + 1 in extra Vitae at the start of every game.
• Each dot in the Herd Merit gets you an extra Vitae at the start of every game.
• Using a downtime action to hunt gets you between 2 and 4 Vitae, depending on which District of the city you’re hunting in.  Some areas of the city are better for hunting than others.  Hunting in a District without permission may cause issues of its own, and too many Kindred hunting in the same place in a given downtime may start to threaten the Masquerade…

There are a few things that can negatively affect your starting Vitae.

• If you were starving (2 or fewer Vitae) at the end of the previous game, you take -1 to your starting Vitae.
• Each NPC ghoul you maintain gives you -1 to your starting Vitae each game.  (PC ghouls are a little more complicated - contact the STs for more details if this is relevant to you.)
• Healing damage in downtime will impact your starting Vitae.  You take -1 to your starting Vitae for every level of Lethal damage or every two levels of Bashing damage you heal in downtime.  You take -5 to your starting Vitae for every level of Aggravated damage you heal in downtime.  It’s good to know a Night Doctor at times like those…
• Using Vitae for Disciplines or other purposes during downtime may have an impact on your starting Vitae.

In general, these modifiers won’t take you below 1 Vitae at the start of a game, but you can’t heal damage or maintain ghouls you don’t have the Vitae to pay for.

If a player hasn't submitted a downtime before a given game, we will assume they spend a downtime action hunting and give them 2 extra Vitae at the start of the game.

Feeding Grounds

Feeding grounds are choice bits of territory in the city.  The Prince has divided the city into seven Regencies.  The Regents then appoint Barons to oversee the districts of their Regency.  The Barons in turn lease small parcels of territory (the feeding grounds) to individual Kindred for a reasonable rent.  Or not-so-reasonable, depending on the Baron’s mood and how well they like you...

So, how does this work mechanically?  To buy dots in the Feeding Ground Merit, you need at least 1 dot of City Status.  A Feeding Ground gives you its dot rating + 1 in points of Vitae at the start of each game.  Approximately every six months, your rent is due (timed to coincide with one of the two major festivals celebrated by the Kindred of Norwich), which will usually be 1 Sang per dot of the Feeding Ground Merit.  Of course, that may vary from territory to territory and depend on how much the Baron likes or dislikes your character...

Every District of the city has a limit to the number of dots of Feeding Ground available, so you’ll be competing with other Kindred for territory rights.  The more prestigious the area, or the easier to feed within, the more Kindred who’ll want to live there.

We’ll be keeping track of where in the city each PC has their Feeding Grounds (if any).  Keep an eye on this blog for more about the city, its Regencies and districts in the near future!

One major advantage of renting a Feeding Ground is you can let other Kindred draw on its resources.  While this gets you less Vitae, giving another Kindred access to your Feeding Grounds can be a powerful bargaining chip or payment for services rendered.  Maybe you even do it just out of the kindness of your heart, although Kindred are rarely known for their selfless natures.

Whatever your reasons for doing so, the rules work the same.  The slightly confusing table below shows the amount of Vitae each character gets from using a Feeding Ground, based on the number of characters accessing the Feeding Ground in a given downtime.

Feeding Ground dots	Number of Kindred using the Feeding Ground
	1	2	3	4	5
1 dot	2 Vitae	1 Vitae	-	-	-
2 dots	3 Vitae	2 Vitae	1 Vitae	-	-
3 dots	4 Vitae	3 Vitae	2 Vitae	1 Vitae	-
4 dots	5 Vitae	4 Vitae	3 Vitae	2 Vitae	1 Vitae
5 dots	6 Vitae	5 Vitae	4 Vitae	3 Vitae	2 Vitae

Needless to say, 4 and 5 dot Feeding Grounds are highly sought after and jealously guarded by those who rent them.  And there’s always the risk of uninvited guests poaching on your territory...

Herds

Herds represent a more personal resource than a Feeding Ground.  Rather than renting an area of territory, a herd is a group of people (usually) that the vampire can feed from with ease.  Herds represent a more personal relationship with your vessels than the anonymous prey of a Feeding Ground, which has both benefits and disadvantages.  It’s much easier to keep track of a herd than a chunk of the city, and easier to spot when things are going wrong.  But equally herds have this unfortunate tendency to get attached, and are by their nature a borderline infringement on the Masquerade.  After all, there’s a limit to the number of times that someone can be fed from before they start asking some awkward questions.

Mechanically, each dot in the Herd Merit gives 1 extra Vitae at the start of every game.  That’s a little less than a Feeding Ground, but you don’t need to have City Status or pay rent to have a Herd.  The ST team are keen to know who your Herd are, so we can help to work them into your character’s story.

Hunting in downtime

Sometimes the Vitae you get from your feeding grounds and herd might not be enough.  Or maybe you don’t have either of those resources for whatever reason.  With some time, effort and a little luck, a Kindred can get a little extra Vitae by hunting.  It’s hard work and riskier than having a feeding ground to herd to rely on, but sometimes you need just a little more Vitae…

By spending a downtime action on hunting, you can get some extra Vitae at the start of the game.  There’s a few steps to this process:

• Choose which District of the city you’re hunting in.  If you've got permission to hunt there from a resident or Baron, make a note of that in your downtime action, as poaching is a notably riskier proposition...
• You get an amount of Vitae based on the quality of that District. This ranges from 2 for barren districts, to 3 for “average” districts, to 4 for districts where hunting opportunities are abundant.  You get 5 Vitae for hunting in a Rack, but Racks come with their own issues.
• Each Kindred beyond the first taking a Hunting Downtime Action in that District lowers the Vitae received by 1 for all Kindred hunting in the area that downtime, to a minimum of 1 Vitae each.
  (Example: Two Kindred both hunting in an average district receive 2 Vitae each (3-1), three Kindred hunting in an average district get 1 Vitae each (3-2), four or more Kindred hunting in an average district get 1 Vitae each (3-3, to a minimum of 1) and inflict the Stressed Condition on the District (see below).)
• If the Vitae value of a District is reduced to 0 by too many Kindred feeding, a Masquerade issue has occurred - the District has become Stressed.  This isn't good…

A District that has become Stressed becomes harder to feed in as the people get more wary and subconsciously aware that there’s something out there in the night.  A Stressed District drops in quality by one (abundant districts become average, average districts become barren, and barren districts offer very little Vitae) until a downtime has passed with no Kindred taking a Hunting Downtime Action there or PCs take suitable action to correct the problem.

If a currently Stressed District is Stressed again, it falls into Crisis and more significant Masquerade issues occur.  This is very bad news, and is likely to draw the attention of the Regent and other High Court authorities along with potentially other groups like the police or mortal hunters.  Getting a district out of Crisis is likely to be a significant plot in its own right.

Racks

A number of areas of the city are designated as Racks.  These are particularly plentiful areas for hunting, and so are generally quite tightly controlled by the Regents.  They’re a resource for the city, and permission to feed in them is usually reserved for visiting Kindred, newly arrived or Embraced Kindred who are still finding their feet, or as a reward for services to the city’s elders.    We’ll have more information about Racks in the near future as part of our setting information about Dark Metropolis Norwich.

The Blood Bank and Sang

We’ve talked about the Kindred institution of the Sanguinarium (more commonly known as the Blood Bank) earlier on this blog.  However, there are a few more details that we’d like to discuss here.

Any Kindred in good standing (City Status 1+) can make use of the Blood Bank, although under certain rare circumstances the Bank’s Governor has barred a particular Kindred from using its services in the past - usually for attempted thefts or fraud.

Once you’re at the bank and speaking to one of the clerks, turning Vitae into Sang takes a few minutes to do, as the mystical process requires the Kindred “depositing” their Vitae to fill out a short contract detailing their transaction.  The Blood Bank has a surcharge of 1 Vitae per transaction, meaning that larger deposits are more efficient - many neonates grumble that this costs them disproportionately, while the High Court stays conspicuously quiet on the topic.  Under no circumstances will the Blood Bank allow a Kindred to drain themselves of the last of their Vitae as part of this process, and attempts to do so may result in a temporary or permanent suspension of the Bank’s services to that Kindred.

Once the contract is completed, the Vitae is mystically transferred from the Kindred making the deposit to the Bank’s vaults - something that only the most trusted employees of the Sanguinarium will ever see.  In return, they’ll be issued with Sang to the value of their deposit.

It’s worth noting that the Blood Bank has limited business hours, usually closing its doors before most Kindred gatherings end for the night.  As such, those wanting to do business with the Sanguinarium should do so earlier rather than later.

By focusing on Sang in their possession, a Kindred can tap into the contract it represents and “withdraw” Vitae of equivalent value into their body.  This takes an Instant action per point of Vitae transferred in this way, making Sang not the best option to rely on when time is a pressing concern…

The Vitae gained from Sang is neutral, carrying no risk of the vinculum or blood addition with it.  It counts as Kindred Vitae for sustenance purposes, making it very useful to Kindred who have particularly potent blood themselves.

Development Notes

We wanted to make Vitae a valuable resource in the Dark Metropolis chronicle, and build something of an economy around it.  To do this, we needed to make it a scarce resource, hence our rules for starting Vitae.

With Vitae being scarce and valuable, it also means that certain actions have immediately meaningful consequences into the game.  Having to make extensive use of your Disciplines to fix a potential Masquerade breach carries a cost, and getting into a fight will leave wounds that won’t heal without the use of blood.

We hope that Sang will prove a useful currency to PCs, allowing for more of a back and forth of small transactions between characters than Boons allow.  Of course, Boons still have a significant value of their own, particularly when it comes to dealing with the High Court.

This is an experimental system, and the ST team may well adjust the numbers presented in this blog post to suit the needs of the game as things develop in play.  We’ll be sure to keep everyone informed of any changes we make however.