Unbidden, the Malkavians seek to open the perceptions of others, using pranks, misdirection and chaos to force others into new viewpoints and to shatter accepted norms. Some vampires whisper that the Malkavians control the Jyhad subtly, that the war of ages is

simply a great joke of their founder… and a few fear that the Malkavians are already laughing at the coming end. 

 

The Lunatics Embrace seemingly at whim. Many members of the clan are insightful, some even brilliant. Any other categorizations,

aside from their common insanity, fail. A Malkavian usually Embraces someone on the edge of insanity or one already driven mad, but none can really say what might motivate a Lunatic to bring another into the fold. Some new childer are not insane when they are Embraced, but their sires seek to rectify this “shortcoming” as quickly as possible. A few are physically brutal, and some can be quite socially charming when not visibly afflicted, but these outlyers serve only to point up the commonality of the clan: Madness — and

enlightenment — can infect anyone. 

 

Most Malkavians seem to have little care for sect politics, although those who do so are terrifying in their dogged pursuit of their aim. The true loyalties of the Malkavians likely lie with whatever greater goal drives their shared insight, though. Even the most chaotic Lunatics occasionally find themselves working in tandem at the most unusual of tasks.

 

Roleplaying Hints:

You see and understand things that nobody else comprehends. Maybe they’re right when they say you’re mad, but maybe it’s just that

they can’t handle the truth! You’re not feeble, helpless or stupidly comical. You have a vision, and though it sometimes makes unlife difficult, you can look at things from directions that nobody else contemplates. You can sometimes get others to see brief moments of your vision by tricking their minds into thinking in strange ways, so you create plans designed to interrupt the “normalcy” of other peoples’ existences, so that they are forced to examine their motives and places more carefully. You may have a lot of trouble with unlife, or you may be only subtly touched and pretty much functional in normal society — but you are always aware of the invisible pulse of currents underlying everything

 

 

Disciplines:

 

Auspex, Dementation, Obfuscate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Advantage:

Advantage: The Lunatics seem “blessed” with a special insight into the workings of the hidden world. Whether they discern small bits of knowledge from watching leaves fall or they work divination with human entrails, all of Malkavs’s brood seem to follow hidden patterns that few others are even aware of. Because of this bizarre insight, all Malkavians gain a free level of Awareness. 

Some Malkavians possess a strange link to others of their kind. Indeed, the Lunatics seem to be able to recognize one another on sight, and they even pass along bits of knowledge from time to time. This “madness network” may be the result of a true sharing of minds, or simply ranting — none outside the clan really know, and few wish to explore the matter too deeply. 

 

Disadvantage:

The members of the Malkavian clan are universally insane. All Malkavian characters suffer from a derangement of some sort. These sorts of personality disorders are not humorous — they are cracks in the workings of the mind, turning the Malkavian into something beyond the comprehension of even vampires. A Malkavian is unlikely to regress to a childlike or clownish state, collecting teddy bears and silly clothing. A Malkavian who wears blood-stained pajamas and babbles in a room full of teddy bears covered in entrails, seeking wisdom from the charnel pit — that’s the sort of insanity that infects the Lunatics. A Malkavian’s initial derangement can be temporarily suppressed with Willpower Traits like any other derangement, but it can never be removed or cured permanently.

 

Bloodlines:

Most Malkavians claim nominal membership in the Camarilla, though antitribu are found in the Sabbat — the Freaks are usually the most

deranged and homicidal of their kind. Some Malkavians of the Camarilla still possess the Discipline of Dominate (instead of Dementation), but most of the Lunatics were “converted” to the ways of Dementation in a wash of madness that swept through the clan in recent years.

 

History:

As with all the major clans, the Malkavians originated in the pre-Deluge city Enoch. Little is known about the clan's early composition, only that their Antediluvian, Malkav, was a seer Embraced by one of the Second Generation. Malkav was particularly close to two other Kindred: Saulot, the founder of the Salubri, and Set, self-appointed god to his followers. Some accounts suggest the three shared the same sire, possibly Enoch.

Sometime after the Flood, Malkav was ambushed and murdered by his fellow Antediluvians. Most Malkavians believe that he is still undead, only now he exists entirely within the Madness Network(or "Cobweb"), the group mind that all Malkavians share. Some Malkavians speculate that Malkav literally is Clan Malkavian and that when Gehenna arises, he will devour the clan whole and reconstitute himself.

Many of the early Malkavians posed as city-gods, using their oracular powers to convince the population that they spoke and listened to the gods. In Greece and the lands of the Fertil Crescent, many of the early Malkavians prospered as oracles and soothsayers and later, their foresight placed them into the role of viziers and advisors to the ruling Ventrue of Rome. It was on behest of the Malkavian prophetess Tryphosa that Camilla called for the war against Carthage and it was with the aid of Alchias, the Malkavian ruler of Syracuse, that the Romans proved to be successful in the end. Later, however, the Malkavians were blamed for the more instabile emperors and when Rome finally fell apart, the Malkavians drifted away, shattered and lost. Several Malkavians, however, became attracted to early Christianity (a running gag within some elements of the Clan are the consequences of a graverobbery in 33), seeing Jesus as the reborn Malkav who would end their curse. Some even claimed that Andreas, one of the disciples of Jesus, was secretly a Malkavian, and tasked by him to find Caine to persuade him to finally ask for forgiveness from God.

Dark Ages:

The Dark Ages were a difficult time for the Malkavian; still suffering from their fall from grace as an important clan after the collapse of Rome, many of the Kindred feared and distrusted the Madmen. Many more pitied their sad, insane state. Humans, needless to say, also feared the madness of the Malkavians; many were persecuted more for their derangements than vampirism. That is not to say all Malkavians suffered horribly; quite a few became advisors, seers, and jesters to well-placed and powerful Cainite princes. However, the bulk of the clan lived up to the Low Clan status bestowed on them by the more self-important Kindred. Part of this age were also the Ordo, secret covenants of Malkavians who sought to utilize their madness to predict the future and carried on the legacy of the Malkavian Oracles of Antiquity.

Islamic Malkavians, known as Bay't Majnoon, were more respected than the Christian counterparts in Europe. Many were held as advisors, bodyguards, and even Islamic prophets. Some Majanin took this last position a bit far, breaking off from the main bay't, calling themselves khaqas and forming their own twisted version of Islam that drove their disciples mad. Between this and their claims to supplanting Muhammad as the last prophet, the Ashirra watched them with a wary and unfavorable eye.

Victorian Age:

The Victorian Era was the time of Freud and Jung, as the old theories of phrenology, demon-possession and divine punishment gave way to more learned theories of psychology and psychiatry. Asylums now started doing what Malkavians had been practicing for centuries - taking an interest in insanity. While the reforms of these hospitals no doubt crippled more than one Malkavian's supply of blood, the new system permitted the Lunatics to experiment with madness like they had never before. Some set themselves up as psychologists - others visited psychologists as patients.

The rise of the Bohemian lifestyle within society meant many more kine were willing to expand their own perceptions with new cultures, experiences and drugs. The Malkavians were only too happy to oblige. New forms of expression and ways of thinking both nourished the Malkavians and allowed them to be as florid as they pleased - after all, if a finely dressed gentleman is shouting about how people on the street are telling him to kill dogs, why it must simply be the newest performance piece going around the salons. In fact, a friend of yours heard it on the streets of Paris...

Final Nights:

The Malkavians always had a dangerous reputation due to their madness and their signatureDementation discipline, which can induce madness in others. With the Inquisition and the formation of the Camarilla, the clan faced possible extinction at the hands of other clans - the Malkavians were just too dangerous to continue existing. In order to prevent this, the elders of the clan changed the Clan in ways unknown and incomprehensible - the result was that the majority of Clan Malkavian discarded Dementation in favor of the Dominate discipline. More disturbingly, the majority of Malkavians, even those present at the time of the change are unaware that this happened. A small fragment of the clan preserved the Dementation discipline, defecting to theSabbat and becoming antitribu.

This "Great Prank" means that almost all Malkavians are antitribu. While Sabbat Malkavians possessed the same mystical abilities as their ancestors, the violent environment of the Sabbat drove the antitribu even madder: all Malkavians have a mental disorder they cannot overcome, but Sabbat Malkavians have two.

This division was fixed in 1998, when for reasons unknown to anyone, the Dementation resurfaced within the Camarilla, although several "Domination" Malkavians remained un-affected, for some reason.

 

Organization:

On the surface, clan Malkavian is barely a clan. The majority of Malkavians are only marginally aware they belong to a clan; Sabbat Malkavians generally claim to be Panders. What connections Malkavians generally have are informal and generally paternal, sire-childe relationships being the most common, although Malkavian sires are prone to abandoning their childer.

Scratch the surface, however, and the Malkavians become a smörgåsbord of paranoid delights. Malkavians operate on their own timescale, and will gather spontaneously for incomprehensible events. Malkavians usually don't explain how they know these gatherings are occurring, and when they do the explanation isn't necessarily worth anything. Scratch deep enough and it appears that the Malkavians are highly organized, so highly organized they don't even know they are, and instead they continue to pursue incomprehensible and arcane goals that even they aren't aware are relevant.

This organization is generally termed the "cobweb", "Malkavian Time" or the "Malkavian Madness Network" and is a form of shared consciousness unifying all Malkavians. The strength of the voicesvaries from Malkavian to Malkavian, however all of them are at least aware of its call and capable of interacting with it. Dead Malkavians' memories live on in the cobweb, and it is implied heavily that Malkav himself is this network. The cobweb is only accessible by Malkavians, and they themselves only marginally understand it - most of them merely listen to the voices, but elders have demonstrated a powerful capacity to manipulate the rest of the clan through it. It is rumored that powerful Methuselahs partially exist within the Cobweb and can "download" themselves on their descendants if needed. The Cobweb also reacts to the presence of powerful Malkavians, like theAnkou.

 

Cultures:

Malkavians have traditionally fulfilled two roles in Vampire society: seers and jokers. As seers, the Malkavians have relied on advancedAuspex and the Cobweb (Madness Network) to provide information. Malkavians being Malkavians, this information is generally jaundiced, incomplete, filtered through cracked lenses or a total lie.

The joker role is somewhat more complex: Malkavians have a clan tradition of pranking. The exact purpose of these pranks is open to debate; they often appear intended to readjust the target's perceptions, but are also often sadistic.

In the Camarilla, Malkavians are tolerated; they are rarely princes but often are importantprimogen or otherwise figures of authority. Given their obvious insanity, princes traditionally give the Madmen a certain amount of latitude; in return, Malkavians are generally expected to demonstrate enough self-control to not break the Masquerade. This is not a benevolent arrangement but largely driven by fear on both sides: fundamentally, Malkavians are unknowable and the general attitude among princes is that its better to keep them quiet and happy, since unhappy Malkavians have a tendency towards introducing bizarre and inexplicable incidents to the equation. Conversely, Malkavians need the protection of the Camarilla, and have been modified as discussed above to make them more amenable to it.

Many Malkavians are gifted with insight into the world around them. Through their shared madness and the powers of Auspex and Dementation, many are able to glimpse little bits of the future or the past. True Oracles and Seers, however, go beyond these common talents. They are blessed (or cursed) with strong visions that come upon them without warning. No one knows for sure from where this connection originates. Some embrace their powers and attempt to channel them. Some try to shun the visions and get on as if nothing happened. Other unsensitive Malkavians use the picture of the prophet for their own advantage like mortal fortune-tellers, using vague prophecies to secure themselves safe places. Those with the true Sight, however, often suffer for it, as they receive visions they do not understand at first and then watch helplessly unfold before them. During the Dark Ages, the Malkavian Orders of Mystery, also known as Ordos, tried to channel the gift of prophecy to mimick the Methuselah-Oracles of Antiquity, but with the formation of the sects and the severing of Dementation, their practice fell out of use.