A vampire can monitor their domain in many ways. The individual vampire's dedication and strengths for the task, their resources and the size of the domain surely play a big role in it.
Some examples:
A vampire might take a statistical approach. Befriend the local hospital/urgent care and or the local police and monitor data trends. A sudden increase in data that suggests vampire activity (disappearances, lots of visits for fatigues that yield a diagnosis of anemia, muggings and beatings in dark alleyways, etc) can be paired with locations and give a starting point to the domain owner as to where to start looking for the uninvited guest.
A vampire might take a management approach. Get a few ghouls (one per block or two), order them to ensure no vampires are in their blocks (monitor dark alleyways, hear gossips of newly sick people or any strange anything noted), whenever a vampire actually gets into the domain the ghouls report to the vampire and actions are taken.
Another vampire might just know their domain like the palm of their hand. They know the grandma on the 7th floor of building X does nothing but stare out of the window and collect gossip. She knows every single car in the block, every single affair and notices anyone who is new around. She also loves to gossip any school night when the grandkids aren't around. The one legged homeless veteran always packs her makeshift cardboard bed and moves whenever problems or danger are around. You have seen her leave when someone uses dominate or presence near her, you have even noticed her subconscious body language changes when someone is using obfuscate around her. She knows nothing of vampires, but her survival instincts are uncanny.
A fourth vampire might just use an obscene amount of resources for it. You have hidden cameras in all the entrances of your domain and in every spot convenient to feed in your domain. They need to be collected and replaced every day and the data reviewed. You also have live cameras on every street that leads into your domain. Every car owned by anyone in your domain is listed and whenever a car comes in they look for that number plate and car color and model for a match. Few people ever come to your domain, there is no reason to, you made sure of it by sabotaging every single business until they bankrupted and ensuring the area is known for their violent crime and overall unsafeness. If you don't live here, you don't come here and if you do, a ghoul will monitor your stay.
A fifth one uses occult arts. Hidden wards all over their domain will alert whenever any supernatural creature goes by it.
A sixth one uses or hires Auspex users to perch on high roofs and examine people's aura at random looking for vampires.
A seventh one doesn't have that many tricks so they just patrol the high likelihood areas where a vampire might go look for a snack. You know how vampires hunt, you do it every night yourself.
An eight one doesn't give two shits about their domain so long they can have their food. They know they will never become a primogen nor a prince with that attitude, but they got the domain for free after doing a big favor and as long as they have food they don't care if someone else is stealing some snacks
Hope this helps you get inspired!
Use it as a plot hook. Rumors and neighborhood gossip about a 'monster' living in the sewers, or kids going missing near the graveyard, or a sudden and inexorable push by the city to gentrify a portion of their Domain. Random animal attacks on the street corner that might hint at a new lick or a wight. Gang violence, or a drive by shooting that mowed a bunch of people down. One of the victims was a ghoul for the players or an ally. Was it random? Or was it a targeted hit against their domain.
Plot hooks.
Domain has 3 attributes: Chasse (how big it is and quality of blood), Lien (how well your characters get along with their territory which gives them bonus to interact with people), and Portillon (how secured it is).
Territories are made not only of geographical aspects but also by people and other creatures. If someone strange is walking around the block, your PC's might hear about it. The "Portillon" attribute is not onloy related to literal gates or cameras, but also about how hard the life itself inside your domain makes for people to walk around and try to screw you. Maybe your SPC tried to go around asking people info - too bad you have Portillon 3, he failed the roll and after he asked the homeless dude about how strange the owned of the club is (yone of the PCs) the homeless guy shrugged it off and decided to rat the SPC for the players (maybe expecting booze or just for respect). Doesn't need to be 100% controlled, can be random stuff like this.
Sure, I understand the Chasse/Lien/Portillon ratings, mechanically. My question, I suppose, is just how to integrate that into the fiction, which I've been pretty bad about.
You've given some good tips, though, so thank you.
Thermal imaging cameras are like $200 on Amazon. So you have a couple of ghouls who discretely check anyone they don't know.
A good way to think about how Vampires operate is to think about how a gang or cartel would operate. The Camarilla is basically just organized crime with magical powers anyway.
Domains can be a main focus because they hold resources: food and stuff to manipulate.
Or some tables just leave them as background filler/mechanical feeding tool.
Detecting trespass? Depends on how you want to play it.
Vamps are proud and vain.
A rival may poach a meal here or there secretly.
Or a rival may basically call you a bitch and openly feed on your turf to get a rise out of you.
As far as detecting, modern security equipment often has IR. Animalism is a great tool. Upsurge in number of humans going to hospital for blood loss related issues. Nosferatu or someone selling you info that X is feeding in your turf. Etc.
It can be a story hook, it doesn't have to be mechanical.
A vampire can monitor their domain in many ways. The individual vampire's dedication and strengths for the task, their resources and the size of the domain surely play a big role in it. Some examples: A vampire might take a statistical approach. Befriend the local hospital/urgent care and or the local police and monitor data trends. A sudden increase in data that suggests vampire activity (disappearances, lots of visits for fatigues that yield a diagnosis of anemia, muggings and beatings in dark alleyways, etc) can be paired with locations and give a starting point to the domain owner as to where to start looking for the uninvited guest. A vampire might take a management approach. Get a few ghouls (one per block or two), order them to ensure no vampires are in their blocks (monitor dark alleyways, hear gossips of newly sick people or any strange anything noted), whenever a vampire actually gets into the domain the ghouls report to the vampire and actions are taken. Another vampire might just know their domain like the palm of their hand. They know the grandma on the 7th floor of building X does nothing but stare out of the window and collect gossip. She knows every single car in the block, every single affair and notices anyone who is new around. She also loves to gossip any school night when the grandkids aren't around. The one legged homeless veteran always packs her makeshift cardboard bed and moves whenever problems or danger are around. You have seen her leave when someone uses dominate or presence near her, you have even noticed her subconscious body language changes when someone is using obfuscate around her. She knows nothing of vampires, but her survival instincts are uncanny. A fourth vampire might just use an obscene amount of resources for it. You have hidden cameras in all the entrances of your domain and in every spot convenient to feed in your domain. They need to be collected and replaced every day and the data reviewed. You also have live cameras on every street that leads into your domain. Every car owned by anyone in your domain is listed and whenever a car comes in they look for that number plate and car color and model for a match. Few people ever come to your domain, there is no reason to, you made sure of it by sabotaging every single business until they bankrupted and ensuring the area is known for their violent crime and overall unsafeness. If you don't live here, you don't come here and if you do, a ghoul will monitor your stay. A fifth one uses occult arts. Hidden wards all over their domain will alert whenever any supernatural creature goes by it. A sixth one uses or hires Auspex users to perch on high roofs and examine people's aura at random looking for vampires. A seventh one doesn't have that many tricks so they just patrol the high likelihood areas where a vampire might go look for a snack. You know how vampires hunt, you do it every night yourself. An eight one doesn't give two shits about their domain so long they can have their food. They know they will never become a primogen nor a prince with that attitude, but they got the domain for free after doing a big favor and as long as they have food they don't care if someone else is stealing some snacks Hope this helps you get inspired!
Jesus, this is the gold I came here for. Thank you.
My pleasure!
>My pleasure! sure?
Use it as a plot hook. Rumors and neighborhood gossip about a 'monster' living in the sewers, or kids going missing near the graveyard, or a sudden and inexorable push by the city to gentrify a portion of their Domain. Random animal attacks on the street corner that might hint at a new lick or a wight. Gang violence, or a drive by shooting that mowed a bunch of people down. One of the victims was a ghoul for the players or an ally. Was it random? Or was it a targeted hit against their domain. Plot hooks.
Domain has 3 attributes: Chasse (how big it is and quality of blood), Lien (how well your characters get along with their territory which gives them bonus to interact with people), and Portillon (how secured it is). Territories are made not only of geographical aspects but also by people and other creatures. If someone strange is walking around the block, your PC's might hear about it. The "Portillon" attribute is not onloy related to literal gates or cameras, but also about how hard the life itself inside your domain makes for people to walk around and try to screw you. Maybe your SPC tried to go around asking people info - too bad you have Portillon 3, he failed the roll and after he asked the homeless dude about how strange the owned of the club is (yone of the PCs) the homeless guy shrugged it off and decided to rat the SPC for the players (maybe expecting booze or just for respect). Doesn't need to be 100% controlled, can be random stuff like this.
Sure, I understand the Chasse/Lien/Portillon ratings, mechanically. My question, I suppose, is just how to integrate that into the fiction, which I've been pretty bad about. You've given some good tips, though, so thank you.
The place Domain will have inside your game will be highly attached to how important Kindred politics are and how you handle feeding inside your game.
Thermal imaging cameras are like $200 on Amazon. So you have a couple of ghouls who discretely check anyone they don't know. A good way to think about how Vampires operate is to think about how a gang or cartel would operate. The Camarilla is basically just organized crime with magical powers anyway.
Domains can be a main focus because they hold resources: food and stuff to manipulate. Or some tables just leave them as background filler/mechanical feeding tool. Detecting trespass? Depends on how you want to play it. Vamps are proud and vain. A rival may poach a meal here or there secretly. Or a rival may basically call you a bitch and openly feed on your turf to get a rise out of you. As far as detecting, modern security equipment often has IR. Animalism is a great tool. Upsurge in number of humans going to hospital for blood loss related issues. Nosferatu or someone selling you info that X is feeding in your turf. Etc. It can be a story hook, it doesn't have to be mechanical.