Dominate

Description:

Dominate grants the vampire the ability to control the actions of others, manipulate their memories, and force living creatures into acts they would not perform of their own volition. At its most basic, Dominate enables a vampire to make a victim forget the feed they just endured or enjoyed. At its most dangerous, it allows Kindred to enslave entire crowds of kine. This is the Beast at its most cruel and controlling. Dominate acts as a bludgeon to enforce the Masquerade, create submissive servants, and reinforce the self-assuredness of the vampire. When using this Discipline, Kindred feel omnipotent, although the wisest of them know that this too may be shackles of a kind, slipped upon them by the Blood.

Characteristics:

• Most Dominate powers require eye contact with the victim. Once they establish contact, Dominat holds the gaze of the victim until the user conveys their command or commands, barring interference. Catching the eyes of someone actively attempting to avoid the vampire’s gaze requires a contest of the user’s Resolve + Intimidation vs the target’s Wits + Awareness. 
• Using Dominate in combat or in other frantic situations is limited to people attacking or otherwise interacting with the user directly, as everyone else’s attention is firmly focused on their own peril. 
• Unless the user has supernatural means such as Telepathy (Auspex 5) at their disposal, they must command the victim verbally. The victim must be able to hear the user and understand their language.
• Without Terminal Decree (Dominate 5), commands resulting in obvious death or serious injury fail automatically.
• Subjects roll to resist commands resulting in other social or physical harm, such as undressing in public. (See individual powers for details.)
• Vampires cannot use Dominate to extract information, as the victim becomes a mindless puppet while under its influence. For example, the Compel command “Speak” results in blabbering word salad, while someone Mesmerized to “tell what you know about the assassin” responds “what you know about the assassin.”
• Dominate cannot make subjects do something they could not do on command, such as “Sleep.” Ultimately, the Storyteller determines what the Discipline can accomplish, but they should take care that Dominate remains one Discipline of many, rather than the catch-all solution to every problem.
• Dominate cuts to the core of vampiric mastery and predation. Thus, vampires must resist attempts to Dominate them. A vampire of lower (stronger) generation can resist Dominate attempts from higher generation vampires by spending a Willpower point, negating the effect completely. On a total failure on the roll of any Dominate power, that vampire can no longer Dominate that target for the rest of the story.
• Dominate threatens Humanity, especially if the vampire has any Principles involving personal freedom or forbidding violations of human integrity. Using it may incur Stains (p. 239).

Type
Mental

Masquerade threat
Low. 
Barring someone Dominating an entire auditorium to jump off the cliffs of Dover, it remains one of the more subtle vampiric powers.

Blood Resonance
Phlegmatic.
The blood of the submissive or the dominant, masters and slaves, captains of industry, power trippers, cult leaders and followers.

Powers - Level 1:

Name & Requirements	Description & Cost	Dice Pools	System	Duration
Vampire the Masquerade: Core Rulebook
Cloud Memory	By uttering the phrase “Forget!” the user can make the Dominated victim forget the current moment as well as the last few minutes, enough to mask a superficial feeding or a chance meeting. No new memories are formed and if pressed the victim realizes they have a few minutes missing. Cost: Free	Charisma + Dominate vs Wits + Resolve	No roll is required against an unprepared mortal victim. Clouding the memory of a resisting victim or another vampire requires a Charisma + Dominate vs Wits + Resolve roll.	Indefinite
Compel	With eye contact, the vampire can issue the victim a single-action command, no longer than a short sentence, to be obeyed to the letter. It must be possible to complete the command in a single turn. The Storyteller decides whether to interpret ambiguous commands in an unexpected or unfavorable way; alternatively, the command simply confuses the victim and fails. Cost: Free	Charisma + Dominate vs Intelligenc + Resolve	No roll is required against an unprepared mortal victim. Commanding a resisting victim, a victim the vampire has previously Dominated in the same scene, or another vampire requires a contest of Charisma + Dominate vs Intelligence + Resolve. Commands that go against the victim’s nature also require such a contest.	No more than a single scene

Powers - Level 2:

Name & Requirements	Description & Cost	Dice Pools	System	Duration
Vampire the Masquerade: Core Rulebook
Mesmerize	The vampire can issue complex commands to a victim, as long as they have the subject’s gaze and relative quiet in which to issue instructions. The instructions must be carried out immediately to the victim’s best ability, and must not contain any conditional actions (“...if you see Henry, give him the document”), as this would require the victim to exercise cognition. Cost: One rouse check	Manipulation + Dominate vs Intelligence + Resolve	No roll is required against an unprepared mortal victim. Commanding a resisting victim or another vampire requires a contest of Manipulation + Dominate vs Intelligence + Resolve. Commands that go against the victim’s nature also require such a contest.	Until the command is carried out or the scene ends, whichever comes first.
Dementation Requires: Obfuscate 2

Powers - Level 3:

Name & Requirements	Description & Cost	Dice Pools	System	Duration
Vampire the Masquerade: Core Rulebook

Powers - Level 4:

Name & Requirements	Description & Cost	Dice Pools	System	Duration
Vampire the Masquerade: Core Rulebook

Powers - Level 5:

Name & Requirements	Description & Cost	Dice Pools	System	Duration
Vampire the Masquerade: Core Rulebook