The Mnemosyne draw memories from the Blood, and central to the memory of the Kindred are the ties of blood. The Discipline of Meminisse (the Latin infinitive: “Remembering”) depends on blood-ties. Creating them, breaking them and using them are the hallmarks of the Mnemosyne.
All of the powers of Meminisse from two to five dots gain the +2 blood-tie bonus to dice pools, along with any other bonuses and penalties that come into play. For systems covering blood-ties, see Vampire: The Requiem, p. 162.
The Mnemosyne drinks the blood of another vampire; he tastes it; he transubstantiates it within him. He savors the memories encoded within, the millennia of evil that produced it. He gets to know it. He creates a link with it.
Cost: None
Dice Pool: None; the power is always in effect.
Action: Instant
A Mnemosyne can create an artificial blood-tie with any vampire he has drunk Vitae from: he gains the +2 bonus to Discipline use directed at the vampire he’s just drunk from (or +3 if the vampire is from the Mekhet clan, or already has a blood-tie with the character), and can benefit from blood sympathy (see Vampire: The Requiem, p. 163).
The Mnemosyne does not have to have drunk the Vitae directly from the vampire; it might have been decanted into a glass, or bottled, for example.
Note that the Mnemosyne still suffers the adverse effects of drinking Vitae: he becomes more at risk of developing a Vinculum, having taken a taste, and, perhaps more dangerously, may very quickly suffer from blood addiction (which is compounded by the Mnemosyne’s weakness – see p. 82).
The Mnemosyne can use blood-ties and blood sympathy to gain useful flashes of insight. She looks within herself, and then without; blood calls to blood, and draws on faint memories from other vampires in the area, and from mortals whose blood she has tasted.
Drawing on race memories, memories lost in Vitae and the collective pool of experience shared by the living and the dead through generations untold, the Mnemosyne knows exactly how to approach her next task.
Cost: None
Dice Pool: Wits + Occult + Meminisse
Action: Instant
The Mnemosyne must be within 100 yards of at least one vampire with whom she has a genuine or artificial blood-tie and/or one mortal whose blood she has tasted to use this power.
Roll Results
Dramatic Failure: The Mnemosyne draws too much, and becomes overloaded with memories and experiences. She suffers a -1 penalty to all dice pools using a Mental Attribute or Skill for the rest of the scene.
Failure: The Mnemosyne fails to access any memories of use.
Success: For every applicable human or vampire within a 100 yard radius, the Mnemosyne gains a bonus of +1 to a single dice pool using a Mental Skill. For example, if the vampire was within 100 yards of her sire, her childe, a vampire on whom she’d created an artificial blood-tie and a regular mortal vessel, she’d add +4 to her dice pool.
Exceptional Success: The Mnemosyne gains a +2 bonus for every applicable human or vampire in range.
Just as the Mnemosyne can create blood-ties, so too can she sever them.
Cost: One Willpower
Dice Pool: Presence + Occult + Meminisse, opposed by target’s Resolve + Stamina + Blood Potency
Action: Contested; resistance is reflexive and optional The vampire can permanently remove an artificial blood-tie or temporarily sever a “natural” one (that is, one created through the sire-childe relationship).
The blood-tie bonus does affect this power. The target can feel what the character is doing, and can elect not to resist.
Roll Results
Dramatic Failure: The character not only fails to remove the blood-tie, but strengthens it in a way advantageous for the other vampire, meaning that the target gets an additional +1 to Discipline rolls directed at the character for the remainder of the scene.
Failure: The vampire fails to remove the blood-tie.
Success: The target ceases to have the blood-tie in question. If the tie was created by the first dot of Meminisse, the tie is severed permanently. If the blood-tie is “natural,” the tie remains cut for the rest of the scene.
Exceptional Success: The vampire cuts the tie. If the tie was “natural,” it remains severed until the next sunset.
Having gained mastery over blood-ties and learned how to read the collective memory of the blood, the Mnemosyne develops the power to access another person’s memories, human or vampire.
Cost: One Willpower
Dice Pool: Intelligence + Subterfuge + Meminisse - victim’s Resolve
Action: Contested; resistance is reflexive
The character reaches into the mind of a vampire with whom he has a blood-tie or a mortal whose blood he has tasted.
Roll Results
Dramatic Failure: The character accidentally wipes out a chunk of her own memory, losing several years of her mortal memories and the last month of her time as a vampire. She gains the Flaw: Amnesia (The World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 218). This is indefinite, although it can be healed with the Devotion The Restoration of Things Lost (see p. 110).
Failure: The Mnemosyne cannot exchange memories with the target.
Success: The Mnemosyne exchanges memories with the target. He can access any part of the target’s memory, but for every memory he takes from the target, he must offer a memory of equal length, which the target suddenly remembers. This lasts about a scene.
The player and storyteller should talk about what memories the character chooses to give up: it could be anything from his wedding day as a mortal, or his first kiss, the death of a parent or loved one, to his death, an experience of feeding, or any other memory of horror or joy, pleasure or pain. The character and the target both know that these aren’t their memories, and become aware of holes in their own memories, even though they don’t know what they lost. Targets of this power become confused and frightened. A vampire target of this power must roll to avoid Fear Frenzy.
While the power is in effect, both the character and the target forget the things they exchanged. After the end of the scene, both the character and the target get back their own memories, but don’t forget the memories they received from the other. After this experience, the player of a mortal target must roll Resolve + Composure to avoid gaining a derangement.
Exceptional Success: As for success, but the Mnemosyne can elect to exchange some or all of the memories permanently. This can be seductive: the vampire doesn’t know what he has lost, and doesn’t know if it matters or not. Many elder Mnemosyne become repositories of vast stores of memory, with no memories of their own.
Suggested Modifiers: Target is bound to character with Vinculum (+3), character is bound by Vinculum to target (-3), memories the character wishes to take from the target are repressed, secret or traumatic (-2).
The Mnemosyne, having perfected the art of exchanging memories through the ties of tasted blood, now learns how to use this art as an attack.
Cost: One Willpower
Dice Pool: Presence + Intimidation + Meminisse versus Resolve + Composure + Blood Potency
Action: Extended and Contested; resistance is reflexive. The character needs 10 successes to succeed. Each roll represents one turn of effort.
Roll Results
Dramatic Failure: The Mnemosyne wipes her own mind clean, gaining the Flaw: Amnesia (The World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 218). She knows she is a vampire, and she knows how to use her Skills and Disciplines, but everything else is gone, even her own name. This is indefinite, but can be healed using the Devotion The Restoration of Things Lost (see p. 110).
Failure: The character fails to add any successes to her total, or the target gathers 10 successes before the vampire. The vampire fails to steal the target’s memory.
Success: Successes are added to the total. If the character gains 10 successes before the target, the target loses all memory of who he is or was. Although he retains the use of his Skills, supernatural powers and other Traits, he becomes confused. He doesn’t even know his own name. The target is easily manipulated. Any character attempting to use social Skills such as Persuade or Intimidate on the character, does so with a +3 dice pool bonus. The duration of the amnesia depends on how many successes the Mnemosyne rolled or until a Mnemosyne (the original character using this power or another) heals the target with the Devotion The Restoration of Things Lost.
Successes - Duration
10 successes - One scene
11 successes - Until sunrise
12 successes - Until the next sunset
13 successes - Two nights
14 successes - Four nights
15+ successes - One week
Exceptional Success: The character gains a final total of 15 or more successes. The target loses his memory for a week; his player must roll Resolve + Composure when the character’s memory returns; if the roll fails, the character gains a derangement.