Learning and improving one’s mastery of Disci- plines is as important to a Kindred as learning life lessons such as how to read, type, drive or make love are to a regular mortal. While not strictly essential for survival, these skills greatly improve one’s odds of success in the modern nights and make existence that much easier. And, as is the case with the listed mortal skills, finding willing teachers and going through the trial and error of learning Disciplines yields plenty of material for entertaining stories. If your characters find themselves facing an obstacle that they cannot overcome, and some new or improved Discipline is just the boost that they claim to need, their quest to discover and learn said Discipline can make for an enjoyable and rewarding side-story in your chronicle.
Anarch characters most frequently learn Disciplines from the following sources and in the following ways.
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lDersAnarchs learn the Disciplines with which they are the most comfortable from their elders — specifically their sires. It’s their elders who teach them their hunt- ing skills as well as the most immediate and effective
ways in which to manipulate mortals from whom they don’t intend to feed. Many elders consider this tutelage nothing more than an exercise in protect- ing their investment. In most cases (more so than is true for mortal reproduction), Kindred create childer consciously and for a reason, so it only makes sense to see that their progeny do not go to waste out of a lack of familiarity with their predatory advantages. It is also the sire who instills a young Kindred with his perspective on his Disciplines, their use, their relative importance and how closely knowledge of them must be guarded.
Most of the time, however, a sire teaches his childe only what that childe absolutely needs to know in order to survive and fulfill her designated purpose. Camarilla sires often do just that in order to reinforce their childer’s dependence on them and to groom them into efficient tools and pawns. They deny their childer the hope or possibility of further advancement so as not to enable their childer to chal- lenge their power or usurp their resources. Contention over this stinginess can be yet one more example of what it was that drove a young Camarilla vampire to take up the anarch cause.
Vampires who are Embraced into the Anarch Movement by anarchs usually find that their sires are less reluctant to teach them about their Disciplines
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and help them improve their skills. After all, most anarch sires Embrace childer for some purpose relat- ing to the movement, and it behooves them to make sure that their childer are well suited to achieve that purpose. Besides, allowing a childe free access to the strange new powers that Disciplines give them is a good way to convince him of the sincerity of the sire’s devotion to the cause.
If an anarch wants to learn new Disciplines from an elder who is not his sire, nothing in this game’s rules stands in his way. His ability to do so is limited by only his natural charm and his rapport with a Kindred who has the Discipline in question. The trick lies in convincing that older vampire that she (the student) has a true and reasonable need to learn that Discipline, and that fulfilling that need benefits her prospective teacher in some way. That benefit could be the acknowledgement that the student owes her teacher a boon, the promise to take on a dangerous but important errand or the simple knowledge that the student will use her new knowledge to spite one of the teacher’s enemies.
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eersMore often than not, anarchs learn entirely new Disciplines (and develop their existing Disciplines) with their peers’ help. The term “peers” often refers to Kindred of the same clan, of the same relative age, of the same station (or experience) and of equal genera- tion. Usually, though, an anarch actually considers members of his pack to be his closest peers.
While undead predators don’t tend to make real friends, as such, the members of an anarch gang rely on one another for support, protection and amusing diversions from the constant struggle that their unlives are heir to. A part of this reliance lies in knowing that every pack member is devoted to accomplishing the pack’s goals and that they’re all committed to helping one another play their parts in doing so. As such, most anarchs realize that it is in their best interest (individually and collectively) to share what they know with their coterie members, where Disciplines are concerned. They also know just how precarious their position is as part of a sub-faction in the Jyhad, and they recognize the folly of putting all of their eggs into one basket. Specialization in a concentrated area of study is rewarding to a motivated group of individuals, but overspecialization turns into a liability for the group if something happens to the individual specialist. For instance, a reconnaissance-oriented anarch pack is more effective if it comprises several vampires who are proficient with two or three levels of Auspex, rather than if one Kindred in the group has mastered the Discipline and his fellow packmates exist only
to protect him while he’s working. That division of labor is inefficient, and the types of stories that arise around it leave various members of the group out of the action from time to time.
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iVAlsAn anarch’s rivals include those vampires who compete with him to achieve the same goals, but who do not wish him active harm. Opposing anarch packs sometimes consider one another rivals, and many anarchs who were once Camarilla loyalists consider their erstwhile Camarilla associates to be their rivals. Under unusually rare circumstances, particularly militant anarch gangs can even develop rivalries with uncharacteristically laid-back Sabbat packs. Since rivals are not inherently inimical to one another, it is not out of the question for them to share Discipline knowledge among themselves.
Convincing a rival to teach you something helpful is not altogether easy, however. Convincing him to agree depends on how heated the rivalry is between you and what gain he can find for himself in doing so. If the rivalry is a sporting matter between equals, then trading Disciplines might just be a means of keeping the odds even. Otherwise, teaching prized Disciplines might be the terms of a contested wager. If the competition between rivals is more intense (if both competitors are struggling over the same set of resources for the sake of survival, yet neither is impeding the other directly), trade is decidedly less likely unless a common enemy arises and endangers the pair of them. The only times in which anarchs are likely to trade Discipline information with and offer training to their rivals is when it is obvious to both parties that doing so will forward the movement in some tangible way.
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neMiesA Kindred’s enemies are those who not only compete with him for resources, but who also seek to do him harm in the process. Cainites of the Sabbat are the anarchs’ most recognizable enemies, but frus- trated Camarilla Kindred who have been the victims of certain anarchs time and again can develop into potent and dangerous enemies in their own right. It is not enough in an enemy’s eyes that a character fails to achieve his goal, he must also suffer. As such, it is extremely unlikely and difficult to have one’s enemy teach one even the most rudimentary levels of any of his Disciplines.
Yet, while such an undertaking is difficult, it is not impossible. If a group of anarchs manages to get the upper hand on a potent enemy, that enemy can be tortured, cajoled or convinced to spill what he knows upon pain of Final Death. One can even use extreme
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and repeated spirit-breaking sessions to force a pris- oner to dish out the goods before being staked out for the sunrise. Of course, the risk of using either one of these methods to wring information from an enemy is that an enemy becomes more desperate and more dangerous the more often his captors degrade him and compromise him. It is rumored that the Amaranth is also a way to learn Disciplines from a “teacher,” but its side effects are rather final.
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isciplinesAs has been rumored by many superstitious Kindred in the Final Nights, some rare vampires of the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Generation can in- vent entirely new Disciplines. Such a vampire can improve upon these odd Disciplines by up to four levels of proficiency, and he can even teach them to other Kindred of any clan or bloodline. Unusual Disciplines of this nature are rare among the anarchs, however. While it would seem that the downtrod- den and outcast vampires of these pitiful generations would make wonderful anarch idealists, they are often dismissed out of hand as too rare and weak to be of any real benefit to the movement. They don’t truly fit with the anarchs philosophically either, because of what they represent. The anarch sub-faction is a forward-looking organization with designs on the future. The existence of too many thin-blooded in the ranks serves to remind the more knowledgeable anarch leaders that vampires in general might not even have a future to look forward to.