| Contents |
| History • Strongholds • Advantages and Weaknesses • The Samedi in DC • Samedi Characters |
| Samedi | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Pseudonyms | Children of the Baron; Ghedi; Zombies |
| Sect | Independents |
| Disciplines | Fortitude Obfuscate Thanatosis Vodoun |
| Rarity | Rare |
The Samedi are a young bloodline, arising in the Caribbean in the past millennia and seemingly steeped in the hybrid folklores of that part of the world. They are an uncomfortable and unusual breed to encounter, mostly due to their unfortunate constantly-rotting condition, which can make it difficult for even the strongest-stomached Nosferatu to spend a lot of time with them, but that's fine with them; a secretive society of necromancers, they generally find that too much attention is much worse than not enough.
History
The first Samedi appeared in the Caribbean around the islands of Haiti and the Dominican Republic in the sixteenth century, under the leadership of their founder, who goes by the name of a vodun lwa, Baron Samedi. Their origin is officially unknown, not least because the truth is uncomfortable for the Camarilla, but those few in the know whisper that they are an offshoot bloodline founded by a Cappadocian elder who saw the writing on the wall and preserved some of the clan's powers over death in them. Ironically, this is considered a crackpot theory amongst most mainstream vampires, and the Samedi are more often claimed to be an offshoot of the Nosferatu or the result of Giovanni experiments in necromancy that went horribly wrong. (The Giovanni themselves have extensively disclaimed this, and consider the Samedi deeply inferior.)
Closely tied to the vodun religion of their area of origin, the Samedi are seldom seen outside the Americas, and the bulk of their small number still reside in the islands where they arose. The bloodline usually focuses on providing magical and necromantic services to mortals and the undead alike, and have avoided significant crackdowns from the larger sects simply by being too few in number and too subtle in their activities to be worth bothering with. Some vampires, especially among the Camarilla, continue to uneasily wonder if they are related to the Cappadocians or might want revenge for the clan's destruction, but if they do, they've hidden it successfully for some time now.
Strongholds
Samedi tend to live in small family groups and isolated pockets; it is unusual for there to be more than one or two Samedi groups in a given city unless it is extremely large. Port-au-Prince in Haiti is the bloodline's designated meeting place when the Baron calls his fellows to congregate, but this is extremely rare and even in these cases the exact meeting place often moves, seeing the bloodline's members meet in misty graveyards, church crypts, or secluded thickets studded around the city.
Advantages and Weaknesses
Advantages
All Samedi are uniquely attuned to death and decay, which they live with every night that they remain active. They can tell the cause of death of most corpses simply by looking at them, and have two custom powers unique to their bloodline: the discipline of Thanatosis, once used by their Cappadocian forbears, and the necromantic ritual magic of Vodoun.
Disadvantages
The most obvious disadvantage for the Samedi is their actively rotting appearance; they are obviously massive breaches of the Masquerade should they ever be seen in public, and even other vampires and supernatural creatures accustomed to dealing with the weird and offputting often find it hard to even have a conversation with them. They are unable to hide this condition in most cases, and the majority of Samedi stop trying after a year or two of their new existence.
The Samedi in DC
There are no known Samedi in DC, although it is a large enough city that a small group of them might not be easily noticeable if they did not wish to be found.
Samedi Characters
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| Rick Cheveux |