Frenzy

All vampires have an internal drive to feed and survive by any means necessary, rendering them little more than vicious, terrible supernatural monsters in moments of great crisis. This drive is referred to by vampires as the Beast, and while a strong-willed vampire can keep it at bay through willpower and force of personality, almost none are immune to it escaping once in a while. A Frenzy occurs when a vampire loses control and the Beast asserts itself instead, usually causing considerable havoc in the local area. Frenzies can be calmed and dissipated by use of some Animalism powers, but beyond that are usually forces of nature that cannot be stopped without considerable risk to all involved.

A vampire in frenzy has little to no higher thinking ability and acts purely on instinct, usually revealing their supernatural nature to anyone in the area as well as causing considerable violence and disruption wherever they are. Some may remember what they did while frenzying later, while others black out completely and have only a vague impression of strong emotions and violence. In any case, a frenzying vampire is a huge threat to the Masquerade and will usually be overcome (if possible) or fled from by any others in their immediate area.

Hunger Frenzy

A vampire that has run too low on blood or is confronted with too irresistible a feast may succumb to a hunger frenzy, in which the Beast asserts control and becomes a ravening, insatiably hungry monster. Vampires in hunger frenzy attack and attempt to drink from the closest sources of blood around them, which includes other living things, and do not discriminate between "better" or "worse" food sources, nor are they capable of avoiding trying to drink from loved ones or enemies they normally wouldn't. Vampires in hunger frenzy have no impulse control, either, and if not stopped are prone to drinking their victims dry, killing them.

Hunger frenzies generally end when the vampire's hunger is sated, allowing them to return to their senses (often covered in whomever or whatever unfortunate donated the blood to restore them). A few vampires with Derangements that pertain to their feeding habits may be unable to stop even when full, however, and members of Clan Ventrue who enter hunger frenzy are often caught in an endless loop of feeding, purging, and feeding again, if they are not lucky enough to encounter a victim that fulfills their specialized needs.

Rage Frenzy

A rage frenzy occurs when a vampire is so infuriated that they lose control of their personality and succumb to the Beast. Generally, this is triggered by some form of intense insult, injury, or psychological stress, although some vampires (particularly the volatile Brujah) have shorter fuses and may be more likely to enter a rage frenzy for smaller infractions. Once in a rage frenzy, a vampire attempts to completely destroy whatever thing or person angered them, before going on to demolish as many people and as much of their immediate environment as they can handle. Like all frenzies, rage frenzy prevents a vampire from doing anything too complex or involving too much thought, so most simply physically attack those around them, employing teeth, fists, claws, or whatever else they have at their disposal, and they cannot distinguish between friend and foe when they do.

Rage frenzies do burn out on their own eventually, but they do so slowly, usually only after the vampire has either successfully destroyed everything in the area and has nothing else to vent their rage on, or has exhausted themself to the point of no longer being able to continue on. Since rage frenzies are easily the most destructive and long-lasting of the frenzies, other vampires usually try to contain or even stake a vampire in one, even if they could normally have escaped; the resulting damage is often too much of a problem to simply let them rage themself out.

Fear Frenzy

Vampires enter fear frenzy when confronted with something so frightening and overwhelming that they can no longer consciously face it, causing the Beast to surface and attempt to escape the source of the trauma. Usually, this results in the vampire blindly trying to flee from whatever frightened them, although they may also become violent or disregard the safety of people and things that get in their way in the process. Fear frenzies are usually triggered based on an individual vampire's psychological makeup and are not always predictable; for example, a vampire suffering from combat-related PTSD might succumb to fear frenzy when hearing gunshots, while another might frenzy when confronted with their abusive sire, and so on.

Fear frenzy usually ends with a vampire in hiding somewhere, and typically recedes once the Beast establishes that it is no longer threatened by any outside fears. Although fear frenzy is less dangerous than some of the other types, it can still lead to breaches of the Masquerade (particularly if the frenzying vampire has Celerity, for example), and may still involve violence if the Beast cannot escape and is instead forced to lash out against whatever has terrified it.

Rötschreck

Rötschreck, or the Red Fear, is a form of frenzy specific to the physiology of vampires, and strikes whenever they are confronted with either fire or sunlight, the two greatest dangers to their undead state. It functions much like a fear frenzy, forcing them to flee immediately and violently and to attempt to destroy anything that would keep them from doing so, but is even more blind and instinctual than most other types of frenzy. Even a small flame - for example, a lighter - could touch off Rötschreck in a vampire (especially one that is already nervous or uncomfortable), and any sight of sunlight or larger flame is likely to shake even the most strong-willed of the undead.

Rötschreck ends only when the vampire has successfully escaped from the source of their terror, and usually not for some little while, since the Beast is paranoid about these great dangers and likely to try to continue running or hiding until absolutely certain that they are out of danger.

Wassail

Vampires who have been too far divorced from the humanity they were once a part of may fall into a state known as Wassail, in which they becomes permanently and irretrievably forced into frenzy. A vampire in wassail has effectively ceased to exist as a thinking person; they have become the Beast permanently, and they behave as if in an ongoing, inescapable rage frenzy, stalking, killing, destroying, and generally acting as a plague upon society. Wassail typically occurs because a vampire has either witnessed or personally performed so many horrific acts that they can no longer maintain any shred of human morals, and therefore no longer have anything with which to fight off the Beast's constant attempts to take over.

Vampires in wassail (referred to as Wights) cannot be restored to their previous state by any powers or actions, and most are destroyed with extreme prejudice by other vampires, who do not appreciate either their tendency to panic mortal society with their very obvious behavior or their likelihood to attack and destroy other vampires if given the chance. They cannot be affected by any mind-controlling powers (including those from the Dementation and Dominate Disciplines), and must be dealt with directly and physically.