Obtenebration

Obtenebration is a vampiric Discipline which allows its users to manipulate and control darkness.

Shadow Play
This power grants the vampire limited control over shadows and other ambient darkness. Though the vampire cannot truly “create” darkness, she can overlap and stretch existing shadows, creating patches of gloom. This power also allows Kindred to separate shadows from their casting bodies and even shape darkness into the shadows of things that are not there. Once a Kindred takes control of darkness or shadow, it gains a mystical tangibility. By varying accounts cold or hellishly hot and cloying, the darkness may be used to aggravate or even smother victims. Certain callous Caenebrae claim to have choked mortals to death with their own shadows.

Shroud of Night
The vampire can create a cloud of inky blackness. The cloud completely obscures light and even sound to some extent. Those who have been trapped within it (and survived) describe the cloud as viscous and unnerving. This physical manifestation lends credence to those Caenebrae who claim that their darkness is something other than mere shadow. The tenebrous cloud may even move, if the creating Kindred wishes, though this requires complete concentration.

Arms of the Abyss
Refining his control over darkness, the Kindred can create prehensile tentacles that emerge from patches of dim lighting. These tentacles may grasp, restrain, and constrict foes.

Black Metamorphosis
The Kindred calls upon his inner darkness and infuses himself with it, becoming a monstrous hybrid of matter and shadow. His body becomes mottled with spots of tenebrous shade, and wispy tentacles extrude from his torso and abdomen. Though still humanoid, the vampire takes on an almost demonic appearance, as the darkness within him bubbles to the surface.

Nightshades
Nightshades is an ability that allows vampires to grant further substance to the shadows under their control, enabling them to craft simple objects out of shadow, such as chairs or swords. These objects can only be sustained whilst in the presence of their creator, and only for short periods of time, unless the vampire wishes to continually expend blood to create them.

Tenebrous Form
At this level, the Kindred’s mastery of darkness is so extensive that she may physically become it. Upon activation of this power, the vampire becomes an inky, amoeboid patch of shadow. Vampires in this form are practically invulnerable and may slither through cracks and crevices. In addition, the shadow-vampire gains the ability to see in natural darkness. They are however, still able to be harmed by magic, fire, and sunlight.

Aegis of Shadows
The proficiency of vampire elders in creating shadow constructs allows them to form sets of armor around themselves in battle. This power can shield them from all manner of physical attacks, though it is powerless against fire and sunlight.

Eyes of the Night
See without light, even through supernatural darkness

Shadowstep
The vampire has such fine control over the darkness that he may become it briefly and reform himself from other darkness close by. The vampire may Shadowstep through walls, floors, and even mystical barriers. The Kindred simply steps “into” a shadow and re-emerges from another shadow a short distance away (or next to the barrier, if there is no shadow on the other side).

Shadow Parasite
Grow a black tentacle within a target until it kills them

Shadow Perspective
Move senses to a nearby shadow

The Darkness Within
This power allows the Kindred to call forth the darkness contained in her black soul. This enormous, turbulent shadow vomits from the vampire’s mouth, though some vampires are said to cut themselves and let the blackness seep from their veins. The shadow-cloud engulfs a chosen target, burning it with a soul-scarring chill and siphoning its blood away in torrents. This however, does require a deal of focus from the user, and any attack against them or other distraction causes the cloud to dissipate.

​ Level 7
Darksight: Watch and listen through any shadow in the world

Fortify Against Ahura Mazda: Your shadows summoned through Obtenebration become resistant to sunlight

Shadow Lair: Pause mid-step when using Shadowstep

Shadow Twin
The vampire’s control over darkness has progressed to such a degree that he may bestow upon it a limited degree of sentience. By animating his own shadow or that of another, the Kindred can actually “free” the shadow cast by light. While this power is active, the subject casts no shadow, as it has left to pursue the vampire’s commands. This power can unnerve mortals and even a few inexperienced vampires. The Kindred wielding Obtenebration commands the individual’s shadow; some vampires report having seen mortals literally scared to death, as their shadows leapt away to taunt or menace them.

​ ​ ​Level 8
Dark Hunter: Create a shadow duplicate of yourself that hunts a specific target

Inner Darkness: Draw the shadow into yourself to gain great power

Night Shades: Summon shades to act as your servants

Oubliette
By creating a “chamber” of pure darkness, the Cainite may entrap or smother her enemies. No air exists in this shadow-trap, and mortals suffocate within its chilling void. Even vampires have little recourse once trapped — they may leave only at their captor’s whim. The Oubliette appears as a dense patch of shadow, unaffected by ambient light around it

Shadow Watchtower
Merge with a shadow, becoming invulnerable to everything except sunlight

Ahriman's Demesne
This power allows the vampire to summon a darkness so oppressive that it extinguishes the light of life — or unlife — of any victim trapped within it. Ahriman’s Demesne creates a 50-foot (or 15-meter) radius of void that issues from the Kindred's hand and takes away the bodies of those it claims when it vanishes. The overwhelming darkness destroys friend and foe alike, claiming anyone unfortunate enough to be within its circumference.

Enter the Abyss
Enter and leave the Abyss at any time, allowing you to teleport from shadow to shadow around the world

Tchernabog: Temporarily blot out the sun in your area

​ ​Level 10
Banishment: Send someone to the Abyss for an extended period of time