Editing Vampire: The Masquerade (section)

===[[Sabbat_(Vampire)|The Sabbat]]===
[[File:Sabbat.png|200px|thumb|right|The symbol of the Sabbat. Looks [[slaanesh|vaguely familiar, and horny]] ]]

The Sabbat rejects the notions of humanity, but they still needed a way to keep the Beast in check. To this end they invented the Roads of Enlightenment, which is known to some fans as the Roads of Edgelightenment. These inhuman alternatives often justify things like murder, torture, self-mutilation and other such extremes as a way to keeping your act together, albeit with justifications (Path of Metamorphosis emphasizes evolution via pain to justify torturing captives with Vicissitude, and Path of Night forbids killing of innocents but allows killing of evil mortals to "harvest their sin"). That doesn't mean all Sabbat are complete monsters; some Roads of Enlightenment tell the vampire not to murder humans for kicks. A very few of their founders are even on good terms with Humanity, like the Malkavian Vasantasena. In theory, the Sabbat are still on their mission to destroy the Antediluvians in order to save the world. In reality... things aren't exactly like that. And not just that in reality most of them don't really care about the Antediluvians or their machinations as long as they can [[Drowtales|slaughter and torture humans for fun, and commit as many atrocities as possible while maintaining a semblance of righteousness]]. Made even more solid when the only decent Sabbat, the Path of Harmony followers, getting exterminated around the time of Revised Sabbat Books were published, and the "Ritae", traditional pastimes of Sabbat aren't making it any easier: some of them reek of individual bravery, such as Fire Dance which is pretty badass by itself but most are usually sick contests of how to skin humans alive, enslave two humans and make them fight each other to death for lulz, regularly hang captured humans from a ceiling, drink them dry and bathe in their blood...and just ways to horribly abuse and torture whatever they catch. For a sect that seems to "ignore humans or deem them beneath their notice", it raises a bit of a flags in mature roleplayers' minds.

Even funnier is that the Sabbat openly wants to rule the world and subjugate the human race. Which is not very likely: not only is Sabbat territory limited to Latin America, most part of Canada, Spain and the poorer parts of the United States with no grasp on any country's mortal militaries (Ventrue dominates the US Army, which is the mightiest war machine on the planet), they also have to compete with the other supernatural powers of the World of Darkness. Pentex is everywhere and is their prime competition for who can be the most cartoonishly evil and the Technocracy has fingers in every pie and is advanced enough to explore other star systems, make Terminators on the side and was able to ONE-SHOT Zapathasura when he awoke using space mirrors and magical nukes (and that was only a fraction of the Technocracy's full power, while the ENTIRE Ravnos clan plus the [[Kindred of the East|Kuei-jin]] fought the dude [[Week of Nightmares|for a night and a day]]) while the Sabbat's only contribution to that fight was pinning down their Ravnos pack mates and keeping them from joining their Antediluvian. And all that is discounting the Garou, Kuei-Jin, Hunters, Changelings, Mummies, the Traditions and the Crafts, the Fallen and the Earthbound, Malfeans that are the size of Godzilla and can sweep entire cities clean and... look, Sabbat victory is not likely. The Sabbat could have been a dark mirror of Camarilla, but in the modern nights they are little more than a swarm of borderline insane monsters autistically raging to beat imaginary monsters while committing atrocities beyond measure.

But that's not all. The Sabbat claim that the Camarilla are Antediluvian puppets ignoring the Masquerade as they see fit, and that only they are able to destroy the 11 remaining Antediluvians in order to save the world. In practice, the Sabbat is almost exactly like the Camarilla that they claim to hate. The Sabbat's inner circle, the True Black Hand, is ''directly serving the Antediluvians'', they have their own Masquerade (the Lasombra vampires pay off Mexican authorities to ignore them, ghoul families (particularly Zantosa) clean up messes, and the Tzimisce pretend to not be vampires in their domains in the old world), and instead of being a beacon of freedom it's a tyrannical shithole whose mortal population would go extinct in a single week if the Sabbat could openly do what they want; even their vampires aren't "free", they are blood bound to their packmates in mental slavery...Which is the very thing they swore to end. 

And those two Antediluvians that the Sabbat killed? They're not dead. Lasombra used his own diablerization in order to unshackle his soul from his body and enter the Abyss: he is now trying to merge with it. Meanwhile, Tzimisce has gone through a whole deal of stuff and is now currently a massive growth of flesh in the sewers of New York, biding its time. [[Lulz|So, good going there, Sabbat.]]

====The Code of Milan====
Because the Sabbat is filled to the brim with assholes, edgelords, and other creepy fucks, early Sabbat leadership realized that they'd need a code to keep the whole bunch of them fuckers in line. As such, the Code of Milan was penned and ratified to get at least some sense of coherency without betraying the founding principles of the Sabbat. The statutes are:

*'''I: The Sabbat shall remain united in its support of the Sect’s Regent. If necessary, a new Regent shall be elected. The Regent shall support relief from tyranny, granting all Sabbat freedom.'''
:Simple enough: the Regent is the boss. It's the Regent's job to make sure the Sabbat has the freedom upon which it was founded, and if needed a new one can be elected. Note that the wording is vague enough to imply that the Regent may be overthrown in case the Regent is an ass.

*'''II: All Sabbat shall do their best to serve their leaders as long as said leaders serve the will of the Regent.'''
:Listen to the folks who tell you what the Regent wants you to do. This is in theory free of the tyranny of elders because again there's the implication of said leaders being able to be overthrown.

*'''III: All Sabbat shall faithfully observe all the auctoritas ritae.'''
:The Auctorias Ritae are the religious rites that form the basis that bind the Sabbat together. All thirteen of the rites (The Binding, The Blood Feast, The Blood Bath, the Creation Rites, the Festivo Dello Estinto, the Fire Dance, Games of Instinct, Monomacy, Palla Grande, the Sermons of Caine, Vaulderie, the War Party and the Wild Hunt) are observed by proper Sabbat and foregoing their use will get you into trouble.

*'''IV: All Sabbat shall keep their word of honor to one another.'''
:If you give your word, you've given your word. With so many assholes in one place you'll need a way to keep them in check. The Tzimisce are especially big on this.

*'''V: All Sabbat shall treat their peers fairly and equally, upholding the strength and unity of the Sabbat. If necessary, they shall provide for the needs of their brethren.'''
:Help your peers for the good of the Sabbat. Within reason of course: if a particularly dickish pack tries to exploit this they'll find that there are limits to this hospitality.

*'''VI: All Sabbat must put the good of the Sect and the race of Cainites before their own personal needs, despite all costs.'''
:Speaks for itself, but the threat's gotta be pretty big to get the entire Sabbat on the same side. Otherwise certain Kindred will be too busy being dicks.

*'''VII: Those who are not honorable under this code will be considered less than equal and therefore unworthy of assistance.'''
:Don't be a dick or your ass is grass.

*'''VIII: As it has always been, so shall it always be. The Lextalionis shall be the model for undying justice by which all Sabbat shall abide.'''
:Be an especially big asshole and you'll have a Wild Hunt (the Sabbat name for the Camarilla Blood Hunt) called on your ass.

*'''IX: All Sabbat shall protect one another from the enemies of the Sect. Personal enemies shall remain a personal responsibility, unless they undermine Sect security.'''
:Civil wars are bad, so if two Sabbat have beef it's their problem. This does mean that if you manage to stretch the meaning of "Sect security" you can make this rule work in your favor with some planted evidence calling for Monomachy.

*'''X: All Sect members shall protect Sabbat territory from all other powers.'''
:There's plenty of Camarilla and Anarchs who'd love to set up shop in Sabbat cities and they frequently try to do so. Few Sabbat need the encouragement to kicks a bunch of Camarilla/Anarchs in the dick, so this is pretty easy to enforce.

*'''XI: The spirit of freedom shall be the fundamental principle of the Sect. All Sabbat shall expect and demand freedom from their leaders.'''
:The counterpart of statutes I and II: leaders have to give freedom while the common Sabbat demand it.

*'''XII: The Ritus of Monomacy shall be used to settle disputes among all Sabbat.'''
:Monomacy is the sacred duel between two Sabbat, but a disturbing amount of them will want to use it just to kill folks without repercussions.

*'''XIII: All Sabbat shall support the Black Hand.'''
:The Black Hand, also known as the ''manus nigrum'' have made it their job to hunt down infernalists and demons to destroy both, which is considered laudable by the Sabbat. ''Tal'mahe'Ra'' or True Black Hand is a completely different animal, even having Mage and other supernaturals aiding it. They are the ones who work for Caine and Antediluvians, with no one in the Sabbat having an idea.

On December 21st, 1933 the Code of Milan was revised after the end of the Second Sabbat Civil War. This revision added three addenda to the Code, which are to be upheld in the same way as the original 13 are:

*'''XIV: All Sabbat have the right to monitor the behavior and activities of their fellow Sect members in order to maintain freedom and security.'''
:Aka "you can spy on everyone as long as it's for the good of the Sect." Yes, it's [[Paranoia|written vaguely]] for exactly that purpose.

*'''XV: All Sabbat possess the right to call a council of their peers and immediate leaders.'''
:Sometimes it's better to talk than to fight, which became obvious during the civil war. This gives all Sabbat to call such councils to defuse otherwise violent situations, but at the risk of having to deal with violent reprisals if the council was deemed to be bullshit. This wisdom did pay off, with the Third Sabbat Civil War lasting only 100 days and ended with diplomacy.

*'''XVI: All Sabbat shall act against Sect members who use the powers and authority the Sabbat has given them for personal gain at the expense of the Sabbat. Action shall be taken only through accepted means, approved by a quorum of Prisci.'''
:A counterweight to statutes VI and IX: if leaders do start like the hated elders the rabble now has the right to take them down... with approval of course.

[[File:Anarch.png|200px|thumb|right|The symbol of the Anarchs.]]