[WIR] Let the Streets Run Red (COMPLETE!)

[CTPhipps]

Freddie Montgomery



Type: NPC

Synopsis: The childe of a doomsday prepper cult who now questions her insane ideology.

Analysis: Freddie isn't inside LTSRR but shows up, instead, in Children of the Blood. Which is a shame as she's a fascinating character and really makes Innocence in Blood a more interesting chronicle. I think I wouldn't have been so dismissive of the character's importance if she'd been included in the original write-up.

Freddie's basic history is she grew up in a Christian doomsday prepper cult akin to the Branch Davidians. I have a personal story here that is not at all funny and disturbing but I'll get to it later. Basically, the FBI eventually broke into their cult, and took the children into foster care. Much like the Children of the Corn sequel, Urban Harvest, she continued believing in her cult and even evangelized her isolationist millennialist beliefs to them.

Freddie being a homeschooled lunatic still managed to find a life for herself in the local evangelical community (not as unbelievable as you might think) and eventually attracted the attention of Melvyn Ramsay. I have to think that Melvyn has to have been a white man because the kind of communities that Freddie runs in would not accept any sort of teaching from a POC Follower of Set.

Whatever the case, she became a devout believer in the Ministry and started learning the ways of blackmailing other Kindred with horrifying secrets before her research into her sire's past showed he'd been around her cult as a child. She also remembered a large amount of childhood sexual abuse and other things that caused her to (presumably) frenzy before killing him. I'm going to suggest that it was full-on diablerie too.

Freddie is now continuing to be a doomsday prepper but has lost her faith in the Followers of Set, moving toward being a more ecumenical Ministry. The implications being that she has returned to her evangelical Christian cult beliefs (if she ever left them in the first place). This part I don't quite buy because even if she cast aside the Church of Set, I don't buy her believing any other religions but her own.

Curiously, there's no mention of Gehenna and it's entirely possible that Freddie is completely unfamiliar with the Noddist interpretation of the End Times. If she ever met someone suitably Protestant or hell just discussed it with someone who was passingly familiar with the Caine myth then I would see Freddie utterly ditching Set. I actually don't see her joining the Church of Caine or Sabbat, though, due to its heavy Catholic influences. She might start her own Gehenna cult, though.

Suggestions for Freddie's Use

+ I mentioned before I would push a romantic angle to Freddie's relationship with Honor. Honor because I believe she was a lesbian while alive and Freddie because she is trying to "save" Honor. How Freddie feels about sex is probably incomprehensible gibberish given her upbringing but nothing would have stopped her from being gay or bi while in life. It also probably would have been encouraged for her to use any methods necessary as a Follower of Set because, well, they're scummy that way.

+ I would add an element of tragedy to Freddie blackmailing Honor by her messy feeding (and possibly killing someone) because it's something she was taught to do. I would encourage the ST to play Freddie as actually motivated entirely by a desire to help Honor escape her insane sire but believe, due to her indoctrination, that the methods don't matter. Just the results.

+ Freddie seems like a character who you can have the True Blood-esque joke of using INSANE interpretations of Bible quotes with. "God gave humans the fruits and animals to eat, which is actually about the Children of Adam, meaning Caine, which means us and humans are animals so it is permissible to slaughter them for our food."

+ While not terribly funny in real life, Qanon conspiracy theories coming out of her mouth would probably not at all be unsurprising. Weirdly, I'd also recommend she doesn't actually intend HARM by this. Humanity 4 or not, I think she's idealistic and selfless, just horribly BROKEN.

[CTPhipps]

Real Life Story - Warning: Nasty Business

The funny thing about her backstory is that I actually find it a lot more unrealistic than a lot of the ones presented thus far because I'm all too familiar with the kind of insane doomsday cults and militias that she came from. In my hometown of Ashland, Ky (where I've mentioned we have a Nazi problem--and I don't mean that figuratively), we have something like 15 militias and cult compounds in the surrounding area.

Some of them are racial supremacists, some of them are Christian fundamentalist's fundamentalists that think outlawing dancing is normal, and others are just people waiting for the end of the world so they can rule the ashes like Immorten Joe. There's also plenty of what amounts to cosplayers acting out their survivalist fantasies. To give a sense of how this is personal, my wife's mother was an escapee from this life.

The thing about these groups is the police never actually raid them, Waco showing exactly why. They tend to be very well armed with military grade weapons and ten pounds of crazy in a one pound bag. As such, there's a standing order among law enforcement to do their best to deescalate any kind of mass murdering shoot out by just letting them go about their business and wait for the End Times versus initiating what they'd perceive as an attack. If there's child abuse and so on going on (and there almost certainly is) you have to try to grab them outside. Many times it just gets ignored and that is why we have a lot of people like Freddie in RL who never know why it was wrong.

I wish I were kidding.

Oddly this means that if you are VERY familiar with these kind of groups in RL like me, that might be a clue that Freddie's vampire cult theory is probably true and the police going after them were probably under the influence of Kindred machinations. Another angle, to get rid of RL parallels, is that Freddie's family were actually Garou Kinfolk and Melvyn was planning to destroy them. After all, the only way to tell the difference between a terrorist doomsday cult and a Garou one is whether God is a she or not.

*rimshot*

Oh yes, you can hate me for that W:TA fans. I'm one of you too. I'm just a Ragabash.

Or maybe she's got false memories colliding because, well, she had a horribly abusive childhood that she's falling into old patterns regarding.

Depends if you want to play it for silliness or seriousness.

[Baaldam]

Maxwell

I was also surprised by the fact that there was no hint of Menele's influence in Maxwell's background. Despite being the childe of a 5th Generation Brujah, it doesn't state that his sire is a childe of Menele or even aware of his existence. As far as we can tell, Maxwell never even became aware of Menele during his time as a Prince or subsequently after.

To be fair, there's actually at least one link between the two of them. As an aside, i think his sire's name might be a reference to this locale.

The wiki is not 100% precise - Menele was already becoming a methuselah and considering doing a great spirit journey to the East when Altamira came across him and lead to him changing plans - but the fact Maxwell's sire is the Brujah who presented the "dream of Carthage" to Menele always seemed crazy suspicious for a coincidence to me.

Specially with his return post-Lodin's (supposed) final death - and Menele's long history of stealth programming of other kindred across the ages, with Ublo-Satha keeping her "manchurian programming" through conversion in Gargoyle as ur-example.

[CTPhipps]

Gabriella



Type: NPC

Synopsis: A former Twitch streamer turned Camarilla cyber-Hound.

Analysis: Gabriella is a character that I easily give my 2# favorite character of the book award. I think she's going to be the most popular character in Let the Streets Run Red and the one who will probably get the most use out of the new NPCs for the Chicago Chronicles. Which is quite impressive since she wasn't introduced in the main book but shows up in a couple of The Chicago Folios adventure hooks and here.

The premise of the character is an interesting one as she already challenges traditional notations of Nosferatu just by her appearance. In laymen's terms, aside from her Two-Face thing going on, Gabriella is gorgeous and that opens up new possibilities for the Nosferatu in 5th Edition. We get a lot more character options for this and in LARP with this. Gabriella also fulfills a number of niches that didn't exist before with being the tech-person for the Camarilla after Bobby Weatherbottom's defection to the Anarchs. The fact she's somewhat harmless but could potentially do massive amounts of damage to the players' lives is an interesting twist. I could also see her being a love interest for player characters or a supportive cyber-hacker character if they want her to be.

It should be noted that Gabriella actually showed up for a couple of adventures in THE CHICAGO FOLIO and I had no idea who she was. Sort of like how Freddie Montgomery was important to the Innocence in Blood adventure but didn't show up until Children of the Blood. She's not exceptionally important to any of the LTSRR adventures but could easily be incorporated as a contact to a lot of these adventures.

I think Gabriella's Humanity of 9 is a bit TOO high as I can't imagine her being able to function as a cyber-Hound of any sort with that. Basically, she'll be vomiting up blood the moment she discovers that Damien murdered some people she dug up information on. I'd be inclined to lower it down to 7 and trying to avoid getting involved in worse actions.

I think her Hacking score is also a bit too high and she should be about a 3 as you won't need her to be the equivalent of Lisbeth Salander and able to crack the Pentagon for most of Ballard's needs. Part of what V5 has done well is lower the IMMENSELY HUGE skill sets that many vampires possess. Now, it's closer to the idea that if you have a 5 in something that you're the best in the world at something and you should probably only have one of those skills unless you are a Elder or it is a related discipline.

Suggestions for Use

* I do think that Walter Nash is probably using her to find Redwood and Gabriella despite not being a super-hacker can do so simply because I imagine most of Redwood's success is due to the fact that most Kindred don't know not to talk to the mouse like Scotty in The Voyage Home. Even then, it's not that Redwood is bad at it or that Gabriella is that good. It would be more that she can narrow it down versus Bobby Weatherbottom who CAN do miracles with computers.

* Dawn Nakada might be considering headhunting her and Gabriella is....terrified of that. She would not want to be anywhere near the Kindred FBI or Justicars. I imagine she really just wanted to be Ballard's girl and not even a Hound because she thought it would be easy money explaining how you put your password every time you log in or what a VPN is.

* I would put Gabriella as Eric Sharpe's unwilling second in command in Gary and a Vanguard member. I would have her basically not want to be involved in any fighting and also thinking that going after the Anarchs is insane as well as stupid. Mostly because they're not doing anything to disrupt the Camarilla or disturb the Masquerade. I'd have her, essentially, too smart to be fooled by Sharpe's cassus belli. I'd have her in contact with Jessica Flores and maybe Arthur, even though they are a few years apart in age.

[CTPhipps]

To be fair, there's actually at least one link between the two of them. As an aside, i think his sire's name might be a reference to this locale.

The wiki is not 100% precise - Menele was already becoming a methuselah and considering doing a great spirit journey to the East when Altamira came across him and lead to him changing plans - but the fact Maxwell's sire is the Brujah who presented the "dream of Carthage" to Menele always seemed crazy suspicious for a coincidence to me.

Specially with his return post-Lodin's (supposed) final death - and Menele's long history of stealth programming of other kindred across the ages, with Ublo-Satha keeping her "manchurian programming" through conversion in Gargoyle as ur-example.

Great find there, thank you!

[Baaldam]

Great find there, thank you!

You're welcome.

Truth be told, a bunch of little tidbits across 2nd ed CbN - the amazing coincidence of Chicago's first prince being the childe (barely an ancilla) of a past associate of his, Ublo-Satha's almost millenia-old mind triggers that survived Gargoyle conversion and loss of past identity, the old Brujah's confidence in being able to use Anabelle as a trojan horse of sorts after letting her fall in Helena's hands - paint an image of a Menele far too Dominate-happy for a designated good guy.
Not even going into all his multi-tiered jackassery all through Ashes to Ashes, oh boy.

I sometimes ask myself if his and Helena Dominate levels shouldn't be switched (specially considering she lost Galbraith to another methuselah, Shaitan).

[CTPhipps]

You're welcome.

Truth be told, a bunch of little tidbits across 2nd ed CbN - the amazing coincidence of Chicago's first prince being the childe (barely an ancilla) of a past associate of his, Ublo-Satha's almost millenia-old mind triggers that survived Gargoyle conversion and loss of past identity, Brujah's confidence in being able to use Anabelle as a trojan horse of sorts after letting her fall in Helena's hands - paint an image of a Menele far too Dominate-happy for a designated good guy.
Not even going into all his multi-tiered jackassery all through Ashes to Ashes, oh boy.

I sometimes ask myself if his and Helena Dominate levels shouldn't be switched (specially considering she lost Galbraith to another methuselah, Shaitan).

My headcanon is that Gailbraith switched to the Path of Evil Revelations to get away from Helena because life under was THAT horrible.

With the fact that Helena now knows a little Thaumaturgy from the Baali-days of Carthage, I now wonder if she may have sold her childer to him.

[Baaldam]

My headcanon is that Gailbraith switched to the Path of Evil Revelations to get away from Helena because life under was THAT horrible.

With the fact that Helena now knows a little Thaumaturgy from the Baali-days of Carthage, I now wonder if she may have sold her childer to him.

Hmmm, it is possible, though as an aside i always thought it interesting that she would leave two childer in what would become leading positions of Camarilla and Sabbat in Mexico respectively.

[CTPhipps]

Hmmm, it is possible, though as an aside i always thought it interesting that she would leave two childer in what would become leading positions of Camarilla and Sabbat in Mexico respectively.

Not to mention Paris.

Mind you, while the books tend to blur this, I tend to think that most of the vampires in Modern Day should be descended from the ones in the early books. Most Toreador in Western Europe probably are descended from "Helen of Troy" and hold it up as a badge of honor. Most Middle Eastern and Russian Toreador are descended from Michael.

Most Nosferatu are descended from Baba Yaga.

Most Carthagian Brujah are descended from Menele.

And so on.

I loved this sort of thing in Anno Dracula where bloodlines are like Royal Houses and this adds an additional layer to the fun of Clans.

[Baaldam]

Not to mention Paris.

True, true. There's Villon too. Though he is a funky case in some ways - his supposed embrace 2 centuries prior to the life of the historical Villon, not to mention Helena was apparently staking Menele in Spain at the time. In my games i dealt with the chronological mess by making Villon the childe of another, but all too quick to play with people's confusion (what would be quite appropriate to the Villon's character, might be said).

But then a lot of vampires in my games spout claims of great vaunted origins to beat their own drums (and cover up diablerie at times).

Mind you, while the books tend to blur this, I tend to think that most of the vampires in Modern Day should be descended from the ones in the early books. Most Toreador in Western Europe probably are descended from "Helen of Troy" and hold it up as a badge of honor. Most Middle Eastern and Russian Toreador are descended from Michael.

Most Nosferatu are descended from Baba Yaga.

Most Carthagian Brujah are descended from Menele.

That can be fun indeed, but i like to play a little fast and loose - for every canon/celebrated methuselah or elder there are one or two others who are either forgotten or even actively erased from kindred history among other things.

I also have a bit of a distaste with how some books are a little too prolific with giving 4th-6th gen to NPCs just because - the probable main reason behind the Beckoning as an event - and tend to tweak them in a "bare bones" version: "character, not dots. Elder powers are all about individualization - if none are described, any elder power suffices, power him down to 7th generation, treat stats beyond 6 as buffs from magical objects, MacGuffins or whatever you prefer."

Has lead to some pretty entertaining results - and occasional retcons - overall.

[Justycar]

Freddie Montgomery



Type: NPC

Synopsis: The childe of a doomsday prepper cult who now questions her insane ideology.

Analysis: Freddie isn't inside LTSRR but shows up, instead, in Children of the Blood. Which is a shame as she's a fascinating character and really makes Innocence in Blood a more interesting chronicle. I think I wouldn't have been so dismissive of the character's importance if she'd been included in the original write-up.

I agree with you, this character should have been in the chronicle Innocence in blood depicted in more depth. Honestly, it is the only fail I can point in a very good story. Freddie could be even being considered the main antagonist, preparing the fall and humiliation of Honor from the beginning. Although I would not consider them lovers, a lover would not have orchestrated the corruption of her loved one, I think that she is only using Honor as a weapon against the Camarilla. She deserves that low Humanity even being a neonate.

[Justycar]

I am preparing Innocence in blood, the Milwaukhee chronicle, I have just realized that Doyle "Sledgehammer" Fincher does not appear in the book (Let the streets run red). Doyle appeared in Camarilla 5th edition as the head of the church of Milwaukee, but in the chronicle is not even named.

[The Gentleman Gamer]

I am preparing Innocence in blood, the Milwaukhee chronicle, I have just realized that Doyle "Sledgehammer" Fincher does not appear in the book (Let the streets run red). Doyle appeared in Camarilla 5th edition as the head of the church of Milwaukee, but in the chronicle is not even named.

Yep, it was a conscious decision in the end due to the way I structured the domain of Milwaukee. He's still there, but he's not a prominent vampire in that city.

[Justycar]

Thank you for the insight, Gentleman.

Two years ago I storytelled a chronicle about cults and sects in M20, very similar in plot to Innocence in blood. Reading this story I realized that we have tried to pull the same strings: the disapparition of a young girl, "mortal" fanaticism, moral dilemmas. Even the main antagonist, the "Freddie Montgomery" of that story, was also a victim of his former leader.

That plot worked very well also in Mage because the leader not only gained Quintessence of the cult (as vampire can obtain blood), but also his Paradigm was reinforced by the beliefs of the parish. In the end, the characters found the girl in an abandoned abby, pregnant, and she did not want lo leave. They had to choose between kidnap her, leave her in the abby with the cult or join the cult.

I found inspiration in The Family or Children of God:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Family_International

[CTPhipps]

I'm still interested in finishing up this WIR guys and am sorry for the delay right as we're about to finish but I have a confession--it's because of treason.

I got distracted by my recent Deadlands game.

http://unitedfederationofcharles.blogspot.com/2021/05/50-deadlands-adventure-hooks.html

Yes, I *DO* have a second family!