The Blood Guild
by Michael Robbins

Gang Focus

This gang serves as an extension of its leader's will and depravity. It exists to provide him with victims, income, protection, and people for him to dominate in order to placate his ego. The gang is heavily into organlegging and includes a band of ghouls.

Leader

No one in the gang knows his real name, instead using the title he chose for himself, Lord Blood. He is an African American male, around 6'2" of moderate build. He dresses in dark clothing, usually with a long black duster on top. He also has a large tattoo on his back of a strange creature with a thin body and long razor sharp claws. He leads the gang with an iron grip, using his compelling presence and fear tactics, although he does know when to give out some rewards to keep the troops happy. He follows the Loa of Ogoun and is a high-grade initiate in the Voodoo tradition. The true source of his power is his deep understanding of Blood Magic, and the abilities it grants him.

Lieutenants

Jacob Tulley is a male dwarf and a skilled Houngan of Ogoun. Jacob is also a skilled doctor and uses his abilities to both heal the gang members and perform some of the gang's more illegal activities. He's obsessed with power, mainly personal, and has signed on with Lord Blood in hopes of being taught the art of Blood Magic at some time.

Erik Mendrikkar is a male elf, also a skilled Houngan of Ogoun. Erik has a masterful personality and excels at the art of conjuring. He is also an excellent enchanter and handles most of the magical material creation the gang requires. He speaks for Lord Blood usually, when the master can't be bothered to speak to the gang. Erik is not so much interested in power as he is in wealth. He is also a bit of a sadist, and as long as the Blood Guild can provide him with wealth and the occasional partner/victim, he will stay loyal to Lord Blood.

" Crimson " is the nickname of a powerful Grande Zombie that Lord Blood has enslaved. Lord Blood arranged for Erik to summon a powerful Zombie, and then he had the apprentice houngan knocked out. The spirit went free, but Lord Blood had already created a confining ward around it. Lord Blood then went on an Astral Quest for its true name, and came back, enslaving the zombie known as Crimson. Crimson is a powerful spell caster and has learned several spirit powers while working for The Blood Guild. A common tactic of the gang is to promise a victim he will be let go if they feed Crimson some of their life energy (Karma). The victim is never released, but Crimson grows in strength anyway. In truth, although Crimson hates being under Lord Blood's control, the spirit is treated very well in the gang and Crimson does not really try to gain his freedom. He may occasionally rebel or play games with a poorly worded order, but when it comes to matters dealing with the security of the gang Crimson generally works as part of the team.

" Ogre " is the leader of the human gang element of The Blood Guild. He started out as a slightly better than average ganger with a love of violence, but Lord Blood found him and invested some serious nuyen info him, and Ogre became prime leadership material. He knows that he owes his wealth, power, success, and most of his cybered body to Lord Blood and is fanatically loyal. He has grown obsessed with the notion of working for Ogoun as well, and studies military tactics in his free time. His name may indicate an unthinking brute, but Lord Blood's patronage has allowed Ogre to stop worrying about his next meal and concentrate on self-improvement.

Michael Ingerson is the leader of the ghoul faction of The Blood Guild. Michael was born with the Talent of an Adept and this allowed him to come to the leadership of a small pack of ghouls living in the sewers of Seattle. He proved competent and his band grew as other ghouls tagged along hoping to benefit from Michael's success. Michael, and the rest of his pack are sadistic creatures who know the world hates them and they want to repay the hatred the best they can. When Lord Blood approached Michael with a scheme to guarantee a better life for the pack and provide many opportunities to hurt the city's mundanes he accepted with pleasure.

Gang Rating

Superior

Head Count

30 metahumans, 19 ghouls, plus lieutenants and special members. Of the metahumans and the ghouls, a quarter of them have moderate cyberware. An example set of mods includes: Boosted Reflexes 1, Smartlink, and Dermal Plating 1. In addition, all of these "elite" gangers and some others have all undergone the ritual to be voodoo serviteurs, so Loa spirits can possess them (Page 104, Magic in the Shadows ).

Initiation Rituals

Any prospective new member, metahuman or ghoul, gets a thorough Mind Probing by Lord Blood and Crimson. New members have to be depraved and willing to commit the horrible acts performed by the gang. Ogre usually checks out new metahuman members as well, testing them for combat prowness.

Uniforms

The Blood Guild has no uniform. One of the most important parts of their work is not getting caught so they do not wear any identifying clothing. This changes when they are on a job, though. Whenever the gang goes out to collect new victims, the gangers and ghouls usually wear the colors of another local gang. This throws off pursuit and can open up more territory for The Blood Guild if another gang gets wiped out in revenge for something the Guild did.

Symbol

The Guild maintains no visible markings of their territory. Word of mouth protects them and prevents strangers from being able to easily identify their territory.

Territory

The gang's main headquarters is in the Glow City Barrens. The area's horrible pollution prevents casual inquiries into the nature of the Guild, and the high population of transients provides a pool of resources. The gang also maintains a coffin hotel in Puyallup, where most of the metahuman gangers live. The Glow City base is very well protected magically and the hotel is patrolled by spirits. The gang uses the nearby access to the Body Mall to sell many of their "products".

Operations

The Blood Guild makes money through several channels. They buy small supplies of Kong Chips from the 88's Triad syndicate and sell them in Puyallup. This is a side line business, mainly to give some pocket money to the metahuman gangers. Ogre makes sure that they do not sell enough chips to become a threat to the bigger distributors in the area. In exchange for this moderation, the other local gangs pay more attention to fighting each other than dealing with The Blood Guild. The Blood Guild also brokers its magical power through fixers as shadow work. The gang specializes in wetwork and kidnapping, but is willing to do anything except computer related work, if the price is right. The gang also ensures that the body will usually never be found, in one piece that is. Erik occasionally spends some time at the Enchanting Shop in the Glow City base and produces a batch of valuable radicals that the gang sells for immediate cash. Once per month Crimson can use his Wealth power to generate more money, usually in the form of gems that are fenced to a fixer contact of Ogre. However, by far the largest income generator for the gang is organlegging. The gang, using a mixed group of ghouls and metahumans, goes out in two beat up vans the gang has and kidnaps people from the Barrens. Targets are usually homeless types that will hardly be missed. Sometimes the gang will go into the better area of town to grab someone more valuable. A Control Thoughts cast by Lord Blood through a possessed underling works wonders. They usually target a corporate employee who might yield valuable secrets after a Mind Probe. Yet another tactic is to use the Control Thoughts on a heavily cybered figure who would be quite valuable on the black market.

Foes

In the Glow City area, the gang does not maintain a real visible presence and does not compete with anyone in any major ways. In Puyallup, the gang confronts the Black Rains and Forever Tacoma occasionally. This usually happens because the home territories of these two gangs is a prime homeless area where The Blood Guild often goes "shopping" for victims. The Spiders of the Barrens know something is odd about Lord Blood's base in Glow City, but since it is not apparently an Insect Hive they do not feel finding out is worth the potential loss of life.

Allies

The gang has connections in the Body Mall of Redmond and with other street docs all over the city. The Dissasemblers and the Tartarous Ring are also pseudo allies. They all are in the same business, and they all have connections to Tanemous, but that also means they are all competing for the same resources. They clash occasionally in subtle ways, but they also come to each other's aid if an outside force attacks. The Blood Guild is known to be an excellent source of magical aid so the other two groups rarely attack it, instead skirmishing with each other more often.

Uniqueness

Several of the metahuman gangers and the ghouls have been initiated as voodoo serviteurs. Combined with the conjuring abilities of the three houngans this creates a powerful force. A wave of ork zombies "mysteriously" attacks enemies of the group, on occasion.

Special Tactics

The most important thing to remember about confronting The Blood Guild is that Lord Blood will rarely appear. He can fight through his minions with possession or just let spirits do it. The PC's should almost never even see Lord Blood or know he exists. He is an extremely powerful houngan and hasn't lasted this long by being stupid.

Lord Blood also makes extensive use of Michael's divining abilities. Although the results are somewhat vague, it would warn of impending disaster or ambushes. This should make it difficult for the PC's to ever surprise The Blood Guild at home.

Before a battle begins, some of the gangers on the mission can allow themselves to be possessed by Loa spirits of Ogoun. Imagine a small group of gangers and ghouls attacking another gang or some runners, with one or more of them under the control of a Force 5 Loa spirit. The Concealment power would let them close quickly under cover. Once the fight begins, possibly after a round of surprise, the Loa gangers could close for melee combat with their increased strength and body, or they could sit back and use the Fear power.

Lord Blood could send in an Astral Form Blood Spirit with his gangers. If they run into trouble the spirit materializes much to the surprise of the opposition.

Lord Blood could also use his possession power to take over a ghoul (they would be willing and dual-natured). He could then cast during the battle and not put his own body at risk, plus surprise the hell out of the enemy who probably would not be expecting such a foe. If the gang had some kidnapping victims with them at the time Lord Blood could even use blood magic to make sure no drain occurred.

The Blood Guild has too much magical power to not use it. On any collection run the three houngans could whip up some Loa spirits to provide the gangers with astral cover. A Blood Spirit could be sent along in case the gang needed a spirit capable of materializing. Maybe one of the houngans goes along for astral support. If a fight ever broke out the gangers would certainly call home base to have one of the Houngans astrally project out to the battlefield with some supporting spirits.

If the gang can manage to get a hold of something of the runners, ritual sorcery is always an option. Between the three houngans and Crimson, they would have a very large Ritual Pool. They do however lack a common spell that could harm a target. Ritual tracking is more likely to occur, then Lord Blood could back it up with a real world strike or just send a few Blood Spirits down the Link.

Using The Blood Guild

The Guild could get involved in the runners lives in many ways. The runners could be on an extraction or just kidnapping run, only to find that the Guild beat them to the target. The Guild could have taken them as part of another shadowrun, or it could be totally on chance, one of the times the Guild went after a more valuable target in hopes of getting some marketable information. The runners would have to track down the Guild and get back the person. If the GM wanted a recurring villain it would be better if the party discovered the coffin hotel base and found the target there still. The final battle with the Guild would involve all kinds of magical tricks, but no mages. The runners would wipe out the metahuman element of the Guild and get back the target, but there is no trace of connection with the Glow City base so they don't even know it exists. Lord Blood then targets them for revenge as he rebuilds his gang.

The gang could also be hired for the same run as the runners. In this case the gang party would consist of Ogre, Michael, spirits, at least one elite ghoul, and possibly more elite gangers. The ghoul would be for Lord Blood to possess. If the Guild wins the run, the players need to get whatever it is back from them and the run goes against the hotel like the last example. If the runners win, Lord Blood will want his revenge, especially if the runners cost him some of his lieutenants.

When the group finally does encounter Lord Blood, and hopefully defeats him, the GM can continue the revenge bit. Lord Blood is a Grade 4 initiate, and perhaps he is in an order (he isn't in my game, but that doesn't make it law). This order could then try to get revenge. Perhaps Lord Blood's operations were an important source of revenue for them, or they got some of the victims for their own experiments. Who knows, the point is that The Blood Guild might strike back even after it is destroyed.

Lord Blood
Race : Human
Concept : Houngan of Ogoun, Petro, Blood Magic Knowledge

B Q S C I W E M R
4 3 3 6 5 6 6 10 (13) 4/29

Combat Pool 7 Initiate Grade 4
Astral Combat Pool 8 Potency 3
Spell Pool 7


Active Skills : Sorcery 6, Conjuring 6, Enchanting 6, Biotech 3, Leadership 5, Etiquette (Street) 4, Intimidation 5, Negotiation 5, Talismongering 6, Spell Design 4
Knowledge Skills : Paranormal Animals 3, Anatomy 3, Medicine 3, Criminal Organizations 5, Security Procedures 2, Tattooing 6, English 4, French 4
Metamagic : Masking, Possessing, Shielding, Tattoo Quickening
Spells : Spirit Bolt 6, Mana Bolt 6, Power Bolt 5, Mana Ball 4, Spell Shield 4, Astral Armor 5, Compel Truth 3, Agony 3, Fast 1, Nutrition 1, Acid Stream 4, Silence 4, Improved Invisibility 4, Heal 6, Mind Probe 4, Control Thoughts 6
Gear : Armor Jacket (5/3), Honfour 8, Micro-Transceiver 4 (ECCM 4), Pocket Secretary, Medkit, Enchanting Shop, Enchanting Kit, Silver Ring (Combat Focus 4)
Notes : Tattoo on back (Quickened Spell Shield, Force 4, 8 for dispelling, +4 to Spell Target Numbers)

Jacob Tulley
Race : Dwarf
Concept : Houngan of Ogoun, Petro

B Q S C I W E M R
4 4 5 5 6 6 6 6 (8) 5/26

Combat Pool 8 Initiate Grade --
Astral Combat Pool 8 Potency 2
Spell Pool 6


Active Skills : Sorcery 6, Conjuring 4, Etiquette (Street) 4, Negotiation 3, Biotech (Surgery) 7, Stealth 6, Medicine 6, Biology 6
Knowledge Skills : Cybertechnology 4, English 4, Spanish 4, German 4, French 4, Japanese 4, Music (European) 1
Spells : Antidote 3, Detox 2, Heal 5, Stabilize 2, Preserve 3, Intoxication 4, Mana Bolt 6, Stealth 5
Gear : Armor Jacket (5/3), Pocket Secretary, Micro-Transceiver 4 (ECCM 4), Medkit, Titanium Bracelet with Oricalchum Veins (Health Focus 3)

Erik Mendrikkar
Race : Elf
Concept : Houngan of Ogoun, Petro

B Q S C I W E M R
4 6 3 8 4 5 6 6 (7) 5/24

Combat Pool 7 Initiate Grade --
Astral Combat Pool 8 Potency 1
Spell Pool 5


Active Skills : Sorcery 4, Conjuring 6, Enchanting 6, Etiquette (Street) 4, Aura Reading 6, Biotech 3, Spell Design 6
Knowledge Skills : Smuggling Routes 6, Paranormal Animals 6, English 4, Sperethial 4
Spells : Stun Bolt 4, Stun Ball 4, Mana Bolt 6, Heal 6, Physical Barrier 5
Gear : Armor Jacket (5/3), Cellular Phone, Micro-Transceiver 4 (ECCM 4), Medkit, Enchanting Kit

Crimson
Race : Grande Zombie (Human body)
Concept : Slave of Lord Blood

* All Stats in red depend upon Crimson's current Force and Spirit Energy.

B Q S C I W E M R
2 10 3 2 10 8 8 8 8 6 5

Combat Pool (9) Force 6
Astral Combat Pool (12) Spirit Energy 2
Spell Pool (6)


Skills : Sorcery 6, Negotiation 5, Intimidation 5, Interrogation 6, Etiquette (Street) 3
Spirit Powers : Aura Masking, Sorcery, Hidden Life (Regeneration, Immunity to Normal Weapons/Pathogens/Toxins/Age), Wealth
Spells : Mana Bolt 5, Power Ball 5, Analyze Truth 4, Animate 4, Mind Probe 6, Lightning Bolt 6, Ball Lightning 6

Michael Ingerson
Race : Ghoul Human
Concept : Adept, The Twisted Way

B Q S C I W E M R
8 6 7 3 5 4 5 7 (9) 11

Combat Pool 7 Initiate Grade 2
Power Points 2 Potency 2


Active Skills : Unarmed Combat (Kickboxing) 5, Stealth 4, Divining 6, Etiquette (Street) 5, Negotiation 3, Leadership 3, Athletics 3, Interrogation 4, Car 3, Pistols 6, Edged Weapons 5
Knowledge Skills : I Ching 6, Gang Territories 3, Criminal Organizations 4, Voodoo Lore 2, Chinese History 5, Ghoul Knowledge 5, Barrens Geography 5, English 4, Mandarin Chinese 3, French 2
Metamagic : Masking, Divination
Adept Powers : Traceless Walk, Increased Reflexes 3, Empathic Sense, Pain Resistance 3, Killing Hands (M), Increased Body 1, Increased Strength 1, Increased Stealth 2
Gear : Armor Jacket (5/3), 2 Forearm Guards, Micro-Transceiver 4 (ECCM 4), Cellular Phone, Cougar Long Blade, Ares Viper Slivergun (Smartlink), 3 Clips, Smart Goggles, Ruger Thunderbolt (Smartlink), 4 Clips
Notes : Michael is a voodoo serviteur, able to be possessed by Loa

Ogre
Race : Human
Concept : Cybered Gang Leader

B Q S C I W E M R
6 (8) 6 (10) 5 (9) 4 4 4 0.05 -- 10

Combat Pool 9


Active Skills : SMG 4, Pistols 4, Clubs 5, Unarmed Combat 6, Athletics 3, Stealth 3, Etiquette (Street) 6, Negotiation 4, Leadership 4, Intimidation 4, Biotech 3, Car 3, Bike 3
Knowledge Skills : Police Procedures 3, Pullayup Geography 5, Gang Territories 5, English 4, Spanish 2, Body Shops 3, Tactics (Small Units) 5
Bioware : Bioware: Muscle Augmentation 4, Enhanced Articulation
Cyberware : Cybereyes (Low Light, Thermographic, Flare Compensation), Chipjack, Titanium Bone Lacing, Smartlink, Boosted Reflexes 3
Gear : Armor Jacket (5/3), Lined Coat (2/1 when layered with jacket), Ingram Smartgun, 3 Clips, Ares Viper Slivergun (Smartlink), 2 Clips, 2 Shock Gloves, Club, Cellular Phone, Micro-Transceiver 4 (ECCM 4)