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Clan Highlight: Brujah

VTM_Brujah_type_black.png

Rebels, The Learned Clan, Rabble, Hellenes.

The Brujah are known for their impetuous tempers and defiant natures, and the clan contains some of the most violent vampires. Visionaries and brutes both, the Brujah have fallen from their stature as the Learned Clan to a motley lineage of radicals, troublemakers, and firebrands — all as much at odds with each other as with the systems they claim to oppose.
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Playing a Brujah in Bloodlines 2

If you’re a player who leaves the shadows to the cowards, knows the frontline is where the fun is, and rebels against the establishment, Brujah is your clan.

In Bloodlines 2, Clan Brujah will offer a brutal brawling playstyle with its abilities (in Vampire: The Masquerade, known as Disciplines), getting you into the fray and rewarding you for staying there. The Brujah control the dance of combat by making enemies drop their defenses, knock them around on the battlefield and increase their damage by feeding for powerful finishing strikes.

In social environments, the Brujah are often expected to have a short temper. In Bloodlines 2, certain characters you meet may treat you differently depending on your clan, and while clans have access to angry, violent or threatening dialogue options, throughout Bloodlines 2 you will find unique dialogue sequences for the Brujah. And if you play against the archetypes, characters in-the-know will react.

As a predator of the night, hunting for blood is always a challenge, but the Brujah can often rely on their ability to influence pedestrians’ rage to make them chase you into an empty alley and have a midnight snack.

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Abilities

When you choose your clan, you will start out with a passive ability unique to each clan. You are then able to unlock abilities from the Ability Tree, starting with your chosen clan. Each ability requires spending Ability Points to unlock, which are earned from completing missions, combat and exploration. At the peak of the Ability Tree, you can unlock the clan Perk, a reward to those dedicated enough to unlock all of the abilities for a clan, giving a permanent passive upgrade.

Brutality
Clan Passive

After feeding, become flushed with vampiric strength, temporarily increasing the power of all your melee attacks.​

Taunt​

Use your supernatural Presence to enrage an opponent or civilian prey, compelling them to attack you. While enraged, the target takes increased damage.

Ability-Taunt.png

Charge​

Surge forward with preternatural speed and rage, grabbing an enemy you collide with to use as a battering ram to knock down others in your path.

Ability-Charge.jpg

Lightning Strikes​

Target multiple opponents and unleash an unstoppable hail of punches, with the final strike dealing increased damage.

Ability-LightningStrikes.jpg

Earthshock​

Slam the ground with explosive force, flinging surrounding enemies into the air.

Ability-EarthShock.jpg

Pulverise​

Clan Perk

Killing enemies without feeding still activates your Clan Passive.​

Customizing your playstyle​

In Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2, you can play your character in different ways. Brujah are a more brawler type, and the abilities are focused around supporting that. We wanted to make sure that this is not an ability optimization game where you need to go through a multitude of abilities and weigh them against each other. Playing a clan should be straight forward if you want it to be.

While this is true, you can also dive deeper into the customization of your playstyle. This is done by visiting important Seattle vampires that are sworn to assist the Sheriff (you) including offering their Blood to help unlock abilities from their clan. Abilities from other clans may cost more AP depending on how well they align with your clans Disciplines. The Brujah Disciplines are Celerity (speed enhancing abilities) Potence (strength enhancing abilities) and Presence (the supernatural ability to attract, awe, or terrify)) so if another clan has a speed enhancing ability it would cost less AP to unlock than an ability for a Discipline Brujah don’t have, such as becoming stealthier which is part of the Obfuscate Discipline. Unlocking additional Clan Perks will make them stack, so you can collect them all if you wish, elevating your power much closer to elder level.

AbilitytreeBrujah.png

Image: Ability tree for Brujah. All clan abilities and the clan perk are unlocked. An ability from Banu Haqim has been equipped. Each clan has hundreds of different ability combinations.

While the activated abilities and Clan Perk can be learned from the other clans, your clan passive can not. This means that you can combine features from other clans in hundreds of different ways, but your Brujah playthrough will remain unique from playing as another clan who branches into Brujah abilities.

Silky_Wide.png
Image: Silky, Brujah Primogen in Seattle
 
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I would be interested in playing as almost any of the NPC vampires they've shown (here and elsewhere), as they all have a distinct look, a clear "mindset"/sense-of-character behind their illustration. I wouldn't mind playing as Lou, or as Silky---both look like interesting characters. Phyre looks lame in every single piece of artwork that has been shown---pretty much killing the game for me.

It's especially galling, because the devs *know* what an intriguing and badass vampire character should look like---it should look like almost any of the NPCs! FFS.

Also, the oversimplified ability trees are a big red flag. *sigh* Maybe in another 10-20 years someone will make a real VtM RPG where I can make my own character and actually explore the World of Darkness.

The more I learn about this game, the more disappointed I become.
 
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No, I don't think it needs to be released on an arbitrarly set deadline by some executive. I think the vast majority of gamers prefer to delay games to not cut content and give more polish. Stressing a deadline is why Cities Skylines 2 and Victoria 3 were in quite rough shapes on release day. A game like Bloodlines 2 which has probably very little replay value(given the CR design..) has even more reason to delay to avoid a disastrous launch. If it releases half baked it's due to paradox accepting it's a failure and just want to stop hemorrhaging money.
The problem is that this game was supposed to come out years ago. Constantly postponing it may mean that it will never come out. Three different studios and they all seem to have made the same mistake. They started creating the game from scratch. In my opinion, TCR should have taken what Hardsuit labs did and filled it to the brim with content. The game doesn't have to be super pretty, it has to be super playable and provide a lot of different options for the player.

I consider changing the graphics engine by TCR as a serious mistake. It takes a lot of time and resources and the deadline is fast approaching. The game presented by Hardsuit labs looked much better than what TCR shows. Playing with the graphics engine will probably increase the hardware requirements and will not lead to any major change in the perception of the product itself.

Meanwhile, I am greatly concerned about other issues that TCR should have addressed first. First of all, there are few dialogue options that appear too rarely. Notice that after selecting the dialogue option, our character not only says what we have chosen, but also goes on a tirade, apparently engaging in a discussion with the other character on his own. The player seems to have absolutely no influence on what our character says or does. This makes the presented product resemble a movie with options added from time to time, rather than a full-fledged game, and there is a significant difference. They are actually two different types of product. Blodlines 2 is supposed to be an RPG, not a telltale game.
 
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the devs *know* what an intriguing and badass vampire character should look like
Do they tho?

I mean ...
Its quite clear that most NPCs we have seen so far (Lou, Silky, Tolly) are nothing but recycled models from HSL ... with new, silly, name ... and quite honestly, worse looks in higher quality. :-/

Who we havent seen before, so we can quite safely asume is new ... is as far as i know just Phyre, Willem, and that Black Haired Asian(?) looking lady from first trailer.

And there is several (maybe over dozen) previously shown NPCs we havent seen yet, wonder what they did with them. :-/

//Edit:
TCR should have taken what Hardsuit labs did and filled it to the brim with content.
Agreed ...
Asuming they could have. :-/

I mean ... there are two important points ... even tho neither was ever confirmed, and i dont think they ever will be.

1) Paradox had some demands, when they give the project to another studio ... that is standard procedure, so i find that quite believable ... the problem here would raise if (or when) those demands didnt fit to whatever HSL did, bcs as we know, there were some creative differences.
If (and this is just theory by now) for example as it flows on the internet Paradox demanded Action driven game with some RPG elements ... but HSL were creating rpg simulator focused on dialogues and story ... most of what HSL did wouldnt be usable for CHR, since Paradox would demand Action driven game. :-/
(Exactly same thing happened to Star Wars: the Old Republic remaster by the way.)

2) (And this is super rumor, i wouldnt even shy to call it pure gossip.) Some people who claim to have insight ... mostly on reddit tho, so feel free to not believe a single word ... claim that game was in bad shape, so bad in fact that to put together whatever HSL created would take more time than re-create it from the scratch ... and that was the reason the only thing they are using are models, bcs they are not tied to anything else.
I even heared someone who claimed (and i cannot stress enough that this is just a rumor) that HSL purposefully named all their files randomly in order to make the work for whoever takes over as hard as possible. -_-
Disclaimer: I dont think that happened in fact ... but to be perfectly honest, i would probably understand the bad blood, and lust for revenge, if it, or something simmilar, did.
 
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Do they tho?

I mean ...
Its quite clear that most NPCs we have seen so far (Lou, Silky, Tolly) are nothing but recycled models from HSL ... with new, silly, name ... and quite honestly, worse looks in higher quality. :-/

Who we havent seen before, so we can quite safely asume is new ... is as far as i know just Phyre, Willem, and that Black Haired Asian(?) looking lady from first trailer.

And there is several (maybe over dozen) previously shown NPCs we havent seen yet, wonder what they did with them. :-/

Ah . . . I didn't know that. And once again, the more I learn, the more disappointed I become.
 
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I postulate that this is Ryong, one of the major characters mentioned in the streams and interviews. I base this on knowledge that Ryong is a Korean surname, and that the woman in the trailer looks to have some manner of Asian heritage. Also usually its the major characters that are shown in trailers, which implies that this is in fact, a major character. I could be wrong, sometimes trailers swindle you, but Im reasonably confident based on my experience of observing games like this before their releases.
 
Not sure where you got this ...
But i cant say i agree.
Also usually its the major characters that are shown in trailers
The major character used in advertisment for first Bloodlines was Jeanette ... hells, she even made it to cover. :D
Wouldnt say she was any significant tho. :)

Major two characters from previous Bloodlines 2 marketing ... were Mr. Damp and Elif ... both being just lackeys, most likely quite low on any social- or power- ranking ladder. :)
 
The major character used in advertisment for first Bloodlines was Jeanette ... hells, she even made it to cover. :D
Wouldnt say she was any significant tho. :)

The Santa Monica part of the main story entirely revolved around her. How is she NOT significant? You literally cant progress in the main story without dealing with both her and her missions. Sure, Santa Monica is just one part of the game, but an integral part. You can't reach the rest of the game without going through it. Sometimes I wonder if you even play these games.
 
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The Santa Monica part of the main story entirely revolved around her.
Eh ... nope ... it didnt. o_O

If you cut out whole Santa Monica only to Main Quest ... you are down to:
Visiting Mercurio, Getting the Astrolite, talking to Voermans, visiting the hotel, slashing some paintings, go to dinner, fighting club chat, talking to Berthram, and exploding the Warehouse

Then you keep cuting to only involve those where Voermans are involved:
talking to Voermans, visiting the hotel, slashing some paintings, go to dinner, fighting club chat

But half of them you are talking to Thereese in fact ... so quests directly related to Jeanette are:
talking to Voermans (only if you count initial dialogue with Jeanette in club, wich gives you nothing in matter of quest, or story progression ... she just introduce herself after all), slashing some paintings, go to dinner (again undirectly, you are searching for her there, but she is not involved in this quest physicaly), and fighting club chat

Meaning ...
Jeanette is involved in 1 quest ... and arguably have important role in 4 dialogues, of wich all except second part of one are part of quest where she just happen to be, but is neither giver, nor receiver ...

If there is one NPC that i would say "Santa Monica part of the main story entirely revolved around" it would be Berthram.
> Finding the Astrolite is important for a job he prepared for you ...
> You are searching for HIM the entire time, Voermans are just means leading to an end ...
> He actually sends you on your final act quest ...
> He is ACTUALLY working for Camarilla, wich is your sect in this game ...
(Remember? Thereese was not officialy accepted as a Prince by this time, and Jeanette was openly concidered an Anarch)

It may be tough pile to swallow ...
But lets face it, all and the only reason Jeanette was allways used to promptly in all and every promotion material, is bcs she is arguably the hotest female character in the game. :D
 
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The problem is that this game was supposed to come out years ago. Constantly postponing it may mean that it will never come out. Three different studios and they all seem to have made the same mistake. They started creating the game from scratch. In my opinion, TCR should have taken what Hardsuit labs did and filled it to the brim with content. The game doesn't have to be super pretty, it has to be super playable and provide a lot of different options for the player.

I consider changing the graphics engine by TCR as a serious mistake. It takes a lot of time and resources and the deadline is fast approaching. The game presented by Hardsuit labs looked much better than what TCR shows. Playing with the graphics engine will probably increase the hardware requirements and will not lead to any major change in the perception of the product itself.

Meanwhile, I am greatly concerned about other issues that TCR should have addressed first. First of all, there are few dialogue options that appear too rarely. Notice that after selecting the dialogue option, our character not only says what we have chosen, but also goes on a tirade, apparently engaging in a discussion with the other character on his own. The player seems to have absolutely no influence on what our character says or does. This makes the presented product resemble a movie with options added from time to time, rather than a full-fledged game, and there is a significant difference. They are actually two different types of product. Blodlines 2 is supposed to be an RPG, not a telltale game.

I don't think there was ever a serious option to take over HSL spaghetti code(because TCR was already developing an action game before they got the job to reskin into BL2..)

I consider HSL Bloodlines and TCR Bloodlines completely separate games(except for a few returning NPC assets and same city). TCR has never made a delay. You are confusing cause and effect, delays is sometimes a necessity whether you want to or not, basic features is simply not there yet. The delay itself doesn't cause the game to be cancelled, many great games get delayed including Baldur's Gate 3 recently. Paradox cancelled HSL Bloodlines because the staff simply couldn't make progress despite delays given, very likely due to a combination of inexperienced developers, bad management and over-ambition.

We don't know the agreement TCR has with Paradox, it might be just a licensing deal where TCR takes all the risk and paradox doesn't pay anything if TCR fails to meet the deadline. TCR has one chance to get this right, it would be stupid to squander it over a release date very few people actually care about. We have been waiting for 20 years at this point , it's pointless to rush things the final step and fall on your face.
 
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Do they tho?

I mean ...
Its quite clear that most NPCs we have seen so far (Lou, Silky, Tolly) are nothing but recycled models from HSL ... with new, silly, name ... and quite honestly, worse looks in higher quality. :-/

Who we havent seen before, so we can quite safely asume is new ... is as far as i know just Phyre, Willem, and that Black Haired Asian(?) looking lady from first trailer.

And there is several (maybe over dozen) previously shown NPCs we havent seen yet, wonder what they did with them. :-/

//Edit:

Agreed ...
Asuming they could have. :-/

I mean ... there are two important points ... even tho neither was ever confirmed, and i dont think they ever will be.

1) Paradox had some demands, when they give the project to another studio ... that is standard procedure, so i find that quite believable ... the problem here would raise if (or when) those demands didnt fit to whatever HSL did, bcs as we know, there were some creative differences.
If (and this is just theory by now) for example as it flows on the internet Paradox demanded Action driven game with some RPG elements ... but HSL were creating rpg simulator focused on dialogues and story ... most of what HSL did wouldnt be usable for CHR, since Paradox would demand Action driven game. :-/
(Exactly same thing happened to Star Wars: the Old Republic remaster by the way.)

2) (And this is super rumor, i wouldnt even shy to call it pure gossip.) Some people who claim to have insight ... mostly on reddit tho, so feel free to not believe a single word ... claim that game was in bad shape, so bad in fact that to put together whatever HSL created would take more time than re-create it from the scratch ... and that was the reason the only thing they are using are models, bcs they are not tied to anything else.
I even heared someone who claimed (and i cannot stress enough that this is just a rumor) that HSL purposefully named all their files randomly in order to make the work for whoever takes over as hard as possible. -_-
Disclaimer: I dont think that happened in fact ... but to be perfectly honest, i would probably understand the bad blood, and lust for revenge, if it, or something simmilar, did.

I don't believe either of these options.

Paradox was the ones that not only bought rights to Bloodlines and but the whole of White wolf to remake the pen and paper game. Florian the project director from Paradox was a big roleplay fan and bloodlines fan. Remember then it was Mitsoda and Avellone (two legends within PC RPGs) that pitched the idea to paradox, it doesn't make any sense to accept their pitch if it wasn't that they loved story and rpg elements first and foremost. That paradox wanted an action game first, is nonsense in hindsight. Seems like a bad take from people who love to blame publishers at all cost and not the incompetence of the developers.

2. If HSL was incompetent(clearly evidenced by janky gameplay and ability to make progress on delays), the ability for a second developer without guidance to understand their spaghetti code would be a monumental task, I'm sure some of their files were seemly named randomly, not of malice but of sheer incompetence.
 
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I don't believe either of these options.
Thats fair.

Paradox was the ones that not only bought rights to Bloodlines and but the whole of White wolf to remake the pen and paper game. Florian the project director from Paradox was a big roleplay fan and bloodlines fan.
I dont know man ... from people that i talk to, V5 isnt exactly concidered "pure gold" ... quite the oposite.
Seems odd when you "love" something, that your quite litteraly first act is to re-write and change almost everything about it. o_O

Personaly i incline to believe that they simply felt that there is market to fill ... hasbro is releasing new rules regulary, and it pays off ... so why not WoD?
Could be wrong ofc. but thats my believe.

it doesn't make any sense to accept their pitch if it wasn't that they loved story and rpg elements first and foremost. That paradox wanted an action game first, is nonsense in hindsight.
Why?

Who ever said that action game cant have great story?
Have you played Mass Effect? Dragon Age? Witcher (especialy III.)? Star Wars: Fallen Order / Jedi Survivor?
I could go on ...

Those are all action games that have phenomenal story ...
AND funny enough, they all include RPG elements aswell ...
AND (final and also quite important argument) they selled well, very well, in fact.

I wasnt there on that pitch ... so i dont really know what was presented, nor what Paradox liked the most about that presentation ... but i dont find it too stretched out that what they had in mind, and what HSL had in mind, were quite different pictures ...
And if that would be true, then if makes perfect sense to me that when HSL was supposed to show their progress ... and whatever part of game (my bet would be combat, for that ACTION part) werent in the shame Paradox wanted it, bcs HSL were focusing elsewhere ... there were "creative differences" leading to curent state. :-/

If HSL was incompetent(clearly evidenced by janky gameplay and ability to make progress on delays)
"Janky" is very subjective description ...
I wouldnt shy away from using it for TCR version aswell.

And quite honestly ... i liked HSL version ... both published and leaked.
Yes, it required lots of more work, no doubt about it ... but it simply felt right. This, whatever that is, dont. :(
 
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Thats fair.


I dont know man ... from people that i talk to, V5 isnt exactly concidered "pure gold" ... quite the oposite.
Seems odd when you "love" something, that your quite litteraly first act is to re-write and change almost everything about it. o_O

Personaly i incline to believe that they simply felt that there is market to fill ... hasbro is releasing new rules regulary, and it pays off ... so why not WoD?
Could be wrong ofc. but thats my believe.


Why?

Who ever said that action game cant have great story?
Have you played Mass Effect? Dragon Age? Witcher (especialy III.)? Star Wars: Fallen Order / Jedi Survivor?
I could go on ...

Those are all action games that have phenomenal story ...
AND funny enough, they all include RPG elements aswell ...
AND (final and also quite important argument) they selled well, very well, in fact.

I wasnt there on that pitch ... so i dont really know what was presented, nor what Paradox liked the most about that presentation ... but i dont find it too stretched out that what they had in mind, and what HSL had in mind, were quite different pictures ...
And if that would be true, then if makes perfect sense to me that when HSL was supposed to show their progress ... and whatever part of game (my bet would be combat, for that ACTION part) werent in the shame Paradox wanted it, bcs HSL were focusing elsewhere ... there were "creative differences" leading to curent state. :-/


"Janky" is very subjective description ...
I wouldnt shy away from using it for TCR version aswell.

And quite honestly ... i liked HSL version ... both published and leaked.
Yes, it required lots of more work, no doubt about it ... but it simply felt right. This, whatever that is, dont. :(
V5, however you want to feel about it's still a pen and paper d&d. All other projects endorsed by paradox were visual novels or heavy story like Swansong. All promo material for HSL bloodlines was heavy rpg focus, this is why we like it, because it's Mitsodas world building with heavy rpg aspects. Paradox was definitely into RPG over action, but I think they simply was left with no choices at the end. HSL version could not be completed by HSL or anybody else.

Wester, CEO of paradox said he was ready to cancel the project, when another studio made a convincing pitch. IE they sought out paradox, not the other way around. I think that pitch was "hey people we have a working combat in first person, we can add some RPG elements so we can call it Bloodlines 2 and still legally fulfill obligations to our preorders". Paradox said, well it's better than cancelling and they just lets TCR make the game they want to make, which is this ACTION rpg game.

The assertion that paradox is somehow behind the pivot to action game I find very peculiar, given evidence that TCR designers are the ones that only seem to want talk and show combat. This is not paradox Bloodlines, that was HSL version when they actually had a project director (Florian) involved and owned the whole studio (HSL). Until they deemed that version was impossible to make with Mitsodas firing and HSL ineptitude, what we are left with is TCR Bloodlines. This is the hands off version of Bloodlines, which happens to be an action game.
 
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@Baalzamon85, excellent insights on aspects of TCR’s Bloodlines2 that I was unaware of. Thank you.

have a great day, and ever better tomorrows. :bow:
 
V5, however you want to feel about it's still a pen and paper d&d.
Indeed ... your point?

All other projects endorsed by paradox were visual novels or heavy story like Swansong.
Yes they were ...
And would you say any of them was some major sucess? In financial aspect ...
Me neither.

Now just include to that calculation simple fact that Action RPGs as previously mentioned Star Wars games were huge hits ... and here we are.

All promo material for HSL bloodlines was heavy rpg focus, this is why we like it, because it's Mitsodas world building with heavy rpg aspects.
Yes ... and now they are not, its all about combat instead.
Wonder why? :)

Paradox was definitely into RPG over action
I dont know man ...
Brian Mitsoda certainly was ... HSL was probably aswell ... but i havent seen anything from Paradox ... they simply own the IP, nothing else.

HSL version could not be completed by HSL or anybody else.
I understand why would you think that ... but i disagree.

EVEN in that case, where new studio would re-create it whole from the scratch, using only models ... just as TCR did ...
There is quite litterally nothing stoping them from keeping the identity and things that were previously announced in ... except they simply didnt want to.

We could of course argue about if that is "completing" in the right meaning of that word ... maybe not.

But the fact remains that we could have Bloodlines 2 we were promised, we were exited about and we were all looking forward to.
And thats the point here, isnt it?
Wester, CEO of paradox said he was ready to cancel the project
And they should have. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Paradox said, well it's better than cancelling and they just lets TCR make the game they want to make, which is this ACTION rpg game.
That much is basicaly confirmed:

The assertion that paradox is somehow behind the pivot to action game I find very peculiar, given evidence that TCR designers are the ones that only seem to want talk and show combat. This is not paradox Bloodlines, that was HSL version when they actually had a project director (Florian) involved and owned the whole studio (HSL).
Well, i gues that is matter of point of view ...

I for one find it very peculiar, that from one studio you give all credits to Publisher ... and from another all blame goes to Developer ...
(It reminds me people who praise Favreau and Filoni for awesome Mandalorian ... but blame Disney for horrible SW: Ep. 7,8,9.)
Im not very good in this two-measures kind of approach, so maybe im missing something.

But in my eyes ... since i tend to approach everyone with the same metric ...
Either it both is Paradox fault ... or neither is ...
And since i think that Publisher should at very least work as ocassional overseer for developers ... i tend to incline towards first option.
 
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