The highly anticipated action-RPG, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, has finally clawed its way into our hands. As you awaken in the shadowy, vampiric underworld of Seattle, you’re thrust into a city teetering on the brink of war, with a heap of unsettling mysteries demanding your attention. Right from the start, one critical decision looms: choosing your vampire clan. This initial choice isn’t just cosmetic; it profoundly impacts the unique vampiric abilities you’ll wield in the early stages of your blood-soaked journey.
Understanding the Clans: What Sets Them Apart?
Essentially, each clan acts as a distinct character class, granting you a unique set of passive and active abilities. Each lineage possesses natural affinities for specific types of vampiric powers, and progressing within your chosen clan even unlocks new outfits.
While your starting clan dictates your initial abilities, fret not! You’ll have the exciting opportunity to unlock powers from other clans as the story progresses. However, there’s a crucial catch: your primary passive ability is permanently tied to your chosen clan, meaning you’ll be locked out of other passive abilities.
To acquire abilities from rival clans, you’ll need to collect special currencies from Blood Resonance activities that pop up unpredictably throughout Seattle. Once you’ve spent this currency to gain an ability from another clan, you’ll still need skill points to fully unlock it. Abilities from clans you have low affinity with will cost more skill points. Thankfully, you can increase your affinity by completing quests for the various clan leaders.
Brujah: The Brawlers
Mastery Rating: Normal
Clan Affinities: Celerity, Presence, and Potence
The Brujah are the masters of brutal, direct combat, excelling at hitting hard and fast. Their passive ability provides a temporary damage buff after feeding, allowing you to unleash even more devastation. As you delve deeper into the Brujah skill tree, you’ll gain access to advanced open-combat maneuvers and powerful ways to dispatch multiple foes simultaneously. If you crave the adrenaline of being in the thick of battle, the Brujah are your perfect match.
Tremere: The Blood Mages
Mastery Rating: Normal
Clan Affinities: Dominate and Blood Sorcery
The Tremere clan embodies the role of the arcane mage in Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, granting access to potent blood-based magic. Their passive ability is incredibly convenient: enemies you drain dissolve into nothingness, significantly reducing your risk of breaking the Masquerade and getting caught. Further down their skill tree, you’ll unlock formidable spells like Blood Curse, which makes an enemy explode upon taking next damage, and Blood Salvo, enabling you to conjure and telekinetically hurl deadly blood daggers.
Banu Haqim: The Silent Assassins
Mastery Rating: Hard
Clan Affinities: Celerity, Blood Sorcery, Obfuscate
The Banu Haqim also harness magic, but their focus is on swift, silent eliminations, allowing them to glide undetected through the night. Their passive ability grants you a brief period of silence after feeding, and subsequent abilities further enhance your stealth capabilities. With the Mute ability, you can silence an enemy, preventing both their attacks and their screams, making them easy prey. The Split Second ability allows you to momentarily slow time, granting you precious moments to reposition in the blink of an eye.
Ventrue: The Commanders and Tanks
Mastery Rating: Easy
Clan Affinities: Dominate and Presence
The Ventrue clan masterfully blends manipulation with a tank-like combat style, allowing them to absorb heavy blows while clouding the minds of their adversaries. Their passive ability provides substantial damage resistance after feeding. Abilities within their tree empower you to subtly or overtly eliminate both humans and vampires. Terminal Decree compels a mortal enemy to end their own life, or forces vampires to disarm and stagger. Possession, a more advanced power, grants direct control over someone, whom you can then command to attack others.
Lasombra: The Shadow Weavers
Mastery Rating: Hard
Clan Affinities: Dominate, Potence, and Oblivion
The Lasombra expertly manipulate shadows, using them to appear and disappear, striking fear into anyone who witnesses their power. Their passive ability, Shadow Cloak, envelops you in shadows after feeding, making you nearly invisible. Shadow Step allows you to teleport through the darkness, while Glimpse of Oblivion instills terror, sending enemies fleeing from your presence and abandoning their posts. The Lasombra offer a classic vampire fantasy, blending darkness and dread.
Toreador: The Seductive Speedsters
Mastery Rating: Normal
Clan Affinities: Celerity and Presence
The Toreador thrive on high speed and their inherent charm, using seduction and allure to control their enemies. Their passive ability grants a burst of movement speed upon feeding. This clan excels at control through enticement, utilizing powers like Entrancing Kiss to mesmerize an enemy and compel them to fight by your side. Beckon puts an enemy into a trance, drawing them to your last known location. If the romantic, alluring side of vampirism appeals most to you, the Toreador clan is your destiny.
So, Which Clan Reigns Supreme?
Since the majority of abilities from other clans can be unlocked later, your initial clan choice isn’t overwhelmingly impactful in the long run. The decision ultimately boils down to which passive ability you prefer to have when feeding, and which set of powers you want to access first.
Our recommendation is the Tremere clan. This is primarily due to their incredibly useful passive ability: slain enemies dissolve after you feed on them. This dramatically lowers your chances of accidentally breaking the Masquerade and exposing your vampiric nature, or getting caught while sneaking. Furthermore, Blood Curse, one of the Tremere’s earliest unlocks, is a fantastic combat tool, especially against groups. It primes an enemy to explode the next time they take damage, dealing massive area-of-effect damage and proving incredibly effective against bosses right from the start of your adventure.