The Path of the Crotchety Bastard

by Mr Badger and Handel W. Care

"Stop your endless chatter - it's as informing as it is amusing. You're not impressing anyone you know! Yes, yes, yes, we've all see it before and at least then people were more polite about it. Youngsters today, no respect for their Elders. We fought for those Traditions you keep endlessly spouting on about in that little whiny voice, we know perfectly well what they say. Do we get any respect for this, oh no all we get is............."

- Vampire Elder.

Nicknames : Old Farts, Oldbies, Geriatrics, Grand-dads, Beardymonsters.
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Basic Beliefs
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The Path of the Crotchety Bastard is based upon age being the only true indicator of status. Without experience there can not be wisdom and the only true indicator of experience is age. Thus only age bestows wisdom. The older a Vampire the more wise and revered they become. At least from the point of view of the Elder. Is it not true that Caine is the oldest and most powerful of all the Vampire kind? Of course it is, so it follows that those oldest of those of us remaining must be the most powerful as well. The followers of this Path believe they have experienced so much they've already forgotten more than anyone else could possibly know. In that way they are an expert on every field and have seen and/or done everything there will ever be to see or do. With such breadth of experience and wisdom a follower of the Path of the Crotchety Bastard just want to share what they know (or think they know) to the less fortunate. Of course the only reason for sharing is to gain the respect they know down to their soul they deserve. For the more advanced followers of the Path the respect should occur automatically with or without the sharing of experience part.

The golden age for all Vampire kind is sliding towards its end. The greatest achievements have all occurred and the greatest discoveries have all been found. Like the fall of Rome those who built the greatest of glories now stand watching them be defiled by barbarians. The weak walk through cities built by the strong without care for how such magnificence came to be. Such fools must be reminded at all times who came before them and who performed such deeds of grandeur. The followers of the Path of the Crotchety Bastard are the ones who do all the reminding, even if they weren't the ones who performed all the deeds.

The Ethics of the Path
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Defend what is yours with all your might. The barbarians are at the gate and demanding entry, so pour the boiling oil on them before they get too uppity. Whippersnappers.

Disregard what is new and maintain the old. The best has already happened, anything new is just a shallow mockery or a boring rehash. Originality is your resource alone and it all got used up centuries ago. You know. You were there, after all.

Status and position is defined by age and not ability. Age is constant while ability and success waxes and wanes in time like quicksilver being dripped into a river - shiny, tiny; quickly gone and forgotten in comparison to the flow of ages.

There is no need to learn further, you've already forgotten more than anyone younger could desire to know. It's all hogwash these days, anyway, and not even good hogwash like they used to have.

Gather material comforts - with all you've done for the world you deserve all there is and more. Never fail to comment if your needs are not met, as how else will your position improve for the better?

Gift the young with your knowledge and experience; you know far better than they. If they still fail, they're useless students and should have listened better. If they succeed in their endeavours the credit is entirely due to you.

Never fear of succumbing to indolent pleasure, while on the counter suffering should only occur in public with an audience. Of course, such suffering is to be seen but not actually experienced.

The world only exists because of your deeds, make sure everyone is aware of this. Point out your signature in the firmament if they are rude enough to question this fact. Hardly your fault if their eyes aren't good enough to see to the basis of creation, is it? You told them that acting like that would make them blind, but would they listen? Oh no.

All misfortunes in the world are because people did not listen to those who know better, make sure everyone is reminded of this as well. No one ever got anything done by being quiet. Shout, whinge, heckle and bluster - it's the best way and it's all for their own good.

History
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Vampires suffer a certain medical condition as they age. Once past a certain point their bodies start to reject animal and mortal blood and instead desire the Blood of other Vampires. At this point the Vampire also suffers some form of abstraction from the society around them. Their desires become more dominating and their awareness of those around them dims like that of a lost memory. (A similar insular, self indulgent mental separation has also been observed in younger Vampires who have yet to experience the restriction to diet common to the above; the causative factor here certainly being different.) The abstraction from society comes more from what is unknown instead of total. As such the Vampires involved cluster themselves with and around what they know best with an active abhorrence of what is unknown. They knew perfectly well that as time passed more and more was becoming unknown and less and less was of what they remembered. Time itself was found to be at fault and thus time itself was to blame. Since the old was familiar and the new challenging these Vampires decided what was new was a sign of degeneration and thus to be avoided. The Path of the Crotchety Bastard was created as a means of remaining active in a new and continually surprising world while remaining true to the remembered glory days.

Current Practices
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Followers of The Path of the Crotchety Bastard gather themselves in small groups in which to better remember what has occurred before. Such groups may be remembered as the "Gentlemen's Clubs" from the 1800's as well as sports team reunions. Memories are retold and retold till the point they evolve and adapt to the changing world in a manner Darwin only dreamt about before becoming rather sticky. Deeds performed grow and change with each retelling, gaining flavourful characteristics, colouration and potency in the manner of a bottle of cellared wine. Followers of the Path are certain to the point of utter belief that no matter what may happen they have done it already but larger, faster, better, cheaper, more colourful, more often, with more people, with less people, on their own, on their own and blindfolded, in their sleep etc, etc. Followers of this Path consider history to be of fluid construction, where you can cut and paste, redirecting and altering streamlets of actuality within as required to the benefits of your own glory. It's not dishonest, you had just forgotten about your own achievements along the same lines just mentioned till just that moment. Funny how that keeps happening.

Followers of the Path of the Crotchety Bastard practice a ritual known as the "Scorning." Within this ritual the success or actions of a notable non-Elder Vampire are discussed in open forum and are always found to be lacking in all possible qualities compared to the deeds of the Scorning Elders themselves in years past. Somehow the younger Vampires become aware of this, even if the Scorning is not publicly actualised. In fact, a number of younger Vampires have been known to use the Scorning as proof that the Crotchety Bastards are against them and always trying to belittle their achievements, despite not actually having true evidence of any such an occurrence. The fact that they are completely correct is neither here not there as far as the Crotchety Bastards are concerned, and just goes to show that the young are a pack of ungrateful wretches who should mind their manners and be seen but not heard. For preference (and in reality), not being seen would be included as well, of course.

Followers with low Path ratings are more concerned with smacking down young upstarts who could over shadow, them while followers with higher Path ratings console themselves with past achievements (achievements that become increasingly magnified with each retelling) and thus see no substance in the prattling concerns of the younger generations. All followers of the Path will of course take great care to explain this fact to all who will listen and indeed all those who wish they weren't listening at the time.

Some followers of the Path adopt a benevolent grand fatherly image, always ready with advice and a tale of deeds past. When angered followers of the Path assume an image more congruent with that of an older sibling suddenly confronted with the loss of a parent's love (attention) due to the addition of a new born baby. Funnily enough, like a new born baby the followers aren't above crying, screaming, ranting and wetting themselves to regain any lost attention, real or imagined. Unfortunately for those around them the noise and bad smells an Elder is capable of creating in a fit of pique can be the by product of the levelling of a city block. They are bigger babies than most nanny services would care to deal with.

Description of Followers
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Followers of the Path of the Crotchety Bastard wear old, outdated clothing mixed and matched with the clear abandon of those who dress themselves in the dark or those who are truly deranged. There is no concern for present fashion or sensibilities as such illusions are degenerate in the face of what has occurred before. Followers undertake a strange metamorphosis when in public, into strange and crippled creatures bowed under the weight of the world's problems selflessly taken on board for the benefit of all. Like Atlas they somehow manage to soldier on despite the terrible burdens only they can possibly deal with. Followers will take great pains (thus causing pain in others) to mention this fact as often as inhumanly possible. This appearance is undertaken purely to gain attention and sympathy amongst non-Path followers. Such disabilities will instantly disappear once in the company of Path followers without any outside witnesses. At this time the Followers will attempt to stand as tall and straight as possible so as to impress all other Followers with how well they look considering their age and all the wounds they suffered attacking dinosaurs one handed with their eyes closed.

Views on Other Paths
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"Look at them all pretending like peacocks to be something they're obviously not. Disgusting is what it is, disgusting and vile. All that pretending and shouting about this and that which has nothing to do with the price of fish. Need a good lesson they do, a good lesson and a sound thrashing behind the woodshed. What they should do is come here and listen to how we used to do it, never had any trouble like this back in my day." - View on all other Paths no matter what they may happen to stand for.

Following the Path
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Followers have to become (if not already) self-centred in a manner that they believe not only are they the centre of the universe they also built the entire universe around themselves first and, unlike others who won't be mentioned, it only took them 3 days, with one of those days being a bank holiday they worked without complaining about it. Not like the youth of today who also expect weekends off. Greedy and intolerant of all things and people younger than themselves Followers find the idea of siring further Vampires distasteful in the extreme. Any Childe sired before the Vampire adopted the Path is considered to be caused by the evils of an unsafe world and not the fault of the Sire at all. The young don't deserve being sired, they won't respect you if you do. Followers are wasteful and loud. They cling to those who listen to them and their stories and pester those who do not.

Abilities : Area knowledge, tale telling, eidetic memory (except in the case of remembering if you've told a certain story to a certain person before, in such a situation you retell the same old stories over and over again as they sound new to you at least. The young all look alike so it's no wonder you can't tell them apart, they're selfish in that way), acting, etiquette (knowing when you're being slighted by someone), heraldry, investigation (getting the details so your version of your own deeds will be better and louder, think of it as gossip gathering), politics, bureaucracy (knowing who's older than you and thus working out who's younger and thus disrespectful) and intimidation.

Disciplines : Presence, Dominate and Fortitude.

The Path of the Crotchety Bastard Hierarchy of Sins
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10 Being corrected about anything. [1]

9 Admitting something new is better than anything remembered.

8 Showing tolerance of anything/anyone younger than yourself.

7 Not being a burden on your lineage. (Path members excluded unless you're older than them.)

6 Generosity without personal gain to wealth or respect from others.

5 Failing to brag about your own or acquaintances' deeds when the opportunity arises (or is forced). [2]

4 Allowing progress to occur without hindrance.

3 Allowing common sense to rule over experience. "That's how we did it in my day."

2 Failing to seek attention and/or recognition.

1 Dying. [3]

Notes:

[1] - You do not make mistakes and have never made any nor will you ever make any. If you are corrected it means Gehenna is close. Your memory is never flawed, sometimes people just do not listen properly. Correction of yourself means you're in the wrong universe. You are never to be corrected.

[2] - You've done it all or you've known someone who has. Anyone who has had the misfortune to listen to a follower of this Path knows this fact. Followers suffer from a condition where they will create people who have accomplished mighty deeds. They do not know they are doing this but will do so with alarming regularity. Such friends often mentioned appear to be three colour comic book characters who conquered the earth with their magnificence. All followers have one, many have more. You may have juggled sixteen crocodiles but my mate Ol'Dusky Sherman did twenty with his eyes closed just the other day.

[3] - Dying is unforgivable. Dying is giving in and if it's one thing followers do not do it is giving in to anything at all in the slightest. By dying you're letting go of this world you built. By dying you're giving this world you built with your bare hands to those who do not respect you and therefore do not deserve it. Do not die, ever. Not even a little bit.

Do's and Don'ts of the Path of the Crotchety Bastard

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Do not die.
You do know more.
You have done better.
You do not take no for an answer.
You are so deserving.
They are not deserving. Of anything. At all. Ever.
You deserve respect. They do not.
Do not die.
The world revolves around you, act like it.
If at first you do not get your own way, shout louder and more often.
Complain first and think second.
Correct people, they should have asked you how to do it properly before
they screwed it up.
Do not be tolerant of mistakes, you never make mistakes.
Do not die, that would be giving in.
Keep score of all things, grudges are eternal and so are you.
Never forgive, they don't deserve it.
Do not die, we really mean it.
Suffer loudly but not really.
Remind people, of everything.

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