Mithra is the Zoroastrian angelic deity of oaths and covenants. By recreating his legendary bull-slaying, Assamite sorcerers can confer his blessing on an operation against a single target.

First, the Sorcerer ritually cleans an underground chamber and positions a bull which will be sacrificed. The Sorcerer and participants gather over the bull and chant the name of a single target for one hour. Each participant then smears a point of their own blood on the blade of a two-handed sword. In unison, the participants chant the target’s name one last time and the Sorcerer plunges the blade deep into the throat of the bull to complete the ritual. As one, the participants kill the bull, and as one, they vow to kill their target.

Not all the participants need to know the ritual in order to take part, only the presiding Sorcerer. In order for the ritual to be cast, it must have at least two participants and no more than seven.

System

When the participants make an attack in unison against the selected target, a number of them (equal to the successes achieved in the casting) can propel themselves up the initiative order to act one round before the target. For example, four Assamites are attacking a target. The target acts on initiative 10, but three of the Assamites roll initiatives of 9, 9 and 7 respectively. Two successes were achieved in the casting, allowing two of the three stragglers to act on initiative 11 instead. The third remains on their original initiative order. The ritual only grants its benefit if all of the participants (including the Sorcerer) actively engage their target at the beginning of the combat.

In addition, each participant in the combat has a bonus (equal to the successes in the casting) to any Alertness rolls for that scene. The effects of the ritual last until the following sunrise, or until the end of the first combat against their target, whichever comes first.

Setite Sorcery is a curious magical phenomenon. It has elements from across the magical spectrum, though its implementation has a largely ritualistic, religious format. That said, “Setite Sorcery” is a bit of a misnomer. The term implies a singular practice, but Setite Sorceries would be more apt, as it is actually a collection of different practices from Followers of Set around the world.

No matter what form of Sorcery they practice, all Setite Sorcerers ultimately strive for the same goal.

Each faction and bloodline of the Followers of Set that practices Sorcery has their own mask of Set that they revere as the driving force behind their magic. Through practicing them, they are drawing upon the Dark God’s power to weaken the forces that imprison the Setites in this world so that they can take a step closer to becoming Gods, as Set commanded. Thus, Setite Sorcery is the direct manifestation of Set’s power in the world. At least, that’s their argument.

Followers of Set strive to free themselves from the bonds and rules of the mortal world. While these chain them, they will never become gods like Set himself. To enlighten others to the wisdom of Set’s teachings, they strike out against the lies taught by other religions, the laws of governments, and the worship of wealth and luxury. These indulgences are just a few of the tools employed by the Aeons, the jailers of humanity, who would seek to bar the way to any who strive to achieve Godhood.

Setite Sorcery is one of the Clan’s most useful tools to aid in this endeavor. Many of the effects of Setite Sorcery share similarities with Thaumaturgy, though they were practiced many thousands of years before the Tremere came into existence. One of the prime examples of this is the art that allows Setite Sorcerers to command the weather. In ancient Egypt, the weather patterns influenced the regular flooding of the Nile and thus in turn affected crop production. To control the weather was to control the crops, and therefore to control life itself. If the Sorcerer could thus become as a God, then surely the witnesses to this miracle might find the way to enlightenment one day themselves.

While the world in the modern nights has changed in ways that would be incomprehensible to the minds of those in ancient times, the purpose of the Followers of Set has not. The Clan just has to find new ways of employing these ancient tools to achieve the same results.

As the Followers of Set have slithered across the globe, they have found that the best way to preach their doctrine and philosophy in certain lands was to use parallels to each culture’s indigenous myths and legends. In many of the religions around the world, Setites found Gods that bore a striking resemblance to their own Dark God, and proclaimed that these were in fact “masks” of Set himself.

In each of the schools of Setite Sorcery, the Sorcerer draws power directly from the particular mask of Set they believe in. Each school is characterized by the religion to which that mask originally belonged. The different schools are detailed below.

As discussed above, Lector Priests must have desecrated the corpse of someone buried according to traditional ancient Egyptian practice. These corpses are kept as offerings to Set and are the means by which these sorcerers channel his power into the world. As such, they are usually placed in shrines dedicated to Set and adorned with his iconography. Within this Blasphemous Shrine, the Lector Priest can perform powerful Akhu rituals, amplified by the proximity to the source of their power.

The more dots in the background, the greater the connection the desecrated corpse has to Set. Mechanically, this background grants a number of bonus dice to the casting of Akhu rituals equal to the number points in Blasphemous Shrine. However, this only applies to rituals cast in the shrine itself.

As an optional rule, a Storyteller may insist that a Lector Priest has to have at least one dot of Blasphemous Shrine to represent the desecrated corpse offering to Set, without which they cannot cast Akhu.