Academics
From Circle Of The Crone
Overview
Over the span of history, most of the factual and religious lore detailing old religions beloved by the Circle has fallen from popular wisdom and academia into the catagory of the occult. Of course, most of it has always been in that catagory. The covenant requires scholars, academics, and researchers to recover the lost wisdom of the ancient world and record it once again for the benefit of tomorrow night's waking elders. These are the people who ratify each local body of canon and form the basis of orthodoxy. Unlike almost every other type of coterie, the Circle actively organizes the Academics, usually thorugh word-of-mouth or ghoul servants. Most are organized by the local Hierophant, but others may be selected by the covenant as a whole.
Academic, or Investigative, coteries have a not-undeserved reputation for disdaining the Masquerade. They tend to keep unusually large numbers of mortal servants and ghouls due to the need for access to rare or one-of-a-kind sites and artifacts under mortal control. Additionally, researchers often require manpower to work in the daylight at historical and archaeological sites. Academic coteries weigh the risks carefully before each actual breach of the Masquerade, and they usually have a plan for the elimination of mortals in the know. However, Academic coteries have had amazing luck with the kine they choose for this work, with their truth about vampires and supernatural forces inspiring excitement more powerful than fear in the mortal allies chosen by the scholars. But the Circle knows that eventually your luck will run out, and consequences are sure to arise. It's best, say the Academics, to get as much done as possible before that inevitable situation arises.
Formal expeditions are rare, since while they center on the Academics, they generally swell to include packs of muscle and sometimes tag-along devotees. Additionally, many of the great occult sites of interest to the covenant are difficult to reach or study by night. Instead, an expedition usually consists of a coterie independently visiting a remote site and hiring poorly informed workers to explore, catalog, and photograph sites while the coterie waits, sometimes for weeks. Then the coterie takes the results of its expedition back to covenant elders for praise and rewards. Of course, these quiet expeditions are just as likely to be devoured by the creatures that lurk in the night at those sites.
The Academics are charged with tracking vampire geneaology and history, keeping and cataloguing stacks of books, maps, plans and records, and recognizing the truth. These Acolytes find new bits of knowledge from old texts and inscriptions, advise the Circle or even the Prince, and judge what is safe to share...and what should be kept secret. This existence is nothing if not interesting.
