LOSE YOUR MIND AND YOU CAN LIVE FOREVER.
Freejack one-sheet
The Malkavian Madness Network. OK, long-time WhiteWolf readers will remember the Malkavian Madness Network. Well, WhiteWolf got it wrong. It's not a secret language, they're not imbedding any hidden text into everyday items.
The key to the Malkavian Madness network is, that you have to be Malkavian to understand it. And I use that word literally, understand. The reason they can discern secret messages to each other is that they know how the Malkavian mind works. And the only way to know how the Malkavian mind works is: be a Malkavian. To know the object, you have to understand the object. To understand the object, you have to think like the object. To think like a Malkavian is to be a Malkavian. It's a one-way trip.
Oh, and how does the MMN work in our game? There's a black pot we keep the player numbers in. Y'know, the plastic cauldron sitting on the ST table. Just drop a note in there. Explain on it how you're sending the note out, but just write down your messages. Only Malkavians (and STs) are allowed to read them. Simple.
Battlin' Mark Shute uncovered an excellent online resource for the Malkavian in all of us: Internet Mental Health Disorders. The WW descriptions of derangements suck. These guys know how to do it.
Interpretation: Clan Malkavian is one of the most popular clans, but I feel a lot of its fans are missing the point. The point isn't to run around, act crazy, and expect to get away with anything. Malkavians are quite honestly suffering under a mass insanity. They may see things no one else can, or experience a world unlike any other, but they cannot relay this information to other people. It literally hurts to think about it. So they devolve into madness as a symbol for their inner turmoil. Think about that next time you think it'll be 'cute' to play with a rubber duckie at the next game.
Malkavian Links:
Paul M. M. Jacobus (vampire@digex.net)