Rankings of Tremere

So here is my question. I understand that the Tremere have a lot of different questions on how you guys are working Tremere. So here is my first. The rankings of the Tremere are someone convoluted. There are 5 ranks and 7 Circles.

Ranks - Apprentice, Regent, Lord, Pontifice, and Councilor.
Circles - 1 (lowest) - 7 (highest)

So does each Circle have an Apprentice, Lord, Pontifice, and Councilor? Or are the Regents, Lords, Pontifices, and Councilors nothing more than the Apprentices of the Circles.

If the each Circle has a ranking, then does that mean that there is a potential of 7 Regents for each Chantry? 7 Lords of each Region? and 7 Pontifices under each Councilor?

From what I understand it goes like this:
There are 7 apprentices per chantry. They are apprentice circle 1 - 7.
There are 7 regents to a lord and each one controls 7 chantries. They are regent circle 1 - 7.
There are 7 lords per pontifex and each one controls 7 regents. They are lord circle 1 - 7.
There are 7 pontifexes for each member of the tremere council and each one controls 7 lords. they are pontifex circle 1 - 7.
The final rank has only one person for each circle 1 - 7 and those 7 are the tremere council.

Each one of these ranks corresponds with how long you have been that particular rank. i.e. if you were regent 1 and the regent 7 rank holder died. Every regent would move up a rank and you would now be regent 2 (as well as some apprentice getting promoted to regent 7).

The only thing that was left out, is that each council member is in charge of each particular continent. And that it doesn't necessarily mean that there is automatic promotion due to death or removal, promotions and demotions are at the discretion of those above in the ranking structure. IE. any regent may promote or demote any apprentice, etc. all the way up the chain. But no Regent may make an apprentice into another regent.

Also, as it states in the Tremere Clan Book, even though this is how it is structured, most cities do not necessarily have exactly 7 apprentices, most regents do not actually hold sway over 7 chantries, and so on and so on. However, that is how they originally intended things to work.

Mostly you only find that "all" positions are filled in accordance to the exact lay out of the clan from the Regent to pontifice and up. IE each Pontifice always promotes if he loses a regent, and there are always 7 regents to each pontifice, 7 pontifice to each council member and so on. That's mostly (I would assume/get the feeling from reading) due to the fact that at that level most activity is reported to the council, and the elders want things a certain way IE they do as they're told.

But further down the chain things get more lax due to either issues that come up (reasonable to say that if there's 6 tremere apprentices in the city, and no one that has not yet earned their circle is worth of promotion, they don't throw a magically uninclined idiot into the station out of tradition.) they generally tend to be more selective, and some regents even purposefully keep slots open should they come across someone that is exceptionally well suited for embrace or promotion, or to just make people lower on the totem pole THINK that there is a chance for advancement, IE tricking them to beg for a treat by working harder.

sorry it took so long for me to get on here and create an account, but her i finally am. so far what i have read has been correct, except that there are 5 potifixes to each continent, not to each council member. as for North America, Nicolai is the Pontifix, and Merlinda is the direct council member. The reason for the Pontifix's being attached to each continent and not to a council member is because the council member's territory is constantly changing over the centuries as country's change and region lines shift. As of recent centuries the Pontifix's have aligned there regions with that of the seven continent's to placate the younger kindred in there domains who still feel some allegiance to there old sovereignty, a number that is growing every year. everything else is exactly right

only thing I can really add here is a this... Tremere rank is seldom a measure of age in the traditional sense and more a measure of ones value to his direct superior. It is a hold over from when "Clan Tremere" was "House Tremere" in the Order of Hermes. in the order it is a strict adherence to skill, once you can show mastery of a specific level of skill in the mystical arts, your rank increases. however that has long since passed and in the modern nights of clan Tremere it is ever the Carrot, and the Stick.

gaining rank is always of a reward but that does not stop it from being a punishment either. the easiest way of looking at rank in a small game is simple there should be a Regent of the Chantry he/she should have as many apprentices as there are in the game until such a time as one of the following happens (there are enough tremere players to warrant a second Chantry, you join a larger gaming universe where there are more players, he/she out lives his usefulness to his Lord or is slain) at such a time a change may happen or you may add an additional chantry... there should be one Lord who over sees a region (in our small game the state or maybe the tri-state area) ranks of Regent and below should be player held. and the rank of Lord should seldom if ever be seen unless a player is promoted to such a rank for doing something superb at that point if I were running the game the NPC lord would be reassigned and this area would become the player Lord's territory.

Lastly I leave you with this, whenever you can allow players to control there ranks obviously you can't let payers dictate there own rank but once you have a regent let that person raise and lower the ranks of the other PC's this will add a whole new dynamic to being a Tremere.


Joshua H. Coons
old guy