MARCEL
The Useful Outsider
“Do you think the Camarilla elites of this city are really concerned with your welfare? Let me talk on your behalf and we'll get this sorted out. It won't cost you anything.”
Facts at a Glance
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Marcel is a major player in the Chicago drug trade, specifically trafficking heroin and cocaine.
Marcel runs a debauched blood cult where he is worshipped as a god.
Knowledge(1)
Marcel is a primary source for secrets regarding moral failings in both mortal and Kindred circles.
Asset(2)
Marcel uses Deon Adams, a local high schooler, as a lookout for his haven.
Marcel blackmails Imani Singleton for information and access to the Department of Buildings.
Threat(1)
Marcel muscled into the Chicago cocaine trade following Prince Lodin's death.
Alliance(2)
Marcel Embraced Thea Noel-MacCrain to infiltrate Chicago's white, old-money elite.
Marcel maintains a lonely, philosophical friendship with the Tremere Erichtho.
Goal(3)
Marcel offers free favors to outsiders to build a long-term network of indebted, powerful allies.
Marcel aims to undermine the Camarilla from within by making himself indispensable to its daily operations.
Marcel is obsessed with discovering the true owner of the Succubus Club.
Quirk(1)
Marcel is exceptionally skilled at simulating mortal life in his home neighborhood.
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Pressing the Flesh
From the perspective of an Anarch or a hapless neonate, Marcel's offer of help can be a surprisingly good deal. His goal is to help outsiders and the dispossessed have a voice in the city, and in the short term these favors come for free. Marcel plans in the long term, accumulating favors, boons, and loyalty. He trusts a few of those he assists will become powerful eventually and that will be the time to ask for a favor in return.
Tower Undermined
Going back to his days as a mortal man, Marcel has always seen clandestine criminal networks and the struggle for liberation as essentially the same. This made him a natural fit for the Ministry's theology of freedom through debasement. It also explains his seemingly contradictory goals and actions: Marcel believes that by making himself integral to the Camarilla's functioning in Chicago, he can turn the city on its head beyond anything a small Ministry temple could achieve.
Thea is Marcel's childe, Embraced three years ago to provide an agent who could operate among the white, old-money elites of the city. Marcel saw something in Thea that seemed to promise affinity with Ministry doctrine, but Thea took to the moral degeneration of the Ministry and the Kindred with such joy that Marcel is not sure whether he should be proud or concerned.
Marcel has represented many people on the Primogen Council, the Tremere among them during a recent crisis. As a legacy of this time, he got to know the enlightenment seeker Erichtho and made a hobby of trying to argue philosophy with her with a view to spreading Ministry ideas. In reality, although he doesn't admit it to himself, Marcel is lonely and it's nice to have someone with similar esoteric interests despite their radically different occupations in unlife.