Everything You Need to Know About Suspicion: Basics

Keep your Suspicion low in Vampire: The Masquerade — Swansong! Learn how feeding, Hunger, and intel affect your Masquerade status and game difficulty.

Alright, let's talk about Suspicion in Vampire: The Masquerade — Swansong. Think of it as your personal 'wanted level' with both mortals and other vampires. The higher it gets, the more everyone's on edge around you, and honestly, the game just gets tougher. It's a core mechanic, so understanding it is key to not making things harder than they need to be.

Suspicion mainly ticks up in two ways: how you feed and whether you snag important intel. We'll break down both.

The Suspicion Scale

Your Suspicion is a number from 0 to 100. As it climbs, mortals get spooked (obviously), and other vampires will definitely judge you for messing up the Masquerade. For every 20 points you gain, the game throws a little more difficulty your way. For instance, hitting 20 Suspicion means any opposed Psychology checks get harder by one point. This means you'll either need to pump more XP into your own skills to keep up, or use more Willpower for checks, which lowers your success rate. Ultimately, keeping Suspicion low means more options and an easier time overall.

Suspicion	Effect
0 - 19	None.
20 - 39	+1 difficulty in Psychology.
40 - 59	+1 difficulty in Intimidation.
60 - 79	+1 difficulty in Presence.

Feeding and Suspicion

Using your Disciplines generates Hunger. If it gets too high, you might lose control and go on a feeding frenzy, which is a big no-no for the Masquerade. You need to feed strategically. Here’s the kicker: feeding can raise Suspicion, even if you don't leave a mess.

• Killing your victim: This satisfies Hunger more but will bump your Suspicion up by about 15 points. Ouch.
• Feeding without killing: If you spare your victim, it's better, but if anyone sees you lure them to a Safe Room to feed, expect about 5 Suspicion points per witness. Yeah, people notice when someone gets lured away and later found drained. Always do a quick scan around before you feed to see who might be watching. This helps you understand the trade-off you're making and limits how often you can feed per level if you want to keep Suspicion down.
• Feeding on rats: This is an alternative, but even leaving rat corpses or being seen feeding on one will raise Suspicion. Being witnessed feeding on a rat nets you 2 Suspicion, which is much more manageable than the human drama.

Intel and Suspicion

You're not the only vampire in town, and not all of them are great at keeping the Masquerade intact. Any mess they make reflects on you. You'll need to keep an eye out for 'Intel' that could expose vampire activity. Not every scene has it, but when it's there, you *must* find it. Leaving Intel lying around will increase your Suspicion, and you won't even know you missed it until the scene is over. So, be thorough!