The Ruins (spoiler)

Just saw this last night from netflix. Did anyone who see it think that the cannibalistic plants inside that Mayan pyramid were like vampiric mandragora from VtR?

Haha never really thought about it till now, but ya some really vamped up Mandragora maybe. But ya, thats kind of a wicked connection!
Gold Star for you good sir!

jburgos:

Just saw this last night from netflix. Did anyone who see it think that the cannibalistic plants inside that Mayan pyramid were like vampiric mandragora from VtR?

That kind of thing makes me think of the Dragon Kings and their vegetative technology in Exalted, but yes, mandragora could be a very cool fit too. The matter might be how would the Mandragora keep their condition without periodic donations of vitae, not just human or animal blood.

For a Requiem chronicle of mine i wrote a certain "ghoul family", the Anhanga, who would periodically hunt kindred to inter in their sacred hollow, a whole clearing with a one or two dozen mandragorae, each one of sprung from a unholy seed used to stake the interred vampire into a torpid state. The Anhanga gave blood to the earth, the torpid kindred took drips and bits of the blood while the tree's roots that riddled through the corpse would feed on the generated vitae, keeping the mandragora alive - and gifting the Anhanga with lacrima, that they would mix with other weird substances to make the sacred drug that matained them as ghouls, beside giving them a whole range of psychotropic experiences and the occasional link with one of the torpid vampires.

Real shame i had to interrupt the game much before the players ever learned what the shapechangers, the other common name kindred use for the Anhanga - in fact i made the ghoul family out of a desire for "more traditional" therianthropes than Uratha or the changing breeds, not to mention a reference to all the legends of animals living like people, in tribes with huts and all that, that are quite common in the folklore of brazilian indians that i know of. A weird ghoul family of hunters with Protean looked like an easy and fun take and i went on with it, adding twists and tweaks along the way.

Dutin103:

Gold Star for you good sir!

Why thank you, thank you very much!

Ever tried to use those mandragora in a WoD game of your own Burgos?

Actually, I have, not as in the movie The Ruins, but an Elder used them as a means of defending/protecting his haven. One of the players thought the plants were magical.

Basically, my idea is setting a game in post-conquest Mexico where a band of uratha discover a pyramid housing an Elder in torpor, protected by mandragora, sort of a one-shot dungeon crawl.

There is mention of the mandragora plant on page 107 in the Ancient Bloodlines corebook controlled by the Adrozani bloodline.  Course they are based out of Africa though.  When I saw Ruins I automatically thought of this bloodline and how if I made a game around the Ruins movie I would involve them somehow.