“Value is the most invincible and impalpable of ghosts, and comes and goes unthought of while the visible and dense matter remains as it was.”
W. Stanley Jevons
“Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable.
However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than
those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable.”
Lord Chesterfield
“Blood ages like wine,
But only with the best vintage, cellar and cask becomes priceless.”
Invictus proverb

The New Orleans Invictus bitterly resents the dominance that the Sanctified exert over the city. New Orleans has passed through the hands of multiple governments during its history, any one of which could have provided the occasion for a change of power among the Kindred as well. The Crescent City is one of the centers of power for the “Southern Nobility,” the old plantation families that still practice the customs of, and survive on the monies from, the days when they owned not only the fields but also the people who worked them. Further, while no records survive to prove any such thing, most local Kindred believe that the first European Kindred to arrive, in the nights before the coming of the Spanish and Prince Vidal, were Invictus. A great many members of the First Estate in the Crescent City honestly believe that New Orleans is rightfully theirs. Of course, Invictus Kindred tend to believe that every domain is rightfully theirs, but in this instance they feel particularly strongly about it.

For the most part, Invictus vampires in New Orleans grit their teeth and follow the Lancea et Sanctum’s customs and traditions, especially in Elysium. It chafes them to do so, but the alternative is banishment from court functions, and cutting off their own access to what little power they wield would be foolish. The Invictus thus serve as long-standing, albeit grudging allies to the prince. Support for the Sanctified is particularly strong among the First Estate’s Ventrue, who owe allegiance to Vidal as their strategos and resent the Toreador dominance of their covenant. Some of the city’s younger Invictus, however, are slowly but surely drifting toward Antoine Savoy’s camp. Since the Invictus is nowhere near a position where it can yet put one of its own in charge, many of its malcontents prefer to at least support someone less fanatical than Vidal. Still, showing too much loyalty to Savoy is frowned upon—the Lancea et Sanctum is still the Lancea et Sanctum, after all. Some Invictus Kindred have even gone so far as to attempt alliances with Anarch gangs in order to oust the Sanctified, but have obtained only limited success so far. Baron Cimitière and the Anarchs are willing to exchange occasional information with the Invictus, but are unwilling to actually work alongside those whose objectives they trust no more than they do Vidal or Savoy.

At its own covenant gatherings, the Invictus looks and feels very much like a gathering of traditional Southern ladies and gentlemen. Its meetings have an air of refinement about them, of the last keepers of a lost noble tradition. Only a few of the eldest and most eccentric actually still dress in the garb of the 19th century, but the customs and etiquette of the Old South are alive and well. Unfortunately, many of the other attitudes of the time survive as well, and a significant minority of the city’s Invictus Kindred maintain their old racial prejudices. This isn’t to say that no black or Latin vampires have joined the New Orleans Invictus, only that a select group of the covenant’s most affluent and influential make a point of snubbing these “lower-born” members.