(The following information will be useful if you are either playing a Tzimisce in a Dark Ages story or a centuries old Tzimisce in a current story.)

Rule by Fear
The Ventrue and Lasombra, it would seem, are reborn to rule. Both clans have potent Disciplines enabling influence over or direct control of mortals. By contrast, the Tzimisce lack such straightforward methods of manipulation. Although many voivodes gain skill in Dominate and Presence over the centuries, the clan as a whole lacks such aptitudes. One might thus surmise that the voivodes are correspondingly less capable of governing their fiefdoms or ensuring their puppets’ subservience than are their southern and western cousins.
Such a supposition would be a grievous and potentially lethal error. If anything, Fiends are among the most territorial and possessive of all Cainites, and nothing matters more to them than security of the home. Over the centuries, Fiends have developed many techniques for ensuring the stability of their rule. Tzimisce do not need artificial means of turning their subjects into quivering wrecks, and when they command, they do not depend on mystical reinforcement to ensure obedience. Some might call the Fiends’ methods of negative reinforcement monstrous; Tzimisce would counter that they live in an untamed and violent frontier, and harsh means are necessary to guard their domains against marauding Lupines, mortals and their own kind.
Many Tzimisce terror tactics are ubiquitous among mortals, having been employed since the nights of biblical tyrants. Certainly, such brutalities as collective punishment and public torture are as effective in the hands of the living as they are in the talons of the undead. But Tzimisce have developed cunning methods of using their vampiric arts to guard against insurrection — or at least to punish it. Tzimisce are masters of Auspex, and this Discipline they use to terrifying effect. Voivodes routinely stand atop the battlements of their fortresses, listening to the words the night wind brings as it wafts up from the villages below. The faintest mutters of rebellion can reach the ears of a Fiend using Heightened Senses, who thereupon devises a poetic and hideous end for the would-be rebel. Obviously, the higher powers such as Soulsight, Steal Secrets and Anima Walk also prove useful in exposing recalcitrant subjects, until finally, those governed grow too terror-dulled to even think of treason.
Generally speaking, however, a voivode would not lower herself to walk among mortal villagers, save as a predator. But voivodes routinely create childer whose duties include precisely such Auspex-enhanced surveillance. These canny spies slip from the dom by night, creep into the mortals’ lairs and employ Auspex powers to evaluate the prey’s moods. As mortals’ deepest resentments are ‘magically” unearthed and punished before they can even be acted on, the populace grows too fearful even to think of revolt.
Other Tzimisce Disciplines likewise serve useful functions in maintaining rulership. Besides its obvious value as a punitive measure, Vicissitude allows the voivode or her childer to walk among the mortals in any number of guises. Even if a practitioner is not sufficiently skilled to duplicate another, he may still change himself into someone other than the dread vampyr on the hill. Mortals are wise to distrust strangers in the East.
Provided a Tzimisce has a high Via score and can afford to miss a day or two of rest, Animalism allows auxiliary espionage capabilities. Through the eyes of a cat, hound or cock, the Fiend can spy on a village without leaving his lair — though certain wisewomen have grown uncomfortably adept at discerning if a beast possesses "the evil eye." On a baser level, Cowing the Beast proves exceedingly useful at numbing unruly mortals, stripping them of courage and filling them with apprehension. Then, too, Tzimisce tend to be more openly predatory than many other vampires. In practical terms, this means they replenish their Blood Pools more often, which in turn gives them fewer qualms about spending Blood Points to enhance Physical Attributes. Although Fiends may not specialize in Physical Disciplines per se, a Tzimisce who has spent 10 or more Blood Points to raise Attributes is capable of doing all manner of gruesome things to a victim — and then replenishing herself from the victim’s family.
The greatest weapon, though, is the Tzimisce power over the Blood Oath. Voivodes who have studied alchemy or Koldunic Sorcery often find ways of extending the chains of mystic servitude through entire family lines. Generation after generation of peasants, lords, and even clergy dutifully serve the voivode on the hill. The greatest and most useful of these - families are the revenant lines — but there are many, many others, sprouting through the Old Country like poisonous weeds. Provided the proper pawns are in place, a Fiend may instigate a violent purge of her fiefdom without ever stirring from her crypt.
Skeptics, noting the Old Country’s predilection for invasion, might scoff at the Fiends’ vaunted might. Such doubters should remember that Tzimisce are primarily concerned with the supernal, and that the human spark burns much dimmer in them than in most other vampires. What difference, Tzimisce reckon, whether the ants scurrying through a lion’s den are red or black? Secure in her dwelling, a Fiend views “conquerors” with a jaded eye, scrutinizing who among the invaders may prove useful in future struggles with rival voivodes or werewolves. As the conquerors levy tribute and solidify their power, the Tzimisce stealthily deploys her minions among their ranks, snatching a few key victims and substituting fleshcrafted doppelgangers. And should any among the newcomers actually ignore their victims’ “superstitions” and turn an avaricious gaze toward the old castle on the hill — well, a few well- chosen, well-placed examples quickly hammer the lesson home to even the most impolite intruder. And so, the miasma of fear envelops the invaders; within a few short generations the conquerors and the conquered wear the same invisible yoke and so are indistinguishable.

(LS pg 55-56)