Cult of Celebrity Death

The Cult of Celebrity Death was a "temporary fad" of Faction Paradox's recruitment policies, a movement within the Faction comprising individuals for whom famous historical figures' deaths were a particular fascination. They sought to recruit such individuals into the Faction by luring them into the organisation a few days before their scheduled demises and leaving biodata dummies to die in their places.

The scheme was initially developed by Godfather Morlock himself, based on the observation that, due to occupying key points in cultural history, these people's biodata was a powerful "attractor": as he put it, "if Lord Byron leapt up and demanded a charge against the Faction’s numerous opponents, then half the table would be following before they even realised what they were doing"".

The Cult lost most, if not all, credibility following the twofold failure of their meddling in early-20th century Russian history. Firstly, their recruitment of Grigori Rasputin (as "Father Dyavol") was a catastrophe from the start as the Faction's attempt to save Rasputin from his death ran headfirst into the Celestis and the Great Houses' own schemes to scoop Rasputin from his scheduled death and ensnare him into their service, with none of the three factions being aware of the others' actions. Secondly, Dyavol then induced their other Russian Celebrity Death recruit, Cousin Anastasia, to rebel against the Eleven-Day Empire and found a rival Faction government, the Thirteen-Day Republic. (PROSE: The Book of the War)