A Druid Vampire

[Diamond Cross]

Well, let's just say I don't want to give away any spoilers yet.

I am doing some writing, which will eventually be posted to my blog for this site. Which will have something.

And this thread has given me some ideas. For example, because of the corrupted magic, I can see the Druid using animals to channel blood in some way to the Druid.

Frequently, when I write I see an image of something first then an explanation comes later.


But my basic idea is that the Druid was turned by a vampire who is trying to become human again, and turned her so she would help him instead of trying to destroy him all the time.

Because when a vampire is sired, sometimes a strong bond is formed between the two of them.

And an 18th level Druid is a powerful friend indeed.

 

[Aeolius]

And an 18th level Druid is a powerful friend indeed.

Just don't call him a Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker ?

 

[Nifft]

But my basic idea is that the Druid was turned by a vampire who is trying to become human again

There's a spell for that.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Diamond Cross]

Hmmm....

Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well.

HEY! I'm RIGHT HERE!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

 

[Hussar]

BTW, in case this goes too far down the other road, I also have no problems with this at the table. The idea is fine. I was simply commenting on the justifications. See, the problem with bringing in real world examples is that we have no actual way of seeing a soul. We do in D&D. When a character dies, his soul goes to wherever he's supposed to go. Raise dead works by bringing the soul back.

Vampires, OTOH, have no soul. That's the whole point of being undead. They are powered by Negative energy (whatever that is).

Trying to argue that they are part of the natural order does rather strongly contradict what's stated in the game.

Which is perfectly fine. I got no problems with ejecting game canon and inserting my own. But, my issue was with the justification.

As far as the idea goes, I think it's really cool.

 

[blargney the second]

Vampires, OTOH, have no soul.

Page reference?

 

[Hussar]

Page reference?

Ask and Ye shall receive:

Undead Type

Undead are once-living creatures animated by spiritual or supernatural forces.

...

Not affected by raise dead and reincarnate spells or abilities. Resurrection and true resurrection can affect undead creatures. These spells turn undead creatures back into the living creatures they were before becoming undead.

Pretty much what I said wasn't it? "once-living" and the fact that they aren't rezzable - they are actually destroyed by returning the spirit back - pretty much says to me they are not "natural" creatures.

 

[Nifft]

Vampires, OTOH, have no soul.

Nobody has a soul, because "souls" are nothing but Pelorian propaganda. Same deal with "alignment". It's fiction.

- - -

Everything has a soul, because there's a god for everything, and within each thing resides a spark of its god. We call this spark its "spirit". Gods of the living dislike the undead because they are fragments of the god who do not return to it on command. Some ancient, long dead gods fragmented into free-roaming spirits (elementals, faeries, angels & demons). Be wary of killing these beings: each time one dies, the "whole" of the ancient dead god grows stronger. This world does not need to know what an ancient undead god is like. (This is why we try to trap or bind elementals, faeries, angels & demons instead of just killing them.)

- - -

Souls are just ethereal energy clouds generated by living beings. They represent your identity, but they aren't any more special than your fingerprint or dental record. They're used in similar ways to fingerprints: you leave marks wherever you go, especially if you touch stuff. ("Touching stuff" with your soul == using magic.) Undead don't have souls because they aren't living, but they still generate ethereal energy clouds -- it's just that those clouds are different enough that we don't call them "souls". When you die, your soul detaches from your body and floats through the Ether. We can sometimes make a copy of a dead person by consuming that energy cloud.

- - -

Vampires won't give you a ride to Brooklyn, because they indeed have no soul.

Cheers, -- N

 

[jonesy]

In the old eastern european myths vampires did have a soul. The idea was that when someone died the soul tried to leave, but if you kept the windows of your house closed it had nowhere to go. Then, after a certain amount of time and for certain reasons, the soul could become tainted and it would then return to the dead decomposing body because it was the only option it had left. And the tainted soul in the rotting corpse would then act out its frustrations towards the living. Kill them.

 

[Hussar]

Nifft and jonesy - totally, 100% agree with both of you.

But, just to be pedantic, in D&D, there is such an object as a "soul" (which elves at one time didn't have and thus couldn't be raised from the dead) and, given a bit of magic oomph, the character can actually go and meet it. I was speaking specifically from a RAW standpoint.

From a campaign building standpoint, RAW is something that stands in the corner weeping softly.