Well, one thing is that if you can still experience human emotions, your vampiric nature means you'll get to see most of who and what you love deteriorate and die.
Not exactly exclusive to vampires.
You'll get to see humanity making the same mistakes again and again
Most historians and archaeologists I know cope pretty well.
Don't know about psychologists at large, but I hear politicians talk about penitential system at least annually - and yet we don't notice any spikes in their suicides (
"yup... they're gonna read what we've found aaany decade now...").
That's the problem with "unimaginable" pain, or fear or whatever. Because it's someone's creation, and it's targeted at some audience - it is by very definition imaginable. It just ends up being kinda bad (and in some cases - hilarious. Shoggoth, really? I had worse puddings.).
As to "vampires of legends" - well most of them seemed to be rather enjoying themselves IIRC. Monsters without remorse or conscience, something all RPG's indulge by default. As players we're not
deluded by our egomania into thinking that everything around us is meant only as a trifle for our entertainment - we
know so.
Thankfully, we - unlike our characters do now have eternity to spend, which drives us to some progression. But I really had problems thinking about concepts of vampires that would really have some inner struggle (as in actual dichotomy, not bitching about how bad it is to be an immortal). I'm immortal and have strange powers. Wooo!
Not being able to eat is a bitch, all right - but then again you get off by drinking your beverage of choice. Again, not a bad deal.
It seems that vampires are a bogeyman that will be more and more inadequate. Born as "eew, bodily fluids!" - we now know about worse and real monsters that walk among us, indeed doing just as good for themselves.
Thee hee - in how many decades will Wolf publish "Psychopath: The Masquerade"?
