Am I the only one who doesn't like the D&D Vampire? (Pointless rant, I suppose)

[LostSoul]

FWIW, the permanent Con drain can make a great clue that Something Is Up.

Or that Something Was Up 10, 20, 50 years ago, when the Vampire strolled through town and drained a couple people.

 

[Tonguez]

Okay I did some maths (and made lots of assumptions)

Okay small village of 200 people average con 10
Assuming a Vampire needs to feed once/week and does not drain a person entirely in one go but only requires 3 con worth of blood each time then a Vamp could survive on 1 victim per month (roughly) - thats 12 per year which means a Vamp in a town of 200 has 16 years of food available (which we will make 10 due to death by other causes, age, babies etc)

So A Vamp feeding of one village of 200 can survive for 10 years

Now most successful Vampires are Lords other their domain (Dracula was Lord of Transylvania) so we can assume more than one village - say 5 villages of 200 - 1000 people or 50 years worth of food.
50 years is about 3 generations for humans (assuming woman have babies from age 15) ergo the Vampire has 3 generations of human cattle to feed upon without counting stray Travellers and victims from foreign raids.

With the above assumptions the idea of Vampires 'milking' a village of permanent con is plausible, remember too that Vampires can sleep for a few years if they think that the Stock needs time to recover.
During this time they can have other agents keep the stock under control or even make a deal with the local village to not molest them as long as they protect the Master!

YMMV

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

Hmm, maybe it would work better if there was a vampire prestige class with the prerequisite being that the (N)PC have the/a vampire template?

I don't know how often a D&D vampire has to feed, but the Anne Rice vamps I like so well don't have to feed at all. But that's usually only an option for the ones ancient enough to become really strong. The young ones go without food for a while and they get pretty weak. In game terms, going without food when you're too young a vampire to handle it would probably cause a temporary inability to use certain powers, or a temporary reduction of ability scores.

 

[Zhure]

Maybe there are lots of cleric vampires who cast restoration/lesser restoration on their victims.

 

[A2Z]

I to never really liked the D&D vampire. Maybe this is blasphemy, but, I'd really like to see a new vampire template (or series of templates) based on the Vampire:The Masqerade vampires. Think about it. You could have different bloodline based on the different clans. And each might have different powers based on what Disciplines are available to each bloodline.

Celerity = Haste, Potence = Incresed Strength, Protean = Some form of shapechanging, Thaumaturge = spellcasting ability and so on.

I don't know I just always thought vampires should be more than simply another monster to kill. I've always liked the somewhat romantic portrail of vampires in games like The Masqeurade and books like Anne Rice's.

On another note, another good idea for vampires comes from the Legacy of Kain playstation games. After thousands of years the oldest vampires have 'evolved' into insanely powerful creatures. Sort of the equivalent of Methuselah and Antideluvian vampires. I'm not quite sure how you would model this increase in power with a template though. Would an increase in power when a vampire reaches a certain age work with a template?

 

[el-remmen]

Funny this should come up - but just the other day I added "New Vampire Template" to my "Things to Do" list for Aquerra. . .

I want a more classic and fearsome vampire. . .

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

Well Green Knight, your "pointless rant" has garnered 46 posts so far without any flames. I'd say that's a decent accomplishment.

nemmerle, that sounds interesting. If you make one please let us know how it turns out. BTW, have you seen my post on the last page of the Favorite Monster Book thread? It's a little blast from the past.

 

[MeepoTheMighty]

Well Green Knight, your "pointless rant" has garnered 46 posts so far without any flames. I'd say that's a decent accomplishment.

Except for the guy who said that anyone who uses the monster manual is lazy and using a crutch..

 

[mmadsen]

The use of the template for vampires is a good idea for handling the differences that occur when someone's transformed into one of them. Using the class mechanic to advance their powers over time, OTOH, is the ideal method to handle the concept that those vampires become more powerful over time. Both are applicable.

Wouldn't it make sense then to make Vampire a Prestige Class? It could grant all the special abilities "necessary" to be a Vampire (or Vampire Spawn) at 1st level, and it could slowly add on more power with each level. I don't see the benefit of the template.

 

[hong]

I don't know I just always thought vampires should be more than simply another monster to kill. I've always liked the somewhat romantic portrail of vampires in games like The Masqeurade and books like Anne Rice's.

You'll probably hate the hopping vampire and penanggolan, then.