Can the Vampire Class make new vampires?

[Dannyalcatraz]

Heh... Conversely NOT explaining a supernatural entity's supernatural stuff through use of magic makes me cringe almost as much as the idea of a metachlorian count.

I'm not saying that the reason for XYZ is not supernatural. What I'm saying is that even the supernatural has rules.

For instance, in some legends, vampires have a kind of OCD- if you scatter rice or seeds before them, they must count the grains. The reason is their undead curse makes them obsessed with the origins of life.

The reason they cannot cross water is because of something like Ley lines (as I recall).


IOW, even though the "Why" is supernatural in origin, there is still an answer beyond simply "it's magic."

 

[Scribble]

I'm not saying that the reason for XYZ is not supernatural. What I'm saying is that even the supernatural has rules.

For instance, in some legends, vampires have a kind of OCD- if you scatter rice or seeds before them, they must count the grains. The reason is their undead curse makes them obsessed with the origins of life.

The reason they cannot cross water is because of something like Ley lines (as I recall).


IOW, even though the "Why" is supernatural in origin, there is still an answer beyond simply "it's magic."

Well sure that's fine, but I think the rest of Umbran's statement holds true there- it's closer to emotion then logic. Obsession with life causing you to count seeds is emotion based.

The emotions of a forced blood draw is different then the emotions of a freely given one. The magic supernaturalness created is different.

That's kind of a staple of myths and legends. The only way to get rid of a curse is for someone to do something for you of their own choosing.

Beauty and the Beast comes to mind...

 

[braro]

Actually, this falls nicely into "bag of rats". A GM might very well let you do this once (as as expressed by the designer, doing it once is intent), but that's totally discressionary and any GM worth his or her salt will call BoR on repeat tries.

I don't think it is an exploit / using the rules in an unintended way to get unfair advantage. I think it is roleplaying a vampire feeding off of fallen foes kept alive just for that purpose. The best case scenario is that you are not draining healing surges off of your allies; this makes the vampire less of a drain on other PCs resources. It doesn't make them unstoppable, as they still only have two surges base per combat, or grant them an unfair advantage, in my mind.

It's very much like using healing word during rests. It takes more time, but is safer.

I like to think I am worth my salt, and I wouldn't have a problem with this (outside of the moral quandaries, I think).

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Obsession with life causing you to count seeds is emotion based.

No it isn't. In the legends of origin, it's explicitly part of the curse of vampirism, a magical compulsion that they cannot rid themselves of.

To say otherwise is like saying vampires that can't cross water hate taking baths, that the garlic-phobes hated Italian cuisine.

 

[mneme]

I don't think it is an exploit / using the rules in an unintended way to get unfair advantage....

It's very much like using healing word during rests. It takes more time, but is safer.

Really? What if the creature was a giant rat? Or a rat swarm?

Seriously, I can't think of how this scenario (bag of monster) could be any -more- BoR.

Moreover, I don't see how one can justify this as making any sense when taken to extremes; where's this endless vitality the PC is generating?

Also, imagine the party with the Vampire and the Artificer. The Vampire generates surges out of nothing with a short rest; the Artificer makes potions out of them. Whee! Endless infusions for everyone! (Actually, Artificers are -great- partners for vampires).

 

[Scribble]

No it isn't. In the legends of origin, it's explicitly part of the curse of vampirism, a magical compulsion that they cannot rid themselves of.

To say otherwise is like saying vampires that can't cross water hate taking baths, that the garlic-phones hated Italian cuisine.

I disagree.

It's a nod to the idea that they are no longer part of the living world, and are in fact only a creature of death forever cursed with trying to experience life by taking it from others.

Vampires to me aren't creatures of logic.

They're the embodiment of the raw emotional power of the folly of trying to steal life after death. The fear of death itself and our powerless inability to stop it combined with our fascination with the afterlife.

We can disagree if you want, but to me trying to boil that experience into a weird science/logic thing is the very antithesis of what it is.

 

[Rechan]

WHAT HAVE I CREATED?

On the whole "Vampires can't benefit from enemy blood", what I find interesting is that the vampire class can't drink the blood of enemies to get healing surges.

But, the Dhampir can. Their racial ability is a vampire bite to drink an enemy's blood for a healing surge use.

 

[braro]

Really? What if the creature was a giant rat? Or a rat swarm?

Seriously, I can't think of how this scenario (bag of monster) could be any -more- BoR.

Moreover, I don't see how one can justify this as making any sense when taken to extremes; where's this endless vitality the PC is generating?

Also, imagine the party with the Vampire and the Artificer. The Vampire generates surges out of nothing with a short rest; the Artificer makes potions out of them. Whee! Endless infusions for everyone! (Actually, Artificers are -great- partners for vampires).

Stepping back a second, if your post said, instead of "any GM worth their salt" to "some GMs" or even "Most GMs," my response would be:

"Yeah, I can see that. Not everyone wants that in their game."

It's only because you are bringing it up as a value statement against the worth of the GM that I'm opposing your statement. Now, on with the conversation.

With regards to giant rat or swarm? How does blood drink work for that? The idea of the vampire juicing rats is kind of amusing...

I also don't understand how it doesn't seem to make any sense, that a vampire can keep draining victims to recover his own health. Isn't that kind of what they do? Isn't an unholy abomination fueled by blood kind of the schtick? I mean, I am happy to argue the balance of it; to be honest I don't see one PC as having very limited short term health but unlimited long term health, but that could be me, and I will gladly admit that for some games, that might make an imbalance, although I do not think it is an exploit.


Now, the Vampire and the Artificer is a little different; it's two different game mechanics working together in a way not intended. Now, I suspect that if I look at the rules carefully, the combo is blocked: the vampire loses all surges above its normal after a short rest, required to get his HP back; the artificer, I think, generates the potions at the end of the short rest, so the sacrifice would cause off the two base surges (because the vamps bonuses are gone). Now, I guess you could try to get in to some weird dialysis trick where the vampire sacrifices his two surges during a short rest, then drains blood, sacrifices again... then you end up with the artificer making vamp blood potions, which while neat from a flavor perspective...

Yes. I would DM rule against that, or at least demand that some people start spending multiclass feats on vampire related stuff at next level.

Lastly, I think it is really cool that this thread was started by concerns that core vampire abilities did not reflect the myth due to balance reasons, but now we are having a discussion about how the mechanic for a vampire draining victims might make them overpowered. So this conversations shows the distance between different people interacting with the class.

 

[mneme]

Stepping back a second, if your post said, instead of "any GM worth their salt" to "some GMs" or even "Most GMs," my response would be:

"Yeah, I can see that. Not everyone wants that in their game."

If you like, I can rephrase that as "Any GM using the Bag of Rats rule". Obviously, you don't have to run the game by the rules, but that does break the warranty.

I also don't understand how it doesn't seem to make any sense, that a vampire can keep draining victims to recover his own health.

Because the whole idea of vampirism is that the Vampire can't create vitality from nothing; if she could, she wouldn't need the blood. Instead, the entire schtick is predicated on moving vitality from one place to another. That said, I'd forgotten that Blood Drain does do a decent chunk of damage to the target; as such it's only -really- broken if you capture a regenerator and carry them around.

Lastly, I think it is really cool that this thread was started by concerns that core vampire abilities did not reflect the myth due to balance reasons, but now we are having a discussion about how the mechanic for a vampire draining victims might make them overpowered. So this conversations shows the distance between different people interacting with the class.

KInda. The thing is, even if it's not overpowered, it's worth noting BoR situations as they occur, as there are actually several reasons to honor the BoR rule:

1. It can create broken results.

2. It gives players a benefit for adding to the clutter of the game.

3. It lets players create repeatable powers out of nothing.

4. It uses powers in an unintended way.

What's a complicating factor is that in this case, the designer has said outright that he expected it to be used on helpless prisoners. But lots of powers produce unintended results if you let them be used against walls/rats/prisoners. So it's worth examining any tactic that starts out there very closely.

 

[braro]

If you like, I can rephrase that as "Any GM using the Bag of Rats rule". Obviously, you don't have to run the game by the rules, but that does break the warranty.

Well, that's pretty direct and a little inflammatory too, I think. But we will have to agree to disagree on this.

Because the whole idea of vampirism is that the Vampire can't create vitality from nothing; if she could, she wouldn't need the blood. Instead, the entire schtick is predicated on moving vitality from one place to another. That said, I'd forgotten that Blood Drain does do a decent chunk of damage to the target; as such it's only -really- broken if you capture a regenerator and carry them around.

To me I was seeing the prisoners and their blood as the "something" involved, and you are moving vitality from them to you. Granted, on a level of symbolism, beating them might wreck their vitality a bit. I see your point on this, and I think it just depends on where the line you want to draw in the narrative is.

I think BD specifies that it has to use a vampire at will as well, so it is damage on top of damage really. With that in mind, do you feel like the possible balance* problem could be resolved by requiring an out of tactical combat BD on a helpless foe to be a CDG that kills the target?

KInda. The thing is, even if it's not overpowered, it's worth noting BoR situations as they occur, as there are actually several reasons to honor the BoR rule:

1. It can create broken results.

2. It gives players a benefit for adding to the clutter of the game.

3. It lets players create repeatable powers out of nothing.

4. It uses powers in an unintended way.

What's a complicating factor is that in this case, the designer has said outright that he expected it to be used on helpless prisoners. But lots of powers produce unintended results if you let them be used against walls/rats/prisoners. So it's worth examining any tactic that starts out there very closely.

Right; if I thought that the combination was broken, I would have no problem houseruling it. I would agree with your guidelines; I just feel like the blood from the enemies knocked out constitutes something for number 3, and that the end effect isn't as breaking as it would need to be for number 1.

Number 2, though... The prisoner/blood drain think is pretty cluttery. There, I can agree. Maybe making some houserule that is essentially summarizing this mechanic.

"Lifeblood Scavenger - After a battle, while taking a short rest but before you regain your HPs and have your healing surges reset to normal, you can drink blood from the fallen foes and recover an additional healing surge."

That really seems more like a feat to describe the mechanic, which might also help with the feelings of balance, since it is requiring a cost from the player.



* Again, I am not sure there is a balance problem, but I think that developing the idea against others will make it run better. I believe it would work fine. However, I have believed in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and that the Transformers home base was a big superchurch near where I grew up when I was 3 (it looked just like their base on Cybertron, I swear!). So I have been wrong in the past, I will be wrong in the future... and I might be wrong right now.