Vampires

[ManUtd4Ever]

For some of us... the word Vampire strikes fear and loathing into anyone who has been on line when these fiends have surfaced.

There was a time when Vamps were common place. Now? The last time I saw one when Bloody Redjack was kicking my arse (thank you! great rp) not too long ago.

Question for the staff: Is this something of the past, or something you want to animate in the future?


Cheers!

[[DM] Grinning Death]

Hah. Well, this brings back memories of player hate for the living-challenged.

It depends. We're always open to vamping people if they fulfill the proper requirements and are good RP'ers. However, the Colibrii church has been in a slump (as has the rest of the server), and so we haven't seen anyone who's really 'vamp material'.

[thaelis]

Hah. Well, this brings back memories of player hate for the living-challenged.

Hehe...a lot of that hate probably comes from the fact that its an ECL +8 race, but you don't get any -8 character levels when you become a vamp.

Its kinda funny that Drow/Svirfneblin take a negative level whereas vamps can run around frolicking in their dark castles as 28-29th level characters.

Give them 2 or 3 negative levels and it might reduce player-hate a bit

[Catastrophe]

Well that is not how ECL works. ECL + 8 means that it takes the vampire pc 8k the xp to get a level than your average adventurer does.

[Thief Of Navarre]

But if your a 20th level character when you get vamped? I think that's what thaelis was hinting at.

[kuscotopia]

Not to mention all those vamp sex parties...

Dwarves are suffering a -2 CHA due to them keeping their music turned up until the wee hours of the morning...

[Phantom Lamb]

Which raises the next question - why are there no dwarven vampires?

[Cornuto]

Dwarves don't have necks.

[thaelis]

But if your a 20th level character when you get vamped? I think that's what thaelis was hinting at.

Which I imagine most of them are, or at least 15th+ when they get bit.

What about making it so they don't get all the bonuses immediately on becoming vamped, and have to go through a tiered ageing process which takes RL time? Like 35+ days play time to reach maximum age (my highest character has 26, and that seems like quite a lot?)

At least then not all vamps would immediately become super awesome (I'm not suggesting outright nerfing vampires...they should indeed be scary as hell!)

p.s. Dwarves don't get bit because they smell :P

[ManUtd4Ever]

Which raises the next question - why are there no gray dwarven vampires?

ftfy

I think a Duergar would make an outstanding vampire

Note: This comment is self-serving as I have an active gray dwarf.

[Redjack]

Playing a vamp can be a challenge. You have strengths yes, but with that come huge disadvantages. No one pays more attention to the time then a vamp. There are several classes that are quite lethal to a vamp. And then how to role play your vampy character without pissing everyone off. Jumping out of the bushes and slashing a loner's throat time and time again might be realistic for a vamp, but would likely alienate a player before long. Hanging out at the campfire for chit chat grinds to a halt as the undead. Vamp players tend to burn out after awhile. Yes you can smash the average adversary, but whats the fun in that after a few clashes? I spent ~90% of the time with Clive not picking fights, but defending him from angry mobs. Angry mobs usually form shortly after you walk up to the campfire and say "Hi"
If you want to play a vampire then you have to accept you will have continuous conflict.

[KingArthur]

-Snip-

That has always been a problem, in my mind, being evil. You NEED 'evil' people to interact with, and from my experience more of the player base tends to be 'good' aligned. This ends up with too many good people, with no evil people to fight because the evil people really have no one to RP with themselves, and get bored.

Just my opinion on what I have seen.

[Seheren]

Agreed, but some of us evil folk try to get out there. Some of us even get out there to try and change your minds on just how bad we really are.

[OnyxTigress]

That has always been a problem, in my mind, being evil. You NEED 'evil' people to interact with, and from my experience more of the player base tends to be 'good' aligned. This ends up with too many good people, with no evil people to fight because the evil people really have no one to RP with themselves, and get bored.

Just my opinion on what I have seen.

True, but it's even more prevalent when you are a vampire. Even the bad guys don't normally want to rp with you.

[Kaybrie]

True, but it's even more prevalent when you are a vampire. Even the bad guys don't normally want to rp with you.

This is born from every bad-guy faction generally attempting to be on top. Vampires believe they have been made superior through their dogma which states that vamps are the true nobility blah blah, and simultaneously Banites have been given the god-given right to rule over all, regardless of race, domain, nationality, alignment blah blah blah. This spells a recipe for internal strife, you may as well be trying to make Cyric and Bane work together for all its worth.

Then there are the Mask/Sharran player's, who generally got along from what I recall, but never got along with the larger group of Colibri/Banites, save in underhanded spying sorts of ways. Which doesn't really help a lot when a fight breaks out.

Problem with lots of evil factions is that evil is always trying to undermine itself as often as it's undermining good. Whereas good factions have it in their best interests to work together to keep the bad guys from throwing flaming poo on their lawn.

It's by design, there's not a lot you could do about it save eliminate a ton of evil deities from being select-able, or finding lore related means of making all these larger groups best friends, giving them roles and the like in a larger machine.


On the point of Vampire popularity, it's a powerful template, though the fact that it has hard counters on the server (Master of Radiance/Morning Lord/Paladin for instance) makes me feel that the availability of the template should be made more readily available for player-characters who wish to pursue it.

As an aside; Dreadmaster/Red Wizard Buffs

Bring Bane/Colibrus into the spotlight as being the main villains by making their biggest toys OP.

That's just me though.

/ramble