Dhampirs, how well do they play with others?


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One of my players expressed interest in playing a Dhampir Cleric (Crusader). I'm not sure I should allow it.

To me Dhampirs don't seem to mesh very well with a good/neutral-aligned group at all.
First and primarily I see their Negative Energy Affinity as a problem.

They'll be unable to benefit from Channel and from normal CLW spells etc.
As a cleric he'll probably be neutral and channel negative energy (that's a guess, I've not asked him that yet), so he can heal himself. So while he doesn't need healing from someone else, that makes his own healing pretty useless to anyone else.

On the other hand Infernal Healing seems to work just fine on them too, and that's the best healing spell anyway for OOC healing. (And I will most likely houserule a good version of it in, or take the 3.5 Vigor spell)

So am I overreacting in my worry, or are they really not good teamplayers?


You is the overreacting panda. You let him play with anything he likes. Also Negative Channel can be taken out with alternate racial traits if I recall correctly.


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also it would not be any different then a group who only has a cleric with negative channeling, simply he would be able to gain a benefit from his burst damage, he can still use wands of CLW and above for free AFAIK.

but i would hope he does take selective channel as a feat


I don't think you can take their Negative Affinity away, but later, you can turn positive energy into temp. hit points. My gf plays a Dhampir Paladin/Ranger. Can't heal herself yet, but can heal others. And she doesn't mind taking Infernal Healing (at least, not too much).


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Not very well.

They're emotionally unstable and are constantly on a quest to redeem themselves for the accident of their birth, thus bringing down the mood of the entire game with their astronomic levels of emo.

Oh and the Negative Energy Affinity is a pain in the ass as well.


They're completely fine.

We have a Dhampir Wizard in our main game and he acts like his negative energy affinity is an allergy. Everywhere he goes, he informs any healers/holy men they run across not to heal him in case of injury less they accidently kill him. Its sorta humbling and strangely down to earth. When he needs to get healed, he purchases his own potions or trades for them from other casters.

He doesn't care much about his ancestry and is True Neutral; focusing only on arcane power. He knows what he is though, and having run across a Dhampir Inquisitor he recognizes the stigma he sometimes faces... but most of the time it's not a big deal and doesn't impact game that often.

Grand Lodge

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What is his Angst score?


Dhampirs are the only Race I do not allow. That is because I think they have a drawback that affects the party more than himself.
They do not mix well (there may be exceptions but as an exception you could play a ghul pc as well).

The worst players are those who wish to play a dhampir and then go to their gm and try to get him to chenge the rules so that lay on hands isn't positive energy and chease like that.

Grand Lodge

The new Dhampir book does seem to mean that they are becoming ever more popular.


Umbranus wrote:

Dhampirs are the only Race I do not allow. That is because I think they have a drawback that affects the party more than himself.

They do not mix well (there may be exceptions but as an exception you could play a ghul pc as well).

The worst players are those who wish to play a dhampir and then go to their gm and try to get him to chenge the rules so that lay on hands isn't positive energy and chease like that.

See, I don't see how their abilities affect the party more than them... Unless when the Dhampir's knocked out someone tries to use one of his potions of "healing". Just means they have to jump a few hoops to heal them. And if someone has a neutral cleric they can always just prepare inflicts and convert them to positives if need be. Dhampirs aren't a problem unless you make them one.

Like this, that just sounds like you have a player who's trying to reap the benefits of the class(stats, darkvision, & partial immunity to negative levels) without the downsides(vulnerable to positive energy, light weakness). In and of themselves they're fine.


I'm currently running a game for a group with a dhampir in it, and thus far it hasn't been a huge problem. The player has to be careful, sure, but he's also taken steps to have some self healing (via sanguine bloodline) and has a shared backstory with the party's cleric, so the cleric knows about his "condition." Overall, we've had a lot of fun with the dhampir's somewhat touchy feelings about his race and his need to stay on the down-low in Ustalav. Personally, I'd allow it.


Haven't had any problems with the one in my game, a Rogue/Psion. Oracle was nice enough to pick up inflict moderate for her. Otherwise the only issues she's caused is being too darned good at stealth in the forests due to the dim light.


He can affect the party by hindering a positive energy channeling pc in hurting undead. Or by forcing said pc to take selective channeling.
It is the dhampir's drawback so why should another pc be forced to spend a feat because of it? Just one example.


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Umbranus wrote:

He can affect the party by hindering a positive energy channeling pc in hurting undead. Or by forcing said pc to take selective channeling.

It is the dhampir's drawback so why should another pc be forced to spend a feat because of it? Just one example.

Most Clerics take selective channel so its not that big of a deal.

or he can get out of range
or have the cleric apologize and unleash the channel any ways.

I don't see this being any different than a cleric that takes negative channel. I have played one, and my party just knew to not get too close at lower levels when channelling was viable, and at higher levels spells and domain powers were the best options, so it wasn't an issue anymore.
Give the players some credit, they will figure out the differences and adapt quickly.


the upside is the benefits from that negative energy affinity when fighting undead, specifically in a character like a kinslayer. I'd rather let him tangle with undead in hand to hand that one of us 'normal folks' plus a kinslayer can pick up inflict spells and heal himself.


Darth Grall wrote:
See, I don't see how their abilities affect the party more than them... Unless when the Dhampir's knocked out someone tries to use one of his potions of "healing". Just means they have to jump a few hoops to heal them. And if someone has a neutral cleric they can always just prepare inflicts and convert them to positives if need be. Dhampirs aren't a problem unless you make them one.

And why should the rest of the party have to jump through hoops to do something as simple as healing a party member?


Let me just offer this bit about a player with a dhampir in the campaign I am DMing right now. The players had picked up a couple NPCs to help them with their current mission, one of which was a healer. In order to hide his heritage, the dhampir character made a disguise check every day so nobody would notice it. In one fight, the dhampir got knocked just below 0 HP and went down. The NPC cleric, just trying to help, ran over and cast CLW on him to save his life. Instead, the damage was enough to outright kill him.

Was I a bad GM for doing this? I don't think so, the character was specifically trying to hide his nature.


"To me Dhampirs don't seem to mesh very well with a good/neutral-aligned group at all."

.

I take offense to this (well, as much offense as one takes over something fictional who isn't a rabid twilight mom/beiber fan). They're a player race. Whether or not they "don't mesh well" with a party of a particular alignment is in the hands of the player who's crafting the character, not inherent in their statblock. It'd be the same as going "i don't think aasimar would mesh well in an evil campaign"--despite the ARG specifically noting how great evil aasimar can be.

negative energy affinity? buy a wand of inflict light (or infernal healing, whatever) and hand it to the cleric (oh right, himself). bam, done. it also doubles as an offensive spell in a pinch. so long as the party knows how to work together there will be absolutely no feather-ruffling that was not assigned by a cloaked man in a dim tavern corner table.

being an angsty idiot is also completely in the hands of the player, not the race.

to answer your question: yes, you're overreacting.


Rynjin wrote:
Darth Grall wrote:
See, I don't see how their abilities affect the party more than them... Unless when the Dhampir's knocked out someone tries to use one of his potions of "healing". Just means they have to jump a few hoops to heal them. And if someone has a neutral cleric they can always just prepare inflicts and convert them to positives if need be. Dhampirs aren't a problem unless you make them one.
And why should the rest of the party have to jump through hoops to do something as simple as healing a party member?

why should anybody worry about casting healing on anyone, regardless of what spell is required to do so?

It's a boon if the run up against an evil cleric (hey thanks for the recharge buddy) and a bane when the party cleric catches him in his channel.... oh well.

IF your're in a gothic campaign or running Carrion Crown , could be a really cool character concept (especially that Kinslayer)

Characters like sorcerers with the undead bloodline would also make interesting characters.... but random dhampirs because they think it's cool? dude... play a half orc.

It really comes down the the DMs choice on if he wants to allow the race in his campaign.

that being said, Id really like to play a Dhampir Kinslayer/Magus in carrion crown. I think it'd be epic.
But I wouldnt choose it for say Legacy of Fire, just because I wanted to play one.


Especially for CC I think it would be bad for some builds to have someone with negative energy affinity around.
Undead killing channel builds don't need selective channeling.


But... Why wouldn't a cleric take Selective Channeling at some point? I understand if it's not a priority for a build, some want to grab other things first in those low levels, but I rarely see one that doesn't plan to eventually take it.

Even if you're fighting undead the entire campaign, which is a rarity, you'll still eventually fight non-undead. And in a big melee against non-undead you'll heal the enemy too if you don't have selective channeling. Not that long ago in my homebrew a cleric healed a Baddie cause they were too low level to have the feat and said baddie killed a PC the turn after since they didn't put him down in time because the heal.

So is it really so troublesome to take the feat earlier? Especially if/when said dhampir informs everyone of his condition?


Some builds are just too feat starved to afford one. And not every cleric is designed as a healer. Just because you can channel energy doesn't mean that you have to use it for in combat healing.
We had a cleric of sarenrae with an anti undead build in our CC game which didn't have selective channel and it worked well.


A full group of Dhampir with a spontaneous inflict/channel negative cleric would be pretty strong. If they could stop moping around long enough to get anything done that is ;-).


I've seen negative channeling baddies take down the entire party like a nova burst... and certain undead do unspeakable things very quickly to a party... something that would take the evil cleric and/or the undead by surprise and ruin their day if they suddenly found themselves toe to toe with a Dhampir kinslayer.

For positive channeling the radius isnt the whole room, just MOVE some if you don't have selective.

Liberty's Edge

We have a Dhampir Cleric in the party for one of my games, and they play with the party just fine. They're true neutral and worship a neutral god, so they took versatile channel to help with healing, they spontaneously cure (not inflict), etc. It's a bit of a pain when he goes down, but that only happened once and turned out alright as one of the other party members made a successful heal check.

Later, I had to switch characters so I made a black-blooded oracle. Now we have two negatively aligned characters, making the party a very interesting thing. I think that earned us some bonus points with a few undead we have been forced to work with lately.

Also, once we had a negative channeling cleric as an opponent who was failing spectacularly to hurt our squishiest party member (the cleric). Nothing quite like turning a foe's best offense into a heal.

TL;DR - It'll be fine. A bit odd, sure, but fine.


Umbranus wrote:

Some builds are just too feat starved to afford one. And not every cleric is designed as a healer. Just because you can channel energy doesn't mean that you have to use it for in combat healing.

We had a cleric of sarenrae with an anti undead build in our CC game which didn't have selective channel and it worked well.

Yeah, but if there is a Dhampir in that party your build should be different or at least the Dhampir will play around the actions of the cleric. They can just warn the Dhampir and he/she can move out of range. If you're not healing the party in combat, they they can not get hurt out of combat from said healing with more warning.

I still don't see how this would be a problem as long as there is, you know, team work in a team oriented game.


Wouldn't the better and easier expression of teamwork being not to pick a race that handicaps the rest of the party by its very existence?


Rynjin wrote:
Wouldn't the better and easier expression of teamwork being not to pick a race that handicaps the rest of the party by its very existence?

It may be easier, but I wouldn't say it's better. Cause it's clearly a boon too. You guys come up against a bad touch cleric, anti-paladin, or any undead whipping out negative levels and suddenly their "handicaps" becomes an advantage.

And it's not even that much harder than what other classes have to do. Imagine if you're playing an alchemist throwing around bombs. You have to carefully place said bombs cause you can hurt your allies. All you have to do to not hurt them is move/aim at a different zone or warn them of the incomming attack.

Why can't the combat cleric do the same? Why is it such a hassle that you guys wanna ban a whole freaking race when there are plenty of simple options for the cleric to take? Why wouldn't the cleric wanna learn an in game option that will completely spare his budy from being hurt by him? I just don't get it.


Darth Grall wrote:

It may be easier, but I wouldn't say it's better. Cause it's clearly a boon too. You guys come up against a bad touch cleric, anti-paladin, or any undead whipping out negative levels and suddenly their "handicap" becomes an advantage.

And it's not even that much harder than what other classes have to do. Imagine if you're playing an alchemist throwing around bombs. You have to carefully place said bombs cause you can hurt your allies. All you have to do to not hurt them is move/aim at a different zone or warn them of their attack.

Why can't the combat cleric do the same? Why is it such a hassle that you guys wanna ban a whole freaking race when there are plenty of simple options for the cleric to take? Why wouldn't the cleric wanna learn an in game option that will completely spare his budy from being hurt by him? I just don't get it.

Because the Alchemist can mitigate his danger to the team ON HIS OWN, with the Precise Bombs Discovery, thus as early as level 2 nullifying any danger he poses to the rest of the party.

Dhampirs don't have any such option so far as I know. If they had a Feat that downgraded their weakness to positive energy to just not benefiting from it is a different story.

My point is, the difference in those two scenarios is this: The Dhampir forces the WHOLE PARTY to accommodate for HIM, whereas the Alchemist is forced to accommodate FOR the whole party.

Liberty's Edge

Darth Grall wrote:
Rynjin wrote:
Wouldn't the better and easier expression of teamwork being not to pick a race that handicaps the rest of the party by its very existence?
It may be easier, but I wouldn't say it's better. Cause it's clearly a boon too. You guys come up against a bad touch cleric, anti-paladin, or any undead whipping out negative levels and suddenly their "handicap" becomes an advantage.

The negative levels thing of Dhampirs is HUGE. It allowed our cleric to ignore (and continue to ignore, actually) two negative levels he received (I forget where). When we choose to heal them, he can do so himself since his caster level is not penalized, meaning he can still cast the spells that heal them. We're high enough level now that death from negative levels seems unlikely (level 13 with 2 neg levels means he needs another 11 to die from them), so he might never bother.

Okay, so it isn't huge due to the low frequency of negative levels, but it certainly makes it easier to deal with death (no need to hurry on those restoration scrolls) or the occasional nasty undead.


Rynjin wrote:

Because the Alchemist can mitigate his danger to the team ON HIS OWN, with the Precise Bombs Discovery, thus as early as level 2 nullifying any danger he poses to the rest of the party.

Dhampirs don't have any such option so far as I know. If they had a Feat that downgraded their weakness to positive energy to just not benefiting from it is a different story.

My point is, the difference in those two scenarios is this: The Dhampir forces the WHOLE PARTY to accommodate for HIM, whereas the Alchemist is forced to accommodate FOR the whole party.

But how is that different from a cleric taking selective channel? As a battle cleric you can be a Positive channeler; hitting undead. Or you can be a Negative Channeler, hitting living creatures. All dhampirs do is mean that the positive battle cleric should to pick up selective channel too. Since he/she is the one who has to mitigate damage since she's the one doing it.

And actually they do, they have a Dhampir Item that turns positive energy into temp hp rather than damage them. Its in the ARG.

He's not though, I'm saying the Dhampir accomadates for the party. How else is he going to get healed? He has to tell the healer not to heal him(which how does that negatively affect the healer? He just spends the rest of his time doing damage to undead or healing other guys in the party). The rest of the time the Dhampir buys items for the healer to heal him with; or carry's potions for himself. How is that a big deal?


Darth Grall wrote:
But how is that different from a cleric taking selective channel?

Because the Dhampir member is forcing ANOTHER PLAYER to blow a Feat to avoid harming him while he helps everyone else, and the Alchemist (who is the Dhampir analogue in scenario 2) has to blow one of HIS OWN Discoveries/Feats to get Precise Bombs. See the difference?

Darth Grall wrote:


As a battle cleric you can be a Positive channeler; hitting undead. Or you can be a Negative Channeler, hitting living creatures. All dhampirs do is mean that the positive battle cleric should to pick up selective channel too. Since he/she is the one who has to mitigate damage since she's the one doing it.

Except there wouldn't be a problem at all if the Dhampir weren't in the party.

Darth Grall wrote:


And actually they do, they have a Dhampir Item that turns positive energy into temp hp rather than damage them. Its in the ARG.

If the guy actually bought that I wouldn't have a problem with it. How much is it?

Darth Grall wrote:


He's not though, I'm saying the Dhampir accomadates for the party. How else is he going to get healed? He has to tell the healer not to heal him(which how does that negatively affect the healer? He just spends the rest of his time doing damage to undead or healing other guys in the party). The rest of the time the Dhampir buys items for the healer to heal him with; or carry's potions for himself. How is that a big deal?

The party has to make sure:

Not to heal him.

To carry Inflict potions for if he ever goes down. Or prepare an Inflict spell.

Make sure you never take your turn before his, since he needs to move out of the way first.

To "accommodate" the Dhampir *gasp* does something EVERY PARTY MEMBER WILL BE DOING (buying potions for themselves). It's more of a hassle dealing with than any other race in the game that I can think of. If the player wants to play a half-Vampire he could just as easily play any other race and reflavor it.


Or he could simply play the Half Vampire, the party makes a few minor concessions for him and his playstyle, vaguely remember that its all a game and just move on?

If the party isn't flexible/capable enough to deal with such minor issues then frankly they wil probably struggle whenever the GM throws them any sort of curve ball.

Optimal party dynamics should end with the party being able to overcome sub-optimal conditions.


It's nothing to do with capability, it's more the player is willfully playing a race that is annoying to deal with.


Rynjin wrote:
It's nothing to do with capability, it's more the player is willfully playing a race that is annoying to deal with.

ah, i'm beginning to understand now. it's not that its annoying for others (as has been voiced repeatedly here, along with INCREDIBLY SIMPLE FIXES), it's that it's annoying to you. to bring your alchemist defense up:

"Because the Alchemist can mitigate his danger to the team ON HIS OWN, with the Precise Bombs Discovery, thus as early as level 2 nullifying any danger he poses to the rest of the party."

with a few slight changes it becomes:
"Because the Cleric can mitigate his danger to the team ON HIS OWN, with the Selective Channel Feat, thus as early as level 1 nullifying any danger he poses to a member of the party. as well as preventing him from accidentally aiding his enemies."

.

in the case of OP, the dhampir in question is the cleric himself, making all of this a non-issue.

as for other instances, it's simply a matter of coordination and teamwork. if you don't want to spend a feat to better aid in that, then that's your problem--you're not forced to, as if you dont take it you simply need to plan ahead and actually work with your party during combat (adventurers do that, right? tactics and stuff--they're not just one-man-island statblocks who are constantly worried about "I Me Mine" and no-one else, right?)


I find it astounding that your defense of the race boils down to "don't be selfish" when the player of that race is the one being so. It's a give and take. What does he give back to the party that is equivalent to burning a Feat for the Cleric and (depending on how you divide money) draining party funds buying two different potion supplies?

I understand that in this ONE PARTICULAR SCENARIO, the Dhampir is the Cleric, but what about the Dhampir Fighter that's always in the middle of everything? The Cleric is now forced to either get that Feat, not Channel at all, or wait for the Fighter to make himself effectively useless by getting out of the way so the Cleric can Channel.

It's not "Me me me and no one else" it's "Everybody in the party has to compensate for this one guy whose race choice has pretty much forced 'Me me me and no one else' accommodations".

Edit: Now, that said, this irritation is not directed at the player who picks Dhampir. It's not even something I was consciously aware of until it was brought up. But the more I think about it, the more it pisses me off that this race is designed, with no way out, to require accommodations from the entire party. It's a mild irritant, but even a single grain of sand in your boot starts to chafe after a while. Which is a shame, because you can't blame anyone for picking it either, because it's such a flavorful class it's hard to stay away from. Beyond the obvious stereotypical angsty characters you can make with it, it's got a lot of potential for story, which is what's so frustrating about it. I'm of the school that no one should have to sacrifice efficiency for story, you should always be able to build something that lives up to your story goal while still not hindering you or anyone else in-game.


What does the OP's other players think of one of them playing dhampir? If the whole issue is a slight inconvenience to the other players...why not ask the other plays if they have a problem with it? If the other players are fine with this guy playing a dhampir, it's a non-issue.


Rynjin wrote:
Because the Dhampir member is forcing ANOTHER PLAYER to blow a Feat to avoid harming him while he helps everyone else, and the Alchemist (who is the Dhampir analogue in scenario 2) has to blow one of HIS OWN Discoveries/Feats to get Precise Bombs. See the difference?

As mentioned; he's the cleric so it's his own issue. Also as mentioned by AndIMustMask; it's not different at all from the Alchemist.

Rynjin wrote:
Except there wouldn't be a problem at all if the Dhampir weren't in the party.

Perhaps; but how is it different from a Negative Energy Channeler who heals undead? He comes across a Dhampir, he will wish he had selective channel to compensate.

Rynjin wrote:
If the guy actually bought that I wouldn't have a problem with it. How much is it?

12K and it's an amulet. However that probably won't be an option till mid game.

Rynjin wrote:

The party has to make sure:

Not to heal him.

How hard is it not to heal a guy with positive energy? That literally means you can cast more spells on other guys if you choose not to do any healing on him.

Rynjin wrote:
To carry Inflict potions for if he ever goes down. Or prepare an Inflict spell.

... Which would likely come out of the Dhampir's pocket. He buys them and hands them out. Imagine if you were deathly allergic to something. Is it REALLY such a hassle to buy a few epipens and give them out to your trusted buddies in case you start dying?

Quote:
Make sure you never take your turn before his, since he needs to move out of the way first.

OR the DHAMPIR makes sure he goes just before the cleric by holding his own actions. Idk about your games but hasn't talking always been a free action? Just ask, "hey cleric bob, you gonna channel?" *gets nod* -> *Dhampir moves out of the 30 feet away*.

Rynjin wrote:
If the player wants to play a half-Vampire he could just as easily play any other race and reflavor it

This is perhaps the only thing I could agree with you on. But the fact is, dhampirs come with some cool kit(kinslayer is just flavorful as heck) and some interesting abilities and I really don't think it's the problem you're making it out to be.

Rynjin wrote:

I find it astounding that your defense of the race boils down to "don't be selfish" when the player of that race is the one being so. It's a give and take. What does he give back to the party that is equivalent to burning a Feat for the Cleric and draining party funds buying two different potion supplies?

I understand that in this ONE PARTICULAR SCENARIO, the Dhampir is the Cleric, but what about the Dhampir Fighter that's always in the middle of everything? The Cleric is now forced to either get that Feat, not Channel at all, or wait for the Fighter to make himself effectively useless by getting out of the way so the Cleric can Channel.

It's not "Me me me and no one else" it's "Everybody in the party has to compensate for this one guy whose race choice has pretty much forced 'Me me me and no one else' accommodations".

It's not selfish to pick a race or class, especially one that grants them an immunity to a type of attack. People mention fighting undead with an offensive postive channeling cleric(which as of an FAQ ruling, a cleric has to target undead to damage said Dhampir, which means when the cleric targets the living he's not targeted when he wants to heal his allies most of the time); wouldn't said Dhampir be USEFUL against undead?

Or do one of the other things we mentioned.

You act like it's so hard. Is it so hard to think that it's not a big deal for a Dhampir to be effective? To be a good team member? Even if you've had a bad game with one, that doesn't mean every one will.


Darth Grall wrote:
Umbranus wrote:

Some builds are just too feat starved to afford one. And not every cleric is designed as a healer. Just because you can channel energy doesn't mean that you have to use it for in combat healing.

We had a cleric of sarenrae with an anti undead build in our CC game which didn't have selective channel and it worked well.

Yeah, but if there is a Dhampir in that party your build should be different or at least the Dhampir will play around the actions of the cleric. They can just warn the Dhampir and he/she can move out of range. If you're not healing the party in combat, they they can not get hurt out of combat from said healing with more warning.

I still don't see how this would be a problem as long as there is, you know, team work in a team oriented game.

The dhampir is not hurt when the cleric channels to heal but when the cleric channels to hurt undead. They are treated as undead for channeling.


Rynjin wrote:
I find it astounding that your defense of the race boils down to "don't be selfish" when the player of that race is the one being so.

Yes I can see how he is being selfish by not doing exactly what you want regardless of whether thats what he wants to do or not. How annoying when players 'willfully' playes what he wants to play. How selfish to expect to be able to 'force' others to simlpy deal with the small difference and just move on.

Darth has pretty much explained out how it should work, and Umb makes a very salient point. The cleric can pump those positive heals all day and not bother fang face, its only when he blasts the channel to kill undead Dhamp has an issue.

telling players what they can and can't have in 'your' team and demanding that they toe your line because you don't like something is a lot worse behaviour than someone just trying to play something a little different.


Shifty wrote:


telling players what they can and can't have in 'your' team and demanding that they toe your line because you don't like something is a lot worse behaviour than someone just trying to play something a little different.

I'm only telling players they can't play a dhampir when I'm the gm. When I'm a player myself it's easier to just leave the game.


Umbranus wrote:
I'm only telling players they can't play a dhampir when I'm the gm. When I'm a player myself it's easier to just leave the game.

Why is someone playing a Dhamp such a complete dealbreaker for you?


Rynjin wrote:
I find it astounding that your defense of the race boils down to "don't be selfish" when the player of that race is the one being so.

Yeah, I mean we wouldn't ever want someone to be selfish in their roleplaying choices like:

that annoying rogue that makes us all have to wait and strategize so he can get in optimal sneak attacking position,

or that buffoon of a barbarian that ruins all our carefully laid plans by going all Leroy Jenkins, and ruining everybody else's chance to do something cool,

or that useless oracle that can't channel or anything,

or that idiot gunslinger that had to give away our position with his loud gun, cuz he didn't wanna be nerfed by using a different weapon,

or that gloryhog aasimar that makes us all feel inferior with their race that has all benefits and no drawbacks,

I could go on and on about the selfish players I will never play with again.

Or... I could, you know, enjoy a *roleplaying* game.


Or, y'know, none of those things hinder the party in any way except for that asshat of a Barbarian who seems to be every Barbarian ever.

Protip: Sarcasm works better when you pick examples that make sense.


Why are bearded dwarf women or even monks and gunslingers so bad for some people?

It has multiple aspects for me:

In Game:
Why sould a normal adventuere accept a half undead monster into his party, when he can't be sure whether this foul beast will kill him some day to drink his blood?
Better either kill it with fire or at least chase it away.
I would have to play a necromancer or something like it to be able to join forces with a dhampir.
Just saying that the other PCs know that the dhampir is a nice guy is metagaming.

The fluff:
The idea that male vampires and female humans can have a child together may fit into some silly teeny flick like twilight. But for me it doesn't fit into fantasy.
So what remains is the second option, that a pregnant woman being bitten by a vampire has her baby transform into a monster. That would be ok, if they went the whole way and said that dhampirs are actually undead. I could live with that but it would have consequences, as every cleric of pharasma would want to see the dhampir dead.

The mechanical consequences:
As I and others have stated it is not ok, if another player has to pay for the dhampirs drawbacks. In carrion crown clerics who channel positive energy to harm undead can be really strong. And with a normal party they have no reason at all to take selective channeling. With a dhampir he has to either make a totally different char or take selective channeling, which amounts to: The dhampir is deciding what others can or can't play.
So even without problems 1 and 2 the easiest solution to avoid such conflict is to ban the dhampir and other feats and abilities that give negative energy affinty except for special campaigns.

TL;DR
I detest their fluff, I can't (without metagaming) see my PCs join forces with them and they shift part of their drawback onto the party's shoulders.

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.

The dhampir's flavor is straight out of centuries-old real world folklore. Not freakin' Twilight.*

As for the half-undead monster stigma, look at the other races that face a similar stigma.

And the point about gunslingers is that the use of guns murders stealth attempts.

And the writers have confirmed that NOT every priest of Pharasma would want to see dhampirs dead.

There's a lot of misinfo floating around here.

We had a dhampir in our CC party(who was mostly Pharasman, including the dhampir himself). It did not change how we played outside of spotting some cash for inflict wands because, hey, he was family. Everyone played the character they originally planned on playing.

*Also, other dhampir before Twilight and not at all resembling anything from Twilight: Vampire Hunter D and CastleVania.


Also, the claim that all barbarians are Leroy Jenkins clones with no sense of discretion is false.


I truthfully have never played with one that was anything other than Leeroy Jenkins with wild matted hair.

I keep hearing about these fabled "smart Barbarians" but the most recent experience I have with the class are the Barbarian who got 3 of my friend's party members (including himself) killed by announcing their presence before an ambush, and the Barbarian in my own game who sliced me for almost 40 damage (of my 57 HP) because he couldn't wait for me to go NEXT TURN AFTER HIS to tie up the guy I had Pinned.

Silver Crusade

That's just a bad player. Condolences on that.

But not everyone plays the class like that. A lot of us are far removed from that character-type in fact.

My current barbarian has actually worked to prevent unnecessary fights when possible, and detests bloodshed for its own sake. Now if it's something worth fighting for, yeah. But he still doesn't fight stupid.


LEEEEERRRRRROOOOOOOOY JENKINS!

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