In the MM it says that a vampire spawn reduced to 0 hp has to return to it's coffin or grave and regenerate in two hours or it is dusted.
What happens if it doesn't have a grave? Say a vampire attacks a church, kills a paladin (thereby turning him into a spawn) and leaves his body on teh floor of the church. When 5the spawn awakens the master vampire orders him to guard the area. Say the very next night after the spawn rises PCs come and reduce spawnboy to 0 hp. Where does he flee to? He's never been buried, just killed and reawakened...
Since its a low level party I was thinking of ruling that because he was never buried (and the vampire who made him regards him as expendable) that he has nowhere to escape to and is destroyed after 2 hours in gaseous form. But recurring villains are always so much better so maybe I should rule that he flees to a hole in the ground on the island he died on, or flees to his master who has a bed ready for him in his lair.
What would you guys do?
I think the first place that he seek shelter that would be "safe" for the night would become his "grave," and thereby, his resting place would have to be there or have some element from that place.
As far as the church analogy goes, in Bran Stoker's Dracula they had a crucifix on Lucy, which kept her from becoming a vampire until they could do something more permanent, like cutting off her head, but before they could, the crucifix was removed.
Going by this logic, if someone dies in a hallowed place, they wouldn't come back as a vampire until they were moved away from that place, but unless the head was removed or the body destroyed or what have you, as soon as they weren't in a hallowed place . . . instant vampire.
No, I don't know what the last two paragraphs had to do with what you asked, but for some reason the way I read the questions the thoughts jumped into my head.
That is an interesting concept. The sentence structure implies that a vampire spawn has a coffin that is "his" or "hers" and that any other coffin just wouldn't do. But how does a vampire spawn become paired to its coffin?
Maybe it becomes paired to the first coffin it spends a complete "rest cycle" in. Maybe the coffin has to be prepared by the vampire for the new vampire spawn, like you suggest. Maybe any coffin will do, and it simply becomes his coffin because he chose it for the night.
I am not an expert on vampire mythology or even vampires in D&D, and I generally avoid using them as a DM just to make it easy for me. :)
I do like your idea of making it easy to destroy for a lower-level encounter, though. But it might be a good start for a recurring villian. Or maybe if they destroy it the spirit of the paladin will return in the future to help them in return.
The church thing is not important - it's actually a church of Heironeus that also serves as a jail so you can just imagine that the room he was killed and left in was unhallowed.
I like the idea of the paladin's spirit helping the PCs later. Very cool.
I would actually rule his "grave" to be the last place his corpse was placed. If you die via vampire and are going to rise again and are buried, you've got a proper grave. If, like the paladin, you were killed and just left to lie there, that site is your "grave" that you return to (or the nearest location sheltered from the sun). The vampire could rest somewhere other than that, but they'd need to take stones or some such thing from the site with them. It also doesn't have to strictly be a coffin. Dracula moved around in crates filled with the earth of his home. That seems to illustrate to me that the most important thing is to have a place to "sleep" that has some form of physical tie to the lair/grave/site of death.
Interesting topic!
Yes, Brimstone, the vampire smoke drake from the Year of Rogue Dragons trilogy also kept a piece of treasure from his hoard with him to serve as his "grave" when he was travelling, so I like the concept that you need something symbolic and representative of your grave for your resting place.
I always associate the symbology of a Vampire being required to keep a memento of his grave with him with the Portrait of Dorian Gray. I wonder if there was some crossover influence there?
Anyway, I’ve run across this several times in 2e, where parties lose members to a life-draining undead. A character destroyed becomes one of whatever destroyed him. For some, like Wraith, Wight and Specter, this was almost immediate. The destroyed character could actually end up joining the baddies against former party members during the same combat, if it lasts that long. For characters destroyed by Vampires, though, it’s a little tougher. Normally, the “grave” or “final resting place” is where the body was buried. In this instance, it would be either…
1) The place where the corpse fell, if left undisturbed since that moment , or
2) The place where the corpse was laying at the time of rising , if moved since death.
I decided to rule that the room he was killed in was his refuge.
The PCs had to fight him on the way out of the shrine when they were badly hurt, and by the time they dusted him they didn't even bother following his gaseous form, they just ran to their boat and got the hell off the island. Which is awesome because now they have a vampire spwan with a grudge against them.
Now I just have to figure out where he runs to when the paladins come and rehallow the church. I'm thinking he'll scrabble a grave out of earth (seeing as he can't cross running water) and then he has the whole island as his refuge.
Cheers for the input everyone.