So what I'm looking to create with the aid of the community (hopefully) is a vampire that we can use at level 1. (I'd prefer if we can get it down to a CR +1
However..... This is the part where it gets a bit interesting...
I don't want dominate person, and level drain / negative energy.
They are able to walk in the sun light (it basically irritates the skin and or fatigues them, but it doesn't kill them or seriously hinder them)
The only method to kill them is to lop off their head (Yes this means that staking doesn't work) Garlic doesn't work, water doesn't work, holy symbols don't work.
The way to spread vamprism is through the ingestion of vampire blood.
Anyone interested in taking on this project with me?
Check out Liber Vampyr from Necromancers of the Northwest, they have all your asking for, and they have the Pathfinder compatible stamp.
I did and no they don't. I'll take the project on myself. I'm tired now.. Sleep well everyone and take care.
The "unkillable except by decapitation" bit is a bit of a deal-breaker if you want this to be available around 1st level.
I'd suggest damage resistance with some regen factor that comes into play if they're not decapitated but make it an easy enough coup de grace action.
Regeneration 0 (coup d'grace)- cannot be killed except for the rounds after coup d'grace. Couple this with Feign Death when dying (Heal check to recognize that vampire remains undestroyed) making possible being left for dead.
The "unkillable except by decapitation" bit is a bit of a deal-breaker if you want this to be available around 1st level.
Unkillable ... NO
Want to make it more live the Movie version, suggest this...
A) = Vampires should still take normal damage from: Silver, Wood, and Fire at the very minimum......(even then Fast Heal rate of healing is reduced to 1 minute for wood, 10 minutes for Silver, and 1 hour for fire)..... Unless you want to give up Fast Heal, Undead Traits, Damage resistance, and Resist Cold/Electricity.
B) = Sunlight should at least cause PAIN!!! (like -6 to saving throws, Attack roll, AC, and Initiative),....although does no do any damage unless your Hit points are at 0 hp or below..... so you lose Energy Drain, Dominate........But i would give them Charm Person (D&D version) instead.
C) = Lose the shape change (bats, fog, etc) and Children of the Night abilities ..... and loss the weakness to water, garlic, and ordinary holy symbols (Cleric holy symbols with cleric, spells, powers etc would still work as normal).
Most of the New movie vampires, give up option C. and B to some point. Wood has tradition been used vs vampires (although not so much in D&D version), Fire is an old classic (Takes a long time to regenerate), and Silver i have noticed used alot in the new movies (( but never in the very old old black and white movies... which was wood and fire-----silver was the were-wolf killer)).... alas time change as does there venerability... hehe take a look at the Buck Rogers 23 Centery TV show version of a Vampire:)
B) = Sunlight should at least cause SPARKLES!!!fixed for you.
LOL ;p
Sunlight I'm thinking would cause irritation, fatigue of some sort.
A -6 to saves to me just seems extensively silly.
My goal is to bring the vampires in and around the lycanthrope area but a tad more powerful.
Any way, since some of the community does seem interested I'll post the results here of the progress once it gets going.
As for damage. I was thinking perhaps that yes the only way to officially kill them is to lop off the head, but they take damage from just about anything.
In addition perhaps dead man's blood >.> (I am so not taking inspiration from Supernatural here >.>)
Here is a quick question for you all.
If I were to remove the standard pf vampires energy drain and dominate abilities. Would that drop it down to a +1 CR rather than +2?
So what does everyone think of this. My goal is to make a vampire which is stronger than the lycan, but yet not as strong as the vampires in the beastiary. Any help would be appreciated. I'm aiming for a +2 CR which can be applied to lvl 1 characters and doesn't unbalance things too much.
CR: Base Creature's +2
Racial Hitdice become d8's
+2 Natural Armor Bonus
Darkvision 60 ft
Channel Resistance +4
Resistance 5 Cold
Fast Healing 5Corporeal Undead Traits
Vampires are subject to non-lethal damage.
Vampires do sleep, preferably during the day.
Vampires are required to drink fresh blood or they suffer penalties and severe hunger.Weaknesses: Dead man's blood. If vampire ingests or takes into body, they become exhausted and sickened.
If exposed to sunlight vampires feel sickened and are required to rest for two hours per hour they remain exposed. In addition they suffer 1d6 nonlethal damage per hour they remain exposed.
The only way to kill a vampire is to decapitate it.
+2 str, +2 dex, +2 wis
+8 perception
Alertness and Toughness.Blood Drain (Su): A vampire can suck blood from a grappled opponent; if the vampire establishes or maintains a pin, it drains blood, dealing 1d4 points of Constitution damage. The vampire heals 5 hit points or gains 5 temporary hit points for 1 hour (up to a maximum number of temporary hit points equal to its full normal hit points) each round it drains blood.
Anyone have ideas for feeding penalties, or rather lack there of?
I dont have any books in front of me, so I dont know what the CR modifier is off hand. If it is CR+2, and you want to start one at 1st level, then just halve all the bonuses. Make it a 1st level vampire with just half the bonuses that vamps get and nothing to BAB or saves or skills. Then at second level take the rest of the bonuses with again, nothing to BAB, saves and skills. Then at third take your first level in whatever class you want. Just remember for balance sake, whatever weakness you take away from them you need to replace with something equally severe. If not, you are making a character that will be vastly superior to any other character in the game. Hope that helps.
I was recently thinking about stripped down PF vampires, without level/Con drain or fast healing (to start with). I have yet to see how that would actually work.
Well my vamps now have fast healing of 2.
Anyway, I'll let you know how it goes Arakhor
CR: Base Creature's +2
Racial Hitdice become d8's
+2 Natural Armor Bonus
Darkvision 60 ft
Channel Resistance +4
Resistance 5 Cold
Fast Healing 2Corporeal Undead Traits
Vampires are subject to non-lethal damage.
Vampires do sleep, preferably during the day.
Vampires are required to drink fresh blood or they suffer penalties and severe hunger.Weaknesses: Dead man's blood. If vampire ingests or takes into body, they become exhausted and sickened.
If exposed to sunlight vampires feel sickened and are required to rest for two hours per hour they remain exposed. In addition they suffer 1d6 nonlethal damage per hour they remain exposed.
The only way to kill a vampire is to decapitate it.
+2 str, +2 dex, +2 wis
+8 perception
Alertness and Toughness.Blood Drain (Su): A vampire can suck blood from a grappled opponent; if the vampire establishes or maintains a pin, it drains blood, dealing 1d4 points of Constitution damage. The vampire heals 5 hit points or gains 5 temporary hit points for 1 hour (up to a maximum number of temporary hit points equal to its full normal hit points) each round it drains blood.
1st-6th lvl, sunlight - instant death
7th - 13th lvl, sunlight burns 1d6 dmg per round of exposure, skill use and powers impossible.
14th - 19th lvl Sunlight causes weakness and lethergy, reducing all skills and damage by half.
20th lvl no damage from sunlight, but it darkens the skin from temporary cooking reduce all abilities by half.
Just some thoughts.
I would just use the vampire rules as is and allow the players stronger characters to begin the campaign. Have it be a villians campaign. Your the bad guys controled by an evil intelligence, it demands a vast dungeon well stocked. The higher level a vampire is, the more powerful it is.
Van Richten's Guide to Vampires (AD&D: Ravenloft Accessory
I was playing around with the idea of Nosferatu prestige class. Not really a prestige class the a PC would take, rather a 10th level Nosferatu master would forcibly impose onto a potential victim. Working like a prestige class it had a requirement equivalent to a 5th level character, as those of lesser levels do not survive the 'transition.'
I gave it 10 more or less traditional vampire weaknesses, however lowered the 'being in sunlight' to a light blindness they suffer, rather than any actual damage. As the 'aspiring Nosferatu' gains levels he loses one vampire weakness of his choice, except for the most severe which was immersion into water causes CON drain 1 per round.
As the Nosferatu progressed he gained up to five powers mostly based on combat, movement and mental attacks. Though these nosferatu are not as powerful as their Vampire equivalents in the Bestiary - though not as weak either.
Although an undead type, my Nosferatu was required to cause CON damage in blood loss to its victims to gain a temporary 1 CON per point damaged up to a maximum CON point the Nosferatu had in life. Then 1 point of CON is consumed per day, until a Nosferatu is forced to CON damage someone else in order to survive. Note victims do not require complete CON damage to feed a Nosferatu.
Only a master Nosfertu (10th level) can create new Nosferatu, lesser Nosferatu can only CON damage or kill.
Anyway, I didn't develop it much further than that, though I do have a complete list of 10 weaknesses.
I was hoping to release something for October, but got too busy on other projects to get around to it. So I might finish designing it and publish on its own or with a mini adventure sometime next year.
Sorry, that was my most recent thoughts on vampires.
GP
|
Just thought I'd mention, but what you're describing is quite similar to something I wrote up around the release of pathfinder (i think it was for 3.5).
An LA+0 Vampire Template, with a (I think it was 10) level PrC.
The Power was a bit high, but it would be less problematic in PFRPG, and could be toned back a bit.
Here's a link
http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-legacy-house-rules/268688-playable-vampire -level-0-up.html
I was trying to avoid the whole 'Monster Template' concept, and using Prestige Classes to help define 'formerly human monsters', such as vampires, werewolves and flesh golems. So I created unique Monster Prestige classes only as: Nosferatu, Loup Garou and Frankenstein's monster.
So instead of taking on a monster template upon 'conversion', PC's automatically take the Prestige Class, but then like a prestige class, a minimum power level is required (5th level).
Note the bestiary hints that fully intelligent Flesh Golems are believed to exist, so what I did was create a standard flesh golem, that once it goes mad and rages, at the completion of rage period, the Flesh Golem is now thinking as the PC and fully aware, and no longer under control of its maker.
GP
Really it was intended as an NPC prestige class, but also for my players - I've got some weird players who want to play Vampires and such. I've always felt that vampires were too weak (no day walkers) and too powerful (drain life is just ugly), so I was creating a step in between less weak and less powerful, but still fitting the vampire tropes.
And to me Prestige class levels aren't outside the system, as prestige classes are a possible expectation in normal play. To achieve some balance, a 4th level PC/NPC being drained by a Nosferatu is just dead, whereas a 5th going to 6th level is strong enough to survive the conversion.
Still, I never published it.
GP
|
|
Drain life isn't in mine either.
I turned the instadeath into damage, so if you're powerful you can survive it, and you get a resistance to it from turn resist.
Giving someone a free level in a prestige class outside regular leveling is outside the system to me, unless you do one of the following:
- Make them permanently lose a level (I dont like that idea)
- Make them wait until they level to become a vampire (that's really unsatisfying to me).
For either of those, you made them give up a level to become a vampire. More okay if they want to be a vampire, less okay if they didn't have a choice in the matter and it just happened. They also may have lost an opportunity to level in another class because they got turned.
So I came up with a template that wouldnt change their level. They can acquire the template spontaneously - mid level, and it won't make them much more powerful.
Then if they want to gain more power after that, they can take levels in the PrC, but it's completely optional.
btw, GamerPrinter - how did your british isles campaign setting turn out, with the wizards who use staves as spellbooks? (Sylrae)
btw, GamerPrinter - how did your british isles campaign setting turn out, with the wizards who use staves as spellbooks? (Sylrae)
Hey, Sylrae! Didn't mean to put you off, on the Runemaster, got busy on other things. Right now my feudal Japan inspired horror setting is a patronage project in development right now (should be released in March). Once Kaidan is released, I can look to doing the Iron Age Celts again. Priorities got in the way.
GP
|
|
No worries. You did some interesting things with it, and I wouldn't mind checking it out when its finished.
I think ENWorld might be the only site where I'm still using the moniker Sylrae.
But thats basically why I still have a template for vampire. the template makes you a spawn, and anything after that is earned at levelup. That way I don't feel like I'm giving someone a free levelup if they become a vampire mid session, and yet I can still do it.