Dhampyr: A New Take

[W E Ray]

I've always felt that the idea of a vampire getting a chick pregnant and having a Dhampyr offspring, half vampire/ half human, was incredibly stupid. Almost as dumb, even, as a Dragon vampire.

But the idea of something like a Dhampyr is cool -- as well as very old in real world myth.

So I have a new idea for the basis of the Dhampyr but it's a bit incomplete and was hoping to chew it a bit here with other Lords of the Boards.

Dhampyr:
A half-vampiric-human resulting from an ancient Divine Curse against heresy, apostacy or other anti-Divine crime.

Ages ago the Divine god of Light (Sarenrae, Lathander, Mishakal...) cursed the first mortal with vampirism as punishment for crimes against the Divine, unfortunately causing the plague of vampires in the Material Plane.

Avatars and High Clerics of the god of Light, in recent ages, have punished apostates and heretics likewise with a similar curse, that of the Dhampyr, a weaker version of the vampire.

While vampires are undead, reproducing through blood sharing in death, dhampyrs are alive and reproduce naturally, through copulation.

Dhampyrs' racial stats are not changed from the Bestiary 2.

(Just, what level Cleric spell would be Curse of Dhampyrism? What would it look like? And -- is this a good idea?)

[Purplefixer]

Sounds like the new 4e 'not a vampire nyah nyah' race that came out with Heroes of Shadow.

As far as good ideas? Sure, that's fine. Flavor-skin anything however you like as long as you're homebrewing. Make it a magical effect that has bred true for a thousand generations, like Owlbears and Gelatinous Cubes.

As a curse something could remove it. You don't want players dropping racial templates for having Break Enchantment cast on them, OR disjunction, so make it diefic and be done with it. Failing that? Polymorph Any Object makes this exact ability possible, and since divine magic isn't as good at altering actual physical things as arcane magic is, make it the same level.

[W E Ray]

Ewwww -- WotC did this?
Yuk. It's far less appealing now.
Ah well.

. . . . I didn't think of the whole Break Enchantment thing. I guess I could say that, like the vampire, the dhampyr was originally a Divine curse but that's been so many bazillions of years ago that the only Dhampyrs you see today, like vampires, are descendents of the long ago curse.

That way I don't have to deal with making a new Cleric spell or adjusting Create Undead or something.

[Mystic_Snowfang]

The only Dhampyrs that occour from the impregnation of a female are those that occur after a male has only recently (like in the past few days max) been turned into a vampire.The others are created a'la Blade.