DRACULAS 101↴
As indicated in the Celebration setting post, vampires are about to become a thing again. As such, a want to go over some of the basics with you, so that you will be able to plot with and NPC them for yourself during the masquerade event.
The vampires that the carnival has been having trouble with are of a demonic variety - a new vampire is created by infecting the freshly dead or dying body of a victim with the blood of their vampiric killer. This is accomplished by drinking from them, and then orally feeding them your vampire blood. This will infect them with the vampire curse, fully killing the victim and then resurrecting them unto a kind of undeath, that is not quite living and not quite dead. Any creature with blood is capable of being given this infection - but it has to be something that actually serves as blood, and not just oil or fuel. Most robots or inorganic creatures will be excluded, with a few possible exceptions.
Once transmitted, the infection corrupts the soul of the victim with demonic energies - something almost like a possession, from a second spirit that they will come to know as their "beast." This demonic beast spirit will fuse with the victims, and though it is possible to separate them after the fact, it is magically rather difficult. This demonic spirit contains most of what one would consider to be vampiric instincts - the lust for blood, animalistic tendencies, and a violent nature. It can be combated against by the host, but how much success they will have depends on the strength of their own spirit.
A vampire's power increases as they age, marked by the advancement of their demonic infection. A new vampire will be far less powerful than an elder vampire. As they develop, they will gain new abilities while still retaining their old ones.
► NEONATE
A freshly made vampire - that is, still within the first year or two of their undeath. Neonates are the most numerous stage of vampire, as whether or not they survive this stage tends to be a right of passage towards becoming a full adult. While a terrifying enemy against regular mortals, those with strong magic or enhanced combat abilities will find it possible to take them one on one, or even one on two if they are feeling spry. About 80% of the vampires that attacked the carnival months ago were neonates. Neonates tend to be less graceful than adults, and also struggle to control their bloodlust. Neonates will be available for anyone to NPC during the masquerade.
Physical Power: A neonate vampire could lift a half-ton truck, and can move with speed just beyond peak human physical capability.
Supernatural Charm: New vampires immediately begin to exude a kind of animal magnetism, that will subconsciously draw in humans and other like-minded creatures. Those near them will find it difficult to say no to their demands, and will find it tempting to get close to them, due to a mixture of intimidation and seduction. They may or may not realize that this is an irrational compulsion.
Paralytic Saliva: Their saliva can cause numbness in areas touched by it, as well as causing victims to lose control of their motor functions with prolonged exposure. This is a magical affect and not a chemical one, so it will work on any creature that would be susceptible to alchemy based poisons.
► ADULT
A fully matured vampire, this stage will have developed additional powers and physical capabilities, and will gradually grow in strength with them as they age. Depending on a vampire's sire, it may take anywhere from a couple months to a few years to reach the state of being fully mature. This means that an "adult" vampire could have been undead for anywhere from a few months to a few centuries. The remaining 20% of attackers were mostly adult vampires. Adults can be NPC'd by players during the masquerade, but only if get permission from the mods first and give us an idea of what they'll be doing, so we can keep track.
Physical Power: By the time they are an adult, a mature vampire's strength and speed will have approximately doubled from how they were when they were a neonate. That means about 1 ton lifting strength and the ability to move twice as fast as any human.
Hypnosis: At this stage, vampires will have learned how to use their magnetism to fully hypnotize susceptible victims, based primarily on the use of eye contract and voice. Though outside interruption can break the hypnotic trance, while in its sway a vampire can use it to control or break down a victim's will or even convince them to forget or missremember information. With enough time and exposure, a victim's memory and identity could be completely warped by this power.
Beast Control: Vampires can use their own "beastial spirit" to control or intimidate animals. Predators and scavengers will be inclined to obey their will as if a member of their "pack" and prey animals will be instinctively terrified of them. This effect may work on those in the carnival with animal instincts, whether they be from fae effects, a part of their species, or otherwise.
Shadowalk: Not quite teleportation, not quite invisibility - vampires can blend into the shadows and pass through crowds without drawing attention. If there is any shade present, they will be able to blend into it and go unseen by human eyes. In crowds, this will make them completely indistinct to people's notice - they may realize there is a body there, but its relevance will be completely suppressed until they strike.
► ELDER
The longest lived of all vampires, elders are usually at least a thousand years old if not older. They are the most loyal servants and right hand men of their demonic overlord, and can bend the wills of most mortals with ease. Elders are not available to be NPC'd by players, and will be exclusively under mod control for plotting purposes.
Physical Power: This is where you get to the level of being able to shove semi-trucks around and moving so quickly it may as well be teleportation. Wounds will heal within minutes if they haven't been dealt by silver or holy magic. Damaging the heart can prove to be difficult, as even getting through an elder's outer skin is a challenge. Elders are also more or less immune to damage from heat or cold.
Mind Control: Straight up mind control, without the fragility or hypnosis. Elders can erode the will of humans just by being around them, and can control multiple individuals at once, to varying degrees.
Transformation: Elders can turn onto smoke, thus becoming mostly immune to damage, and can also grow bat wings and other devilish features at will.
All stages of vampire are vulnerable to silver, particular forms of holy magic, and damage done directly to their heart. They are not more vulnerable to fire than average. Most other injuries can be healed within days or even hours, provided they are able to feed and recover. Destroying a vampire's heart will destroy the demonic spirit's hold on their body, thus effectively killing them.
BECOMING A VAMPIRE↴
Since the villains of this plot are vampires, there is going to be the potential for carnival members to be turned into one during the attack - provided they have the necessary blood, of course. This transformation will not necessarily be permanent, as the Ringmaster will be capable of potentially removing the infection with enough time and care, and so your character could be expected to be in that state for as little as a week, or up to as long as 'indefinitely', depending on your narrative preferences. That is, after things have been settled and they have been brought back to the carnival in one piece.
Being turned into a vampire will mostly occur during the masquerade, during which vampires will be using stealth and seduction to turn or capture members of the carnival. The primary focus of kidnappings will be on the supervisors, or order to most effectively disorganize the carnival's ranks, but being turned could happen to just about anyone. Once a character is turned, they will be compelled to obey their sire, and follow the bidding of the vampire's overlord - this effect will last until these characters are subdued or rescued from the vampire's clutches. Special situations asides, all captives and newly turned vampires will be stolen back to the vampire's home dimension before the masquerade is over.
New vampires will, by default, start with the abilities of a neonate - however, if they are turned by a particularly old or or elder vampire, they will potentially get a head start on developing adult vampire abilities. The older the vampire the sire, the more powerful their progeny will be. The purpose of turning carnival members is mostly to corrupt and confuse their command structure, and also to be as huge of dicks as possible. |
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livinglot2017-02-23 11:29 am
⇨ QUESTIONS
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Also do vampire snakes need less blood than vampire humans? I can't believe I'm asking this but it MIGHT BE RELEVANT.
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2) No heartbeat.
3) Cold, hard to cut skin.
4) Fangs that can get even bigger if they are amping up for the kill.
5) Longer than normal tongues.
6) Finger nails that are hard to break and claw-like.
7) Consumed blood isn't proportionate to how much blood stays in the body. (IE they can drink a lot more than a body could hold.)
8) Burn in sunlight, though it would take a bit of exposure to actually die.
9) Genitals are still functional, with some effort.
10) Usually vampires become more attractive, in subtle ways.
RE: SNAKES - yes, they would require far less blood than a human sized vampire.
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Also, from what my understanding of black hellfire was, they wouldn't be more affected by it than average, since they aren't more soul than a human is. Or I guess, they have more soul, but in the same sized package. So it would suck for them, but not more than standard. Unless I am misunderstanding how that ability works!
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Thanks!
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Zombies like him are a lower order of undead than vampires, I would assume, so like... adult vampires would presumably be a lot more difficult/resistant and anything especially old would just probably find him annoying at best.
Y/N/potato?
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I'm not sure what qualities a corpse has that his magic is specifically attuned to, but since vampires already have two souls inside of them, controlling them, it doesn't seem like it'd be more effective than use against a living body.
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2nd Question: How aware are the new neonates of the control their vampire sire's have over them? Are they completely aware and helpless to stop themselves or do they think they've always wanted to obey?
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2nd: That would depend on the sire and what they're will is. An adult sire would be capable of manipulating their children into believing they were loyal for reasons beyond just the compulsion. And, even if they are turned by a neonate, that neonate's sire will have that sort of influence through the family line. So, really, the mind control aspects can vary.
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Are vampires able to sense if someone's a vampire, or are they running on 'this person looks human, they must be human' logic? The reason I ask is Sora looks semi-vamp-ish right now, so would they be able to tell he's human?
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Sora has Light and Holy powers! They're not anything extreme, but they're pretty prominent in his skill set. Would that effect him turning into a vamp?
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Lambert's got a few doses of a potion that can temporarily render the drinker's blood toxic to vampires (either ingestion or exposure, but user has to be wounded first) -- would it be safe to assume hurt these vampires too? If it helps clarify its properties at all, it's made largely of dead person blood.
This is probably going to later down the line (or not at all since he won't have time to prepare it/gather ingredients unless they go back to the carnival) but he can make a 'vampire oil' meant to coat weapons to make them temporarily more effective against vampires! Will this be something he could make for general distribution/will it be effective against the creatures?
Is silver readily available around the celebration in the form of household objects/jewelry if our characters don't have silver weapons on their person?
Do the vampires have reflections or not?
Can we NPC killing the vampires (assuming mostly neonates, and within reason) at the Masquerade if they attempt attacking other characters? Will this result in repercussions from the Host?
I had some more questions but I think they're more generally Masquerade-specific and things that'll be answered when the post goes up, but these are the big ones for me!
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2) What quality to the potion makes it effective against vampires in particular? Is it a sort of anti-evil concoction or is it a bane that's specific to his homeworld?
3) The cutlery in the dining hall is silver!
4) They do have reflections.
5) You can definitely have your characters kill NPC vampires - within reason, as mentioned. You can even have them kill an adult, as long as you let the mods know what you're doing first. There will be reprecussions from the host, but those will be coming no matter what, so there's no reason not to in a narrative sense.
I think that was everything? Let me know a bit more about what aspects of a vampire those potions target and I can let you know more,
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Lambert's going to want to pin down and interrogate a vampire -- ideally an adult -- in an effort to find out more about what's going on, motives behind the attack, basically get some clarity beyond what the supervisors have been able to spit out. He'll try to recruit other characters to assist in the take down, but he's gonna be pretty direct about the interrogation itself bc of time constraints -- bind 'em with silver, feed them poisonous blood to weaken/disorient them, and then try to use his ~Witcher magic~ to persuade them to cough up info.
Obviously this is a bit involved, so questions:
1. Would this effort be successful? If so, what kind of info could he find out?
2. Logistically, do I need to make up a personality/information bit about the vampire, like I would if I was getting a character turned, and NPC that vampire?
3. Barring intervention by characters, Lambert would kill the vampire at the end of his session, because that's how he rolls -- would that be okay?
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This tip came in a couple days ago. The neonates and their sires were sent in with the main objective of capturing the supervisors, and turning any other carnival randos they could find. It was revenge for all of the vampires they killed during the last confrontation Morningstar's forces had with the carnival - particularly the Nightrider's crew starting shit by assassinating some of them on the vampire's home planet.
This vampire will also plead that Lambert doesn't kill her in exchange for this information, but. Well.
2) You don't really have to because Lambert is probably going to kill them. I have arbitrarily decided that they are female and that they will plead for their life, but beyond that you can assume what you want.
3) THAT'S UP TO HIM.
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