Other Vampires. What's everyones opinion and thoughts on how they should be created and played in roleplays?

[Cosmos]

I think the title says it all haha, having recently created a vampire based roleplay I was wondering on thoughts, I've seen many MANY variations throughout my time on the site and was in general wondering everyones favourite style of vampires or any good lore tis bits they've heard or thought of? Even just some good character art would be interesting!! :3

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[Heavenchi]

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I think the title says it all haha, having recently created a vampire based roleplay I was wondering on thoughts, I've seen many MANY variations throughout my time on the site and was in general wondering everyones favourite style of vampires or any good lore tis bits they've heard or thought of? Even just some good character art would be interesting!! :3

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For me personally, heavy lore. I want to know their status in this world, powers, limitations, etc. If I don't see that I fear the worse will happen, OC's that don't correlate even though they're the same species. So, I love it when I see, vampires need to drink blood every.. . .. . four days and (insert consequence here) if they don't. There's a . . .. monarchy and a nobility system. Not to mention, I'm a sucker for a bit of a darker twist on them, like a monstrous true form perhaps? I actually have some good vampire art I'll send you a little later. Here's one I have right away though. A good anime character to look up is Shalltear Bloodfallen.

 

[StoneWolf18]

Vampire: The Masquerade

Don’t think I need to elaborate further x3

 

[BackSet]

Vampires have never been a big thing for me. Like, yeah, sure monsters that drink blood. Whatever. If you want to play ine, fine. Just don't expect me to play one and don't go god mode sue.

 

[Idea]

The way I have vampires work in my RPs is really a marriage of convenience and lore. There are, as mentioned, a ton of legends and tales about vampires out there- as a result my image of vampires was of these monsters of the night. They were vulnerable to sunlight and required blood to sustain themselves. If they bit someone they would turn that person into a vampire, and silver was especially harmful to them, as was garlic. Vampires had pale skin and two sets of long teeth, which would still work even when extracted. A lot of this still exists in my current concept of a vampire.

I never held much of a stance towards vampires, not until recently anyway. They were either sheer monsters or occasionally badasses. I thought of vampirism as a cool power/curse and inspired myself in characters like Sorin Markov from magic the gathering or Mina from league of extraordinary gentleman. I dreaded twilight stuff like a lot of people, and even today still feel the need to say "they don't sparkle" whenever I say I'll be playing a vampire.

It was only quite sometime after getting into anime that the idea of vampires as anything other than 100% badass scary monsters started to really get to me. While I don't remember which one started the idea for me, I do know a few really impactful ones towards my current conception of them. Evangeline AK Mcdowell, Leticia Draculair are great classic badass vampires with distinct conflicts of overwhelming power at the cost of one's humanity and with the struggles of immortality. Fate Apocrypha's lancer of black also known as Vlad the Impaler (and later **spoilers***Dracula**) is one of those characters that resonated with me due to his unique goals, to wipe away the legend that made his name a vampire's. Hikair Takanashi and much more recently Sophie Twilight are two characters that take vampire anatomy and traits under different lens, with the former in particular introducing to me the idea of recontextualizing certain supernatural elements into more complex but naturally-forming anatomy. The three big sellers for me on wanting to play such characters were Oshino Shinobu, Evileye and Argen Vampir , being some of th emost compelling characters in the archetype in my opinion. This settled the image that first pops into my head when I think "vampire".

I should probably also mention shadowverse having a tiny bit of influence, but eh.

Spoiler: Sorin Markov

Spoiler: Oshino Shinobu

Spoiler: Hikari Takanashi

Spoiler: Evangeline A.K. Mcdowell

Spoiler: Evileye

Spoiler: Leticia Draculair

Spoiler: Sophie Twilight

Spoiler: Lancer of Black

Spoiler: Argen Vampir

The current version I have of vampires was originality created for my world of Euphorium. I had the ideas floating around before then, but it was as I made it that they really settled into a cohesive unit. In Euphorium vampires come in three kinds: Draculas, Pureblood and Turned. Draculas are the highest form of vampire, being also the most vulnerable to the sun, and being entirely immortal unless killed, but able to regulate their body's aging as they please. When a dracula bites one, that person turns into a turned vampire themselves. Purebloods are vampires born of vampires. They age extremely slowly and turn people into nulls not other vampires when they suck their blood. Turned vampires don't age at all, instead they are immortal within the bodies they had when they were turned into vampires. There is more to the differences, like the different magic these vampires can use, but that's for the curious.
Common traits all vampires have are extremely highetened senses, which functions as a double edged sword because they are too senstive to light and strong smells. A vampire turns to dust when exposed to sunlight, but only the exposed part and the speed at which this happens depends on the vampire's power: the more powerful, the faster. Vampires have the ability to regenerate and can suck out blood and if skilled enough, other things with the blood, however they are dependent on it for nutrition and sanity, as the hunger will make ravaging beasts out of them if they starve for too long. Silver is capable of reversing a vampire's powers. A vampire has pale skin and two elongated fangs which contain small valves capable of forming a vaccum and using pressure to suck and store blood when they bite. Lastly, like all worldhole's in Euphorium, vampires have no inner self, which in their case causes them to lack a reflection, which translates into a difficult but rewarding way of defeating a vampire: Make a portrait of them in their presence and show it to the vampire. This can fundamentally alter the vampire and force it to do your bidding.

Even when I don't use that exact version, one thing I like about my current loli-vampire-based conception of vampires is it fulfills two roles that there aren't that many alternatives to: They go very well with my favorite type of character, the child character, allowing me to also make them more powerful or even badass in their own right so they can better stand with the rest of the crowd, and also vampires are one of the few non-human powerful iconic entities that still look essentially human.

 

[Tove]

I haven't done a vampire in some years now. I like to try to stick to the lore of them being monsters without straying into the realm of them having a wide range of elemental powers or can get pregnant or get someone pregnant. The sunlight still is the enemy and darkness a friend. I just like to keep it simple but that's just me.

 

[BackSet]

I haven't done a vampire in some years now. I like to try to stick to the lore of them being monsters without straying into the realm of them having a wide range of elemental powers or can get pregnant or get someone pregnant. The sunlight still is the enemy and darkness a friend. I just like to keep it simple but that's just me.

To be fair Vampires have been depicted as mages for years even before the invention of tv.

The pregnant thing is vallad. Vampires are corpses, people.

 

[Tove]

To be fair Vampires have been depicted as mages for years even before the invention of tv.

The pregnant thing is vallad. Vampires are corpses, people.

What you're talking about has nothing to do with the topic or my opinion which I stated that's how I play and see them don't quote me just because you don't agree with how I see them. And to be clear I see them as undead creatures that can't reproduce because they are dead. If you want to see them in any other type of way that's on you, dude.

 

[BackSet]

What you're talking about has nothing to do with the topic or my opinion which I stated that's how I play and see them don't quote me just because you don't agree with how I see them. And to be clear I see them as undead creatures that can't reproduce because they are dead. If you want to see them in any other type of way that's on you, dude.

You misinterpreted my post. What I said was that Vampires could potentially, via their long standing assosiations with magic that goes back to before the invention of modern entertainment, have elemental magic spells so that's technically vanilla vampire. I was agreeing with your opinion, nay, fact that vampires can't reproduce because they are frikken corpses.

 

[Tove]

You misinterpreted my post. What I said was that Vampires could potentially, via their long standing assosiations with magic that goes back to before the invention of modern entertainment, have elemental magic spells so that's technically vanilla vampire. I was agreeing with your opinion, nay, fact that vampires can't reproduce because they are frikken corpses.

I'm sorry yeah I did, big apologies.

 

[QuirkyAngel]

My favorite vampire is the sophisticated, elegant kind with a touch of monster. More human than monster (in terms of sensibilities), though I can play all kinds if I like the lore.

I like lores that split abilities and powers between bloodlines, so there's not a bunch of op Draculas with various kinds of magic. One group with shapeshifting abilities. One group with elemental powers. One group of psychics. Reserving such abilities to purebloods/truebloods/nobles/originals/progenitors/ancients would be good too, so that only certain "special" vampires have them. Most "normal" vampires can have supernatural strength, heightened senses, reflexes, blood-drinking, fangs, claws...and that's all a vampire really needs to hunt. Along with immortality, the appearance of a human, and regeneration with blood, they are already quite powerful. While I'm not adverse to magic (on the contrary, I love magic) I find too many superpowers into one creature makes the creature not as appealing (apologies to those that like it).

I'm okay with attractive appearances ( even "sparkles") so long as it serves a purpose for the species. Like lures human prey to them, etc.

As a lover of fantasy and magic, I enjoy vampire origin stories that have to do with a people cursed by "god" more than a vampire virus. Though, its not particularly ground-breaking for me if one is chosen over the other.

Weakness to sunlight and the nocturnal nature of vampires (and drinking blood) is pretty much what defines a vampire to me, so lores that don't have that isn't a vampire story in my mind.

Pregnancy is okay as long as it's restricted to pureblood/trueblood/nobles/originals/progenitors/ancients. I'd prefer it if vampires have low birth rates to compensate for the fact that they're pretty much immortal unless killed (otherwise ecology says they should be outpopulating humans). Procreation through the spread of vampirism to humans is another route to go. While vampires are pretty much corpses, whether or not their reproductive organs work as well as their muscles seem to while undead doesn't matter too much to me--just so long as it makes sense and remains consistent.

I remember liking a lore that required vampires to go through temporary rest/sleep periods that forced them to "die" for every 200 years they live or something like that. They'd reawaken every 50 years having readjust to changing times and their immortality clock resets or something like that. I thought that was a interesting concept.

With regards to aging, it isn't something the dead do...so with vampires that are created after death (formerly human), it's easy to say that they simply remain (appearance-wise) at the age they died. However, if pregnancy and a growth stage for vampires is included in the lore, I like to say young vampires are pretty much similar to humans (barring taste for blood...and maybe strength) until they are killed and reawakened by another vampire (the parent vampire). It's a ritual "natural -born" vampires undergo when they are ready to "die" and join the brood/coven/group of undead. A rite of maturation, so to say. In all cases though, whether natural born or not, a vampire to me has to have at least died once to be a vampire.

 

[Cosmo]

Generational bloodlines are my favorite. Natural born vampires aren't a thing, but the original vampires, or the 'first', came about either through a curse or alchemy making them the 'first' generation. Any humans that those vampires turn would be slightly weaker this represents that initial 'curse/magical power' being diluted as is passes generations. So, a sixth generation vampire is going to be considerably weaker then that first generation but it isn't just the strengths that dilute but weaknesses as well. A newer generation is less effected by sunlight, silver, etc then the older, so, for example, where a first generation vampire will burst into ash in the sun, a sixth/seventh generation vampire would merely feel uncomfortable in the sun. In the end, I suppose, it could dilute enough to where they were just ageless humans with a taste of blood.

As for personality, I love when people keep that bestial nature of the vampires. Yes, they are beautiful, sophisticated 'things', but they aren't human anymore. Behind that beautiful face lies a monster, a beast that wants to drown in blood and this beast is barely kept in check by what humanity [or pride] that vampire has left [or they might even fully indulge, and I love when the lore has such people slowly turning monstrous]. I think the 'hunger' plays a huge role. I like vampires that can survive on sips but will never be satisfied so they can drink an ocean of blood and still the hunger would gnaw at their sanity. So, they are trapped in this never ending war against the hunger and the beast within, a war they will eventually lose and be driven mad by which is why ancient vampires tend to be a bit more unhinged and see humans as nothing more then cattle or blood bags.

Without that inner conflict, Vampires might as well be 'elves' with a taste of blood [ageless, super pretty beings, because, come on, ugly vampires in RPs are rare even more rare if they aren't NPCs].

 

[The Mad Queen]

Vampire the Masquerade and to a lesser extent, Requiem have a lot of tips on playing Vampires. There is going to be horror involved, either in the personal horror as the Vampire tries to hold onto their humanity (this is especially the case in fledglings/new Vampires or Vampires who have killed before and are trying to stay on the wagon) or in the creature horror of the Vampire with no humanity, a nigh-unstoppable force driven by bloodlust.

Being Human (UK) has Vampire characters who fit into both. I won't spoil it though.

 

[Dalamus Ulom]

To me, vampires resonate with the ideals of the tragic hero or villain, and the symbolism of being such a creature enhances and helps represent the ideas behind vengeance and/or revenge by making the character both figuratively and literally bloodthirsty, while allowing one to explore the monsterization and fall of the character through their search for vengeance.

Vampires don't have to be purely villainous mustache twirlers, but by nature of their very existence leeching off of the living, they can no longer be considered purely good in any capacity, but that doesn't block one from doing good despite their abhorrent and unsettling nature. Vampires lay more naturally along a spectrum of gray hues, rather than being morally black or white, allowing them to easily explore darker and more "taboo" areas of morality.

But hey, you can take all of this with a grain of salt if you'd like. After all, Vampires and their hundreds of cousins have existed for centuries, so you can do just about anything you want with them. Hell, it'd be great to see someone make vampires based off of the Australian Yara-ma-yha-who in their setting. I know I'd like to see that.

 

[The Mad Queen]

But hey, you can take all of this with a grain of salt if you'd like. After all, Vampires and their hundreds of cousins have existed for centuries, so you can do just about anything you want with them. Hell, it'd be great to see someone make vampires based off of the Australian Yara-ma-yha-who in their setting. I know I'd like to see that.

When my friend was making bloodlines for a Vampire: The Reckoning game she made custom ones for different parts of the world. The Yara-ma-yha was one of them.

 

[Dalamus Ulom]

When my friend was making bloodlines for a Vampire: The Reckoning game she made custom ones for different parts of the world. The Yara-ma-yha was one of them.

That is freaking awesome.

 

[yanastyboi]

I'm a sucker for vampires but my favorite method of turning is:

Vampire bites person draining a lot of the blood, then shares their own blood, triggering the change. As the person changes their insides die, it's excruciatingly painful, a person can end up not coming out on the other end, but if they do their insides leak from their anus and are puked up (expelling from both ends the remains of your human self). After the master vampire will share more of their blood and then help the new vampire get their first meal.

 

[StormWolf]

Bring on the vampire body horror. Fiction has become over-saturated with the brooding male antithesis to the manic pixie dream girl (depressive demon nightmare boy). That's where Dresden Files, Witcher, and the Strain brought in some much needed fresh air. Dresden Files vampires being personal favorites, because of the variety in different courts.

Spoiler: Dresden spoilers

Red Court is beastly bat-monsters under the masquerade (hurr) of humanity, White Court are succubi/incubi that feed on desire, lust, and sexual energy, Black Court are literal walking dead that eat people and can also use magic.

Witcher was similar to that, in that higher echelons of vampire could blend more, and were more like the classic Dracula, while the lesser vampires were ghoulish monstrosities that couldn't pass for human if they wanted to.
Then, there's the beautiful horror of "The Strain". A truly original and fresh take on vampires in the bland sterility of the boo-hooing deep south gentleman hedonist and the emotionally abusive/misunderstood eternal teenager but-totally-not-a-pedophile vampires. Strain vampires are to vampires as to xenomorphs are to aliens.

 

[The Mad Queen]

Bring on the vampire body horror. Fiction has become over-saturated with the brooding male antithesis to the manic pixie dream girl (depressive demon nightmare boy). That's where Dresden Files, Witcher, and the Strain brought in some much needed fresh air. Dresden Files vampires being personal favorites, because of the variety in different courts.

Spoiler: Dresden spoilers

Red Court is beastly bat-monsters under the masquerade (hurr) of humanity, White Court are succubi/incubi that feed on desire, lust, and sexual energy, Black Court are literal walking dead that eat people and can also use magic.

Witcher was similar to that, in that higher echelons of vampire could blend more, and were more like the classic Dracula, while the lesser vampires were ghoulish monstrosities that couldn't pass for human if they wanted to.
Then, there's the beautiful horror of "The Strain". A truly original and fresh take on vampires in the bland sterility of the boo-hooing deep south gentleman hedonist and the emotionally abusive/misunderstood eternal teenager but-totally-not-a-pedophile vampires. Strain vampires are to vampires as to xenomorphs are to aliens.

I love The Strain. Eichhorst is genuinely frightening in that. I am yet to read all the books or watch the final season as of yet though, but will get round to it.

 

[Elysian-]

They're too overdone.

 

[Elysian-]

Oh sorry I didn't read the rest of this title I think they should be more original.

 

[Dalamus Ulom]

Oh sorry I didn't read the rest of this title I think they should be more original.

Okay, but how? How should they be more original? Do you want to see a version of vampires not often portrayed in media? There are plenty of versions. For example, there is the Malaysian Penanggalan, which is a flying woman's head with trailing entrails.

Or... what? I mean, if you don't know what you want to see, than how can you convey what you want to see to people in order to actually ever see it? Just going and saying they should be more original is like going and giving a one star review to something, with your only explanation for said review being "It's bad".

 

[Elysian-]

Yes, I would like to see a version of vampires not often portrayed in media. Like maybe they're not the typical vampire or something. Like in Darren Shan.

 

[StormWolf]

Re-reading through the comments made by others, vampires and reproduction is a bit of a quagmire. Generational vampirism often lends to mixed-breed nonsense, Sue-characters, and other undesirables. The only instance of vampires sexually reproducing in popular media that I found fitting to the monster they are supposed to be is "Van Helsing" (the B/C movie with Hugh Jackman, not that terrible show). The result of coitus between two undead creatures of the night was appropriately monstrous. Honestly, the vampires in "Van Helsing" in general were freakin' awesome. If you're going to have vampires biologically procreate, have the offspring be a monster as well. Have it result in a ghoul, or some other nasty half-living creature. Have the ghouls eat their way out of their "incubator".

Twilight, True Blood, Vampire Diaries, and a mess of Anime/Mangas have established a dreadfully sterile and squeaky-clean version of the vampire that I find boring, bland, and distasteful. They're supposed to have sexual allure, sure, but it should be like a hunting call. Imagine getting freaky with a longhorn or a buck. Gross, right? That's the similar mentality a vampire should - in my mind - have towards your everyday human. The vampire will use allure as a means to draw out their prey for a cleaner kill, not unlike using a mating call to draw out an animal you would hunt with in the woods. I also understand that biting can be erotic, but there's a definite line between sexy-biting and "blood-sucker" biting. Now, if there is something to explain that away, like in Dresden Files, where Red Court vamps have an opiate effect in their saliva to stun (and addict) their prey, then go for it. Or maybe there's something in the water that makes everyone into that kind of thing. I mean, there IS a brain-eating amoeba that spawns in the waters around Louisiana. It would explain most of Bon Temp's problems.

Giving vampires a loophole like animal blood or blood bank bags is a milksop copout, in my opinion. At that point, it isn't a curse anymore. If you want to have that in your lore, make it a means of survival. It'll keep the vampire "alive", but they'll be sickly and weak. Maybe if a righteous individual is turned, they'll keep it up for a long while, but starvation wins 9/10. To feel full and fed would be enough to crack anyone after a while, nevermind the unnatural powers that might come from feasting on a human. That can play into making a vampire tragic as a player-character/protagonist. How much is someone willing to actively suffer for a population that either doesn't even know they exist, or would hate them for their very nature? How much is believable? How do they keep going in the face of it? Staying isolated while being sickly and starving is a surefire way to turn someone into a psychopathic killer.

tl;dr:
For the love of Gaia, it's okay to make monsters monstrous. Players are generally expected to bet the exception from the norm anyway, so make Vampires grotesque again.

 

[The Mad Queen]

Twilight, True Blood, Vampire Diaries, and a mess of Anime/Mangas have established a dreadfully sterile and squeaky-clean version of the vampire that I find boring, bland, and distasteful. They're supposed to have sexual allure, sure, but it should be like a hunting call. Imagine getting freaky with a longhorn or a buck. Gross, right? That's the similar mentality a vampire should - in my mind - have towards your everyday human. The vampire will use allure as a means to draw out their prey for a cleaner kill, not unlike using a mating call to draw out an animal you would hunt with in the woods. I also understand that biting can be erotic, but there's a definite line between sexy-biting and "blood-sucker" biting.

The anime I saw that made that exception was Castlevania. Yes, Alucard was born from a human woman but Dracula's marriage was viewed by the other Vampires as more like he was keeping a pet, if anything else (only one Vampire had the gut to say that to his face). The Vamperic creations and the Vampires themselves (with the exception of the Vampire hybrid) wreak havoc and are pretty bloodthirsty overall.

There's literally a scene where some Vampires massacre a whole village as part of a hunt because they're bored.
Even if you're meant to sympathise with Dracula, he's still a monster who wants to genocide humanity. The fact that the most "human" pureblood Vampire is a vengeful, genocidal maniac really says something about the other Vampires in that series.