Your quarrel with vampires vs utility isn't silly at all. They really do look disgusting, and it's the main reason why I'm so hesitant at going vamp. Unfortunately, for me, the pros massively outweigh the cons and I need to infect myself.
I run a Templar tank, and I just don't see how I could live without Vampire.
- Elusive Mist is amazing - it gives Templars/DKs huge mitigation and that extra speed they don't naturally have.
- Invigorating drain is hard to beat when it comes to ultimate regeneration, and the stun it causes is rather hard for the enemy to break out of, on my max health tank it actually provides me with a huge heal.
- Devouring Swarm, while it doesn't do a great deal of damage on my tank, if there's enough people around me I will stay alive. For characters built with max magicka and spell damage in mind, this ultimate is cheap, does a great deal of damage and you just won't die while it's up.
- Undeath passive gives you around 33% damage mitigation when you're low health. This can literally save your life.
- Supernatural Recovery.. well, who doesn't want extra stamina and magicka regeneration? =D
A majority of Vampire's fire weakness is negated by Champion Point passives since they lowered it to only 25%, so if you're magicka, there's really no reason NOT to go vampire unless you care about how you look.
So, whenever I create a brand new magicka character, the first things I do is
1. Get vamp
2. Put on a costume and hide that disgusting face
3. Profit