Vampires

Morgha_Kul · July 2

So... I haven't played my vampire character for quite some time, and I'm forced to wonder what the point is now.

There seems to be no reason to feed. My vampirism stage doesn't progress at all, no matter how long I go without feeding. Indeed, I'm told now that feeding actually advances the stage.

So... there's no drawbacks at all to being a vampire now? Vampirism is supposed to be a curse, as is lycanthropy. I feel things are backwards now. Vampirism needs to be a curse. Great power, but at a great cost, and feeding would be required to avoid the cost... or at least mitigate it.

Having said all that, I gather they revamped werewolves recently, so I'm kind of expecting the same for vampires (a literal reVAMP). My thinking is this: Historically, there have been several CLANS of vampires. Why not implement vampires as separate clans?

In Morrowind, there were three clans, Berne, Aundae and Quarra (representing rogues, wizards and warriors, respectively). Each had the basic attributes of a vampire, but different skills, based on the characteristics of the clan. Of course, you would only be able to be in one clan at a time.

They could do the same for various factions around the world, such as the knightly orders of the Bretons, the Great Houses of the Dunmer or what have you.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 2

The Vampires in ESO are tailor made by Lamae Bal, the original Vampire, in most settings the oldest Vampires tend to have the fewest weaknesses, they don't possess regular Vampire weaknesses because you're not a regular Vampire.

Toanis · July 2

Morgha_Kul wrote: »

So... there's no drawbacks at all to being a vampire now? Vampirism is supposed to be a curse, as is lycanthropy. I feel things are backwards now. Vampirism needs to be a curse. Great power, but at a great cost, and feeding would be required to avoid the cost... or at least mitigate it.

That same talk got Vampires changed in the first place, it used to be a boost to regular builds, that had to be moderated by feeding, now it's a curse for anything other than bloodfiend, and by feeding you decide how deep you want to steep into it .

How bad the drawbacks are depends on your priorities, but there's something for everyone:

3-12% cost increase for any non-vampire ability
5-20% Increased incoming fire damage
10-100% reduced health recovery
A skin condition that is more likely to be a detriment to fashion than a boon

icefyer_ESO · July 4

Toanis wrote: »

[*] A skin condition that is more likely to be a detriment to fashion than a boon

This is exactly why I'd love to be able to hide your vampire skin overlay like you can your helmet. There's canonically a vampire strain in the ES universe that looks basically like mundane mortals, from I think Oblivion? And the lore has bosmer vampires that are completely indistinguishable unless viewed in candle-light specifically which is odd, but another precedence. You'd think us being the spawn of the first vampire directly would mean we could do that too considering all other strains are offshoots and descendants of that original strain.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 4

icefyer_ESO wrote: »

Toanis wrote: »

[*] A skin condition that is more likely to be a detriment to fashion than a boon

This is exactly why I'd love to be able to hide your vampire skin overlay like you can your helmet. There's canonically a vampire strain in the ES universe that looks basically like mundane mortals, from I think Oblivion? And the lore has bosmer vampires that are completely indistinguishable unless viewed in candle-light specifically which is odd, but another precedence. You'd think us being the spawn of the first vampire directly would mean we could do that too considering all other strains are offshoots and descendants of that original strain.

Not quite, lesser clans are mutated versions

Arunei · July 4

icefyer_ESO wrote: »

Toanis wrote: »

[*] A skin condition that is more likely to be a detriment to fashion than a boon

This is exactly why I'd love to be able to hide your vampire skin overlay like you can your helmet. There's canonically a vampire strain in the ES universe that looks basically like mundane mortals, from I think Oblivion? And the lore has bosmer vampires that are completely indistinguishable unless viewed in candle-light specifically which is odd, but another precedence. You'd think us being the spawn of the first vampire directly would mean we could do that too considering all other strains are offshoots and descendants of that original strain.

The Cyrodiil strain I believe is the one that looks completely mortal as long as they're well-fed, and iirc was given to the original clan leaders via Clavicus Vile.

But Vampires are lore-wise also extremely skilled with magick in many cases, with the ability to charm and enthrall others easily. Even if that wasn't the case, Illusion magick is a thing. I don't see why Vampires couldn't just innately be able to disguise themselves as mortals. Verandis does it after all at first, and there are a few other Vampires that hide their appearance as well.

At any rate, I've said before that I'll be surprised if we don't hear about a Vamp rework next year at some point seeing as all the other Classes and WW have got/are getting one.

icefyer_ESO · July 6

Arunei wrote: »

icefyer_ESO wrote: »

Toanis wrote: »

[*] A skin condition that is more likely to be a detriment to fashion than a boon

This is exactly why I'd love to be able to hide your vampire skin overlay like you can your helmet. There's canonically a vampire strain in the ES universe that looks basically like mundane mortals, from I think Oblivion? And the lore has bosmer vampires that are completely indistinguishable unless viewed in candle-light specifically which is odd, but another precedence. You'd think us being the spawn of the first vampire directly would mean we could do that too considering all other strains are offshoots and descendants of that original strain.

The Cyrodiil strain I believe is the one that looks completely mortal as long as they're well-fed, and iirc was given to the original clan leaders via Clavicus Vile.

But Vampires are lore-wise also extremely skilled with magick in many cases, with the ability to charm and enthrall others easily. Even if that wasn't the case, Illusion magick is a thing. I don't see why Vampires couldn't just innately be able to disguise themselves as mortals. Verandis does it after all at first, and there are a few other Vampires that hide their appearance as well.

At any rate, I've said before that I'll be surprised if we don't hear about a Vamp rework next year at some point seeing as all the other Classes and WW have got/are getting one.

True. No reason Verandis or his Ravenwatch kids couldn't teach the player character how to do it as part of the vamp rework in that case. I know in Greymoor he's even shocked as all hell that another vampire was powerful enough to do it to other vampires, including him in like the first couple quests of the DLC. Makes sense the group of vampires most wanting to live among and help mortals would do what they could to spread the knowledge of how to blend in with their allies.