D.17 Vampire
A vampire is an undead creature that must drink the blood of living creatures to survive. Unlike most undead creatures, vampires appear to be alive and human, allowing them to act normally in society. Vampires have great power, but also many dangerous weaknesses.
The unusual blend of life and death in a vampire comes from the strange disease of vampirism. This blood-transmitted disease attacks the brain of an infected creature. Such destruction is lethal, and it does cause the death of the original creature’s mind. However, the disease also takes over and replaces most of the brain’s autonomous functions. The creature’s heart keeps pumping, it continues to breathe, and so on, giving the dead creature a convincing imitation of life. Vampires are generally pale thanks to their poor circulation, but not impossibly so.
The half-death inflicted by vampirism can be confusing for a creature’s soul. Although most of the soul passes on to its normal afterlife, fragments remain behind and cling to their original body. These give a newly born vampire a hint of its original personality, but only a hint.
A newly born vampire, called a vampire spawn, does not have a full, independent soul. Its will is completely bound to the vampire that created it, called its sire. The sire’s soul invades and replaces the vacuum left behind when the vampire’s original soul was fractured by death and fled to the afterlife.
Over time, by feeding on blood to strengthen its body, a vampire spawn can connect more deeply to its original soul. If allowed and guided by its sire, it can become strong enough to wrest the rest of its soul back from its afterlife. This unifies the creature’s soul and makes it a new entity fully independent from its sire. A fully ensouled vampire is called a true vampire.
Only true vampires can create new vampire spawn. Since each spawn claims a piece of its sire’s soul to sustain its capacity for thought and action, most vampires can create few spawn at once, or else they risk losing their will. Despite this risk, many true vampires do not permit their spawn to become ensouled. Instead, they may prefer to maintain a small handful of spawn to serve them with no possibility of betrayal. A vampire with a soul powerful enough to command many dependent spawn is called a vampire lord.
Creature Type: Unlike most other playable species, vampires are undead instead of humanoids.
Size: Medium.
Attributes: +1 Strength and Dexterity, -1 Constitution.
Special Abilities:
- Climb Speed: Vampires have a climb speed 10 feet slower than their base speed.
- Darkvision: Vampires have darkvision with a 90 foot range, allowing them to see in complete darkness (see Darkvision).
- Fangs: Vampires have a bite natural weapon (see Table 9.6: Natural Weapons). These fangs retract when not in use, so vampires cannot be identified as non-human by their fangs unless they choose to expose them.
- Undead: Vampires are undead instead of living, and they take damage from most healing effects (see Undead)).
- Unnatural Life: Unlike most undead creatures, vampires share some aspects of living creatures. They must breathe air, and they must sleep as much as humans do.
- Unnatural Charm: Vampires gain a +3 bonus to the Persuasion skill.
- Vampire Archetype: Vampires only gain two class archetypes instead of three. Instead, they treat the Vampire archetype as one of their archetypes, and they gain ranks in it just like they gain ranks in class archetypes.
Special Weaknesses: Vampires have a number of specific weaknesses.
- Blood Dependence: For every 24 hours that a vampire remains awake without ingesting at least one pint of blood from living creatures, its maximum hit points are reduced by 20. If its maximum hit points are reduced to 0 in this way, it dies and withers away into a pile of ash. This penalty is removed as soon as the vampire drinks a pint of blood. A vampire can can enter a torpor to survive indefinitely without blood. While in a torpor, it is unconscious until it smells blood nearby.
- Consecrated Ground: Whenever a vampire enters consecrated ground, it takes 10 damage and becomes stunned (-2 defenses) as a condition. This damage is repeated at the during each subsequent action phase that the vampire spends on consecrated ground.
- Garlic: Whenever a vampire smells or touches garlic, it takes 10 damage and becomes frightened (-2 Mental, -2 accuracy vs. source) by any creatures bearing garlic as a condition. This damage is repeated at the during each subsequent action phase that the vampire spends exposed to garlic.
- Holy Water: Whenever a vampire takes damage from holy water, it becomes stunned (-2 defenses) as a condition.
- Running Water: Whenever a vampire touches or flies over running water, it takes 10 damage and briefly becomes immobilized (-4 Armor and Ref, cannot use movement speeds). This applies as long as the vampire is within 100 feet of the running water, even the water is underground or under a bridge. It can use the struggle ability to move despite being immobilized, but only towards the closest shore. This damage is repeated at the during each subsequent action phase that the vampire spends touching or flying over running water.
- Silver: Vampires are vulnerable (-4 defenses) to strikes using silvered weapons.
- Sunlight: Whenever a vampire is exposed to sunlight, it takes 10 damage and becomes stunned (-2 defenses) as a condition. This damage is repeated at the during each subsequent action phase that the vampire spends in true sunlight.
- Unmirrored: Vampires have no reflection in mirrors, including their clothes and equipment. This can allow careful observers to identify vampires.
- Wooden Stakes: If a vampire loses hit points from a critical strike using a wooden stake, the stake becomes impaled in its heart. The vampire becomes paralyzed (cannot move) until the stake is removed. A wooden stake is a Light improvised weapon that deals 1d4 damage.
D.17.1 Vampire Archetype
Rank 1 – Blood Drain
Whenever a living creature with blood loses hit points from a strike using your bite natural weapon, you can increase your fatigue level by one. When you do, you regain damage resistance and hit points at the end of the round. The recovery is equal to the hit points the target lost from the attack, ignoring negative hit points and any damage increase from critical hits.
Rank 2 – Gentle Fangs
Whenever you deal damage using your bite natural weapon, you can choose not to reduce the target’s hit points below 0, or you can treat the damage as subdual damage. In addition, damage dealt using your bite natural weapon does not wake sleeping creatures unless you inflict a vital wound.
Rank 2 – Reviving Coffin ✨
You can designate a coffin as your home by resting in it for 24 consecutive hours. When you take a long rest in your home coffin, you recover two vital wounds instead of one. In addition, you can cross running water without penalty while in your home coffin.
When you die, if your corpse is placed in your home coffin, you can be resurrected after 24 hours. You can only be resurrected in this way if you were killed by a vital wound with a vital roll of -3 or higher. If you were killed by a more severe vital wound, or by some other effect, even your home coffin cannot save you.
Rank 3 – Charming Gaze ✨
Usage time: Standard action.
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Make an attack vs. Mental against all humanoid creatures in a Large (60 ft.) cone from you. You take a -10 penalty to accuracy with this attack against creatures who have made an attack or been attacked since the start of the last round.
Hit: The target is charmed (friendly with charmer) by you. Any act by you or by creatures that appear to be your allies that threatens or harms the charmed person breaks the effect. Harming the target is not limited to dealing it damage, but also includes causing it significant subjective discomfort. An observant target may interpret overt threats to its allies as a threat to itself.
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The attack’s accuracy increases by +2 for each rank beyond 3.
Rank 4 – Creature of the Night ✨
| Creature of the Night ✨ | Attune |
Usage time: Standard action.
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You shapeshift into the form of a Tiny bat, a Medium cloud of mist, or your normal humanoid form.
- Bat: While in your bat form, you gain blindsense (120 ft.) and blindsight (30 ft.). You cannot speak and have no free hands. All of your normal movement modes are replaced with a 40 foot fly speed with a 60 ft. height limit.
- Mist: While in your mist form, you become floating, intangible, and legless. You cannot speak and have no free hands. All of your normal movement modes are replaced with a 20 foot fly speed with a 30 foot height limit (see Flight).
In either non-humanoid form, you are unable to take any standard action other than movement. Since you have no land speed in those forms, flying does not penalize your Armor or Reflex defenses. You cannot use this ability while paralyzed (cannot move).
Rank 4 – Reviving Coffin+ ✨
You can designate up to three home coffins, rather than only one. This can allow you to travel with one coffin while keeping others safe for emergencies.
Rank 5 – Unholy Perfection
Choose any two attributes other than Constitution. You gain a +1 bonus to those two attributes.
Rank 6 – Dominating Gaze ✨
Usage time: Standard action.
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Make an attack vs. Mental against a humanoid creature within Short (30 ft.) range.
Hit: The target is stunned (-2 defenses) as a condition. While it has no remaining damage resistance, it is confused (-2 defenses, randomly attack or defend) instead of stunned.
Critical hit: If the target is humanoid and was already confused from a previous use of this ability, you may attune to this ability. When you do, the target becomes dominated (must obey commands) by you for the duration of that attunement.
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The attack’s accuracy increases by +2 for each rank beyond 6.
Rank 7 – Blood Drain+ ✨
You can use this ability without increasing your fatigue level. After you do, you briefly cannot do so again.
Rank 7 – Eternal Undeath ✨
Your reviving coffin ability can revive you from any cause of death or severity of vital wound. As long as some part of your corpse, even just a pinch of ash, is placed inside one of your home coffins, you will resurrect after 24 hours. Only the destruction of all of your home coffins or the total annihilation of your corpse can prevent your return.
D.17.2 Base Class Effects
If you choose vampire as your base class, you gain the following benefits.
Attributes
You gain a +1 bonus to your Dexterity. In addition, you gain a +1 bonus to either your Strength or your Intelligence.
Hit Points
You have 8 hit points + twice your Constitution, plus 2 hit points per level beyond 1. This increases as your level increases, as indicated below.
- Level 7: 20 hit points + three times your Constitution, plus 3 hit points per level beyond 7.
- Level 13: 40 hit points + six times your Constitution, plus 6 hit points per level beyond 13.
- Level 19: 80 hit points + twelve times your Constitution, plus 12 hit points per level beyond 19.
Resources
You learn four trained skills from among your class skills (see Skills). You also gain an additional attunement point.
Weapon Proficiencies
You are proficient with all non-exotic weapons.
Armor Proficiencies
You are proficient with light armor.
Skills
You have the following class skills:
- Strength: Climb, Jump.
- Dexterity: Balance, Stealth.
- Intelligence: Deduction, Disguise, Knowledge (dungeoneering and religion)
- Perception: Awareness, Creature Handling, Deception, Persuasion, Social Insight.
- Other: Intimidate, Persuasion