Vampires

[Goldennose]

Vampires seem to change most in every edition of Runequest... How do you handle these creatures?

In 2ed scenarios you can meet vampires with POW and load of Spirit Magic... In 3 ed you face a very powerful Vampire that has loads of Rune magic... If you change those creatures to RQG version of Vampire, whole scenarios may start to suck. (I don´t say names of the scenarios to not spoil anyones games, but you may know what scenarios I mean.)

And in recent gameplay Trouble at Greydog´s Inn a vampire turned to wolf... Is it meant in RQG, that vampire in wolf form is a simple wolf or more powerful Vampirewolf, with more STR for example and Vampiric powers still?

 

Edited November 30, 2020 by Caras

[Goldennose]

In bestiary it says that vampires are Runemasters of Vivamort Cult... But I like to have also different kind of vampires... Like in Tales 19... Lesser Vampires... Many different kind of vampires. Vampires that are creation from other sources, such as Delecti.

 

[Goldennose]

Is the mention of Vampire Kingdom neighboring Lunar Empire (Tales 19) canonical or just fanfiction?

 

Edited November 30, 2020 by Caras

[jajagappa]

41 minutes ago, Caras said:

Vampires that are creation from other sources, such as Delecti.

Also see the Daughters of Darkness in the RQ Bestiary.

[Nick Brooke]

My advice? Make each Vampire interesting and unique. Don't apply cookie-cutter templates. Vampires come from many different cultures; vampirism is associated with Sorcery; and Sorcery is experimental by its nature. There isn't a world-wide "Cult of Vivamort" (all with red-lined black opera capes and Transylvanian accents). There's a way you can violate natural law to stay alive when you should by rights be dead, and if you're the kind of person who can crack that you now have a lot of time to work on your own bizarre foibles.

[Nick Brooke]

1 hour ago, Caras said:

Is the mention of Vampire Kingdom neighboring Lunar Empire (Tales 19) canonical or just fanfiction?

There is no canonical reason to believe there is a secretive and ancient kingdom of Vampires in the Grey Mountains north of the Lunar Empire, or to think they are in any way associated with the immortal survivors of the Vampire Legion of Tanisor, nor indeed to associate them with the high rate of vampiric events on the Carmanian regional activity tables. None whatsoever. I hope I have been clear.

[metcalph]

20 hours ago, Caras said:

Vampires seem to change most in every edition of Runequest... How do you handle these creatures?

In 2ed scenarios you can meet vampires with POW and load of Spirit Magic... In 3 ed you face a very powerful Vampire that has loads of Rune magic... If you change those creatures to RQG version of Vampire, whole scenarios may start to suck. (I don´t say names of the scenarios to not spoil anyones games, but you may know what scenarios I mean.)

And in recent gameplay Trouble at Greydog´s Inn a vampire turned to wolf... Is it meant in RQG, that vampire in wolf form is a simple wolf or more powerful Vampirewolf, with more STR for example and Vampiric powers still?

Some indication of how to handle Vampire Magic may come with the Red Book of Magic's impending release.  Currently I figure it's something along the lines of using victim's blood to replenish runepoints.  

The RQ3 vampire that you mention was actually created using the cult writeup in RQ2.  The situation for vampires in RQ3 was at the time of writing unsettled (and continued to remain so).

The main cult of vampires in and around Dragon Pass is Nontraya, who basically commands the uliving army (zombies, skeletons et).  Other vampiric traditions may be destruction of the soul (based on some cryptic hints about Pelanda) and so forth.

Given RQG's sorcery rules, I don't think sorcery is viable as a drop-in replacement for the lost spirit and rune magics.  A vampire might still know sorcery but he would only cast big spells to protect himself, boost weapons, gain magic points etc and not as a versatile source of combat magic. 

[MOB]

17 minutes ago, metcalph said:

The RQ3 vampire that you mention was actually created using the cult writeup in RQ2. 

I can confirm that. 

BTW, Andrew Logan Montgomery, has a HQG conversion of the Old Sun Dome vampire here.

[Akhôrahil]

Vampires right now don't work with any magic except Sorcery (no POW means no Spirit magic and no new Rune Magic), but hopefully the Cults book will give us a working Vivamort cult, presumably with some kind of draining ability for Rune Magic. 

[Hteph]

I have never liked the Vampires so I have used various fan made Vivamort cults and my own tweaks, but Vampires have never been center stage in any RQ campaign that I have run or played in.

But in general my Vivamort has always been centered around a myth of hubris and stealing death and then losing it to Humakt (making it a dark reflection of Erumal) with a long list of small myth where Vivamort loose to all kinds of Gods and in the end overcoming extinction by becoming the opposite of all losses. Kind of that jerk who says "you can't sack me, I quit" and then having revenge fantasies and living in their own reality .... or some variant of this.

[soltakss]

On 11/30/2020 at 11:12 AM, Caras said:

Vampires seem to change most in every edition of Runequest... How do you handle these creatures?

In my games, Vampires are either nobles or thugs. Nobles are refined immortals with long-term plans, temples around them and worshippers who fawn on them. Thugs are the kill-crazy, rip them to bits vampires. Dorastor, of course, has both.

 

On 11/30/2020 at 11:12 AM, Caras said:

And in recent gameplay Trouble at Greydog´s Inn a vampire turned to wolf... Is it meant in RQG, that vampire in wolf form is a simple wolf or more powerful Vampirewolf, with more STR for example and Vampiric powers still?

Sure, why not have vampires turning into bat or wolf form? Some might turn into other forms as well, just to surprise Players.

On 11/30/2020 at 1:21 PM, Caras said:

In bestiary it says that vampires are Runemasters of Vivamort Cult... But I like to have also different kind of vampires... Like in Tales 19... Lesser Vampires... Many different kind of vampires. Vampires that are creation from other sources, such as Delecti.

All vampires are automatically members of the Vivamort cult, whether or not they actually join.

However, some may have never heard of Vivamort and might have been created by lone Vampires or mages. Not everything has to be done the same way.

Delecti is a Mage of Vivamort, but not a vampire himself.

On 11/30/2020 at 1:24 PM, Caras said:

Is the mention of Vampire Kingdom neighboring Lunar Empire (Tales 19) canonical or just fanfiction?

I have Vampires in Carmania. They live in stone towers, or castles, with each Vampire supported by a family. When the family Humakti become Swords they are transformed into immortals who can fight at night. Some people might not like the idea of Humakti Vampires, but I have always loved the idea. Of course, they follow Sword Man, not Humakt, and Dark man, not Vivamort, but the spells are the same.

There is a Vampire Legion rumored to be fighting for the Lunars. The Red Emperor used to have a squad of vampire bodyguards, but I am not sure of that is still canon. Some members of Yanafal Tarnils have absolutely no problem with becoming Vampires and serving the Empire forever.

 

On 11/30/2020 at 2:27 PM, Nick Brooke said:

There is no canonical reason to believe there is a secretive and ancient kingdom of Vampires in the Grey Mountains north of the Lunar Empire, or to think they are in any way associated with the immortal survivors of the Vampire Legion of Tanisor, nor indeed to associate them with the high rate of vampiric events on the Carmanian regional activity tables. None whatsoever. I hope I have been clear.

Oh, that's Ok then.

3 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

Vampires right now don't work with any magic except Sorcery (no POW means no Spirit magic and no new Rune Magic), but hopefully the Cults book will give us a working Vivamort cult, presumably with some kind of draining ability for Rune Magic. 

Secrets of Dorastor does that, with them having spells to drain Rune Magic and use blood to make enchantments.

Gods and Goddess of Glorantha will probably do it differently.

[davecake]

Vampiric magic is a set of rituals. All begin the same way - all vampires have the ability of Ecstatic Communion, during which a vampire drains a victim of POW and blood. The POW is given to Vivamort, and the vampire receives magic points. I think they can also use POW drained for mastering sorcery Runes and Techniques. It’s basically their version of a worship ritual, and like worship needs to be done in an appropriate place, a Vivamort shrine or similar. This ritual doesn’t need to be to the death normally - in fact, participating as the person fed on is art of the cults initiation ritual - but often is.

If the vampire knows a vampiric ritual, they can also use the drained POW for other purposes. Some rituals require draining the victim entirely of blood, killing them, and then raising the body as undead - ghouls, zombies, skeletons, and technically Raise Vampire is one of these, though normally that is only done voluntarily. Other rituals do different things - summoning a darkness elemental is a common one. 
All the rituals must be learned like sorcery. They are each a separate skill, like sorcery spells, though vampires often have the opportunity to spend a lot of time enhancing them with ritual preparation etc. Some are known to many vampires, some only a few - Delecti in particular has some special ones, including Create Blackthorn Tree, that he teaches to his dancers in darkness. Transferring Bodies is one Delecti knows as well, though other vampires may know it. 
I’m not sure how vampires drain rune magic, but I think some of them can (but probably not all), probably it is another Vampiric ritual? 

So many different variations of vampires can exist, using different vampiric magic. Rituals might exist for all sorts of things - creating bonds with those they have fed on, learning new transformations, summoning other other world beings (I suspect the Nontraya cult knows a few). They might also have rituals to Enchant things - vampires wouldn’t really be potent sorcerers if they couldn’t create inscriptions, for example, or have access to bound spirits, but I bet some of them have the ability to do things that are very similar through vampiric ritual. 

Note that vampires can definitely cast rune magic, it’s clear in the bestiary - but they can’t sacrifice to gain more Rune Points (except maybe through vampiric ritual maybe), so probably need to have gained most of it in life, and mostly they will find it almost impossible to regain what Rune Points they have, as most cults hate vampires. But it’s not impossible, especially if the vampire is Illuminated, and no one is concerned about their pallid appearance and only visiting in the hours of darkness. If the Vampire Legion of the Lunars existed, which of course is only unfounded rumour, they’d probably have a pile of Lunar Rune Magic. Theoretically. 
 

So if you want to do vampires with different abilities to the usual, just say it’s something they gained from vampiric ritual. Especially really old ones. 

[davecake]

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

Nobles are refined immortals with long-term plans, temples around them and worshippers who fawn on them. Thugs are the kill-crazy, rip them to bits vampires. Dorastor, of course, has both.

I generally figure ghouls fit the role of kill crazy undead thug pretty well. A vampire could embrace its initiates at a rate and hope they make it, though, I guess. It doesn’t seem a very good long term strategy unless you are hoping they will perish in battle very soon - the last thing most vampires need is another (fanged) mouth to feed. Dorastor, of course, is special.

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

Sure, why not have vampires turning into bat or wolf form?

The bestiary says they can, but is very vague on details. Vampires can, Dancers in Darkness don’t seem to? It may always be something they can learn from vampiric magic. 

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

However, some may have never heard of Vivamort and might have been created by lone Vampires or mages.

Yep. Some vampires may just not want to share their knowledge. 

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

Delecti is a Mage of Vivamort, but not a vampire himself.

I think canonically he is a vampire now, just one that has some unique abilities and many unusual ritual spells. A vampire heroquester, as well as a master sorcerer. 

16 hours ago, soltakss said:

When the family Humakti become Swords they are transformed into immortals who can fight at night.

 I think that is absolutely forbidden and impossible by the rules and Geases of the cult, and Humakti magic would normally prevent it happening.

And by forbidden and impossible I mean, of course, that they must Illuminated heretics. Or technically Umbarist, which is basically Spolite  Illumination for goths. 

[soltakss]

4 hours ago, davecake said:

21 hours ago, soltakss said:

When the family Humakti become Swords they are transformed into immortals who can fight at night.

 I think that is absolutely forbidden and impossible by the rules and Geases of the cult, and Humakti magic would normally prevent it happening.

And by forbidden and impossible I mean, of course, that they must Illuminated heretics. Or technically Umbarist, which is basically Spolite  Illumination for goths. 

Of course it is not allowed by the rules, which is what makes it more fun when it happens.

It really annoys Players of Humakti, which is even better.

[HreshtIronBorne]

According to the new RQ:G bestiary vampires cannot cast Spirit Magic or Rube Magic except for a few Special Vivamort spells. Though Vivamort is not detailed in the bestiary, I am pretty sure he is coming out in the Big Old Gods Books. New vampires are described as possibly being exceptional sorcerers. 

Spoiler

 

I am working on running Balastor's Barracks and would like to use it to get to know how RQ:G interprets some of the new creatures/cults/general foes. Jordak and Blodanga are both pretty fearsome in RQ 2/3 rules. Especially with their clever Warding, trap, pet, and Allied Spirit.

Without their Ironhand 4 and Protection 4 I have given them Enhance INT, CON, SIZ, STR, Boon of Kargan Tor, Neutralize Armor, Ward Against Weapons, Disappear. I am debating Protective Circle and some Neutralize Runes or Spirit Magic.

I am assuming they have a ton of spells for managing and building a managerie of magical beasts. The above were just the buffs/ combat relevant spells. All the MP/POW coming from sacrifical subjects during dark rituals.

I removed the old limitation on DEX x 5% for priest weapon skills. Bot Jordak and Blodanga have 120% in their best combat skills.

I gave them enough inscriptions for a +6 INT, +6 CON, +3 STR, +3 SIZ. Figuring all the Enhance spells with the same +1 then +1/4 Spell Strength as the core rules Enhance Int. They maintain 8 Strength Boon of Kargan Tor, 8 Strength Neutralize Armor, 8 Strength Ward Against Weapons, and Disappear Strength 8. I figure all of the spells are cast during Holy Day Rituals and last for a season. Giving them plenty of time to find victims.

Let me know if I messed up any of the sorcery too severely. Without giving them too much more stuff I dunno if they are at the right power level or not. The Barracks should be fearsome.

 

 

Edited February 9, 2021 by Scotty
admin spoiler test

[metcalph]

3 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I am working on running Balastor's Barracks and would like to use it to get to know how RQ:G interprets some of the new creatures/cults/general foes. Jordak and Blodanga are both pretty fearsome in RQ 2/3 rules. Especially with their clever Warding, trap, pet, and Allied Spirit.

They may be pretty fearsome but they are pretty poorly written monsters.  If they were decent sorcerors, they wouldn't be hiding out in a shithole like Balastpr's Barracks, which also has a giant there lurking for some odd reason.

3 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Without their Ironhand 4 and Protection 4 I have given them Enhance INT, CON, SIZ, STR, Boon of Kargan Tor, Neutralize Armor, Ward Against Weapons, Disappear. I am debating Protective Circle and some Neutralize Runes or Spirit Magic.

Given them rune magic instead.  Jordak is an illuminate so he could have rune spells from other sources.  They could have a lonmg-running sorcery enchantment on one or two of their weapons and armour (cast by a friendly sorceror in Ogre Island say) but they would not use sorcery as a replacement for rune and battle magic (unless they had a band of undead zombies to protect them while they cast long spells).  If Redsong is an ordinary allied spirit, then he may cast spirit magic but I doubt this for Vivamort.

3 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I am assuming they have a ton of spells for managing and building a managerie of magical beasts.

Beasts which are nowhere in evidence

 

[soltakss]

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

According to the new RQ:G bestiary vampires cannot cast Spirit Magic or Rube Magic except for a few Special Vivamort spells. Though Vivamort is not detailed in the bestiary, I am pretty sure he is coming out in the Big Old Gods Books. New vampires are described as possibly being exceptional sorcerers. 

I have a writeup of Vivamort in Secrets of Dorastor, if that is of interest. The spells are in the Book of Doom as well. I give them a spell that allows them to drain Runemagic.

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I am assuming they have a ton of spells for managing and building a managerie of magical beasts.

Only for undead, in my games.

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

The above were just the buffs/ combat relevant spells. All the MP/POW coming from sacrifical subjects during dark rituals.

The writeup mentioned above contains a way of using sacrifices for enchantments etc.

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I gave them enough inscriptions for a +6 INT, +6 CON, +3 STR, +3 SIZ. Figuring all the Enhance spells with the same +1 then +1/4 Spell Strength as the core rules Enhance Int. They maintain 8 Strength Boon of Kargan Tor, 8 Strength Neutralize Armor, 8 Strength Ward Against Weapons, and Disappear Strength 8. I figure all of the spells are cast during Holy Day Rituals and last for a season. Giving them plenty of time to find victims.

Sounds OK.

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Let me know if I messed up any of the sorcery too severely. Without giving them too much more stuff I dunno if they are at the right power level or not. The Barracks should be fearsome.

Again, it sounds OK. You can always adjust things on the fly when you run the scenario. 

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I think I used the spoiler tag right. Okay, I edited this thing like a dozen time to try and gets spoilers to work. I dunno.

You did, but the spoiler tag functionality no longer works due to an improvement in the board software.

[davecake]

 

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Though Vivamort is not detailed in the bestiary, I am pretty sure he is coming out in the Big Old Gods Books. New vampires are described as possibly being exceptional sorcerers. 

Yep. Treat them like sorcerers who can cast magic using POW they have stolen from a sacrificed victim. Mostly, their rituals are cool vampire stuff, including the stuff they did using Rune Magic in Cults of Terror (summoning Ghouls, animating zombies, some small shades, etc) and some new stuff (including most of Delecti's ritual magic, like making Blackthorn Trees to expand the Marsh, or body swapping). Rituals must be learned individually like sorcery ones. They can also use the POW they drain in sorcery (eg instead if the POW needed to master Runes and Techniques). This is temple ritual sacrifice stuff, not magic to use in combat. I think basilisks would be another example of vampire sorcery. 

I'd have Vampiric version of enchanting spells, that can use the POW from sacrifices instead of POW - I think just allowing vampires to wholesale do enchanting with victims POW is very powerful indeed. 

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Let me know if I messed up any of the sorcery too severely.

Eh, I think it is a significant upgrade in power compared to their RQ2 spirit magic, but what matters is are they too tough for your players, and you are best placed to judge that. 

6 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

New vampires are described as possibly being exceptional sorcerers. 

Only a few new vampires, but a lot of the old ones certainly are. Due to a lack of competing vampire hobbies. 

33 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I give them a spell that allows them to drain Runemagic.

Yeah, me too, and I think it's a vampiric ritual - i.e. not every vampire has this ability, and it's a temple ritual. Anyone who really hates the idea of them draining Rune Magic from others (looking at Peter 👀) can just not use that ritual in their games.

 

[soltakss]

8 hours ago, davecake said:

Only a few new vampires, but a lot of the old ones certainly are. Due to a lack of competing vampire hobbies. 

In our multi-GM RQ2 book, several GMs had ancient vampires as foes.

One had an old villa with paintings on the walls. They started off very basic but got better and better as the artist improved over the years, to the point where they were masterpieces. Then the same with sculptures, then with pottery, as the Vampire started a new hobby and got very good at it before getting bored and moving on to something else.

The other GM had a similarly old villa, again with crappy paintings on every wall, some with old scenes and some with new scenes, same with the sculptures and pottery. His rationale was that artistic talent was something innate and you couldn't necessarily teach it, so although the paintings, sculptures and pots were technically quite good, they were artistically poor, so the Vampire never got really good at anything.

In both cases, however, the Vampires had hobbies that they stuck to for a long period of time before changing.

 

[HreshtIronBorne]

11 hours ago, davecake said:

Eh, I think it is a significant upgrade in power compared to their RQ2 spirit magic, but what matters is are they too tough for your players, and you are best placed to judge that.

This is the aspect I am having a bit of difficulty judging. Ironhand 4, protection 4, Detection Blank, Bladesharp 4 are all, in my opinion, much better and more consistent than their sorcery options. Except for maybe Boon of Kargan Tor, which could add a d6 or two to every attack the vampires can imagine. 

[Shiningbrow]

On 1/28/2021 at 9:10 AM, HreshtIronBorne said:

Figuring all the Enhance spells with the same +1 then +1/4 Spell Strength as the core rules Enhance Int.

I'll just point out that INT seems to be the hardest stat to increase (by Gift, it costs triple the geasa of most other stats), and there's not even a Spirit or Rune magic spell for it (yet, officially).

That suggests to me that Enchance STR, DEX, CON would require a lower intensity than the Enhance INT. 

[davecake]

9 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

This is the aspect I am having a bit of difficulty judging. Ironhand 4, protection 4, Detection Blank, Bladesharp 4 are all, in my opinion, much better and more consistent than their sorcery options.

Loosely spirit magic is better, point for point, than the equivalent sorcery spell - but there are other issues, like sorcery spells maintained over a long period of time are muhc better than being able to cast the equivalent spirit magic spell at need (those 8 pt spells are actually 23 pt spells if cast lasting a season!). And they differ in lots of minor ways that depend on circumstance, that only you can know if they apply to your party. 

But it seems like, for example, the originals had Ironhand 4 or Bladesharp 4 (never both at once), which increased their damage by +4, and the new ones have +2D6 damage for Boon of Kargan Tor 8, probably plus another +1d6 or so increased damage bonus for Enhanced STR and SIZ, on top of already hefty STR, so at least +3D6, and then Neutralise Armor 8, very loosely worth up to about 8 points of extra damage vs heavily armoured foes, so obviously put together a massive upgrade compared to just Ironhand 4, even considering they don't get the +20% to hit (though some increase possible from attribute boosts).

8 point Ward Against Weapons is probably about the same as Protection 4 though - its lack of reliability makes it less desirable for most people, but for vampires it's probably about the same. Still, having it constantly up for a season - and a lot of the time, the Disappear will mean opponents are at -50% to hit as well. 

 

Edited January 29, 2021 by davecake

[davecake]

12 hours ago, soltakss said:

In both cases, however, the Vampires had hobbies that they stuck to for a long period of time before changing.

I was being somewhat facetious - vampires can, of course, have hobbies. But their only methods of making themselves more powerful and dangerous are, more or less, Vampiric ritual sacrifice of victims, and endless study of sorcery. Most of their skills, including combat skills, quickly reach a point they can only be increased by experience (so they increase, but slowly, and involve the vampire putting itself in danger).

So yes, they can have hobbies, and most of them are going to be something they do until it becomes frustratingly difficult to increase, and most of them are going to be 'character notes' as you describe, things their ancient minds obsess over mostly to relieve the boredom of the centuries. Their real interests probably tend to be things like seeking new vampire magic, manipulating the lives of mortal followers, seeking new schemes for maintaining a good supply of victims, etc. 

[soltakss]

8 hours ago, davecake said:

Their real interests probably tend to be things like seeking new vampire magic, manipulating the lives of mortal followers, seeking new schemes for maintaining a good supply of victims, etc. 

All good hobbies in themselves. 

Combine them with painting, sculpture, flower arranging and interpretive dance and the vampires are happy.

[Shiningbrow]

2 hours ago, soltakss said:

Combine them with painting, sculpture, flower arranging and interpretive dance and the vampires are happy.

Especially if those are all combined with the end products of meeting a basilisk, and you're set!