Dhampirs

Creating game materials? Monsters, spells, classes, adventures? This is the place!
User avatar
Blorpy
Posts: 97
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2021 3:17 am
Location: Tsawwassen

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Blorpy »

Seven wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 8:37 am To have to qualify for a class with high stats is not a negative.
That just means the character will have abnormally high stats.
To balance a powerful character, you require some of the stats to be low, not the other way around.
Yea, the reason I implemented this was less to be restrictive, and more because dhampirs are supposed to excel in these areas, so they really should have +0 modifiers at minimum for nearly all their stats, wisdom being the dump stat. IIRC most of the PCs in my game only have 1 or 2 stats below 9 anyway, so I'm sure players would qualify maybe half the time.
Seven wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 8:37 am I use the Dhampir as an NPC class.
They are rare and they are loners.

Cannibals make a better player class, although it's all a matter of taste.
Cannibals would be interesting, though I would personally prefer dhampirs as PCs due to the fact that they’re not necessarily evil, but rather cursed. A cannibal is either part of a primitive tribe or a psychopath if domestic. I prefer PCs to be heroic, but don't enforce it except through the chance of consequences for antisocial actions.

As for dhampirs being outcasts, fair enough, though that could easily be true of a number of PC types.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am Blorpy, so -10% to XP is a lot already.
Is it, though? Let's put this in perspective by comparing the fighter to the ranger, since 10% xp is also the difference between them.

So then how much better than a fighter is a ranger? Well, in return for their 10% xp buy-in the ranger gets 3 skills, a chosen enemy, and bow specialty. But it also loses heavy armour. That’s it.

What about the barbarian or paladin vs the fighter since those are an even bigger buy-in (25%!). The paladin gets a nice aura, an at-will spell, lay on hands, nerfed turn undead, and basic cleric spells at level 10. But they also have to tithe 10% and have a strict conduct. The barbarian gets hp boost, better surprise odds, 5’ extra movement, and rage (which is kind of a double edged sword). But they can only use leather.

Do you see what I’m getting at? 10% xp penalty isn’t really that big when you consider what xp is used to justify with regards to classes. Even 20% wouldn't be crazy if you wanted to justify something more powerful still, or perhaps just to justify erasing all the other negatives this race gets. That might be an option since it would also simplify matters, though I think the flavour of them being sun-averse makes for better role-play.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am They get negatives in the sun,
The sun penalties aren’t really so bad IMO. I mean, a -1 to hit is only 5%. I doubt it would affect gameplay all that much other than that they'd go out of their way to avoid fighting in the sun. But I get that people don't like negatives even if they're not very consequential. Again, I could see trading this and all other negatives for a higher XP penalty.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am A dwarf is way stronger than a Dhampir atm. So is the classical elf. They both get dark vision as well as great saves and special abilities.
In what sense is a dwarf or elf more powerful? A dhampir gets all the same bonuses as an elf plus a grab bag full of innate abilities. An elf is also limited to d6 HP. A dwarf has better saving throws, yeah, but they don’t really have special abilities per se. Granted, saving throws can get you out of a lot of jams, especially in my games where I let PCs have death saves.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am Healing one more HP means nothing ultimately.
In a game where PCs are often clawing for HP I would think doubling it would be a big deal. :lol: In my games I see PCs push on without being full HP often. But yeah, in high level play it might become less important.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am Charming is… fine? A first level wizard can do that way better.
I think what you may have overlooked is that the dhampir's hypnotize ability may be used more subtlety than a magic-user’s. A magic user has to basically signal to everyone around that they’re casting a spell, whereas a dhampir only has to look at a person. Onlookers may be none the wiser, which has some utility. Not to mention that magic-user's charm is limited to 4-5 HD creatures IIRC. Granted, the magic user’s charm can last a long while on a dumb creature.
TrickyNikki wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 6:19 am This is why I called Dhampir under powered.
Another point that hasn’t really been discussed is that dhampir has enhanced smell, hearing, and a tracking skills. 2-in-6 for those is higher than a lot of thieves start out. Like, it all adds up to being a pretty sizeable tote bag when you consider how little 10% xp really is.

But I get where you're coming from. At a glance the race isn't as flashy as a dhampir from popular media, and its benefits aren't immediately obvious. And nobody likes penalties even if they don't amount to much. But I think in old-school play this class's benefits would go a long way. Bear in mind that none of the PCs in BF are meant to be very powerful. They're meant to fear for their lives and avoid getting in fights. I designed this race option with all that in mind.

So does the dhampir need boosting? Maybe, but probably not by much. I could see maybe giving them roll-twice-take-highest for hit point gain, which is more or less a +1 but with a cap. Maybe some acknowledgment that they can hibernate pretty much indefinitely. Maybe a +2 against charm/paralysis. More could be done but I think it would involve increasing the xp penalty to 20%, which TBH wouldn’t be game breaking.
teaman wrote: Mon Jan 10, 2022 12:38 pm And they are at -4 on all Saving Throws against Kristen Stewart!
:lol:
User avatar
TrickyNikki
Posts: 113
Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2018 2:56 pm

Re: Dhampirs

Post by TrickyNikki »

Seven, it doesn’t really matter whether or not Darkvision is useful in a party sense, so that point you made is quite mute. The rest I can take or leave but sure I will concede, as they don’t really contradict my points.

The fact that you’d be okay with a Cannibal more than you would a Dhampir baffles me however… could you explain?

Blorpy, so you used a comparison of things between two classes and not two races when it comes to -10% XP. This, I feel, is inherently wrong on a few levels. Classes are built in a different way, with a different set of parameters. A race that would give -10% XP to the player character, has to provide something of equal measure, akin to a class then. Dhampirs, in their current state, do not do this.

Regarding the negatives. While you may be right about the negatives being minor in the grand scheme of things, consider the Player enjoyment aspect. If you just can’t get rid of this negative, it’s an annoying thing you constantly have to remember, and if forgotten, there may be heat between the DM and the player. One could even say someone is cheating by not remembering these things and so on. In a digital platform, where this is constantly tracked, sure. In face to face game, when you do not provide a way to negate it, you may be causing problems you did not even think of while creating this.

Regarding the elf, well the elf does not have the annoying negatives, does not have the -10% XP, and does not have the negatives to other saving throws. And in my opinion, what you have added, does not justify all these negatives.

1 or 2 HP healed is, as you said about the sun negatives, only a single extra addition. On the second and third levels, it becomes somewhat meaningless, at around the 5th level, it is just meaningless. By this point, your cleric can dish out a bunch of Cure Light Wounds a day, you can afford to stay in the inns, you are able to pay for Apothecaries/Doctors. So this extra you got from this race is outclassed by monetary investments, that aren’t that expensive for a PC.

So in summary, it’s not really at a glance. I’ve thought about these points a little :)

Also, we all know that being able to qualify for something in four different stats, you as a player would expect there to be something really interesting/bizarre at the end of that rainbow. So saying it isn’t a big point, I don’t think is fair.
Last edited by TrickyNikki on Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:22 am, edited 1 time in total.
Creativity is just a single letter away.
User avatar
MattJCooper36
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Oct 13, 2021 7:27 am

Re: Dhampirs

Post by MattJCooper36 »

Hiya Blorpy, here is what I would do with the race.
1)Ditch either the intelligence or charisma requirement. 5 requirements is a bit much IMO, if rolling in the conventional way, barely anyone would have the opportunity to play them.
2)Ditch the blood-drinking mechanic. Maybe just say in their bio that they have a lust for blood and may even drink it (to flavor the race), but this mechanic would be extremely detrimental in campaigns where the PCs don't often interact with creatures with blood.
3)Ditch the bite attack. Not much need for it if the blood-drinking isn't necessary. Take or leave this comment though it's not essential.
4)Why a -2 save to magic wands and dragon breath? This REALLY hurts the race, because this penalty can very possibly just get you killed. Also thematically idk if it makes any sense. I'd ditch them.
5)Introduce a negative level perhaps? This will mean their growth is delayed, but they get an extra HD relative to their level. Say if they start at -2000 XP for example. If you're implementing this, maybe decrease their minimum constitution to 9 or get rid of it altogether.
6)Ditch the -10XP. If vampires are methodological learners with high intelligence, why would they have a -10XP modifier? I'd ditch that entirely. -10XP could down the line make you a whole level lower than other party members.
7)If implementing all the following that is above, maybe make the damage from silver and fire worse if you feel it's too OP?

Regardless of what I think needs to be done with the race, homebrew is still an awesome thing, and thanks for contributing to the community.
User avatar
TrickyNikki
Posts: 113
Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2018 2:56 pm

Re: Dhampirs

Post by TrickyNikki »

Hey Blorpy, Here's my amendments with the promised Acquisition and Blood Type sections. I've changed nothing from your original work, cause I presume you will want to do that yourself.
Attachments
BF-Dhampirs-Supplement-r2.odt
(20.34 KiB) Downloaded 129 times
BF-Dhampirs-Supplement-r2.pdf
(196.25 KiB) Downloaded 145 times
Creativity is just a single letter away.
Seven
Posts: 836
Joined: Wed Apr 22, 2020 11:17 am

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Seven »

Vampires and Dhampirs prey on the living.
Cannibals eat the dead instead of living them to rot.
That's a lot let disruptive.
If there is evil, it's in the killing.

Cannibalism was, mostly, a group activity.
Eating the heart of an enemy to get some of his attribute, is a good example.
There is an episode in Game of Thrones, (the book, I haven't watched the show).
There is a cannibal character is a game called Perdition's Mouth--a dungeon crawling board game.

Vampires are associated with romance--as in romance novels.
A lot less interesting that it sounds around a table.
User avatar
Blorpy
Posts: 97
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2021 3:17 am
Location: Tsawwassen

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Blorpy »

TrickyNikki wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:47 am Hey Blorpy, Here's my amendments with the promised Acquisition and Blood Type sections. I've changed nothing from your original work, cause I presume you will want to do that yourself.
These are cool, and it's always good for players to have another money sink. The virgin blood thing made me laugh. I would suggest distinguishing goblinoid blood in this.
TrickyNikki wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:47 am Blorpy, so you used a comparison of things between two classes and not two races when it comes to -10% XP. This, I feel, is inherently wrong on a few levels. Classes are built in a different way, with a different set of parameters. A race that would give -10% XP to the player character, has to provide something of equal measure, akin to a class then. Dhampirs, in their current state, do not do this.
Not exactly. 10% XP wouldn't give you a class worth of benefits. It would give you 1/10th of a class worth of benefits. This would be true when comparing a class to a subclass with a marginally higher buy-in. I don't agree that we can't use class XP as a system of measurement, but we actually don't even need to since the races have an exact adjunct to this.

Humans get +10% XP. As a thought experiment, let's imagine human XP as being the default. Now the demihuman races suddenly have a 10% XP penalty. The maths haven't changed--only our perspective. Humans have exactly zero benefits, so now we have three clean measurements for how much a 10% XP penalty should buy you.

10% XP buys the halfling +1 ranged, +2 AC, +1 initiative, 30% chance to hide (90% in forest), +4 to saves. That's pretty good! But they also are stuck at d6 HP, incur size limitations for weapons, can't carry as much, and have a slight strength limitation (this probably never matters since chance of rolling an 18 is only 0.5%).

Is the halfling a better deal than the dhampir? It might be! But again, not by a lot.

So if we could agree on that metric, then for the XP penalty to work it needs to have roughly equivalent abilities to two demihuman races put together.

Well, they already have all the exact same abilities of an elf but without that pesky d6 HP penalty, so that's one and then some. So then let's examine what they get on top of that: 33% hearing, 33% tracking, 33% smell (nevermind a thief's sneak roll when they can legit smell you), +10' speed, +5' jump, regenerate, hypnotize spells, +2 vs charm/paralyze (planned). And they're penalized by what? Having the sun make them a bit fatigued? A slight weakness to silver/fire/breath? When it's laid out like that it all just starts looking almost OP again to me. There would be no escaping someone that fast, and they can escape from most things. And how many problems can be solved by just jumping over an obstacle that might otherwise kill you? I'm not saying it's 100% balanced but it's far from useless. Perhaps the number of hypnotisms per day could be nerfed to pay for alleviating some other detriments. And the saving throws could be revised.
TrickyNikki wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:47 am the elf does not have the annoying negatives
Elf fighters are stuck with d6 HP. That is surely a negative.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am 1)Ditch either the intelligence or charisma requirement. 5 requirements is a bit much IMO, if rolling in the conventional way, barely anyone would have the opportunity to play them.
I agree with this. 5 is asking too much.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am Why a -2 save to magic wands and dragon breath? This REALLY hurts the race, because this penalty can very possibly just get you killed. Also thematically idk if it makes any sense. I'd ditch them.
Thematically breath is due to the fire weakness. Wands is due to magic weakness vampires have. Might get rid of saving throw negatives anyway though as saving throws are pretty crucial and having negatives to them is already divisive, ha ha. It's also just a good idea to reduce the number of moving parts so there's less to keep track of.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am 5)Introduce a negative level perhaps? This will mean their growth is delayed, but they get an extra HD relative to their level. Say if they start at -2000 XP for example. If you're implementing this, maybe decrease their minimum constitution to 9 or get rid of it altogether.
Interesting idea. Complicates things a bit though. And 2000 XP doesn't pay for much in the long run. That's not really even a first level magic-user spell, and this race already has a few equivalents.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am 6)Ditch the -10XP. If vampires are methodological learners with high intelligence, why would they have a -10XP modifier? I'd ditch that entirely. -10XP could down the line make you a whole level lower than other party members.
By this logic elves/dwarves/halflings are dumber than humans because they progress slower. I don't see it that way. People who are faster at things often just haven't considered as much. But we could take out the descriptive text for that and just leave it as -10% XP without a reason given.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am 7)If implementing all the following that is above, maybe make the damage from silver and fire worse if you feel it's too OP?
This might be a good idea. Focus down the negatives in just a couple small areas and keep it simple. +2 damage from silver/fire perhaps. Helps shift some of the negatives so as to get rid of other ones.
MattJCooper36 wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:07 am Regardless of what I think needs to be done with the race, homebrew is still an awesome thing, and thanks for contributing to the community.
And thank you very much for the feedback!

Seven wrote: Thu Jan 13, 2022 11:30 am
Vampires and Dhampirs prey on the living.
Cannibals eat the dead instead of living them to rot.
That's a lot let disruptive.
If there is evil, it's in the killing.
I appreciate your generous approach to cannibals. I don't quite get why the cannibals aren't the ones doing the killing. So they’re scavengers rather than murderers? Lol, disgusting but awesome. I'm sure I'd have fun playing in such a game even if it's not how I would run it. And that board game sounds wild!
Seven wrote: Thu Jan 13, 2022 11:30 am Vampires are associated with romance--as in romance novels.
A lot less interesting that it sounds around a table.
I feel this sentiment does vampires a disservice. Vampires aren't limited to harlequin romances any more than are pirates or werewolves. The father of the modern vampire is Bram Stoker's Dracula novel, and that book really isn't a romance. There are absolutely some sexual themes in it, but it's so much more than that.
Seven
Posts: 836
Joined: Wed Apr 22, 2020 11:17 am

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Seven »

A group of character kill lots of things which we label monsters even when the things are people.
Do the players eat that giant boar they killed?
What about a bear? A monkey? An orc?

Fallout is another game in which the cannibal option is available.
It's about eating what you kill rather than killing to eat.

Back to the Dhampir.
In a medieval setting, blood does not keep very long.
It's used mostly to make sausage.
Most method of conserving meat involve removing the blood, through salting and drying, for example.
Clerics don't do blood transfusion, so they have no supply either.
Urine was quite popular as a folk remedy because it keeps.
User avatar
TrickyNikki
Posts: 113
Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2018 2:56 pm

Re: Dhampirs

Post by TrickyNikki »

I mean, that is exactly why I provide places from which to get these, I don’t think Dhampirs can just run around with vials, they have to drink the blood given at the places specified. I can make that clear in the text, if you’d like Blorpy?

Also, what would you have for Goblin blood? Darkvision increases by 30 feet as well as getting +10% on Thief abilities, similar to the goblin race.
Creativity is just a single letter away.
User avatar
Blorpy
Posts: 97
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2021 3:17 am
Location: Tsawwassen

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Blorpy »

There's actually a pretty easy way they could preserve blood: alcohol.

It makes for an interesting question of how fresh the blood should be, but it could definitely be preserved. An alternate solution is they could easily ask their party members to donate a quart of fresh blood per week, assuming they're cool with that ha ha ha.

Here's an R2:
User avatar
Blorpy
Posts: 97
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2021 3:17 am
Location: Tsawwassen

Re: Dhampirs

Post by Blorpy »

I just did another editing pass and uploaded R3 to Showcase for playtesting. Aside from cleaning up the document, I boosted the race a bit more due to the flak I got for underpowering it :lol: I hope this version is to everyone's liking.

Many thanks to everyone who commented and contributed!

https://basicfantasy.org/showcase.cgi?sid=205
Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 44 guests