Ancient elves, slumbering dragons... vampires? Options

[ravensmuse]

And me? I'd allow anything. Hell, I'm probably the reason you'll see lots of changelings, technomancers, and other assorted weirdness in any of the Data Haven stuff. I love how weird the Sixth World is.

[Patrick Goodman]

If by "slowly burn" you mean "cast Alleviate Immunity," then yeah.

I know you meant "Alleviate Allergy" as referenced in many other posts.

I'm working on that bit in my copious unstructured free time. Working on phrasing it so that, while it uses the Allergy rules as a template, it isn't actually an "allergy" per se...thus, Alleviate Allergy wouldn't work. That's been one of my pet peeves for many years now.

[Patrick Goodman]

I know I'm not contributing constructively to the topic at hand; I just couldn't resist the opportunity to snark at totally unnecessary and beside-the-point character types in SR.

As someone who helped write the book on Infected in SR, I have to tell you: I'm totally down with them not being player characters. I refused to write PC Infected rules for SR3, and had nothing to do with the SR4 rules (which I maintain were a Really Bad Idea, my personal regard for the guy who wrote them notwithstanding).

[Patrick Goodman]

They do if they cast spells. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)
(Because all spells sparkle in SR4)

They do? Reference.

[Draco18s]

Sorry, SR4A.

Under "Noticing Magic" page 179

More powerful magic is easier to spot with
the gathered mana normally appearing as a disturbance or glowing aura in the air around the
caster.

[crash2029]

As someone who helped write the book on Infected in SR, I have to tell you: I'm totally down with them not being player characters. I refused to write PC Infected rules for SR3, and had nothing to do with the SR4 rules (which I maintain were a Really Bad Idea, my personal regard for the guy who wrote them notwithstanding).

I enjoyed the vampiric former used car salesman that I got to play that one time.

[Semerkhet]

I enjoyed the vampiric former used car salesman that I got to play that one time.

I can't speak for Mr. Goodman but it wasn't my intent to say that it isn't possible to have cool vampire or werewolf PCs in SR and make it work. My main point is that there are a multitude of options to make characters distinct and opening up the Infected and shapeshifters to PC use is unnecessary. IMO it also brings more risks than benefits to any SR game in which they are present. I won't elaborate on that here because that's a whole different topic.

[Prime Mover]

Anyone recall any references outside of the Tir book for the Vampire prince there?

[ProfGast]

There are mentions of noble Banshee families for elves who are somewhat ostracized and such. RC I wanna say. Not what you were looking for though

[Fortinbras]

I know you meant "Alleviate Allergy" as referenced in many other posts.

I'm working on that bit in my copious unstructured free time. Working on phrasing it so that, while it uses the Allergy rules as a template, it isn't actually an "allergy" per se...thus, Alleviate Allergy wouldn't work. That's been one of my pet peeves for many years now.

Dietary Requirement: Lack of Sunlight.
Infected must ingest a lack of sunlight from every pour in their body through osmosis at all times, else take X amount of damage. Ogre Stomach, Beak, Digestive Expansion and the like have no bearing con the requirement.

[hyzmarca]

Alleviate Allergy nets the vampire a sustaining penalty that pretty much cancels out the benefit of the spell. If he wants to dump money and karma into a sustaining focus for the spell, more power to him. That's still a fairly substantial cost.

[Yerameyahu]

Not nearly substantial enough.

[Fortinbras]

Alleviate Allergy nets the vampire a sustaining penalty that pretty much cancels out the benefit of the spell. If he wants to dump money and karma into a sustaining focus for the spell, more power to him. That's still a fairly substantial cost.

I think the issue isn't a mechanical one, but a thematic one. If they don't fear the sun, they stop being vampires in the traditional sense.

[Laodicea]

this thread has a lot of discussion on the same topic:

http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...mmortal+banshee

[hyzmarca]

I think the issue isn't a mechanical one, but a thematic one. If they don't fear the sun, they stop being vampires in the traditional sense.

But, Dracula doesn't fear the sun. It is merely a mild annoyance to him, and only just barely. Hollywood vampires burst into flames because F. W. Murnau couldn't be assed to film a decent fight scene (fight scenes are expensive and he didn't exactly have anything resembling an actual budget) for the end of Nosferatu and so pulled a bullshit copout that the audience bought because it was 1922 and there weren't exactly many other movies to compare it to. The fact that Hollywood has repeated this error an absurd number of times doesn't make it any more accurate to the source material.

Vampires shouldn't fear the sun. They should laugh at idiots who think they fear the sun, just as they laugh at idiots who wave around crosses and garlic cloves.

[Yerameyahu]

The fact that this 'error' has been repeated absolutely makes it 'more true'. It's all just made up, and it's a democratic process. That means that vampires sparkle if those crazy Twilight fans outnumber you. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Sengir]

So IF you presume that there was this Manaspile and that it caused spontanious HMHVV

IIRC it has been mentioned in fluff that HMHVV was around before the awakening - it simply didn't have any effect without sufficient magic. When the mana level rose it probably activated some part of the RNA just like it activated human metagenes. So if somebody with the virus in his bloodstream got caught in a mana spike...
Just to play the devil's advocate: metas don't "revert" to norms in space, why should non-dual-natured Infected? As long as it's just a few single specimen and not the secret vampire conspiracy among mankind, why not, actually?

[Drace]

As long as it's just a few single specimen and not the secret vampire conspiracy among mankind, why not, actually?

Cause there isn't one of those around at all right? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Fortinbras]

But, Dracula doesn't fear the sun. It is merely a mild annoyance to him, and only just barely. Hollywood vampires burst into flames because F. W. Murnau couldn't be assed to film a decent fight scene (fight scenes are expensive and he didn't exactly have anything resembling an actual budget) for the end of Nosferatu and so pulled a bullshit copout that the audience bought because it was 1922 and there weren't exactly many other movies to compare it to. The fact that Hollywood has repeated this error an absurd number of times doesn't make it any more accurate to the source material.

Vampires shouldn't fear the sun. They should laugh at idiots who think they fear the sun, just as they laugh at idiots who wave around crosses and garlic cloves.

Dracula did fear the sun because it weakened him. He didn't have his full range of abilities and he couldn't even fight off Van Helsing and his trio of suitors when they got him during the day. It's why VH was so adamant that they get him before the sun went down. It's also why Dracula needed Renfield.
More over he was a creature of the night. He slept during the day and hunted at night for a reason. Namely a thematic one.

But that's only going on the assumption that Storker's vampire is the only vampire. It has become an iconic image of nearly 90 years of cultural evolution in all forms of media, and you can't just ignore that.
If you do want to to say that Dracula is the only true vampire, then you also have to accept that God is a big part of that story. Heck, he's the driving protagonist.
I, personally, want to leave God out of Shadowrun. Hence why vampires should burn in the sun.

[Vermithrax]

Not all vampires are spellcasters.
Most spellcasters wont give a focus containing their astral signature to a vampire.

These two points should make the sunlight shielded vampires a bit rare.
If, for whatever reason, the existence of sunlight immune vampires is intolerable to you then just turn the sunlight allergy into sunlight weakness.
I currently have 1 vampire PC in my game, it hasn't been a problem yet because she isn't someone who tries to milk every advantage or exploit loopholes.
YMMV.

[Draco18s]

Not all vampires are spellcasters.

They are however, all awakened.
It would be trivial for them to decide to be magicians.

(Unlike most people, awakened critters could go out and pickup Mage or Adept whenever they felt like it)

[Patrick Goodman]

Sorry, SR4A.

Under "Noticing Magic" page 179

Something else for me to ignore if I ever get to run a game again...there are a lot of changes between earlier editions and SR4A that don't make any damn sense to me, and this is one of them.

[Draco18s]

Something else for me to ignore if I ever get to run a game again...there are a lot of changes between earlier editions and SR4A that don't make any damn sense to me, and this is one of them.

Oh I completely agree. But the rule is there and it allows me to say that ShadowRun vampires sparkle (thus validating why I hate the rule because ShadowRun vampires DO NOT SPARKLE).

[Semerkhet]

Something else for me to ignore if I ever get to run a game again...there are a lot of changes between earlier editions and SR4A that don't make any damn sense to me, and this is one of them.

While I am generally a 4th edition backer, I also did not like the change to noticing magic. I simply house-ruled it so that you have to be casting pretty high-force spells to get sparkles.

[Yerameyahu]

I mean, sparkly magic doesn't *not* make sense. It's magic, anything is equally valid. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)