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blakkie
QUOTE (tanka @ Feb 16 2006, 12:52 PM)
In my understand, Nosferatu were the original vampires, or maybe just the masterminds behind all the plots.  Maybe not physically powerful, but they sure could lead.

They had an extra point in Int and Will, and they did have an Essense advantage. That gave them on average as awakened. But the fuff implying they were so much smarter than a normal vampire wasn't that well backed up by the attributes, and even for a caster the enormous difference in physical stats made being a vampire just as desirable.

Top it off with the munchkin blood magic powerplay hyzmarca mentioned and you really didn't need the extra Essense to be like unto G-d. That assumes they could even do traditional self-sacrifice blood magic. Blood magic does seem to center more on sacrifice with blood the mortal version of that.
PBTHHHHT
This all makes me go back to thinking... the only good vampire is a staked one... or blasted, burnt, sliced, diced, etc. This will include PC vampires too. wink.gif
Wounded Ronin
QUOTE (tanka)
QUOTE (Wounded Ronin @ Feb 15 2006, 06:27 PM)
QUOTE (hyzmarca @ Feb 15 2006, 04:48 PM)
QUOTE (Wounded Ronin @ Feb 15 2006, 04:13 PM)
QUOTE (hyzmarca @ Feb 14 2006, 11:17 PM)
A few minutes alone, some chains, ropes, or silk scarves, and an attractive figure or a bullwhip.

According to critters, permenant essence drain requires an unspecified number of unintrupted minutes, for the victim to be unable or unwilling to resist, and for there to be a strong emotional connection such as lust or hatred which is most easily established by sex or torture.  This, I suppose, is why most female vampires are dominatrices.

It won't happen in combat but it could happen if the magician in question is captured or hires the wrong joytoy.  The nasty thing is that that addiction rules apply to recieving essence drain. Being drained causes unimaginable pleasure and the magician will be psycologically compelled seek out that pleasure after the first time.

Hmm, I wish there were some explicitly-written rules so that you could be draining the PCs left and right and not have them complain about how their character is totally immne to fear and passion.

Control Emotion spells are cheap but they get the job done in a pinch, along with control actions to remove those pesky Zen BTLs.

That's brilliant. There's a good use for Control Emotion after all. And if the Control Emotion spell succeeds, there'd be no room for whining about how "my character isn't afraid, really!", since it would be based strictly on the rules as written. You fail your resistance test, you lose a point of essence in a minute, bucko.

Thanks, Hyz!

Are we to expect vampiric cloned ninjas that play XTREME guitar riffs now?

Yes, but that would be the content of my Trashy Japanese Pulp Cinema campaign.
spotlite
Dont' vampires have the Fear power? If they don't (and I'm playing SR3 here) there's nothing stopping a new 'breed' of the virus developing the power. GMs are positively encouraged to swap around the powers of critters... And then you dont' need to worry about spells.

talking of spells, if magic is initially a function of essence until intiation, doesn't that mean a fully fed vampire mage is the most heinously powerful being you're likely to meet outside an IE or GD? And if they're initiated and have a power focus as well... and just THINK of the state of a vamp physad...
tisoz
QUOTE (spotlite)
talking of spells, if magic is initially a function of essence until intiation, doesn't that mean a fully fed vampire mage is the most heinously powerful being you're likely to meet outside an IE or GD? And if they're initiated and have a power focus as well... and just THINK of the state of a vamp physad...

But others say as you lose essence, you lose magic and do not get it back without initiation. So the vampire is looking at burning out quickly with essence loss.

I play that they have their starting magic or 6 whichever is more and leave essence fluctation independant of magic attribute.
Tanka
QUOTE (tisoz)
QUOTE (spotlite @ Feb 17 2006, 11:49 AM)
talking of spells, if magic is initially a function of essence until intiation, doesn't that mean a fully fed vampire mage is the most heinously powerful being you're likely to meet outside an IE or GD? And if they're initiated and have a power focus as well... and just THINK of the state of a vamp physad...

But others say as you lose essence, you lose magic and do not get it back without initiation. So the vampire is looking at burning out quickly with essence loss.

I play that they have their starting magic or 6 whichever is more and leave essence fluctation independant of magic attribute.

That's how I run it, because otherwise the vampire is either horrendously awesome or just plain horrendous.

No use playing with numbers every month. Just make it static and let it fall like that.
Pendaric
Vampires can be extremely powerful or not. Take a moment to consider all the downsides to vampiric existence. (Yes I play White Wolf)
Factor in the real world complicatoin of this creature's existence and not only do you have self generating plot, you have a method of curtailing the blood drinking abominations above.
Or not as the game requires.
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