Talk to Neraph. He can show you why the majority of other people dislike Vampires.
The fact that their magic is variable, and is capable of hitting 2 Digits the moment they leave Chargen (and can keep it there trivially, especially with the ability to eliminate Allergies and possibly (as some have argued) eliminate their need to adhere to their dietary requirement) is a big factor, I think.

Talk to Neraph. He can show you why the majority of other people dislike Vampires.
The fact that their magic is variable, and is capable of hitting 2 Digits the moment they leave Chargen (and can keep it there trivially, especially with the ability to eliminate Allergies and possibly (as some have argued) eliminate their need to adhere to their dietary requirement) is a big factor, I think.

Wow, Infected seem to be a pretty controversial topic on this board. What warrants such hostility? The flavor or the crunch?

Personally, I've both played and DMed for Vampire PCs, and didn't get the impression that they were particularly overpowered. They have a couple of useful powers and good stat boosts, but their inability to use 'ware cripples them as Adepts, and they're about on par with Elven mages in the Drain department. Softmax magic for them is 4 compared to 5 for other races. Mist Form doesn't allow you to carry along equipment, and Regeneration is a joke in the current edition, easily bypassed by combat magic, called shots and brute force.

As for flavor, YMMV. The whole virus thing doesn't sit well with some people, while others think that Real Vampires^TM are supposed to immolate in sunlight, which Stoker style Vampires don't actually do. And then there are those saying that such a fantasy race doesn't belong in a Cyberpunk RPG, conveniently neglecting to mention Elves, Dwarfs, Orcs and Trolls.

Point is: Every group needs to decide for themself what they feel comfortable with at their table. The rules, ideally, should provide a framework to work with and support a versimilitude of playstyles. The freedom of choice is the most significant thing separating a tabletop RPG from a videogame RPG; everyone should embrace and accept it instead of telling other people on the internet that they're "doing it wrong".

Opinions are like nipples. Everyone has one. Mine is that vampires are fine as PCs.

Talk to Neraph. He can show you why the majority of other people dislike Vampires.
The fact that their magic is variable, and is capable of hitting 2 Digits the moment they leave Chargen (and can keep it there trivially, especially with the ability to eliminate Allergies and possibly (as some have argued) eliminate their need to adhere to their dietary requirement) is a big factor, I think.

I feel like Neraph can dominate the system like that with almost any character type, though, so I don't think that's a very legitimate reason to hate Infected.