Vampire (3.5e Racial Template)
Vampires
Personality
Many vampires are shut-ins, servants, or general fiends, but many are also fun loving, classy, or seek to be helpful.
Physical Description
Most vampires appear as they did in life, but if a character chooses to start with this racial modifier without an available class level to sacrifice, they get a -4 to Charisma (replacing the normal +2), often causing an unruly appearance. 3000XP may be spent to adjust the body to its new form, restore the appearance, and thereby rescind the penalty.
Relations
Vampires as a race don't generally get along with races that know them to be vampires, but a handful of well-meaning clans have formed friendships and alliances with living cultures.
Alignment
Upon awakening from death, a new vampire must attempt a will save DC15 for 3 consecutive days. If the save is failed, the character becomes "feral", defaulting to chaotic evil and taking the charisma penalty instead of the level one. Factors like supportive friends or an extreme sense of duty that such an alignment change would defy can allow the saves to be passed automatically. If sired by a Master Vampire, the DC is 20, and instead of being feral, the alignment will be the master's choice, and the level penalty is taken as normal.
Lands
Independent vampires retain their original race's favored environment, feral vampires enjoy caves, underground tunnels, and other cold, dry places, and organized vampires tend to enjoy a temperate climate and live in a castle or manor.
Religion
Asmodeus and Vecna are pretty popular among the vampires who embrace darkness, but not as popular as atheism. A common practice, while not religious per sé, is to idolize Dracula, the first and most powerful vampire. In general, though, the most common thread is praise of a vampire's master if they stick around.
Language
As with most templates, vampires merely retain languages known in life.
Names
Rebirth rarely inspires a change in name (unless given by a master), but a select few choose demon names, either as reminders to themselves or warnings to others. Or as a joke. Or because it sounds cool.
Racial Traits
- +2 Strength, +2 Dexterity, +2 Constitution, +4 Charisma
- Vampires gain +10 to their base race's move speed.
- Charming Gaze(Ex): You may charm a creature, player, or NPC as if you had cast the Charm Person or Charm Monster spell. You may only use this ability if you look the creature, player, or NPC in the eyes.
- Blood Drain(Ex): Whenever you are in a grapple that you have been in control of for at least one full round, you may use an attack action to deal 1d8 temporary constitution damage to the grappled creature, and gain this much HP. If your HP is full, add what remains to your Blood reserve. You cannot have more Blood than your Constitution, and it resets every 24 hours. Blood Drain cannot effect creatures that lack blood. If a creature is killed by Blood Drain, you may instead choose to Sire or Enthrall them. Siring a target causes them to be dead for 1d4 days, but return fully healed, and with the Vampire template added to their race. An enthralled target has the stolen Constitution healed, and must make a DC 20 will save to maintain their free will. If they fail, they adopt your alignment, and become unnaturally loyal to you. Furthermore, vampires you sire have a -15 to social checks based on defying you, and a +15 to checks and saves allowing them to continue obeying you.
- A vampire does not have to breathe or sleep, but must eat and drink. However, 10HP worth of blood counts as a full meal. If you would starve to death, you instead wither and your hair turns white. Your base land speed and stats go back down, and the only non-immunity features of vampirism you retain are Blood Drain and Undying.
- As with other undead, you're immune to subdual damage. You retain a constitution score but gain no benefit from it when rolling hit dice.
- Biological Manipulation(Ex): As a vampire, your control over your body is increased rather strongly. You can spend Blood to heal yourself by the amount spent(including for stat damage)(standard action), spend 1/3rd of your constitution in Blood to recover a limb, close a bleeding wound, etc(full-round action), and you can even safely carry poisons or diseases in your bloodstream while neither succumbing to their effects nor losing their effectiveness. If you are in a situation where you could perform a Blood Drain, or the target is willing, you may heal them the same way you would yourself with your Blood Supply, or even inject or extract poisons and diseases. You may also expel a poison or disease from your hands, but this is more for poisoning food or water than any offensive maneuver. If you know what the poison or disease is, you are immediately made aware of its name and effects once it enters your bloodstream, but you are never subject to it.
- Ravenous Feast(Ex): Three times per day, you may make a five foot lunge and perform a touch attack. The usage of the attack is only consumed if it lands. If it does land, you deal 2d8 + your Charisma or Constitution modifier in normal damage, not constitution damage, and recover this as HP. However, due to the recklessness and swiftness of the attack, overheal does not become Blood, and you can neither sire nor enthrall a target this way. You can, however, inject a poison or disease if you succeed a concentration check against the target's touch AC.
- Spider Climb(Su): You may walk up walls or on ceilings with ease.
- Gaseous Form(Su): You may become a fine mist as a standard action. You have a 20 foot fly speed with perfect maneuverability. However, silver weapons can damage you even while you are mist.
- Undying(Su): If you are killed in any other way than is stated in the weaknesses section, you will rise again with half your total HP in 2d10 rounds. In addition, you are immune to Death Effects.
- Darkvision(60ft)(Ex)
- Weaknesses:
- Silver weapons will kill you normally, and always act like critical hits when they land.
- If a holy symbol is strongly presented towards you, you are repelled, and forced to maintain a distance of at least 10ft.
- In the presence of garlic you get a -2 circumstance penalty to all skill checks due to the overwhelming scent.
- Under ordinary circumstances, sunlight treats you like an anti-magic field might(it's worth noting that your +2 to strength, dexterity, and charisma is considered supernatural for these purposes, but normally extraordinary). Also, if you die in sunlight, you will not be risen until it leaves. Attacks that use sunlight or summon sunlight to deal damage deal triple that damage to you, and can permanently kill you. To avert these effects, you may train in direct sunlight(roll 1d20 four times, and if any of them are 18 or higher, roll again, and you'll gain XP thusly:
1: Self Injury(DM discretion)
2-4: Reroll
5-15: 500XP
16-19: 1000XP
20: 1500XP
You can only train twice a week, and not more than once per day.
if your DM does not allow you to train this way in general, than you can for the sake of this ability alone, and the XP will not count toward leveling up), and spend 3000 of the XP gained from training in the sunlight on building a tolerance to it. If you do, then all effects sunlight had on you before are annulled, but sunlight based attacks or sunlight strong enough to damage most people can still affect you like an anti-magic field would.
- If you are brought to 0HP, you collapse, but are not unconscious. However, if impaled through the heart or decapitated, you will be made unconscious. If you are both impaled through the heart AND decapitated, you die regardless of wether the weapons were silver or not. However, the weapon used to impale you cannot be removed while you are being decapitated, or you will not be killed. If it is removed, you must be impaled again before you wake back up. Undying taking effect will wake you back up regardless of if you have been impaled or decapitated, but you must remove the weapon or reattach/regrow your head on your own, as Undying will not do this for you.
- You can be killed without Undying triggering if your body is completely destroyed. This can be done by:
Being submerged in acid or lava for extended periods of time. A fireball or other AoE damage attack reducing your HP to -30. Explosives or other such devices killing you from inside-out. Anything that generally destroys someone's body without a trace.
- For the sake of most alignment dependent attacks/spells, your alignment is treated as chaotic evil at all times. However, other alignment dependent things, like how an item meant only for those of certain alignment treats you are still based on your alignment. Basically, you can still be a good person, but your form is composed of evil.
- As always, Disruption will fuck you sideways.
- Constitution damage still kills you like normal.
- Death by Turning is fully functional.
- Level Adjustment: You lose a class, and thereby character level, but the XP needed to level up is treated as though this level were still there. Challenge Rating is increased by 1 or 2, depending on how well these abilities synergize with your other abilities(DM Discretion).
When a vampire and a non-vampire breed, the child is a non-vampire. When two vampires breed, the child is a vampire.
Vital Statistics
Vampires are effectively ageless, but still gain their original race's mental bonuses for aging. Other than that, age of any kind is meaningless to them.
Master Vampires
Some vampires ascend to a level that makes man, beast, and even fellow undead quiver in fear. A character who is already a vampire may sacrifice an additional 9 levels (10 including the first), and of course the XP cost for leveling up will be treated as though the levels were still there. Skill points will be lost, but feats can be retained unless they were bonus feats granted by the list class levels. This will ascend the character to Master Vampire status. These characters are terrifying, powerful, and often command great respect from even those who despise vampires. Get ready, because this is LONG.
Disclaimer:I did borrow a great deal of this from the Pureblood Vampire page. Credit where it's due.
Edit: And Alucard from Hellsing. This is basically the intersection of those two.
Personality
A Master Vampire is often very calm and wise. Even if they are chaotic, they still have a firm judgement, and a heart of iron.
Physical Description
Master Vampires are often as they were in life, but quite a bit more attractive. If a vampire previously suffering from a -4 Charisma penalty due to vampirism becomes a Master Vampire, the penalty is discarded.
Relations
To those that admire vampires, Master Vampires are like gods. To those indifferent or generally squeamish of them, Master Vampires are men and women of great respect and talent. To those who despise vampires, Master Vampires are arbiters of terror and power, and not to be underestimated. No matter where you go, you will seldom be taken lightly.
Alignment
Beholden to no one, a Master Vampire selects their alignment freely. They are also immune to alignment restrictions, alignment dependent attacks and spells, and effects that force a change in alignment.
Lands
They often prefer lavish mansions or other high society, but can make due with even the roughest climates.
Religion
Similar to Vampire.
Language
In addition to the languages known in life, a Master Vampire gains Common, Abyssal, Infernal, Celestial, Draconic, and Undercommon. For each of these your character already knew, you may have a bonus language.
Names
As with vampires, Master Vampires rarely change names. However, many often adopt titles, such as Lord, Baron, or Count.
Racial Traits
- +8 Strength, +4 Dexterity, +6 Constitution, +2 Intelligence, +4 Wisdom, +6 Charisma: Master Vampires are superior to most humanoid creatures in every regard.
- The master Vampire's HD all become d12. If they already had d12 for all hit dice, they gain 2 additional hit dice. They also gain an additional 3 hit dice regardless of what they were previous to make up for lost HP.
- Master Vampires gain +70 to move speed.
- Immunity to all mind affecting effects, death effects, cold, energy drain, bleeding effects, and stat damage/drain. In addition, positive and negative energy both heal you, and all spells that are not positive or negative energy that fail to damage you heal you by however much damage they would have dealt. If they would not have damaged you, this doesn't come into play.
- +8 natural armor.
- As before, sleeping and breathing are unnecessary, but eating is still mandatory, and 10HP worth of blood will suffice.
- A medium size Master Vampire's unarmed strike deals 1d8. In addition, all a Master Vampire's attacks in a round can have a Fortitude save DC 10 + half the Vampire's CR + charisma modifier. If the save is failed, the target gains two negative levels. The Master Vampire may choose not to apply this bonus, and it is supernatural. For every negative level the Master Vampire applies this way, they gain 5 temporary hit points. A Master Vampire can only do this to one attack per turn. Improved Unarmed Strike and Improved Grapple are also automatically acquired. If either already acquired, you may take a feat for each one you had.
- Blood Drain(Ex): If the Master Vampire is in a grapple he/she is in control of, they may use an attack action to do 1d12 of permanent constitution damage to the grappled target, and gains it as HP. If their HP is full, it is added to the Blood reserve. A Master Vampire may have up to their max HP in Blood, and it does not reset. This cannot effect a creature without blood. If a creature is killed by the Blood Drain, you may Sire, Obliterate, or Enthrall the target. When Sired, the target awakens in 1d3 hours, and instead of potentially becoming feral, must make the DC 20 save to not become the alignment of your choice. However, no matter what, they must obey you. They get a -Infinity on social checks made to defy you, and a +Infinity on saves and checks made to continue obeying you. Only criticals will free them from your grasp until they become a Master Vampire themselves, in which case the old +15 or -15 will be used. Those enthralled get no save to resist, and just obey you outright. Those Obliterated, however, a different fate occurs. This is the standard kill option, and disintegrates the body in blue flames, and gives you the target's soul. You will acquire all memories the owner of the soul had, repressed or not, and the soul will be added to your bank. Upon acquiring 50 CR worth, you may sacrifice them to mimic a Miracle spell, except you're the god granting the miracle. Other than that, their uses will be covered later. But as figures, the guy you kill this way is NOT getting back up until you let that soul go. And even then, their old body is dust.
- Biological Manipulation(Ex): Same as last time, except now you can name the title and effects of any poison or pathogen that enters your body, and both self healing and recovery from permanent damage are free actions. As a note, this goes for normal Vampires too, but you can turn HP into Blood.
- Alternate Form(Su): As a standard action, you may assume the form of a bat, dire bat, wolf, or dire wolf. You may also return to normal as a standard action.
- Voracious Appetite(Ex): You must feed three times as often as normal in order to maintain the glorious temple that is your body. If you begin to starve, you will enter a Blood Rage, as described below.
- Blood Rage(Ex): If you kill at least three enemies in one turn, you have a chance of triggering a Blood Rage. You may either embrace it or attempt to resist with a will save DC 10 + enemies killed that turn. If you fail or give in, you gain +2 to hit and damage, and will do anything you can to get a day's feast of blood, preferably within your character's code of ethics. The rage ends once you have acquired said quantity of blood, or if your Blood reserve is full, whichever comes first.
- Blood Fiend(Su): As a full round action, you may summon and absorb all blood (not within a creature able to defend itself) within a 30 foot radius. This, of course, will heal you before it becomes Blood if there is damage to be healed, then limb recovery and such. However much blood is around is DM discretion, but a good metric is that any non-energy attack that dealt over 10 damage spilled blood equal to the damage it dealt minus 10. In addition, all bleeding effects release blood at the exact same rate they deal damage. You may also use this ability to disperse blood to willing targets within 30ft, allowing you to heal at range, or even infect or poison at range if you're looking to do a little betrayal.
- Dominate(Su): As a standard action, you may lock eyes with any non-mindless creature within 30 feet. You each roll a will save, and the creature with more hit dice gains a bonus equal to the difference in hit dice. If your will save is higher, the target is placed under an effect identical to Charm Monster as though cast by a sorcerer whose level is equal to your CR. If the creature's save is higher, it is immune to this ability for one week.
- Soul Manipulation(Su): You may evoke a soul within you other than your own to manifest itself as a servant. It retains everything it had in life, including favored loadouts and personality, but answers to you, and may become incorporeal and fly. You may only do this three times per day, and you may keep the souls summoned for up to one hour/level. If it is killed in battle, you lose it. A summoned soul also cannot be sacrificed as though it were in your bank unless you will it to return. If you have over 1000 souls, you may summon all of them at once and gain +6 to all attributes and AC and doubling your movement speed in a move called Release 0, but this will only last 1 hour/four levels and can only be done once every month. You can also teleport without fail while it's active.
- Soul Tear(Su & Ex): Three times a day, you can make 15 foot lunge and perform a touch attack. The attempt will not exhaust the usage unless it lands. This cannot affect a target without a soul. If it lands, you deal 3d8 + charisma modifier as normal damage, and recover it as HP. Then, you and the target each roll a will save, of which you have a +4 bonus for this roll. If yours is higher, you steal all HP they had remaining, and add their soul to your bank. If the opponent is killed by the damage before you can roll the will save, you get the soul anyway.
- Spider Climb(Ex): As before, but extraordinary.
- Flight(Su): You have a flight speed equal to your ground speed as long as you have one soul, willing it to carry you. You have good maneuverability. You can still fly in Release 0, but for different reasons, and with perfect maneuverability.
- Gaseous Form(Su): You may become a mist as before, but now you may deploy diseases and poisons you have in your bloodstream as clouds with 5 foot radii anywhere along your movement line. If someone was already occupying a space you "bombed", they take the brunt of the cloud, causing it to dissipate immediately but also unleash its effects on the target. The clouds last 2 rounds after being placed. You have half your movement speed as a fly speed with perfect maneuverability, and as earlier, are still harmed by silver while mist.
- Fast Healing(Ex): As long as you have 1 hit point, you recover 5 per round.
- Damage Reduction(Ex): You have damage reduction 10/silver or +3. In addition, your natural weapons and unarmed attacks count as +5 weapons for the sake of overcoming damage reduction or striking incorporeal targets.
- Progenerate(Su & Ex): By channelling your Blood into a helpless, willing, or dead target, you may make them a Master Vampire. For every level they could not give(they cannot give their first level unless it's in peasant), they sleep for a week. Upon raising, they are sired as a Master Vampire. You can only do this 1/5 HD per year.
- Resistance(Ex): You have resistance to electricity 10.
- Daywalker(Ex): You no longer have any aversion to sunlight. In fact, if you're good, you get +2 to all attributes during the day, and if you're evil, you get +2 at night. If you're neutral, you get to pick.
- Adept Senses(Ex): You gain Scent, Track, Darkvision(90ft), and a version of Lifesense that causes enemies to be red silhouettes when hidden behind walls, and emit the normal radius of red light when not obscured.
- Racial +4 on Bluff, Hide, Listen, Move Silently, Search, Sense Motive, Spot, Knowledge(Arcana), Knowledge(Nature), and Knowledge(Religion) checks. In addition, any listed that weren't already become class skills.
- Improved Undying(Su): If you are killed in a way not stated in the Weaknesses list, you will recover with half your HP in 1d4 rounds. If you ARE killed in a way that is stated in the weaknesses list, you can instead sacrifice a soul to resurrect yourself in 1d4 rounds or any time after that, and may also reconstruct yourself at any place within 100ft of the place you died. If the soul had more than one hit die, you retain large portions of its essence, and despite being unable to summon it as you have now mulched it, you may still use the remaining HD for future summons or for the purposes of this ressurection ability. This makes you extremely difficult to put down unless your enemies kill you in an anti-magic field and/or extract every soul you've collected. Since most people don't even know this about Master Vampires, it's plausible you could play yourself off as immortal and bargain for the enemy's surrender.
- Ability Thief(Su & Ex): Whenever you succeed a training session, you may focus on a soul in your bank. If you do, instead of gaining any sort of XP, you may acquire a property of that soul. Be it a feat, racial trait, immunity, class feature, etc, you may adopt it, be it supernatural, extraordinary, or anything in between. However there are some ground rules. You cannot form game breaking combinations like a troll's Regeneration with your immunity to sleep effects. You may choose to acquire the Regeneration and still take subdual damage, allowing it to eventually carry over to normal damage, but no matter what, you can't do anything that makes you unstoppable or defeats any foe in one strike without fail, or anything else your DM finds unacceptable. In addition, you may only do this once per soul. You must train again if you want something different from that soul, and you will sacrifice the old trait in turn. Finally, you may only have 10 active stolen abilities at a time. You may, however, reselect which of your acquired traits are active as a full round action. But even after all those drawbacks and balancing factors, this ability is still a terrifying force.
- Weaknesses:
- You can still be killed normally by silver weapons, but you no longer automatically take critical damage from them.
- If a holy symbol is presented strongly towards you, you are not repelled, but cannot harm the presenter from close range.
- Being impaled and beheaded works identically to before, with the exception that neither knock you out or incapacitate you. They do, however, knock you out and incapacitate you if you do not fix them within 3 rounds.
- You will still be killed if completely destroyed.
- Once again, Disruption will fuck your kid and kidnap your parents.
- Level Adjustment: You lose the 9 levels(or 10 if you were made a Master Vampire to begin with), and your CR increases by 12.
When a Master Vampire breeds with a vampire or non-vampire, the child is a vampire. When two Master Vampires breed, the child is a Master Vampire.
Vital Statistics
Master Vampires actually strengthen with age. Although, it takes longer to do so.
| Middle Age1 | Old2 | Venerable3 | Maximum Age | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 350 years | 530 years | 700 years | no maximum age | |
| ||||
Upon becoming a Master Vampire, the subject acquires the maximum height their species will commonly have, and an appropriate weight increase to accommodate the height increase.
Back to Main Page → 3.5e Homebrew → Creatures
→ Templates
Back to Main Page → 3.5e Homebrew → Races