Author Topic: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form  (Read 7333 times)

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Flay Crimsonwind

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[3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« on: June 05, 2009, 05:38:39 AM »
So, I like the idea of giving the players the choice of gaining the old school, mucho stereotyped abilities of the vampire, in whatever form they take it. Hell, I'd even like the idea of a certain character I'd written being produced in DnD form. However, as we all know, the template means no DM will EVAR allow it, and even if they did, it would be a balancing act to give it to you and not unbalance the party. So, though novice to this I may be, I decided to take the idea of the Template class, as inspired from Savage Progressions, and try and make a vampire out of it. I understand it may be strong; that's why I took out a bunch of the abilities and made an LA +8 template a nine-level class (which means you melee types can still get +16 BAB in 20 levels, but you spellcasters are fairly screwed).

Any comments and criticisms are encouraged, if not outright demanded, as I have no doubt balancing is needed. So, here it is...

The Vampire

Base Vampire Template Class
Code: [Select]
L   -   HD     -   Class Features
1   -   1d12   -   Str +2, Cha +2, No Con Score, Blood Drain, Ageless Immortal
2   -   2d12   -   Dex +2, Natural Armor +2
3   -          -   Int +2, Damage Reduction 5/silver and magic
4   -   3d12   -   Str +2, Resistance to cold 5 and electricity 5
5   -   4d12   -   Wis +2, Turning Resistance +4
6   -          -   Natural Armor +2, Gaseous Form
7   -   5d12   -   Cha +2, Damage Reduction 10/silver and magic
8   -   6d12   -   Dex +2, Resistance to cold 10 and electricity 10
9   -          -   Str +2, Fast Healing, Natural Armor +2

Class Features:
*Proficiencies
A vampire character gains no new weapon or armor proficiencies, but retains all proficiencies previously gained.

*True Blood
Depending on how the vampire's bite infects your blood, your true potential can be unlocked. You choose one of three blood types at level 1, and that will determine the base attack bonus and base saves (fortitude, reflex, and will) gained by this class. As a plot point, it is the usual case that a vampire will inherit the true blood bloodline from their sire - the vampire that created them.
If you choose the Vrykolakas bloodline, you gain a good base attack bonus (as a fighter), strong fortitude and reflex saves, a weak will save, and 4 + int mod skill points per level. Class skills are the same as the class skills of the Warrior. The ancient butcher of men is a member of this bloodline.
If you choose the Strigoi bloodline, you gain a poor base attack bonus (as a sorcerer), a weak fortitude and reflex save, a good will save, 2 + int mod skill points per level, and an advancement of one caster level of any existing class (chosen at the first level this ability is gained) for every odd level in this class taken. If you have no spellcasting levels, you gain sorcerer spellcasting levels. Class skills are the same as the class skills of the Adept. The reclusive but powerful vampire wizard is a member of this bloodline.
If you choose the Ubyr bloodline, you gain a medium base attack bonus (as a rogue), strong will and reflex saves, a weak fort save, and 8 + int mod skill points per level.  Class skills are the same as the class skills of the Aristocrat. The aristocrat of the night is a member of this bloodline.

*Blood Drain (Ex)
A vampire can suck blood from a living victim with its fangs by making a successful grapple check. At 1st level, if it pins the foe, the vampire can drain blood, dealing 1d4 points of Constitution drain each round the pin is maintained. On each such successful attack, the vampire gains 5 temporary hit points.

*Ageless Immortal (Ex)
Aside from being killed, vampires are effectively immortal. They never age, appearing to be the same age they were when they were turned. As such, vampires do not take penalties for aging, and have no maximum age.

*Damage Reduction (Su)*Resistances (Ex)
At 4th level, a vampire gains resistance to cold 5 and electricity 5. This resistance grows to cold 10 and electricity 10 at 8th level.

*Turn Resistance (Ex)
As of  5th level onward, a vampire has +4 turn resistance.

*Gaseous Form (Su)
As of level 6, as a standard action, a vampire can assume gaseous form at will as the spell (caster level 5th), but it can remain gaseous indefinitely and has a fly speed of 20 feet with perfect maneuverability.

*Fast Healing (Ex)
A vampire in it's mature stage of development can heal at great speeds. At 9th level, the vampire heals 5 points of damage each round so long as it has at least 1 hit point. If reduced to 0 hit points in combat, it automatically assumes gaseous form. It must reach its coffin home within 2 hours or be utterly destroyed. (It can travel up to nine miles in 2 hours.) Any additional damage dealt to a vampire forced into gaseous form has no effect. Once at rest in its coffin, a vampire is helpless. It regains 1 hit point after 1 hour, then is no longer helpless and resumes healing at the rate of 5 hit points per round.

Edits:
7/12/09:
*Added class skills to each bloodline; Strigoig get Adept, Vrykolakas get Warrior, and Ubyr get Aristocrat, as per the NPC classes.
*Added the immortality clause. They do not age (for RP purposes) and take no age penalties (for co purposes).
*Clarified language about +1 spellcasting/+1 sorc levels in Strigoi bloodline.
*Made a bit easier to read.
4/8/10:
*Changed spellcasting from 1/level to 1/odd level (meaning 5 caster levels over 9 class levels, or 5/9 casting).
*Changed HD from every level to every level non divisible by 3 (so no HD at 9, but bitching fast healing.
« Last Edit: April 08, 2010, 06:54:30 AM by Flay Crimsonwind »

RobbyPants

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #1 on: June 05, 2009, 09:53:54 AM »
All in all, I like the basic idea.  Does a player have to take all 9 levels, or can they dip out into other classes after 1st level if they want the "look and feel" of a vampire without the serious level investment?  Giving HD at all 9 levels certainly makes it more playable.

The only potential problem I see is playing an undead creature at a very low level and running into clerics.  That's something the player and DM might have to agree on ahead of time.

I worked on two vampire templates at Gleemax a while ago and never brought them here.  Here are the basic concepts for anyone interestd:
[spoiler]My first was to scale the abilities with character level, which worked well for NPCs not sucked for PCs.  Effectively, as your level went up, so would your LA, which meant that when you gained a level, your ECL might jump by two.  Ugh.

My second template was very similar to this.  Basically, you would take vampire levels to gain abilities, but I gave the player the choice to take more levels or not.  I treated it just like a class (with no XP penalties for multiclassing).  Also, the first level was more of a 0th level.  The idea was that you would immediately acquire the template if you were turned into a vampire, but I didn't want that to effect the ECL, so that 0th level picked up all the weaknesses and very few powers.  I'm not sure how balanced it was, but the idea was you could be a vampire without ever having to invest class levels into it.[/spoiler]
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AfterCrescent

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #2 on: June 05, 2009, 11:26:12 AM »
that's why I took out a bunch of the abilities and made an LA +8 template a nine-level class (which means you melee types can still get +16 BAB in 20 levels, but you spellcasters are fairly screwed).
Actually, with poor BAB, you only get 4.5 BAB out of the class, so even with full BAB for the other 11 classes, you're not hitting 16 BAB.
Might not be terrible for some builds, but it hurts overall concepts all around...
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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #3 on: June 05, 2009, 07:51:32 PM »
Hm, add an option that lets a vampire choose between Full or Medium BAB, or partial spellcasting progression (7 or 8 levels out of 9)? Choice made at 1st level, probably.
So you end up stuck in an endless loop, unable to act, forever.

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Flay Crimsonwind

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #4 on: June 06, 2009, 04:04:28 AM »
Yeah RobbyPants, my idea was so that people could be vampires just by taking a few (or even just one) level, but there was still the stronger/weaker vampire relation based on unlocking more and more of the inner abilities. So you could be a normal vampire by taking one level, or a powerful ancient lord by taking 9, the choice (and flavor) is all up to the Player (and DM).

Messed up the lingo, meant medium BAB (like a rogue), not poor (like a sorc). What do you think, maybe 7/9 casting? 6/9, so they could just hit 9th level, but have the badass physical attributes of the vampire? Maybe make one "Path of the Strigoi" with good/medium BAB, and one "Path of the Vrykolakas" with full/partial spellcasting?

And yes, I took out the calling swarms thing, as well as one or two others; is the class still unbalanced?
« Last Edit: June 06, 2009, 04:08:43 AM by Flay Crimsonwind »

veekie

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #5 on: June 07, 2009, 08:39:20 AM »
Yeah RobbyPants, my idea was so that people could be vampires just by taking a few (or even just one) level, but there was still the stronger/weaker vampire relation based on unlocking more and more of the inner abilities. So you could be a normal vampire by taking one level, or a powerful ancient lord by taking 9, the choice (and flavor) is all up to the Player (and DM).

Messed up the lingo, meant medium BAB (like a rogue), not poor (like a sorc). What do you think, maybe 7/9 casting? 6/9, so they could just hit 9th level, but have the badass physical attributes of the vampire? Maybe make one "Path of the Strigoi" with good/medium BAB, and one "Path of the Vrykolakas" with full/partial spellcasting?

And yes, I took out the calling swarms thing, as well as one or two others; is the class still unbalanced?
Well, you could just make one for each of the 3 major archetypes, full BAB strong saves moderate skills, 3/4 BAB strong saves strong skills, and 1/2 BAB weak saves weak skills casting advancement...
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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #6 on: June 07, 2009, 03:59:02 PM »
Yeah RobbyPants, my idea was so that people could be vampires just by taking a few (or even just one) level, but there was still the stronger/weaker vampire relation based on unlocking more and more of the inner abilities. So you could be a normal vampire by taking one level, or a powerful ancient lord by taking 9, the choice (and flavor) is all up to the Player (and DM).

Messed up the lingo, meant medium BAB (like a rogue), not poor (like a sorc). What do you think, maybe 7/9 casting? 6/9, so they could just hit 9th level, but have the badass physical attributes of the vampire? Maybe make one "Path of the Strigoi" with good/medium BAB, and one "Path of the Vrykolakas" with full/partial spellcasting?

And yes, I took out the calling swarms thing, as well as one or two others; is the class still unbalanced?
Well, you could just make one for each of the 3 major archetypes, full BAB strong saves moderate skills, 3/4 BAB strong saves strong skills, and 1/2 BAB weak saves weak skills casting advancement...
Since it makes sense, I'm going to contemplate three names that work with it, give the class an overall weak everything, and then make it a first level class feature that some scores are changed depending on bloodline. Once I get back from a trip to my girlfriend's family tomorrow, I'll fix it up, and that should be that! Danke all.

Flay Crimsonwind

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #7 on: June 09, 2009, 02:30:42 AM »
Done! Alright, bloodline ability is up, that should be the end of it.

veekie

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #8 on: June 09, 2009, 03:40:59 AM »
Neat. That looks good to go.
The mind transcends the body.
It's also a little cold because of that.
Please get it a blanket.

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I can barely read mine.

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Flay Crimsonwind

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #9 on: December 08, 2009, 12:22:38 AM »
Alrighty, so, last call.
[UPDATE]
*Added class skills to each bloodline; Strigoig get Adept, Vrykolakas get Warrior, and Ubyr get Aristocrat, as per the NPC classes.
*Added the immortality clause. They do not age (for RP purposes) and take no age penalties (for co purposes).
*Clarified language about +1 spellcasting/+1 sorc levels in Strigoi bloodline.
*Made a bit easier to read.

As it's being used in an upcoming campaign, wanted one last call.

Surreal

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #10 on: December 24, 2009, 01:26:35 AM »
Stumbled here from reading the Maker's Crown PbP... probably too late to throw my two cents in, but I don't think the bloodlines are balanced with each other. If we ignore everything else except what you get from the bloodlines...
the brute: good BAB, good Fort/Ref, med skills, no class abilities
the aristocrat: med BAB, good Ref/Will, good skills, no class abilities
the caster: poor BAB, good Will, bad skills, oh look I get full casting

It definitely needs to be a 7/9 or maybe 6/9 progression.
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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #11 on: March 07, 2010, 01:29:16 PM »
Stumbled here from reading the Maker's Crown PbP... probably too late to throw my two cents in, but I don't think the bloodlines are balanced with each other. If we ignore everything else except what you get from the bloodlines...
the brute: good BAB, good Fort/Ref, med skills, no class abilities
the aristocrat: med BAB, good Ref/Will, good skills, no class abilities
the caster: poor BAB, good Will, bad skills, oh look I get full casting

It definitely needs to be a 7/9 or maybe 6/9 progression.

I agree, there's is no reason not to take this as a Sorceror
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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #12 on: March 07, 2010, 10:18:47 PM »
My first thought at looking at this class is that having a hit die at each level might be a bit much with all the bonuses, with the monster classes in SS about half of the levels skip a hit die gain.
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Flay Crimsonwind

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #13 on: March 09, 2010, 07:04:07 AM »
Stumbled here from reading the Maker's Crown PbP... probably too late to throw my two cents in, but I don't think the bloodlines are balanced with each other. If we ignore everything else except what you get from the bloodlines...
the brute: good BAB, good Fort/Ref, med skills, no class abilities
the aristocrat: med BAB, good Ref/Will, good skills, no class abilities
the caster: poor BAB, good Will, bad skills, oh look I get full casting

It definitely needs to be a 7/9 or maybe 6/9 progression.

I agree, there's is no reason not to take this as a Sorceror
Whoa, what was I smoking? Yeah, meant to cut that down. I hate 1/2 casting, but maybe 2/3 casting? 6 over 9 levels, since I don't believe in epic?  :p Plus, for shit, you're a friggin vampire, you're a bit better than casters out of the gate, when you have spellcasting...

My first thought at looking at this class is that having a hit die at each level might be a bit much with all the bonuses, with the monster classes in SS about half of the levels skip a hit die gain.
Yeah, when I made this originally, there was a reason... I've forgotten what it is now though. I'm thinking of making it each odd level, same for skill points.

Glad this is getting some more cutting suggestions! I was so worried before...

Flay Crimsonwind

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Re: [3.5] Vampire - Class Form
« Reply #14 on: April 08, 2010, 06:57:46 AM »
Alrighty, so I butchered it a bit more (dunno how gimpy the casting is now) in an attempt to make it more akin to the savage progressions that this project was based on. I kind of like it, though I know many DM's still might not (though the vamp weaknesses can be interesting to campaign around).

*Changed spellcasting from 1/level to 1/odd level (meaning 5 caster levels over 9 class levels, or 5/9 casting).
*Changed HD from every level to every level non divisible by 3 (so no HD at 9, but bitching fast healing.

If anything were to be reversed, it would be 6/9 casting instead of 5/9, though I dunno of a great way of doing that. As is, no epic spells for pure casters, but hey, that's not exactly underpowering spellcasters, now is it?  :p

Noting Surreal's comment, I wanted to give the melee and skills guy something more, since casting is kind of a big deal. For the melee, even the three extra HD would probably be fine I think, but for the skill guy, what? Maybe something like "At every odd level, choose a skill you have at least one rank in. This skill becomes a vampire racial skill; all such skills gain a +1 racial bonus per vampire level." Whatcha think? 5 skills that each can get a +9 racial bonus doesn't sound too bad for a skill-based guy, and as mesmerizing as vampires can be, the +9 makes them just more supernaturally proficient in these personal abilities by virtue of their vampire blood. Sounds good, no?

Sure, melee guy gets the boring power, so maybe instead of just HD, a bonus to damage based on level or something? I'm not quite sure what to give (initiator levels?)....
« Last Edit: April 08, 2010, 07:04:20 AM by Flay Crimsonwind »