I've always felt vampires and werewolves are awkward and out of place additions to fantasy universes. Placing them alongside elves, dwarfs and other fantasy creatures weakens them as horror archetypes and brings in goofy questions like 'what about orc werewolves?'
What do you think fundamentally doesn't work in a traditional d&d setting?
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>What do you think fundamentally doesn't work in a traditional d&d setting?
Everything. High-magic high-fantasy settings are shit narrative. Shame low-magic, low-fantasy is a slog to play mechanically.
What ABOUT Orc werewolves? They transform like everything else if they're infected with lycanthropy or whatever the term for making people a werewolf is. That's not a goofy question so much as a really simple answer.
Same with Vampires. Is it infected with Vampirism? Then it follows the rules of being a vampire, why would it's species make any difference?
>why would it's species make any difference?
I dunno, why would mind flayer vampires be especially weird?
Ravenloft had rules for all the different kinds of vampires. Elf, dwarf, and halfling vampires all had different strengths powers and curses
Low fantasy is the most boring setting possible. You are literally a stick in the mud outside of some shantytown hovel. In the rain.
They work fine you just have to build a game around them hence why Curse of Strahd is so popular.
You can't just throw a random bunch of shit like vampires into Lord of the Rings.
The whole point of D&D is that it can play a wide variety of different genres , obviously a monster mash is going to be a cluster fuck.
>I've always felt vampires and werewolves are awkward and out of place additions to fantasy universes
yeah they're best in realistic settings where them and other undead are the only fantastical creatures.
>Shame low-magic, low-fantasy is a slog to play mechanically
its not though. Less magic means less slog. Low-fantasy usually encourages more roleplay. I've played a few low magic, low fantasy settings and they were great, heavy roleplay, lots of interesting combats and highly deadly.
Real life is far more interesting than any fantasy setting, purely because there is so much background information and first hand accounts. You just have to choose a good period and have a DM who is knowledgeable about that period and willing to add his own twist.
Low fantasy makes the elements of fantasy so much more intense, kind of like beowulf - 2 or 3 beasts in a somewhat realistic setting and suddenly you have an incredible setting and the DM can spend a lot of time fleshing out and accentuating the fantasy elements so they feel like they are also realistic (like realistic eco-system impacts, motivations, etc.)
>Low-fantasy usually encourages more roleplay
I mean I guess roleplaying dying in a ditch of dysentry is fun for masochistic players/sadistic dms but not for most people.
>mind flayer vampire
Jesus Christ how horrifying.
Make them fun.
You can have a suave friendly npc appear innawoods at night and offer food in exchange for sharing your fire with them and a good story, then after a charming intro if the players don't find out he will drain one or many of them.
Vampires work perfectly as main villains or random encounters. Still, I'd stick to the human type unless you really have a good idea in mind. Vampire orcs and dwarves are pretty shitty, taking into account vampires are cunning, agile, stalking-type predators.
Same for Elves, unless it's a dark Elf. While not vampires are pure evil, they are tainted by evil, something which shouldn't normally happen to an elf because they're supposed to be higher tier than humans in the scale of good-evil.
DMing Curse of Strahd helped me get in the right mindset. I ended up making it more cosmic horror combined with personal horror by emphasising more beastial nature of them, how the Curse is something symbolic to represent what a malevolent being he is, and got weirdly Earthbound with Dark Powers being like Giygas.
You can have hi-lo fantasy. High fantasy is pretty dull in its own way.
I find it really crappy that any random street urchin or bandit can cast spells. Wizardry should need dedication, skill and intelligence as well as the right information and training, something your average Joe would normally NOT be able to get... but once you get those skills, things get crazy.
I think they fit in just fine. The Witcher 3 did it well in my opinion, especially with how Alps, Bruxae or Ekimmara can absolutely destroy you, more so than Fiends and Basilisks alike.
Depends. I’m fine with giant intelligent wolf monsters in Nordic settings for example. Or maybe an odd bat monster too in the fortress of the dark lord.
But actual vampires and werewolves kinda pull me out of immersion. They’re personal horrors for low fantasy. They just don’t don’t fit in high fantasy beyond being creepy background creatures. I mean sure use them in a Slavic setting or horror setting all you want. But the appeal of vampires and werewolves is their malevolent effects on communities. They’re for panicked villagers to rush behind the safety of the drawbridge before sunset. They’re for detectives to slowly realize that the town is not being preyed on by a pack of feral dogs each month. They’re for desperate sprints across narrow spaces to grab hold of a holy item to keep the damned at bay until sunrise.
Vampires and werewolves in my opinion are inherently gothic creatures. Proof that Satan or his equivalent is very real, and hungering for men’s souls like a wild beast. You just don’t get the same feel with a heavily armored crew of combat wizards hunting for XP.
Could always make them just die when changed, like their method of eating shit somehow doesn't jive with vampirism.
I like having all this weird shit and having to sometimes ask questions about how shit works, like liches and dragons were in the same setting so someone went "What if a dragon became a lich?" and bam, new fantasy staple. Though then you have to wonder about dragon vampires and dragon werewolves.
Orcs that turn into pig-like beasts.
I'd make vampire orcs be just extra warmongery and bloodthirsty but with little to none of the benefits of vampirism. There you have it. A creature that thirsts for battle so much that is shunned by their comrades and loves to drink the blood of their fallen enemies. A creature not made to last, and without special vampiric powers except for raw strength and a feral temper, with lesser shape shifting into a more monstrous form. Would make a nice boss.
But again, not made to last. A vampire is a bit like a tiger. It can stalk you, sense you, drive you crazy or outright kill you. But what makes it so effective is that he's good at all these things and not just one. They can hide when needed.
That's why vampires from Elves or Humans, with more self-control, would be more dangerous and generally older and more powerful, as they can repress their darkest impulses, for a while at least.
Just replace liches with vampires
>Orcs that turn into pig-like beasts.
WEREBOARS!?
Bullshit. Just look at Dwarf Fortress. Epic stories despite it being more mechanic than magic.
>The whole point of D&D is that it can play a wide variety of different genres , obviously a monster mash is going to be a cluster fuck
u w0t m8, pretty much every published setting going all the way back to Gygax' Greyhawk is all Monster Mash all the time. FR, Greyhawk, and Eberron were all very popular sellers despite being monster mashes
And yet that has elves, dwarves, and goblins living in the same space as vampires and werewolves.