Vampirism

If you are hunting a vampire, the first thing you should do is put your affairs in order. I've spent a lifetime studying how to destroy their kind and the most important thing I've learned is that such knowledge should never replace your terror.

Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Handbook

Zombies, ghouls, and skeletons are common forms of undead. While dangerous in large numbers, these undead creatures are mindless beasts driven by base instincts. Vampires, on the other hand, is another matter entirely. While driven by their desire to feed on blood, vampires can think, plan, and scheme. They can remember those who wronged them and plan revenge. Vampires can have a personality, goals, desires similar to any human or elf; this creates an unknown element when facing one. Are they rash and arrogant, or are they intelligent and calculating? With their eternal life, they can learn whatever they set their mind too. They could become expert duelists and warriors or master the arcane arts. If one plans on taking on a vampire, they must do their homework and learn the vampire's capabilities before forming a plan of attack.

Falling prey to a vampire is a fate worse than death. If you're not willing to risk eternal damnation, turn back now.

Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Handbook

There are two main types of vampires, and identifying between the two can be essential for your survival. Vampire lords are the older, more experienced, and deadlier types of vampires. These vampires have their free will and seek ways to improve their power, fighting one toe to toe unprepared is suicide and is strongly discouraged. While Vampire lords teaming up with other vampire lords is not unheard of, it is incredibly rare as most wish not to share their power. Vampire lords surround themselves with minions as a means of protecting themselves, so one will need to disrupt these defenses to reach any vampire lord.
When a vampire lord bites and drains a victim, then raises them again creates a vampire spawn. Vampire spawn is the most common type of undead one will face when dealing with vampires. They are under the direct control of the vampire lord but still maintain a personality and their minds so they can be just as unpredictable as any vampire lord but lack the experience and vitality that a vampire lord maintains. If a vampire lord is destroyed or it feeds its blood to the spawn, then the spawn evolves from its lessor form, and the vampire lord loses its control over it.
The abilities and weaknesses gained from the vampire trait remain constant, so remembering them can potentially save your life.

Strengths

• Regeneration - Vampires rapidly recover from their wounds while in combat. Although it is possible to damage it faster than it can heal.
• Shapechange - Vampire can polymorph into a bat, a wolf, a cloud of mist, or back into its true form.
• Spider Climb - Vampires can climb and stick to difficult surfaces including ceilings and flat vertical walls
• Misty Escape - When a vampire's body is destroyed, it becomes mist and returns to its coffin. All conventional weapons and attacks are useless against this mist.
• Vampiric Charm - One of their most dangerous abilities, vampires can charm a target for a day, making an enemy an ally. Often undetectable, a vampire can charm a target while in its bat or wolf form.

Weaknesses

• Sunlight Sensitivity - Unless you can bring the sun to a vampire, this can be disregarded. A vampire will never be caught out in the sunlight as it is the only way to destroy a vampire completely.
• Running Water - A vampire takes damage when in running water. It is akin to acid for them.
• Forbiddance - A vampire can't enter a residence without an invitation from one of the occupants. Its Vampiric Charm ability can negate this.
• Wooden Stake - Driving a piercing implement made of wood into a vampire's heart will paralyze it until the stake is removed.
• Radiant Damage - If a vampire is damaged by radiant energy or holy water then it's regeneration ability is negated

When dealing with Vampires, one must always know the location of the vampire's coffin. If you do not know the location of the vampire's coffin and are unable to summon magical sunlight, then fighting it is pointless and should be avoided at all costs. Only fight in self-defense, because a surviving vampire can learn from its mistakes and adapt its self to kill you.
A Vampire's coffin must contain the grave dirt of the vampire in order to effectively rest to full strength. A vampire can set up multiple lairs this way in case one becomes compromised. During the day a vampire rests in one of these coffins awaiting the night to return, this is where they are at their most vulnerable so expect the location to be heavily defended. If one is able to locate a vampire's coffin while it sleeps and bypass its defenses, one can stake the creature in order to paralyze it.
If a vampire's body is destroyed and it is not in sunlight or running water it reverts to mist. While in it's mist form, the vampire will return to its coffin to regenerate. While regenerating this way, the vampire is paralyzed and can be easily staked or brought into the sun.

Vampires will never leave their coffins in a location that could be easily exposed to sunlight. However, there are other ways to bring destruction to these beasts; for example, I once faced a vampire who built his lair underground. It was filled with traps, and various types of undead meant to stop any intruders from reaching it. Only an experienced team of clerics and paladins would stand a chance of even reaching the thing, and I was alone. At the end, the vampire could come out of its rest to fight the intruders who would have depleted its resources just to reach the thing, leaving them easy targets for the monster. Going in alone would have been suicide, so I didn't go in at all. The fool was so focused on protecting its self from the sun and intruders that it had forgotten that it built its lair downhill of a river. After blowing the dam, the running water flooded the cave destroying the beast and all of its defenses. Know your environment. If you can compromise a vampire's resting place without entering its lair, you should divert your resources to that objective.

Van Richten's Guide to Vampires

Treatment

None

Type

Supernatural

Rarity

Rare

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