Whatever happened to Vampires?

[Jetrel]

i didn't like the vampire lady getting in and i'm against any more vampire units getting in. Sorry.

Also, we DO have a vampire bat, so vampires themselves i think are redundant.

My thoughts exactly. We should really make wesnoth into something unique. Not that there's anything bad about Warhammer or Warcraft - but I happen to hate the fantasy worlds they have constructed.

I don't like vampires, or werewolves. In the case of vampires, they're really just a special case of a lich, and uhm... I think we should explore other kinds of undead leaders/liches, they easily have the potential to be as "cool" as some people consider vampires to be.


Truly, what we should focus on, if we have such things, is making them scary, insofar as is possible. Undead are [censored] to have if they are not ominous and frightening, and are instead cartoony. It's ok for other races, like dwarves, to be funny, but not the undead.
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Because of this, I would like to see the removal of the bat. I doubt that is going to happen, somehow, so I will be making new graphics for the little bugger, and would like to see the bat then made non-undead.

Need a scout? - lets make some spirits, then.

Additionally, I believe I know of a way to revise the shadow/nightgaunt graphics to make them what francisco had originally intended. He did a really good job with the other ghosts, but those two kinda lacked in the fear dept.
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Really, though, I'd like to see wesnoth blaze down a path that no one has taken before.

Instead of adding things like vampires to make this game just like every other game, I'd like to see people add new permutations of the races we already have - different cultures of humans, elves, etc.

Northern elves, anyone? Few games have more than one group of the same race - even warcraft doesn't.

[Circon]

*agrees with everybody disliking vampires, also drakes*

[Elvish_Pillager]

Because of this, I would like to see the removal of the bat. I doubt that is going to happen, somehow, so I will be making new graphics for the little bugger, and would like to see the bat then made non-undead.

Need a scout? - lets make some spirits, then.

A) Make the bat scarier and nastier looking, preferably gray. I like the nonundead idea, too; the resistances are really messed up for a Bat.

B) What, scouting spirits? You summon a Spirit from the Nether Realms and you send it scouting!!??! No! You send it to devour the souls of your enemies!

P.S.: *agrees with Circon*

[lilepo2023]

this is the best idea for the undead since the idea of the undead, i personally think that possibly they could level up from the vampire bat, then do what ever they do since the bat is only a level 1 unit, and for fitting into the picture, well thats what you get for messing around with necromancers, vampires...

[Tieom]

Need a scout? - lets make some spirits, then.

The obligatory:
Shade
HP 12
Movement (whatever the bat has as movement), as Spirit
Chaotic
Nightstalk
Wail 3-2 Ranged (Cold)

Then just get a vaguely humanoid grey cloud for a graphic (gotta have the red eyes, too) and yer done:

[turin]

this is the best idea for the undead since the idea of the undead, i personally think that possibly they could level up from the vampire bat, then do what ever they do since the bat is only a level 1 unit, and for fitting into the picture, well thats what you get for messing around with necromancers, vampires...

Your logic seems illogical. Vampires don't come from necromancers. Vampires are from (mostly) european myths, and have a more recent feel to them. since they were popularized by Bram Stoker. They are not raised by necromancers, IIRC they come back to life either by their own free will or they are possessed by demons.

[lilepo2023]

i could have sworn that necromancers open up some kind of gate that vampires go through to come to this world...

[Jetrel]

i could have sworn that necromancers open up some kind of gate that vampires go through to come to this world...

Then you're reading [censored] fantasy. The idea of Vampires originated from a basic belief in what is classified as "sympathetic magic" (don't ask why it has that name, I do not know).

The idea was that if you consumed part of your victim, you would gain the power of that part. Barbarian warriors would eat the hearts of their fallen enemies to gain their courage.

The life was seen to be in the blood, and early attempts at alchemy/sorcery, intended to prolong life, saw people doing things with blood, whether it be drinking it, or bathing in it. Sometimes, the blood of virgins was seen as special, since they had not yet given away their power to create life (or some sick logic along those lines), but whatever the case, these deeds lived on in legend, since if you did this kind of thing more than a few times, it would invariably be found out, and humans instinctually balk at this as being horrifying (and rightfully so).

Also:
Vampires are human. Some 20th century authors, writing the literary jizz of our language, may have written about vampires that were not human in origin. But - no surprise - no one has heard of them, because the basic premise of their work is [censored]. Even Anne Rice, who I will not grace with my readership, had human vampires.

With the story "Dracula", the idea of vampirism being a permanent curse was cemented, as were the curious and unrelated abilities and weaknesses of the contemporary "vampire".

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This brings to mind an interesting fact: Most vampire legends involved their antagonist making a pact with the devil to gain such unworldly powers. Obviously, you cannot gain life from drinking blood - this was seen as the thing that activated that capability.

The main purpose of becoming a lich, or a vampire*, is immortality.

Don't even try to argue this. Certainly power was also desired, but power is worthless if you still die from old age.


*or "any self-induced form of being undead"

This is one of the things I would like to see established as one of the axioms of our fantasy world, to which writers and designers should comply. If we have such a set of axioms, our fantasy will not be self-contradictory.

[J-ser]

The vampire might be a hero for someone but not a new race or a new unit. I agree we should dump the vampire bat or make it look cooler. I have no idea how it became purple and then a red orange color. I think we should put in the undead horseman line or the undead beast line as scouts instead of a purple bat or a ghost.

[lilepo2023]

Then you're reading [censored] fantasy. The idea of Vampires originated from a basic belief in what is classified as "sympathetic magic" (don't ask why it has that name, I do not know).

The idea was that if you consumed part of your victim, you would gain the power of that part. Barbarian warriors would eat the hearts of their fallen enemies to gain their courage.

The life was seen to be in the blood, and early attempts at alchemy/sorcery, intended to prolong life, saw people doing things with blood, whether it be drinking it, or bathing in it. Sometimes, the blood of virgins was seen as special, since they had not yet given away their power to create life (or some sick logic along those lines), but whatever the case, these deeds lived on in legend, since if you did this kind of thing more than a few times, it would invariably be found out, and humans instinctually balk at this as being horrifying (and rightfully so).

Also:
Vampires are human. Some 20th century authors, writing the literary jizz of our language, may have written about vampires that were not human in origin. But - no surprise - no one has heard of them, because the basic premise of their work is [censored]. Even Anne Rice, who I will not grace with my readership, had human vampires.

With the story "Dracula", the idea of vampirism being a permanent curse was cemented, as were the curious and unrelated abilities and weaknesses of the contemporary "vampire".

-------------

This brings to mind an interesting fact: Most vampire legends involved their antagonist making a pact with the devil to gain such unworldly powers. Obviously, you cannot gain life from drinking blood - this was seen as the thing that activated that capability.

The main purpose of becoming a lich, or a vampire*, is immortality.

Don't even try to argue this. Certainly power was also desired, but power is worthless if you still die from old age.


*or "any self-induced form of being undead"

This is one of the things I would like to see established as one of the axioms of our fantasy world, to which writers and designers should comply. If we have such a set of axioms, our fantasy will not be self-contradictory.

jeez dude why don't you just publish your next post? anyway there was a lot in there i didnt read BUT the origanal idea of vampirism came from a king who decorated with heads and drunk blood or something along those lines, so you wouldn't have to have any back story on it, it's just some peasents (we drag them into this a lot dont we...) who like drinking blood and joined the undead... sound good?

[Sangel]

jeez dude why don't you just publish your next post? anyway there was a lot in there i didnt read BUT the origanal idea of vampirism came from a king who decorated with heads and drunk blood or something along those lines, so you wouldn't have to have any back story on it, it's just some peasents (we drag them into this a lot dont we...) who like drinking blood and joined the undead... sound good?

Given that that goes against the grain of practically everything ever written on vampires... no, not good. Not really.

[Jetrel]

luego, dude.

[Bander]

The orgin of the vampire comes from europe, were if they thought that someting was going wrong in their village or whatever, sick animals, whatever, that sometimes they would blame it on a "vampire". Then they would dig up this persons grave and open the coffin. When people die their hair and fingernails never stop growing, so these corpses would look pretty creepy. To kill a vampire, you stab it through the heart with a stake. On a corpse this will realses all of the pressurised gasses in the chest, caused by bacteria decay and sometimes the corpse will shudder violently at this and blood will explode out of the chest cavity. Wouldn't it be a suprise that if they dug up every recent grave in the area they would find a "vampire".

As for the unit, I think that it would be pretty interesting if the vampire/blood bat could eventually become a full fleged Vampire, complete with gaze attack. It would certainly make them more interesting from a gameplay point of view. Imagine, all of the bats in a swarm, each a potential vampire.

[Bander]

lilepo2023T the origanal idea of vampirism came from a king who decorated with heads and drunk blood or something along those lines, so you wouldn't have to have any back story on it, it's just some peasents (we drag them into this a lot dont we...) who like drinking blood and joined the undead... sound good?

That would be Vlad the Impaler, sometimes credited as being a vampire. The actual myth has so many orgins that any one scource will not really suffice.

[wildfyre010]

The idea of Vampires originated from a basic belief in what is classified as "sympathetic magic" (don't ask why it has that name, I do not know).

<wordgeek>

This comes from the original denotation of the word "sympathy." Sympathy comes from the latin syn-, meaning "same," or "sharing like qualities" and pathos, meaning (in this context) the essence of what is personal. For two things to be sympathetic is for them to share experience; what affects one affects the other. Thus a vampire and his victim, according to the popular mythos, are linked sympathetically by the blood -- the essence -- of the vampire.

</wordgeek>