Vampires (Side Antagonist) & Vampirism

[Xhuis]

I dropped this a long time ago but I've decided to pick it back up.
https://github.com/tgstation/-tg-station/pull/11951

• Vampires can be created by drinking from a glass goblet filled with blood
• Only non-cultist, non-loyal, non-chaplain crewmen can become vampires
• Vampires sustain themselves from the blood of living creatures
• There are two types of blood: clean and dirty
• Clean blood is gained from sapient humans and is the optimal type of blood, being able to prevent death and heal wounds
• Dirty blood is gained from any other creatures and is basically useless
• To drink a creature's blood, the vampire targets the head on harm intent - after a short time, the target will be continuously stunned and muted while the vampire drains a lot of their blood (however, never a fatal amount is drained)
• After being drained, the target will, fluff-wise, forget everything that happened to them
• Vampires are quasi-immortal and are incapable of death by most means
• Whenever a vampire would die normally, they will instead regenerate a small amount of damage and lose a point of clean blood
• This functionality is null and void if the vampire has over 200 burn damage or holy water in their system - they can die normally in that case
• As long as a vampire has clean blood, they will slowly regenerate damage every tick - 0.1 of each type except oxyloss, which is 1
• Holy water will utterly destroy vampires, doing 8 burn damage per tick
• Vampires can examine each other to determine their vampiric status
• Analyzing a vampire with a health analyzer will display error text in place of blood level and type
• Blood-filled goblets are either admin-spawned or created by an event
• The event picks a random eligible human and plays a sound and message to them before spawning the goblet at their feet

[PKPenguin321]

pretty cool, but maybe they could use a HuD instead of examine text? also, what exactly is their purpose? drinking some blood and immediately making the victim forget about it seems really really passive and probably won't affect the round very much
definitely has potential, and i'm really liking the influx of new antag types.

but aside from all that, the question is: will it be done in time for halloween?

[Alex Crimson]

"I dropped this a long time ago"

You should have that as your catchphrase.

[DrPillzRedux]

I'm gonna tell you right now, vampire is the most shit and hated thing on goon. It's not fun. It's a ling with some homosexual flare powers. It's basically combining ling and slings. They are boring to play against because they are stealth based and they are boring to play as. You sit there as a vamp and chew someones head for a bit then hide the body.

I sincerely recommend not adding them.

[Zilenan91]

Don't vamps on goon get super loud and robust once they get full power?

[Steelpoint]

Don't vamps on goon get super loud and robust once they get full power?

Yes but Goon's Changeling does that but in a more enjoyable and better way.

[Super Aggro Crag]

would they be like regular draculas or freaky aliens

[Steelpoint]

From reading the OP it seems the Vampire is a really weak variant of Changeling.

A Vampire will need to find a stun based weapon before they can drain anyone's blood, and they have no special powers at all to rely upon so its going to be Stun Prod/Water city for Vampires.

Also it seems if you just Laser a Vampire to death that it'll kill them forever, or just swing by the Chapel and get some Holy Water and put that in your peppersprayer.

I don't get this antag, its pathetic and at best it'll piss Medbay off as they have to keep getting more blood to heal people who lost all their blood, at least until someone kills the Vampire, cuffs it and tosses it into a vat of Holy Water.

Seems worthless as a antag, either go big or go home.

Or fix Shadowling, but I digress.

[Incomptinence]

Oh holy loyalty implants. Okay now.

[Xhuis]

This is still WIP but I appreciate the feedback regardless.

[DrPillzRedux]

Don't vamps on goon get super loud and robust once they get full power?

Not really. They're a less powerful ling on goon.

[Xhuis]

All right, I'm not on my phone anymore so I can address some concerns in more detail.

pretty cool, but maybe they could use a HuD instead of examine text? also, what exactly is their purpose? drinking some blood and immediately making the victim forget about it seems really really passive and probably won't affect the round very much

I deliberately abstained from using an antagonist HUD because vampires are reliant on blood, not magically able to tell who each other are with a cursory glance. With examines, you can tell anyway, even though armor of all sorts. They are meant to be passive, and they are entirely nonlethal in their abilities (although people who powergame might just murderbone anyway). I may be granting them abilities.

snip

Vampires will not need stun weapons - if they can catch someone in place for two seconds, the person will be stunned and muted while they're being drained of blood.
With your philosophy of "go big or go home", I should remove a lot of minor tools from antagonists like traitor and changeling because they aren't "big" enough. How about those AI detectors amirite?

"I dropped this a long time ago"

You should have that as your catchphrase.

My name on GitHub is "The Half-Finished".

So are these basically just weaker changelings?

Vampires are almost nothing like changelings. The only similarity between them is that they use a unique resource - vampires use blood and changelings use chemicals. Changelings don't create other changelings, and changelings don't harm people to gain chemicals. They also don't have magical hivemind communications - you can't discreetly communicate with other vampires via some spell or verb.

would they be like regular draculas or freaky aliens

Standard Dracula-type vampires. The alien version of this would be shadowlings.

[Xhuis]

All right, I don't want this to be another shadowling. I want people to actually like this side-antagonist. So...
Post your suggestions below so that I can improve this before I finish it.

[TechnoAlchemist]

Randomly spawning a goblet of blood at your feet in front of a bunch of people is just going to result in a mad grab for the goblet and then an immediate lynching.

[onleavedontatme]

I think you should finish it first so people can actually experience it before they demand it get entirely redone.

The advantage this has over shadowling is that it isnt a game mode. It doesnt have to be interesting for every single player or kill half the station.

Revenants dont impact the round much but theyre still a lot of fun for the person playing them.

Also good choice not using a HUD. They're dull and take the guesswork/ability to disguise out.

[DrPillzRedux]

Kor, my issue with this is that it's not like a side antag. Vamps will hide the corpses or space them like a ling. It's literally ling-lite. Wraiths feast off of the dead and are a pain in the ass but they don't destroy bodies.

[Xhuis]

Kor, my issue with this is that it's not like a side antag. Vamps will hide the corpses or space them like a ling. It's literally ling-lite. Wraiths feast off of the dead and are a pain in the ass but they don't destroy bodies.

Excuse me, did I fucking stutter? Vampires are entirely nonlethal. They are physically incapable of killing people by draining their blood, and doing so will directly impede them since they lose more potential sources of blood.

[AnonymousNow]

Neat, but what about getting a quick nip from the willing?

[Luke Cox]

Vampires would be a great secondary antagonist. If we make them harmed by light, it could make meta-ing Shadowlings more difficult.

[DemonFiren]

Yup, not good enough to be their own mode, but a very low chance to join as vampire regardless of mode (I don't think suddenly becoming one makes much sense) seems fine.

Maybe less so if you're a changeling, because then vampiric powers are redundant, and of course high-chaos modes should probably be out.

[Pascal123]

I wish.

Then i could stop pretending and start being.

[Xhuis]

Vampires are side-antagonists, not actual antagonists. They're stored in gamemode code because there was no better place to put them. They are intended to be part of rounds of other types - for instance, you can have a malfunctioning AI with a coven of vampires on the side.

[DemonFiren]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

[Xhuis]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

Do you mean a nuke op who was also a vampire?
Because that'd be fucking awesome.

[AnonymousNow]

No, seriously, what about blood sharing? It'd be good from a practical and RP perspective.

[Gun Hog]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

Primary antag > Side antag. As a vampire, you do not suck on your friends. Now, if you mean that the Op would be OP (lol) in that case, you may have a point.

[DemonFiren]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

Primary antag > Side antag. As a vampire, you do not suck on your friends. Now, if you mean that the Op would be OP (lol) in that case, you may have a point.

Hell, it might be Nuke OP if we got vampire infection spread (however low - maybe go the VTM way of higher generation = less potency, infected have less powers at their disposal and cannot, themselves, infect. Fuck if I know, I suck at game design.)

[Xhuis]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

Primary antag > Side antag. As a vampire, you do not suck on your friends. Now, if you mean that the Op would be OP (lol) in that case, you may have a point.

It'd be easy to restrict vampires to non-antags already, but I think it'd be more !!FUN!! not to.

[Gun Hog]

Wait, fuck that noise about chaos. Imagine the hell breaking loose if there was a vampire among ops.

Primary antag > Side antag. As a vampire, you do not suck on your friends. Now, if you mean that the Op would be OP (lol) in that case, you may have a point.

It'd be easy to restrict vampires to non-antags already, but I think it'd be more !!FUN!! not to.

I like your way of thinking. It will, without a doubt, be nerfed later, but let us enjoy it while we can, eh?

[Incomptinence]

So basically just an extra layer of regeneration that makes people supermen? You are willing to create changeling vampires but one officer? Gosh the holy power of nanotrasen prevents that!

[Xhuis]

So basically just an extra layer of regeneration that makes people supermen? You are willing to create changeling vampires but one officer? Gosh the holy power of nanotrasen prevents that!

The regeneration is literally 0.1 of each damage type per tick. That's around half a minute for a single point of damage. In addition, changelings can't be vampires. It isn't possible for them to become vampires.

[Incomptinence]

So it does basically near nothing is barely useful requires a lot of work most interesting combinations are cordoned off. So this is basically a way to mass produce work for admins over the IGNORE ME notice and little else.

[Xhuis]

So it does basically near nothing is barely useful requires a lot of work most interesting combinations are cordoned off. So this is basically a way to mass produce work for admins over the IGNORE ME notice and little else.

You just can not be pleased.

[Zilenan91]

So is there an actual reason for the chaplain to want to kill vampires? They'll just get lynched for killing a dude who could help out the station. I think making it so the vampires are a bit more antagonistic and beastly once they have enough blood would incentivise the chaplain from purging it like the filthy heretical scum it is.

[Incomptinence]

Or the vampire can just suck the chaplain if he gets caught by them olo forget me bye.

It's non interactive as hell.

[Zilenan91]

Yeah chaplain blood should poison vamps like on Goon

[Steelpoint]

Since it takes two whole seconds to stun and start sucking off a crew member that's still going to require some method of immobilizing them, since two seconds is long enough for someone to just move to the left/right. If you take the risk of attacking someone with your bite, and they move away and scream out your name, then your up shit creek without a paddle, especially when lasers start flying.

In addition what is to stop a Vampire from simply cuffing/killing someone as they are draining their blood or after the fact? I could catch and stun someone, then cuff them, then drain them of blood and then kill them. Why take the risk of fighting the same people again later when you can just off them and move on.

Finally when I stated (Go big or go home) I am saying that for all antagonists on the whole and not just abilities wise. Many antagonists have a wide range of powers that ALLOW them to go loud or at least to do well offensively, yet they also have cheaper and more subtle powers. The Vampire gets a two second stun mouth and can sssslllooowwwllllyyyy heal themselves.

[Zilenan91]

It would be nice if vamps were like they were in Lifeweb where they're kinda antagonists but not really yet still powerful with some pretty severe downsides to all their abilities.

How lifeweb does them is vamps start out as humans who need blood. Any blood, really, human, non-human, doesn't matter. They also have abilities they can sacrifice humanity for, and the more humanity they lose with these abilities, the more often "beast mode" triggers. Beast mode puts a filter over your screen and essentially makes you an NPC for a while, moving and attacking on your own, and also drinking the blood from the still cooling corpses assuming you find any. It also triggers if you're very low on blood, and you're always given a warning before it happens.

tl;dr you need blood, get cool powers but also severe downsides to compensate.

[Gun Hog]

How lifeweb does them is vamps start out as humans who need blood. Any blood, really, human, non-human, doesn't matter. They also have abilities they can sacrifice humanity for, and the more humanity they lose with these abilities, the more often "beast mode" triggers. Beast mode puts a filter over your screen and essentially makes you an NPC for a while, moving and attacking on your own, and also drinking the blood from the still cooling corpses assuming you find any. It also triggers if you're very low on blood, and you're always given a warning before it happens.

Lifeweb probably stole that from Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, except simply killing innocent humans in any fashion drained Humanity, making the chance of Frenzy occurring while hungry much higher.

[Xhuis]

I'll address some of this once I'm on my computer.

[Xhuis]

Okay, time to respond to some stuff.

snip

What you don't seem to be grasping is that vampires are not antagonists. They are never intended to be a full-fledged mode. They're side-antagonists, and not meant to impact the round in any meaningful way. As for draining people then killing them, there is absolutely no way to stop that. There will always be people who murderbone, and the one time we made murderbone against the rules half the playerbase revolted until it got changed back.

Yeah chaplain blood should poison vamps like on Goon

If you attempt to drain the chaplain's blood, you are disengaged from the draining and set on fire.

So is there an actual reason for the chaplain to want to kill vampires? They'll just get lynched for killing a dude who could help out the station. I think making it so the vampires are a bit more antagonistic and beastly once they have enough blood would incentivise the chaplain from purging it like the filthy heretical scum it is.

Fluffwise, vampires are unholy and a direct enemy of the chaplain, sort of like cultists. I may implement gameplay mechanics to further reinforce this.

[Steelpoint]

Whatever, I just don't see the point. Vampires were never even a good antagonist in the first place.

[LiamLime]

Vampires were suggested, but along with zombies generally disliked because of their commonness in literature and movies at the time. Some people are extremely sensitive to this sort of stuff it seems.

Perhaps enough time has passed to make these viable though:

[Zilenan91]

The Reign of Terror is over. It is time.

[Helios]

This just seems like a side antag, similar to Abductors.

[Xhuis]

This just seems like a side antag, similar to Abductors.

That's because it is a side antag!

[Helios]

This just seems like a side antag, similar to Abductors.

That's because it is a side antag!

Then why is everyone complaining it's like ling but less powerful?
Changelings are an entire mode. Solo Op is like Nuclear Ops but less powerful.

[TrustyGun]

Because people can't read

[AnonymousNow]

How about some less hostile ways to get blood, possibly from willing subjects, Xhuis?

[Xhuis]

How about some less hostile ways to get blood, possibly from willing subjects, Xhuis?

I don't see why not. Also, why are we talking in big text now?