Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[NTJedi]

We should gather what we know about the vampires so we can better know the best way to handle them and/or take advantage of their strengths.  I will list what I've been reading as common for vampires and hope others will add their discoveries:

A} Vampires usually(always?) attack sleeping victims

B} Vampires usually kill their victims by draining all their blood, except for large sized dwarves if the vampire has been well fed.
            ^ {1st reported by trees referencing Toady quote)

C} There's no reported cases of vampires having trouble walking around outside {lore conflict}

D} There's no reported cases of victims rising from the dead and becoming vampires themselves or even lesser vampires(thralls).

E} Vampires can be identified from engravings/decorations. {1st reported by Wastedlabor)
    Vampires can also be identified if a dwarf has a deity, you can check the deity on its relationship screen, then (v)iew it. This lists the various curses it has given out, and if the deity has cursed the dwarf to be a vampire, you'll find it listed there.  Beware some vampires might have been born into the world and thus not cursed.  {1st reported by Stormfeather)
     If anyone accuses one of the original 7 of being a vampire on the justice screen the accuser is usually a vampire trying to shift the blame according to a posts by ThreeToe on the main page. {1st reported by Astrobia referencing Toady quote)

    Some vampires will own or wear lots of jewelry or seek positions of power in the fort or have lots of high skills, yet this is not always true.

F} There's no known method for restoring a vampire back to being a normal dwarf. {golden salve?}

G} There's no known method for protecting your fort from vampires entering {crosses, holy land, etc.}

H} Deconstructing the bed of a targeted vampire victim appears to stop the attack. {1st reported by Wastedlabor}

I} Reported benefits for a vampire unit include: don't need to eat, sleep, or breathe; they can't feel pain, pass out from exertion, feel nausea, get dizzy, stunned, paralyzed or have a fever. The unit has double their strength, agility and toughness along with making all attacks on them have half as much force.  {1st reported by trees)

J} Nicknames in the status screen work as normal for vampires, but the nicknames don't show up in the (u) dwarves list, they just show up as their real name there. This sounds like a bug which is why it's not listed with the other identification methods. {1st reported by Quietust assisted by Stormfeather)

K} Workaround to decrease the number of vampires in the world is when you generate a world, go to advanced options and set the number of vampire curse types to 0.  This won't stop any vampires which were created in the world, but will stop any future dwarves from being cursed as vampires.  {1st reported by PTTG?? then assisted by knutor)


Art of War: Turning an obstacle into an advantage
Stationing vampires doesn't keep them from going to feed in the dormitories on sleeping dwarves. {1st reported by crossmr)
Burrowing works for keeping them outside as always training. {1st reported by Wastedlabor)  
Placing a vampire into a small room and spiking him for blood splatter then filling the room with water to use as a well for drinking will turn everyone into vampires. {1st reported by i2amroy)
If vampires don't need to sleep or eat they would be great walled inside a tower outside with windows and a roof allowing a permanent alarm for your fortress. {1st reported by NTJedi)

[Lord Snow]

They come with a metric ton of jewelry from their previous victims.

[trees]

B} Vampires usually(always?) kill their victims by draining all their blood

Not always:

Yeah, fortress mode vampires will drink less blood if they are well-fed, although I think a dwarf on the smaller side will still die.  If they feed on a nice big dwarf with more blood, the victim will probably make it.

G} There's no known benefits for being a vampire as compared to being a dwarf {Sleep, Food, Morale, Stats, or extra bite weapon)

Not true! Vampires don't need to eat, sleep, or breathe; they can't feel pain, pass out from exertion, feel nausea, get dizzy, stunned, paralyzed or have a fever.

There's also this:

Code: [Select]

[CE_PHYS_ATT_CHANGE:STRENGTH:200:0:AGILITY:200:0:TOUGHNESS:200:0:START:0]
[CE_MATERIAL_FORCE_MULTIPLIER:MAT_MULT:NONE:NONE:1:2]
I'm not positive, but it seems to double their strength, agility and toughness along with making all attacks on them have half as much force. Full-fort vampirism may actually be desirable.

[Captain Goatse]

Ehmmm... OK, I have identified a poorly disguised bloodsucker, how do I get rid of him? Apart for locking his room forever, obviously.

[NTJedi]

B} Vampires usually(always?) kill their victims by draining all their blood

Not always:

Yeah, fortress mode vampires will drink less blood if they are well-fed, although I think a dwarf on the smaller side will still die.  If they feed on a nice big dwarf with more blood, the victim will probably make it.

I'm sure we'll start hearing reports if someone has a dwarf survive a vampire bite.  So far it seems the death rate is 90% or higher since we haven't heard of any surviving.

G} There's no known benefits for being a vampire as compared to being a dwarf {Sleep, Food, Morale, Stats, or extra bite weapon)

Not true! Vampires don't need to eat, sleep, or breathe; they can't feel pain, pass out from exertion, feel nausea, get dizzy, stunned, paralyzed or have a fever.

There's also this:

Code: [Select]

[CE_PHYS_ATT_CHANGE:STRENGTH:200:0:AGILITY:200:0:TOUGHNESS:200:0:START:0]
[CE_MATERIAL_FORCE_MULTIPLIER:MAT_MULT:NONE:NONE:1:2]
I'm not positive, but it seems to double their strength, agility and toughness along with making all attacks on them have half as much force. Full-fort vampirism may actually be desirable.

Thanks for the information I'll update the main posting. I wonder if vampires will attack each other vampires for blood otherwise a full fort of vampires sounds like a benefit.  I wonder if Toady placed any events or weaknesses for not wanting all vampires?
Even if you can't have a fort of all vampires capturing one of these fellas still sounds like a nice benefit because you can place him in a tower with windows unable to escape and he'll forever provide warnings of approaching enemies since he never needs to sleep or eat.

[NTJedi]

Ehmmm... OK, I have identified a poorly disguised bloodsucker, how do I get rid of him? Apart for locking his room forever, obviously.

Lock him in a watch tower outside... sounds like he should be able to forever provide you with alarms of approaching enemies.  I would even go as far as equipping him with weapons and armor because if your fort starts to fall to enemies you could release him using levers to attack the enemy from behind... as an emergency.

[Wastedlabor]

They don't seem to leave a burrow to attack victims, unless they are in a squad and active/training.

Deconstructing the bed of a victim seems to stop the attack.

[Quietust]

In 0.34.01, vampires cannot be given nicknames.

[Maldevious]

In 0.34.01, vampires cannot be given nicknames.

My resident vampire, Count Chocula, would beg to differ.

[greycat]

They come with a metric ton of jewelry from their previous victims.

Is that always true?

I have a fortress, in which a dwarf was found dead, drained of blood.  Prior to that, I had a dwarf immigrant show up with about a dozen lines of "Formerly a member of Such and Such."  I was immediately suspicious of this dwarf, because I'd never seen such a thing before, and it struck me as odd.  Why would a dwarf have such an incredibly long resumé of former positions?  So I suspect she's the vampire, but I have no proof yet.  I've got her isolated in a cell with some booze, but no food.  ("Hey, you, go pull the lever until I tell you to stop."   Then locked the door.)

Anyway, she's not wearing any jewelry.

[Owly]

If you give a vampire a nickname, it will not show the change, but historical records will replace Urist McVampire's real name with the nickname. Also, I believe the blood of vampires will have the label of their real name, but more !!science!! is required.

[NTJedi]

Main post updated and there's rumors vampires cannot be given nicknames.  Perhaps the nicknames don't work for certain keys such as Vamp123 doesn't work, but VampABC does work?

ninja'd:
  Sounds like there's definitely some type of issue with nicknames, but specifics are still being investigated.

[Wastedlabor]

My dwarves elected a vampire as mayor, and his profession still showed up as Armorer.

It must have been an awkward situation, when he showed up in the mayor's office with the hammer and the apron, trying to look normal.

[Wastedlabor]

Decorations reveal dwarf vampires. I have an artifact decoration that identifies my king as a vampire, and an engraving of my vampire mace lord being appointed as militia captain.

[Sus]

Decorations reveal dwarf vampires. I have an artifact decoration that identifies my king as a vampire, and an engraving of my vampire mace lord being appointed as militia captain.

Dorf logic FtW!
"I know, I'll engrave a piece on how Urist McBloodsucker the vampire was elected mayor!"
- 5 minutes later-
"Hello, I'm Urist McBloodsucker, an ordinary dwarf and totally not a vampire."
"Oh, hello Urist, wanna go get wasted on some +prickle berry wine+ ?"
"I never drink... +prickle berry wine+."
"Oh, OK then, see you later. "