Don't Blame the Game, Blame the Pretentious Pretender
Really quick: if you want something similar to Dungeons & Dragons, but which focuses on fun, usability, and quality—yet isn't grossly overpriced—as opposed to social justice progressive politics, propaganda, and irrational, obsessive hatred over mere disagreements and arbitrary thought crime violations, check out Dungeons & Delvers.
This video is my fault. The previous one—showcasing some of the worst gaming advice I'd ever seen—was because someone linked it in a Facebook OSR group, and while responding to that one I wanted to do a bit of due diligence. See if this was habitual for the Homely Hobbit, and while skimming the videos saw one about vampires.
Well, we're currently playtesting an adventure where you basically go to Dracula's castle and try to kill him, so I figured: lets see what Hannah has to say about vampires. Maybe I'll learn a thing or two? And maybe I'll just listen to the audio so I won't have to see her exaggerated expressions (can't do anything about the fake laughter, unfortunately), and watch her head bob around erratically, like an addict itching for his next fix.
Which isn't entirely off the mark: narcissistic grifters are just addicted to attention instead of hard drugs.
Anyway, Hannah starts out—after clarifying that this is for Dungeons & Dragons 5E, something she'll do around a dozen times over the next 20 minutes—explaining precisely where you can find the vampire (you know, in case you're the sort of casual, "potential" gamer that doesn't know which book contains monsters, as well as how to use an index), and then that it's a legendary creature, is lawful evil, has a CR of 13 (and then clarifies that this means Challenge Rating for all the other casuals), and garners 10,000 XP.
You know, assuming that your intrepid clown show of level-appropriate clichés can somehow overcome the odds stacked heavily, obviously in your favor, and manage to stay awake and attentive long enough to defeat such a creature using one of the easiest rule sets ever conceived. I suppose you could just slide that into your ten-page backstory. Think you browbeat your DM into giving you XP that you didn't earn? Along with all the other offscreen, pre-game achievements?
Why not give it a shot? What's the worse they can do? Say no? Just threaten to start a reddit thread about how they hate story and are oppressing you.
But notice that Hannah doesn't describe any of their abilities, things that would actually matter: CR is almost never pegged correctly, and what does the alignment have to do with a creature being competent? Or for that matter the XP value.
In the likely scenario that you don't play 5th Edition (no need to spell it out entirely), or are a lonely casual desperate to find a group that will tolerate you, your character, excessive backstory, and all the associated deviant behaviors, here's what vampires can do and have going for them:
- Half damage from non-magical weapons.
- Transform into animals and mist.
- Auto-succeed on three saves a day (doesn't make any sense, but it's what I expect out of uninspired "designers").
- Turn into mist automatically when dropped, and then fly back to his resting place so that he can recover. There's at least a hour-long window before he regains 1 hit point.
- Regains 20 hit points per round. Pretty hefty, but it gets shut down in sunlight, running water, or after taking radiant damage.
- Spider climb.
- Charm someone for 24 hours. I don't see a limit, so that's neat.
- Summon animals once per day (yawn, another pseudo-Vancian effect).
- Bite for around 17 damage a pop. I'm not sure if this is good or bad, but it also reduces the target's maximum HP and heals the vampire, but the reduction only lasts until the target takes a long rest, so that takes some "bite" out of it.
- Punch for what seems like pretty piddling damage (1d8+4). I'm sure an orc can pull that off, and the vampire is like 12 CR points higher.
While not nearly as scary as 3rd Edition vampires (which drain 2 levels automatically with each hit, and its bite drains Constitution points, which recover much more slowly than hit points), I think there's a lot you could do with it, so long as you play it smart, having the vampire hang back and try charming and picking off the players one by one.
Which is why I'm not surprised when Hannah says "...for some reason, every time I try and run vampires in my campaign, they suck..." and "...they're just not scary".
I'm guessing she's having the vampire just confront the party head on, letting them all gang up on him. They probably even know where his resting place is, so it's a trivial matter to stab and blast all the hit points out of him, follow the mist, and then they can stake it and either drag it out into the sun, or throw it in running water. What makes is especially embarrassing is that she apparently has to go out of her way to retain her group's attention.
But Hannah is an attention-starved egomaniac. It can't be her fault, can it? No, it must just be how vampires are designed, which she addresses after forgetting Strahd von Zarovich's name (whom she insipidly gushes about being amazing and terrifying without explaining why), and referring to I6: Ravenloft as "...the very first time Curse of Strahd was released in 1983".
Because she's a real gamer. She's got the math rocks and books and is definitely not doing this just for the attention and money (don't forget to like and subscribe to her channel and Patreon).
But no, seriously: gatekeep your games.
Anyway, her first reason (or rather, excuse) is that they have "lame weaknesses".
Well, she doesn't say something like, number one, they have lame weaknesses. Hannah actually says, "Let's start with number one. Reason number one that vampires suck in Dungeons & Dragons is that they have lame weaknesses." You know, in case you thought she was talking about vampires in some other context. Guessing she knows her standard audience, too retarded to follow along without constant reminders.
Hannah basically skips over sunlight—something they weren't generally vulnerable to, anyway—to whine about running water. Now for all you plebs, running water might sound strange, but don't worry: Hannah is on the case. She'll explain it to you, enunciating words at random, constantly grimacing her face and shaking her head from side to side. I guess I should be grateful that, for now, she's also not randomly fake-laughing at nothing.
She takes particular issue with "forbiddance", being unable to enter someone's home without an invitation. She thinks it's dumb, but doesn't explain why, downplaying it that a creature is simply "stopped by your front door", punctuates her misleading stupidity with a "really" (something else she does fairly often), and somehow considers that to be an argument.
Hannah brings up stakes next, taking care to specify that stakes don't "actually kill the vampire, it paralyzes the vampire in Dungeons & Dragons...". Gotta keep clarifying that. Don't want someone to think you're talking about vampires in some other context, right? But, what's so "odd and lame" about a stake through the heart? Just guess. Guess what Hannah's issue is. It's that it's wood. This is what she says:
"...the stake doesn't actually kill the vampire, it paralyzes the vampire in Dungeons & Dragons. But still if an adventurer manages to drive a stake, or any it says specifically any wooden weapon through the heart of a vampire while they are in their resting place. It can't just be anywhere, it can't be during a fight, it has to be while they are in their resting place, then the vampire is paralyzed. Which again seems like a really odd and lame weakness for an immortal awesome being. Wood? Really that's that's what we're going with. Okay."
Another "really" in there. I think she thinks it, ahem, really sells her argument, as if there's just no way you can refute her. Not after all that.
Eh.
It's not just that Hannah barely knows the basics of D&D (no need to say the entire thing every time), but now she demonstrates a lack of basic folklore and mythology.
First, she chalks up all the weaknesses as having been "actually" derived from English folklore, before stating that vampires "have been around for a really long time" and "pretty much every culture has had some kind of a vampire type, uh, evil entity". She then says that she'll do a video about the history of vampires, before repeating the lie that "our current cultural vampire is actually from England" and that "a lot of the weaknesses of vampires actually come from Christian tradition".
The only thing about that that is somewhat accurate, is that vampiric entities have been around for a long time, and can be found all over.
Yes, many cultures have monstrous creatures, spirits, and demons that specifically drank blood, but despite some shared abilities you wouldn't recognize them as a vampire. These include creatures like ghouls and even rakshasas. Mythologically accurate ones, I mean, not what you get out of D&D.
For example, ghouls are demons—not undead—that hang out in deserts and eat people. They can transform into animals, and assume the form of their most recent meal. Rakshasas also ate people and were depicted as drinking blood (sometimes out of human skulls), and like some vampiric interpretations have various powers. These vary depending on what you read, but include being able to change their form into different things, fly, and use illusions.
But neither featured vampiric weaknesses, not that they are even undead (or even formerly human).
As for running water, she attempts to rationalize it as follows:
"...running water is a symbol for the spirit of God, which is why running water would prevent a vampire from coming after you. So, if you were running away if you crossed running water the vampire couldn't come after you because it was a symbol of the spirit of god."
Gotta love the circular logic, here. It's the spirit of God because it is and if you do that it works because it's the spirit of God.
Nevermind that running water is an effective deterrent for a lot of creatures, not just vampires, and not just the sort of monsters found in areas with a "strong Christian influence". And, while you might associate it with God, this isn't the only reason: thematically running water is a cleanser, a purifier, unlike stagnant water.
Hannah then claims that stakes do what they do because they "were often made out of yew". Not always, but often. Why yew (sometimes)? Because she thinks that it has something to do with Jesus's cross, which she claims was also made of yew, even though the Bible never specifies. Even though ash, hawthorn, oak, and aspen are mentioned as the preferred wood in various regions. Even though, depending on region, staking doesn't even work.
She also thinks that the stake symbolizes the cross:
Oh I can totally see it. It's not like that, if they really wanted to symbolize the cross, if they needed to, they couldn't have attached a crossbar on there. Go the extra mile. No, no, a sharpened stick is basically the same. Can't even tell them apart. But...what about if the vampire's destruction demands decapitation, driving iron needles into it, incineration, drowning, etc. Oh, I'm sure Hannah would try to somehow associate those with God, too.
Forbiddance is another one that wasn't unique to vampires, or even Christian-themed monsters in general. It's not even a consistent restriction, and might have been started by Bram Stoker.
After failing to explain these inconsistent weaknesses, Hannah then says:
"...so how are we supposed to take these lame weaknesses in D&D, even though they are perfectly valid weaknesses in the real world, given the tradition from which vampires came in Dungeons & Dragons they're just lame. And that's one of the reasons why vampires can seem weak if you don't explain those weaknesses somehow like Christian tradition did."
So vampires can "seem weak", not because of these "lame" weaknesses, but because of a lack of explanation. As if they're explained in other media, given context, as opposed to things that just work. Remember in Bram Stoker's Dracula, where they go through the trouble to explain why the weaknesses work? What about From Dusk Till dawn? Let Me In? Some of the Dresden Files novels?
Is there any sort of media where someone explains the how and why? And, not that they are "lame", but how would merely rationalizing them make them less lame? Like everything else Hannah doesn't elaborate, and just says that you need to explain them, because otherwise, "...it just seems like vampires are kind of dumb, it's like oh, really, you can take out a huge army and suck the blood of thousands of people, but you can't cross this little river..."
I like how she says it, as if the "little river" is a few inches deep and only a few feet across. As if the vampire can't pull it off because it's too stupid or weak to swim, or just irrationally afraid of water. As if it's purely a matter or insufficient strength or speed, and not at all that the vampire isn't a natural creature, and so is affected differently by the world. You know, like creatures vulnerable to silver, or even mundane plants.
But it's not like rivers are everywhere. As if any time a vampire shows up, the party just goes pffft, whatever, and hops over a river that's always conveniently nearby. And, of course, assuming you were in a spot where a river was readily accessible, there's definitely nothing you need to do on the vampire's side of it, right? No reason to ever return? No one else there that he could harm that you care about?
This actually sounds like a great idea: run an adventure where you have to sneak into a vampire's castle, find something or someone, and race across a river before he finds you (because he would be far too powerful for you to confront head on). Damn, there's another one for the adventure document. Maybe I should watch more of these awful videos: despite the abject stupidity I keep accidentally getting some good ideas.
Ooof, pretty far in and we're only on "reason" number two, which is that vampires suck because of "...poor storytelling. It's poor thought. We don't put a lot of thought into vampires..."
Hannah doesn't seem like the sort to put a lot of thought into anything, and it's funny that she phrases it as "we", as if it's DM generally. As if DMs are just going through the list, seeing vampire, noticing its 13 CR, and thinking, yeah, that'll do, and then dropping it in an empty square room for the players to bump into at some point.
Seriously, her actual example isn't much better:
"...we don't really sit down and think about what an immortal being would do in their spare time. They have a lot of it. They can spend centuries planning something, and yet the best we come up with them is that they're terrorizing a little town and adventurers need to go and put them to rest really that's the best we can do."
So this is all projection. Hannah even admits that she's guilty of this, that this is the best she can do, and rather than conclude that she needs to up her game, assumes that it's generally true of everyone else. This way she seems like less of an uninspired hack. In her mind, anyway. Not that a vampire can't "just" terrorize a village. Why not? He needs a food supply.
And what would they really be planning, anyway? Assuming vampires think and behave exactly like a human, probably finding a way to entertain himself. Something he hasn't already done hundreds if not thousands of times. Depending on how old he is, he's probably pushing himself to further extremes just to find something exciting. Or learning how to do something new, discovering some long-lost secret, creating a work of art.
Again, assuming vampires even think like people, and aren't largely ravenous monsters with the occasional lucid period, that prefers to spend most of his time sleeping.
Really I think it should vary from vampire to vampire. Who was the person before? How and why did they become a vampire? Did they survive a vampire's attack, or did they seek one out? If the latter, why? Crippling disease? Power? Revenge? How long have they been a vampire? Did they turn a night or so ago? Years? Decades? Centuries? Millenia? Do they view people as nothing more than cattle? Do they love anyone, or did everyone they knew die long ago?
There's a lot of questions. Questions that even an average IQ DM might ponder. Questions which could shape the vampire's personality, it's goals, if any. But not Hannah. To her all vampires "should be an immortal, legendary being that is smart and cruel. That pays attention to details and really plans out and thinks for every eventuality, and makes it nearly impossible for anyone to figure out their plans, because there's so many layers to it."
Fortunately, even though Hannah is, as she admits "not so clever", there is no reason vampires have to be that intelligent, or even really intelligent at all. What if it was some everyday priest that was cursed by his god? Or an old priest with dementia? What if it was a simple-minded farmer that died, and then a black cat hopped over his grave. What sort of initial goals are they going to have beyond not getting killed?
What, does becoming a vampire grant you inherent genius intellect? Incredible sex appeal? Just as a matter of course? Because nothing from the folklore suggests this is the case.
This also goes against Hannah's moronic suggestion of making them your "ultimate villain". Yes, only ever save them for the end, so that your pathetic group of casual pretenders will know that they aren't going to fight a vampire yet, and that they only will when it's "appropriate", so no worries. Only ever use CR 13 vampires so they know precisely what to expect. That's not lame at all.
This is but one instance where 3rd Edition did it better, making vampire a template you could layer on most any creature, and unless you think vampires are a monolithic monster you should do something similar. Well, you shouldn't play 5th Edition at all, but if your group aren't a bunch of lazy wusses, take the vampire abilities and traits, and apply them to something else. Mess with the Hit Dice. Grant them new powers. Shake things up: there's a lot of vampire variety.
If it makes sense to fight a vampire with only 9 Hit Dice? Do that. Surprise your players. Not just by throwing a vampire earlier than they expect, but by making it something like some random graverobber that dug up a vampire and got bit. Or somehow cursed, so he's more in the CR 5 range or something. Or ignore CR entirely, and throw the CR 13 one at them whenever, see what they do.
Hannah eventually wraps up her "point" by projecting more of her inadequacies, assuming that all DMs "fall into cliches" and come up with mundane schemes, and that they should be hard to figure out for no particular reason. Really I'm curious where this is all coming from, and my only theory is that she's so terrible at creating adventures and running games, that even her group ends up steamrolling her encounters (when they can be bothered to pay attention).
Her third excuse is yet more projection and presumption as to what all vampires should be like, based entirely upon unfounded and arbitrary opinion. There's a lot I could quote, and you can watch the video if you want to suffer through it, but basically she (again) assumes that "everyone" makes vampires seem too weak and makes them too easy to kill.
She repeats this multiple times, and it comes across as something desperately hoping that, through repetition it will become fact, and then she won't be entirely to blame for her boring ass vampire fights. Or she's so pretentious that she thinks that she's solved the vampire conundrum that surely everyone else is suffering from, and is now going to enlighten the masses with her imagined insight.
She also says the words "...we allow players just all of these options to kill them..." and I have no fucking clue what she is talking about. She just sandwiches it between rambling about assuming cultural weaknesses of vampires applying to D&D vampires and how it's "okay" if you want to play a "younger, perhaps not as smart in life kind of vampire", as if you needed her permission.
But, what options? What do you mean "allow"? She doesn't explain. Is she implying that you shouldn't "allow" your players to do something that you don't approve of? If it ruins "the story"? It's what it sounds like, and wouldn't be surprising coming from her. Neither is her randomly gushing about Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, assuming that "everyone" must have watched those shows, and that contributed to her delusional belief that vampires are easy to kill.
The fourth "point" of "why vampires tend to suck in Dungeons & Dragons 5E" (sorry, she just keeps repeating the entire damned thing) is that they are, to her, oversexualized.
So what? This has some basis in folklore, and while present in some movies and books, it's not a default or expectation in D&D. At least, not if you don't want it. But who cares if you do? And who cares if you do and there wasn't any mythological basis?
Hannah does, and again we're met with projection:
"...I mean like you don't even see vampires anymore that are truly evil and disgusting. Like we've made them into these dark and brooding and sexy creatures of the night that are just misunderstood sex monsters and you know it's not their fault that they're a vampire it's not their fault that they have to drink blood um to survive, and they're just misunderstood and sexy when that is not what a vampire has been literally up until our culture."
To be fair, some female slavic vampires were said to be able to return, and lead a normal life, but would "eventually exhaust their husbands with their sexual appetite". And usually male vampires were to blame for dhampirs, half human/vampire hybrids. Which you would know had you attempted even a bit of research.
But there's no "we". We did not make them into anything. Some people did. Some people—mostly fake-woke millennials, I should add—tried to make monsters (like orcs and even demons) appear as simply "misunderstood". That they weren't really evil, but people decided to treat them as such for apparently no fucking reason.
However, vampires can be created from good people, so I could at least better understand if people wanted to have a good, or even neutral vampire. Is this a common thing? Up to you. But then performance "gamers" like Hannah would whine if all or even most vampires were inherently evil anyway. Probably try to find a way to associate it with racism. Eh. There's no winning, because the "fight" is the point, not the solution.
Oh, it goes without saying but it's entirely possible to be misunderstood and not sexy. They aren't intrinsically linked. They aren't even vaguely related traits.
"...I'm looking at you 1992 Dracula movie. Good god that was just a porno like honest to god that was just a porno I don't I don't even understand how that had anything to do with Dracula..."
I'm not surprised. At any of this, really. I'm not surprised Hannah bills a two hour long, R rated movie with less then 30 combined seconds of nipple as "just a porno". Is that normal for porn? There's something resembling a sex scene, but it lasts about six...seconds. I actually rewatched just to count the seconds, so you're welcome.
But man, all that action, and you only gotta wait 40 minutes to get there. It's a nice, very slow burn, like all the good porn. Mind you at this point you've also seen most of the nipple shots, which is great because after you've clearly rubbed one out you get to kick back for another hour and just...watch the rest of the movie, I guess.
Which is clearly just a porno and has nothing at all to do with Dracula. Yeah, if you read deep enough into the abstract symbolism you could maybe make the case that it's kinda sorta about Dracula renouncing God, becoming a vampire, and mistaking someone for the reincarnation of his dead wife, but...I dunno.
I don't see it. I've heard that theory before and it's quite a stretch. I think it's just porn addicts trying to justify liking the movie. Which is clearly nothing but porn. Two hour long, $40 million dollar porn, starring Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, and directed by renowned porn aficionado Francis Ford Coppola.
"...but we are so guilty of making vampires super over sexualized..."
Again, we aren't, even going off your very, very loose definition of super over sexualized.
"...and it's not terrifying anymore. I mean even my first encounter with vampires was Dracula when I read that read dracula when I was 12. I know I'm a nerd I get it..."
"...and it was terrifying it was horrifying to me as a child..."
Just throwing words around, aren't you? Dracula is a "porno" for having brief nudity. All vampires aren't just sexualized, or over sexualized, but super over sexualized. So, I'm curious what terrifying and horrifying means to you? Did you just get a little bit tense? Nervous? Are you confusing nervousness with terror? You force emotion and fake laugh so much in your videos, maybe you just aren't used to feeling genuine emotions.
“...there's so many examples I can't even bring up all the examples…”
I’m guessing this is really all you could come up with, and you had to grossly exaggerate Dracula.
“...but you know what I'm talking about…”
I really don’t, but then I don’t watch trash like Buffy, Angel, True Blood, Supernatural, etc.
“...they're not scary anymore vampires are just sexy…”
Repeating the lie won’t make it true. They aren’t sexy because you suck at using them. You just suck as a DM.
“...it rests on us as dungeon masters to bring back some of that terror…”
What, are you the female version of Scott Garibay? Thinking that fucking D&D DMs are going to “change the world” by running some silly elfgame?
You know what would have a bigger impact? Portraying vampires in literally any other media as monsters. Far more people are likely to see a movie, or play a video game. Probably even read a book, if you can be bothered to do some actual writing. But you won’t, because you can’t. Instead you’ll just keep producing vapid videos where you parrot misleading, moronic talking points and pretend to know what you’re talking about.
“...and to do that you're gonna want to lay off the sexiness…”
Screw that. And miss out on a chance to draw big titty vampire baddies? I’m running my kids through an adventure where they are supposed to kill Dracula. There are three female vampire optional “mini-bosses” hidden throughout, along with a location I’ve simply titled Bride Vault.
“...I'm sorry but you're going to want to censor it a little bit you're going to want to put that off to the side…”
Why? This is one of your problems: you say retarded shit and never back it up. You say “don’t make sexy vampires” because you think it won’t work, and therefore don't think anyone can make it work. And let’s be clear: it’s you. You lack the creativity to pull it off. Or you just don’t want everyone else having their fun in a way you don’t approve of. Maybe you’re jealous of sexy female vampires?
“...and if your players are looking for that have them that's that's a totally different kind of roleplay…”
Yep, yep if you have sexy vampires it’s solely because...what, the players want to have pretend sex with it? The DM wants to have pretend sex with a player? It can’t just be “the vampire also happens to look attractive”. Like a succubus, dryad, or even an elf. Or most female character pre-5E.
Nah, gotta be an ulterior motive.
A sexy ulterior motive.
Because nothing's sexier than describing to someone all the weird crap you plan on doing to an imaginary character, and then probably rolling a d20 to see how it goes down. Because that's what D&D is about, right? Awkward sexual roleplay? I don't think even Venger's stuff goes that, er, deep.
“...I would not make vampire sexy it's just not scary it's sexy they're two different things…”
It might surprise you that things can be both. Sometimes even at the same time.
“...unless again you're into that no judgment whatevs…”
I love how you say no judgments, even though you already did and continue to do so.
“...so what I'm trying to say is that culture has destroyed the vampire's reputation…”
Basically, because some of them are attractive. Not that you demonstrate how this has “destroyed” anything. You just don’t like it. I’m curious what the actual reasons are, though I’m guessing it has to do with envy.
“...throughout folklore and culture vampires have been nothing but horrible disgusting evil creatures…”
Objectively false, but you would know this had you done any amount of research.
“...and we have flipped the script and turned them into something completely different…”
We didn’t do anything. I’m going to call this out every time you repeat this lie. Some authors portray them this way. It isn’t inherently inaccurate. It is not pervasive.
Hannah finally wraps things up with a call to action: it’s up to us DMs! Together we can save the vampire from...something. I don’t know, Hannah’s shitty DMing? From being sometimes sexy, but only when the DM specifically goes that route? We can’t really change the former, but anyone can just make them normal looking or monstrous without changing anything at all. So, that's an easy fix at least.
How terrifying vampires are is up to you. If you throw them at your party when “level appropriate”, they’re going to have an easy time, especially in 5th Edition. Better to do so when they aren’t expecting it. Design vampires such that they can more easily tear into the party, drinking blood and draining their health (also make it harder to recover drained health). Let them use their bite attack without having to grab something, but make a grab-bite just do way more damage.
That ought to at least start to freak them out, but then they might whine that you're being unfair, taking away their "agency". Might need to find a new group, play a new, better game.
You could also mess with them without changing any of the rules, by having the vampire play it smart. Not super-duper genius smart, even, but just...cunning. Attack them when they're separated. Charm NPCs and characters, then have them take stuff from the party, refuse to fight. Sabotage their plans. Outright kill Charmed players with the bite. Run away quickly using the mist form if things start to even begin looking bad.
I think you could really screw with them, just so long as you don't have the vampire stupidly fight to the misty escape.
While the only example vampire in Dungeons & Delvers is level 6, we make it clear that it's for a fairly recent one, and encourage you to mess with its stats and come up with new abilities. Unlike the 5E vampire, it can bite you at any time, draining your health, which also recovers fairly slowly (you don't just bounce back fully after taking a nap).
Finally, their normal description is usually that of a bloated corpse. So, monstrous by default, but you can do whatever. But don't worry, there are plenty of attractive women in the art:
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