[the homestuck man himself]

Honestly, while the idea of a mechanical disease having more effects like giving you skills and all is pretty cool, I can't help but feel like that vampire as a whole should be a sidegrade of what you once were, be it human, kael, etc. It's the main issue with vampire as a whole, it being a race that is barely picked not just because of the lore and what you have to follow, but due to the mechanics involved.

I'm unsure on how it could be turned into a sidegrade, but I have some ideas for what was proposed:

Instead of being weak to sunlight or missing out on healing, they could just have a innate fear to fire in general. For example: If a infected is hit by fire or has fire cast near them, they get X level of fear or hesistation(Could, in theory, be reduced by having fire resistance, though it would kind of go against the innate fear aspect of the weakness).

While becoming a vampire can lose you out on your racial skills/resistances, it could promote a change in playstyle(slightly). A innate resistance to poison(MAYBE 50% if we go full Elder Scrolls, if not, 15%), 15% increase in ice resistance, a 15% decrease to fire reistance. These reistances could be changed out to physical damage resistance, like sharp, blunt and pierce(while keeping the slight fire weakness). They could also be more vulnerable to the burn debuff, but be more resistance to the frostbite debuff as well(again, can be changed into resistances to the lingering effects given by phys. attacks).

Biting someone should be your speciality, so it could become a utility skill more than anything. A 50-25% SWA skill that, upon hitting someone, could restore your HP by X amount, doubling and refunding 2m if it crits, playing into a more savage playstyle if you fight up close and personal. However, there could be a trait that changes the Bloodsucking Bite into a Unlife Tendril, turning into a ranged-exclusive version of this skill that trades the crit effect for a 35% guaranteed scaling and 4-5 range, perhaps?

By becoming a vampire, you could benefit from some IC buffs, too. While being a carrier of this 'curse' could be enough to cause people to hate on you, why not get them jealous? Giving them the ability to heal old scars, wounds, small missing limbs and organs could do just that, maybe even immunity to those pesky lauders.

As time passes, however, another stage could be added onto the disease itself.



The Nightcrawler stage of the disease. After enjoying the beauty and 'immortality' vampirism gives you, you turn into what the disease deems a fitting host, a monster. Your ability to spread this disease(if the concept of infectability stays as the discussion goes on)gets stronger- It is at it's peak, even. You are the perfect carrier.

At this stage, you could play more into player choice, since it would bring on the broader, more brutal aspects of what it is to have a vampire-creating disease in you. Maybe even some movement skills are given to you, like a long leap, gliding, flying, dashes- You name it.

TLDR: My views of what a vampire should be are that of a perfect carrier of the disease, being only noticed by those with a keen eye(or the pyromaniacs). The disease's objective shouldn't be to shaft you all together, but rather, to make you spread it as efficiently(and brutally) as possible.