Prestige Class: High Vampire

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Overview & Creation

The vampire: a highly skilled and deadly creature of the night fabled for their power. The layman might assume that vampirism affects everyone the same way, but they would be wrong. The vampire disease has two forms: high and low. Low vampires are weak to sunlight and are generally loners, hiding in the day and becoming feral over time. The high vampires are the rulers of vampire kind, and use their immensely powerful lineage traits to subvert leaders and destroy armies while remaining in full control of their faculties. Truly it is glorious to be one of the ranks of the everlasting, but can you survive the intrigue of the royal vampire families or will you be cast down like a common mortal?

  At the time of turning, a player immediately gains 1 level as a vampire. There are only 10 levels of vampirism. Increases of ability damage are for total class levels, not vampire levels, unless otherwise specified.

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Class Features

Lineage: Every high vampire has a set of abilities based off of the specific strain of vampirism they contracted. You gain a new feature for your lineage at 1st, 3rd, 6th, and 9th vampire levels.   Blood Charges: Beginning at 1st level, the vampire may activate the latent power in their blood to cause a variety of effects. Blood charges are regained after a long rest.

  Drink: You may take succor only in the blood of the living. You no longer require food or water to survive, but they also do not sustain you. Instead, you must drink the blood from a living creature with an intelligence score of 6 or higher to survive once every 7 days, gaining a single level of exhaustion the day afterward and every additional 7 days that you have not fed.
Drinking may be performed as a basic attack action on a grappled, helpless, or otherwise immobile living creature. It deals 1d10 piercing damage and causes one level of exhaustion to the victim, the damage and effect can not be healed or removed for 24 hours unless by a spell of 5th level or higher. Any levels of exhaustion you had before drinking are removed. Damage increases by an additional 1d10 at 5th, 11th, and 17th levels. You may only drink once per long rest.

  Pallor: You are typed as an undead for the purposes of spell effects and abilities. You no longer need sleep, but must remain perfectly still for at least four hours a day to allow yourself to regain lost energy.

  Revitalize: Starting at 1st level you may use your bonus action to spend a blood charge to heal yourself. You regain hit points equal to 1d4 + your Intelligence modifier. The amount of damage healed increases by an additional 1d4 at 5th, 11th, and 17th levels.

  Reign of Blood: At level 10 you become a true master of manipulating your dark heritage. Whenever you successfully bite someone, you may choose to cast Geas at the 5th level in exchange for reducing your maximum blood charges by 2 until the spell effect ends. At player level 14 you may cast the spell as a 7th level, and at player level 20 you may cast it as a 9th level spell. Casting it as a 9th level spell requires you to allocate 3 blood charges instead of 2.

 

Awakened Blood-skills

Every high vampire has a range of abilities that diverge even from their lineage, which are gained from meditations on the power of their own blood before the shift to immortality.
Starting at 2nd level you may choose a blood-skill to awaken, detailed below. When you gain certain levels as a vampire you may choose a new blood-skill to awaken. In addition, when you gain a level you may replace a single blood-skill with a new one if you desire.
If a blood-skill has prerequisites, you must meet them to awaken it. You can awaken a blood-skill at the same time as you meet its prerequisites upon leveling up. Prerequisites for levels are for total character levels, not only vampire levels.


    Arms of Iron
Prerequisites: 9th level, 14 Strength
You gain advantage on grapple rolls and have a climbing speed equal to that of your base movement.

  Bloodmage
Prerequisites: 5th Level, 12 Intelligence
When casting a spell you may spend a blood charge to increase your spell save DC by 5 until the end of your next turn.

  Crushing Jaws
Prerequisites: 12 Strength
When you drink from a creature you deal 2d10 bludgeoning damage in addition to the normal piercing damage.

  Darkflight
Prerequisites: 9th Level
You may cast Fly on yourself once per long rest, using a raven feather as a material component. The feather is consumed upon use.

  Dark Lore
You gain proficiency in History and Medicine.

  Death Rattle
Prerequisites: 5th level
You may spend 1 blood charge while casting your Toll the Dead cantrip to make it become a burst effect with a radius of 5 feet.

  Draining Bite
When you drink from a creature you restore 1d10 hit points to yourself and add a second level of exhaustion to your target.

  Ensorcelling Bite
Prerequisites: 12 Charisma
When you drink from a creature they become charmed by you for 10 minutes.   Frenzy
When a hostile creature dies within 10 feet of you, you gain advantage on one attack before the end of your next turn and it deals 1d6 additional damage if it lands.

  Hardened Platelets
Prerequisites: 9th level, 14 Constitution
Your AC can not go below 16, regardless of armor or dexterity.

  Hunter's Instinct
You gain advantage on checks to track living creatures.

  Invigorated Blood
Prerequisites: 5th level
Your revitalize ability can now be used on an ally within 30 feet of you that you can see.

  Perfected Form
Prerequisites: Dexterity 12
When you engage in two weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.

  Politician's Dance
Prerequisites: Charisma 12
Beginning at 2nd level, you may spend a blood charge as a bonus action to gain advantage on any persuasion checks made to someone in a position of power. This effect lasts for 10 minute.

  Precise Strikes
Prerequisites: 9th level, 14 Dexterity
As a bonus action you may use 1 blood charge to add both your dexterity and your strength modifiers to the attack damage of melee attacks you make this round.

  Natural Affinity
Prerequisites: 14 Intelligence
You may re-roll a d20 with a result of 1 when making a spell attack once per turn.

  Rejuvenate
The die for your revitalize ability becomes a d6.

  Resolve of the Undying
You gain 2 additional hit points per level. This effect is retroactive and is removed if the skill is switched out for another.

  Scent of Blood
Prerequisites: 9th level, 12 Wisdom
As an action you can detect the presence of all living creatures within 30 feet of you that are size small or greater, though it does not give you their precise location.

  Sharp Senses
Prerequisites: 13th level, 14 Wisdom
You are immune to the blinded and deafened conditions.

  Slow Metabolism
You only need to feed every 14 days instead of every 7.

  Thick Blood
Prerequisites: 5th level, 12 Constitution
You gain resistance to non-magical piercing and slashing damage.

  Well Spoken
Prerequisites: 9th level, 14 Charisma
Whenever you make a Deception, Intimidation, or Persuasion ability check you may treat a d20 roll of a 6 or lower as a 7.

  Venomous
When you drink from a creature they are under the poisoned condition for 1 minute and receive 1 additional level of exhaustion.

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Spellcasting

Though not all vampires are skilled in magic, they do possess some ability to alter the world around them regardless of talent.

  Cantrips
At 1st level you know one cantrip of your choice from the wizard spell list. You also learn the Toll the Dead Cantrip.

  Spellcasting Ability
Intelligence is your spellcasting ability for vampire spells, as you gain insight into the precise machinations of your craft as you advance in unlocking the power of your lineage.
Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier
Spell attack modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier

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Subclass Options

Lineages
There are several royal families who actively increase their ranks, all with different abilities granted by the dark powers that gave them eternal life.

  See DM for lineage traits available to you.

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