Ethereal Forces: 2 Intelligence: 4 Precision: 4

Celestial Forces: 3 Will: 6 Perception: 6

Vessel: humanoid/2, +1 Charisma

Skills: Dodge/2, Emote/3, Fast-Talk/1, Fighting/3, Lying/1, Move Silently/2, Savoir-Faire/2, Seduction/3

Songs: Calling (Corporeal/1), Charm (Ethereal/1, Celestial/2), Darkness (Ethereal/1), Draining (Corporeal/1), Form (Ethereal/1), Healing (Corporeal/1), Might (Corporeal/3), Numinous Corpus (Claws/1, Wings/1), Shadows (Corporeal/1), Sleep (Ethereal/1)

Disadvantages: Addiction/1 (blood), Angry/1, Fear/2 (Fire)

Attunements: Vampyre

Vampyre: Drinking blood allows these ethereals to temporarily boost their characteristics: every pint of blood drained allows the Vampyre to raise one characteristic by 1 (to a maximum of 12) for ten minutes. Blood may be internally 'stored' by the Vampyre for up to a week before use: the ethereal may store up to (total Forces) pints.

Unfortunately, blood is officially deemed a moderately addictive, tough withdrawal drug (see page 124 of the Corporeal Players Guide for details). Many Vampyres have this Addiction at maximum levels...

It's funny how things turn out.

Used to be, the life of an ethereal vampire was right out of Hobbes: that is, nasty, brutish and short. Between genocidal angels, greedy demons, mad sorcerers, those pathetic loser Undead Evil Twins and screaming, screaming humans, one got used to the furtive life, for as long as it lasted. And let's not even get into what one had to look like to get ahead on the corporeal plane. White skin, stringy hair, extremely large fangs - and that's if you were lucky. There was that smell problem, too.

Then, gloriously, it all changed, thanks to that wonderful, wonderful, wonderful Stoker fellow.

Suddenly, vampirism stopped being a metaphor for disease and starting being one for unwholesome sex. With that came all the associated psychological baggage, true - but, all in all, ethereals generated from modern perceptions of the concept were hardly ready to complain about the shift, as it let them get out of the crypts and into the nightclubs. Things just got better and better after that. Thanks to modern tastes (and the depredations of Undead Vampires), there's enough randomized belief floating around to sustain quite a few Vampyres.

Note the use of the 'Y': the ethereal versions consider themselves to be distinctly superior to the Undead of the same name, and try to emphasize the difference whenever possible. It's easy to see their point: Undead Vampires are half-failures, barely able to clutch at a clearly inferior version of immortality, while Vampyres are perfectly adjusted to be what humanity wants them to be.

That's an important thing to recognize, incidentally. Vampyres are excitingly attractive predators because that's the way modern society portrays them. There are humans out there that would eagerly offer their veins to one, no questions asked or conditions made. Of course, it's precisely those humans that are feeding the majority of Vampyric-bound Essence, so the ethereals have a vested interest in keeping them alive and healthy... and for the rest, well, blood is blood and discretion is a good idea. Nobody really notices drained rats.

The above are the nice things about being a Vampyre. There are still problems.

First off, belief is a double-edged sword: theoretically, all Vampyres should need to survive would be belief. Unfortunately, by now it's impossible for them to disassociate themselves with the need for blood: the lack of it not only causes withdrawal, but also keeps them from exhibiting superhuman feats of physical or mental strength. The latter problem concerns them a bit more than the former. There are also the remnants of folklore: although Vampyres may no longer have to automatically cower before religious symbols (many, many do, though), they still have a universal fear of fire. They are working on discouraging that belief, too, but haven't have much luck. This has done nothing to improve their fairly bad tempers (the last lingering remnant of the days when they were avatars of the Beast).

Second, there are the other players. Angels are, if anything, more homicidal these days. Ethereal predators on humanity were bad enough: evolved, clever ethereal predators are worse. No matter how sophisticated, how urbane or how careful a Vampyre might be, to the Host they're just another parasitical tumor just waiting to be excised with a flaming sword. Even Servitors of Flowers are inclined to be hard-nosed (helped, no doubt, by the fact that Vampyres cannot even be remotely considered to be humans).

Demons aren't much better, frankly. At best, they expect Vampyres to immediately obey Hell; at worst, they treat the ethereals as competitors. Serving Hell is always an option, of course: many of the nastier examples of the breed would theoretically have no problem with the concept. The problem, however, is that usually Vampyres are given to Nybbas - and if there's anything that these ethereals hate, it's popular entertainment. It's just so tacky. There's also the minor difficulty that Saminga invariably destroys any Vampyre he notices (which, admittedly, might be a while), presumably because he finds their mere existence an affront to his own creations.

And, of course, other ethereals are jealous of Vampyres, so they naturally can't be trusted, either. This leads to the third and worst problem Vampyres face: themselves. Individual Vampyres have a wide range of personality traits, ethical standards (or lack thereof) and outlooks on life, but there's a strong streak of arrogance running through the entire breed. Even 'good' Vampyres believe, at heart, that the rules simply do not apply to them: this can make keeping a low profile a bit awkward. All in all, they actually don't live too much longer than their bestial 'ancestors' did.

They do get out more often, though, which might be seen as an overall improvement...