Lesser vampiric trait.

[True_Blue_Flare]

I'm going to preface this by saying: I know this is a bad idea with room for abuse that will likely never be added. However, I have a personal reason for wanting this. So I'm gonna post it anyway.

What is the suggestion and what would it add?

A new trait in the body category with a name like "Lesser Vampire", "Lesser Vampiric", just "Vampiric", "Hemophilic Metabolism", something to that effect.
What would it do? It would make your character a vampire with restricted abilities, and not the actual antag (so griefing would still be off-limits).
Functionally, it would make consuming the blood reagent restore your hunger and thirst motives (on the rp servers). Ability wise, it could give at most Bite Victim (but restricted to only work on people with full health so it can't deal any serious damage), and MAYBE Glare, after a certain amount of blood is collected. Anything else has too much room for abuse, and even Glare is really pushing it. Maybe for fun it can change your scream sound to the bat scream sound. Maybe it could remove the upper limit on what can be placed in the age field of the character editor (because vampires are immortal and can therefore be old as fuck). It could cost whatever seems fair. To further mitigate abuse, it could be possibly somehow hidden until a certain threshold of rounds played has been passed, so only people who are familiar with the mechanics and rules can access it. I don't know how possible that is, just throwing it out there.

How could this work in the lore?

Maybe characters with this trait are vampires who work for NT and have willingly undergone a procedure of some kind to restrict their ability to keep them non-threats so they can count as human and keep their job. 

So... what's the personal reason for wanting this?

One character I play frequently has a somewhat questionable backstory of being a cured vampire. The reasoning is because I consider the "canon" version to just be a vampire, but since vampire is an antag role I only occasionally get it. The cured vampire bit is the best option I have to make that character make any amount of sense, but it's a messy option with weird lore implications that has led to me playing that character in a somewhat questionable way at times to avoid breaking character. This would just make that character.... cleaner. Backstory would be more coherent, playing the character would be more fun.

I knew this had a slim chance of being accepted but it hurts anyway when it gets shot down like that
I mean there could be a visual difference in characters with the trait to mitigate them muddying the line between the actual antag and this but I can't really think of a clean way it could be handled because there would still be the possibility of a character with the trail rolling vampire, and then there could be an issue of people just not questioning them drinking blood or some shit. I don't fuckin know. It's still a thing I would like to see, but I guess it's just implausible.

[Waffleloffle]

occam's razor: would it not be simpler to just make a character with approximately the same personality who's just a landlord instead

[True_Blue_Flare]

occam's razor: would it not be simpler to just make a character with approximately the same personality who's just a landlord instead

That.... doesn't feel like it'd be enjoyable. It feels impossible to divorce the concept of this character from the concept of vampirism at this point. It wouldn't be the same character anymore, I feel.

[Lefinch]

I think, before anything else. You need to analyse why you're committing to a bit that has you as you say "Playing a character in a questionable way at times to avoid breaking character" Point blank right now: If you need to be that awkward to commit to a bit then I would personally say the bit is worth dumping, and that's okay to do. Nobody on RP is going to call you out for workshopping a character or story path. Depending on what exactly you mean by "Questionably" you're either having a hard time RPing it or worried about the rules, both of which would be bad.

I think ultimately if you don't find a way you like that removes any question: Dump it. Do something else, and that's totally okay. But for now, let me throw out how I think you could do this before talking about the idea. Bear in mind you ask 10 people "how could I RP this" and you'll somehow get 30 answers, so bear in mind it's always a personal thing, but you can pick-and-choose ideas you like from others and put your own spin on it.

So for me: there's very little stopping you right now from being a vampire. Just act up the bits that aren't against the rules: Wear a lot of black. Describe having fangs. Remember that as part of "you want to keep your job at nanotransen" you generally even as a vampire would want to keep that quiet: so you wouldn't walk around with (I am a vampire) nametags and complain when medbay won't give you blood bags. You'd play it sneaky, cool. Work a shift of QM and order yourself a spare bag to enjoy. Slyly ask the bartender for a "really" bloody mary and emote being mildly disappointed when it isn't bloody. Wince and hiss if someone takes your photo. But, and this is clear: Don't do things antag vampires would do, and don't tell the organisation that hires humans you aren't human. Roleplay it out, maybe with a crewmember you get to know you drop hints

Then, to help blur the line further: Maybe to most others it seems like its just in the characters head: you don't actually ever display any vampiric powers: maybe you're like frankly a lot of real life humans who are larping out the role. That way: You are roleplaying a plausible vampire disguising themselves in a world that tends to -kill- vampires by refuge in audacity: Roleplaying as someone Roleplaying pretending to be a vampire. Work that scene.

If you're finding needing to be a vampire is actually about asserting it loudly that's where yeah, I suspect the "questionable" part is coming up and something I'd say is worth workshopping the idea to avoid because it doesn't make much sense in the environment of being an employee aboard while say another vampire is going around eating half the crew. It causes a dissonance that doesn't fit. But someone coyly keeping it as quiet as possible while occasionally having behaviour that might make someone who knew them really well wonder? That seems fun. Plus when you're actually vampire antag: Maybe that's the shift you drop the mask, or lose control.

I'll talk about the actual idea later but this is a lot to put in one post as is. Please bear in mind its coming entirely from a "I don't want you to be stuck feeling like you have to do -anything- questionable for a bit, so here's a way I think it might work.

[True_Blue_Flare]

I think ultimately if you don't find a way you like that removes any question: Dump it. Do something else, and that's totally okay. 

If I didn't like the character, I would have by now. But, thing is, I genuinely do. It's a character I'm kinda attached to at this point. It's just frustrating how the ideal way to handle the character doesn't and likely never will work mechanically.

[Katzen]

Maybe characters with this trait are vampires who work for NT and have willingly undergone a procedure of some kind to restrict their ability to keep them non-threats so they can count as human and keep their job. 

I know "who can work for NT" is a bit arbitary at this point with all the strange traits and races in the game even before character backstory but we are pretty consistent that we don't like reformed or "nice" antags conceptually. I don't remember us policing it as RP backgrounds but I doubt anything other than jailbird will ever get added as a feature.

[True_Blue_Flare]

Maybe characters with this trait are vampires who work for NT and have willingly undergone a procedure of some kind to restrict their ability to keep them non-threats so they can count as human and keep their job. 

I know "who can work for NT" is a bit arbitary at this point with all the strange traits and races in the game even before character backstory but we are pretty consistent that we don't like reformed or "nice" antags conceptually. I don't remember us policing it as RP backgrounds but I doubt anything other than jailbird will ever get added as a feature.

I understand that it's probably never going to be a thing that can be done mechanically but that's not gonna stop me from asking, just in case.
Whatever, you're a dev and, with the rest of the devs, you're just gonna do whatever you think is right.

Feels a bit rude to shoot it down with a "we don't like reformed or "nice" antags conceptually". Feels almost targeted. Not like it harms anyone's experience either way.

[Waffleloffle]

it harms the general player experience because it muddies the waters between real antags and people who are just playing antag-adjacent characters. like sure you may not be going out there and directly self-antagging, but there's like a weird meta element to it where people will have to make a mental note that so-and-so in cargo is a Nice Vampire so little timmy the new secass needs to be told to ignore when they're pouring blood bags into their mug and drinking it

like... this game isn't just a chatroom where everyone brings their own oc and plays dolls with them. it's got mechanics. and social deduction is at the core of how a lot of those mechanics are designed. what you are asking for here is something that, by its very nature, flies in the face of all that

[True_Blue_Flare]

it harms the general player experience because it muddies the waters between real antags and people who are just playing antag-adjacent characters. like sure you may not be going out there and directly self-antagging, but there's like a weird meta element to it where people will have to make a mental note that so-and-so in cargo is a Nice Vampire so little timmy the new secass needs to be told to ignore when they're pouring blood bags into their mug and drinking it

like... this game isn't just a chatroom where everyone brings their own oc and plays dolls with them. it's got mechanics. and social deduction is at the core of how a lot of those mechanics are designed. what you are asking for here is something that, by its very nature, flies in the face of all that

I posted this because it's a thing I thought was interesting and would like to see not to be treated like I'm stupid or immature or both

[Waffleloffle]

sorry about that, didn't mean to come across as demeaning. that's on me, "playing dolls" is my personal shorthand for going buckwild with characters and I forgot it's got dismissive connotations in the grander scheme of things

I was trying to explain why traits that skirt the definitions of what is or isn't An Antag are sort of counterproductive to the social design at play in this codebase

[True_Blue_Flare]

sorry about that, didn't mean to come across as demeaning. that's on me, "playing dolls" is my personal shorthand for going buckwild with characters and I forgot it's got dismissive connotations in the grander scheme of things

I was trying to explain why traits that skirt the definitions of what is or isn't An Antag are sort of counterproductive to the social design at play in this codebase

I can understand that. It still is frustrating.

[JohnnyJohn]

It's a novel idea, but I just can't see it working out.

[Kotlol]

This idea seems better to be for someone who has a disability... and.. no I don't want to see it. Skip.

[Silent Majority]

We have enough problems with people acting like vampirism is a medical issue. I've been called racist repeatedly for punishing vampires for being monsters.

I'm sorry I cannot ever see this being a good idea

[freedo5]

We have enough problems with people acting like vampirism is a medical issue. I've been called racist repeatedly for punishing vampires for being monsters.

I'm sorry I cannot ever see this being a good idea

people when the bloodsucking murder monster is treated like a bloodsucking murder monster