Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Astarion is a Vampire?

Undead is not the same as dead. In fact, just judging by the linguistics involved, it's kinda the opposite.

Also, of COURSE it's "convenient" that the tadpole just so happens to alter the nature of a vampire spawn in such a way that they become a functionally playable character in the game. This is what game designers do all the time. Sometimes, a particular bit of story or setting is SO important that you tailor the gameplay itself around that narrative element. But most of the time, you design the gameplay you want, and then come up with whatever story excuses you have to in order to fit that gameplay. If this is done very skillfully, it's invisible to the player, but often on big projects with a lot of moving parts, you just don't have the time to perfectly craft an airtight narrative justification for every little element in the game. Especially when 90% of the players literally won't care anyway.

Drow even make it a point to raise their own fallen into skeletons. Elves are still flesh and blood at the end of the day. Vampires just aren't common in general. So of course they won't be common among elves either. It only looks like it's most common among humans because that's where most games take place. But if you had a game set in an elf city with vampires nearby then I don't see why not.

It's already happening in Spellforce 2, Skyrim, Neverwinter Night 1, Baldur's Gate 2... There's PLENTY of proof that elves are affected. And no book stating otherwise is going to change that simple fact.



Actually, it's the opposite. If something "just exists" with no good reason then it's shoe horned in. So it shouldn't be invisible at all. Reverse that logic. A gameplay mechanic should make sense in the game world/setting. Currently we don't know. Which we'll probably find out later. Likely because the "bad guys" wanted it that way to make sure the party reaches them, for whatever reason. If that's the route it's going then that leaves the "why" of it all.

My guess would be that they ARE kind of thrown together. They were all on the same nautiloid ship. They all have the same batch of magically enhanced/controlled tadpoles, they are literally being psychically drawn together. This is the case in the real world, AND in their dreams. They are literally linked by their tadpole's magical/psychic connection.

As to OP's question re Astarion, he's a vampire *spawn*, not a full vampire... maybe that has something to do with it? Regardless, there are other elven vampires within the D&D law, so he is unique because of the tadpole, but he's not the only vampire infected elf.

Also, for those arguing that elves stop being elves when they turn... if this IS the case even for a spawn... loss of religious connection does NOT change their race, just their religious connection. He's still of elven blood, he still has pointy ears, he's still an elf. He's just a mostly undead elf with no connection to the standard deity and afterlife he would have had before he was turned.

Astarion is a vampire? No--say it isn't so! Do tell!...;) And all of this time I thought he was a starving Santa Claus during a Christmas pandemic. What gave it away--his fangs, maybe? Who'd have thunk it...;)