vampire chronicles; vampire powers conversation:
@kaelio & @thecactifindahome
Kaelio: Well, we know that like Baudwin's death helps level up the scrub vampires
Kaelio: His flesh/blood do that!
Kaelio: Well, what if Lestat fed everyone his arms and legs? And then took new arms and legs from a clone of himself that had been made a vampire. [I think Viktor in one line is implied to be a clone and not actually part-Flannery, with her perhaps solely as surrogate despite the sex--need to check this]
Kaelio: Is this basically the infinite chocolate hack?
Kaelio: The only way it isn't, is if losing part of your original tissues makes you weaker; you that has new parts isn't as strong as you that had the old parts
Kaelio: So did cutting off Rhosh's arm make Rhosh weaker at vampire stuff?
Cactus: Oh I see, hm... but the vampirized arm would be a pretty fresh fledgling, right? Somehow I have the idea in my head that the flesh would store, like, blood points essentially
Cactus: Like how Enkil just shattered without blood, I think losing significant body mass would negatively affect them
Kaelio: Yes so it wouldn't level up Lestat but it's not like him getting a new arm would the undo the gains from whoever ate his old arm right?
Cactus: True... does Flavius every say something about his new leg? I can't recall, hm, I'll look
Kaelio: Or maybe you couldn't do this all the time, but it strikes me it's something that maybe you could do every once in a while.
Kaelio: Ahhh yeah 🤔. But we do know that if you don't take all of it, they do have some tolerance and ability to essentially refuel to full power
Kaelio: Or do they! Did Lestat actually take a meaningful step back say post-Merrick vs recently Akasha-clouded qotd Lestat
Cactus: Hm, a rationale for the cult to say that elders/master shouldn't make fledglings, too
Kaelio: You could have a punishment that is less sever than capital punishment but still has a fine-like consequence this way. Ate some of your flesh/power.
Cactus: There's always the cope vs. realism explanation for the downgrade, but it seems like Fareed has to explain things about the leg to Flavius, who take a few months to warm up to it, so maybe there's something to it?
Cactus: You know, I think he might? I was surprised by how much less powerful he seemed to think he was as compared to the ancients in Prince Lestat
Kaelio: Yeah, I actually think that might be the case, and he really does seem like the most powerful around the end of Queen of the Damned and then he definitely isn't later, I mean, I actually would've thought that he could at least put up a fight against Rhosh in a normal sense based on where he is around Memnoch times
Kaelio: Yeah and also maybe Akasha wasn't just the fount for new vampires but basically much more widely used as a recharge than we assumed
Cactus: And Rhoshamandes delegated an unknown amount of fledgling to Benedict
Kaelio: Yeah also maybe then making Fontayne was actually intended as a submissive move by Pandora for Arjun
Kaelio: Almost like self-injury
Kaelio: Of course this also introduces the possibility for gross little mechanisms like Lestat's affirmation that sires have the right to the fledgling's blood
Kaelio: So David's return bite is just about trying to be able to open heavy doors again
Cactus: o: oh now that's a fascinating way to look at it, and also explains why she was not especially raring to go after him
Cactus: [David] was halfway through building a little faux medieval folly on the Talbot estate (old man project)
Kaelio: So implies entitlement to all derived power of the lineage not just intimacy
Kaelio: Kings and vassals indeed!
Cactus: Alternatively, an MLM!
Kaelio: And like an mlm those at the bottom are basically hosed, because wasn't there something about how Amel hits capacity?
Cactus: Yeah, they said people were actually failing to make new vampires there were so many, they'd just die
Kaelio: So it is a scrabble with lords and vassals and subjects over a finite resource. A "game of thrones", if you will.
Kaelio: Although I get the sense the capacity is only a number, not the power of respective components
Kaelio: Which is a really interesting dynamic. It's a zero sum game in terms of population but not in terms of power.
Kaelio: I think a lot of this has to do with how much control we think Amel has over who is getting what powers when, and to what extent, and how much of its power is just to make them vampires period.
Cactus: Oh, I like that idea about them waking up due to essentially hunger pangs, and it explains why the jerks never felt inclined to contribute before but do now
Kaelio: Someone (Marius) does say (to Armand I think) when you get which powers seems kind of strange and arbitrary which is why you have to keep testing your abilities and if they've changed.
Cactus: That comes up a few times I think, I think it took him quite a while to get the Cloud Gift. Or maybe it was fire, hmm
Kaelio: Oh I misread that; do you mean Marius? Because yeah he gets fire before Cloud Cactus: No yeah Marius.
Kaelio: Fire [Marius] gets consistently in Byzantium iirc
Kaelio: But otoh we don't really know because he doesn't know anyone who knows they have it and doesn't really care for it
Kaelio: Avicus it feels like should have it and maybe he does but he doesn't know he does if so.
Kaelio: in Byzantium (or frankly Rome with that sad ass performance against ruffians)
Cactus: Armand mentions he had the feeling he'd get the Cloud Gift fairly soon, so maybe that's what Avicus felt? Like how you can sometimes tell you're going to get a headache before the pain starts
Kaelio: Or I wonder if the powers are granted by a kind of a prayer system to Amel and they just don't realize this is the pathway
Kaelio: And part of the reason they tend to get certain powers is once they know another vampire has them, they can want them
Kaelio: Like maybe he gets the Cloud Gift early because he actually knows what it is and therefore can have a desire for it that might be picked up by Amel
Cactus: Rhoshamandes didn't realize he could fly until reading the books, so that's something
Cactus: Counterpoint: Armand couldn't burn anyone until PL which you'd think he'd have started ASAP
Cactus: So I think it does have to be points to an extent
Kaelio: Oh yeah or at least maybe Amel was like you don't get any more powers for a while, greedy!
Kaelio: At least not until you kill more scrub vampires 👀
Cactus: Unlike the others, he doesn't need an incentive to kill so he doesn't need the perks, lol
Cactus: Like how he never bothered urging him to destroy
Kaelio: Armand was being labor exploited :(
-The council: It seems like Amel has only been commanding those with the fire gift to destroy the young
-Armand: Well he wasn't said shit to me
-The Council: Anyway!
Kaelio: But it's interesting if their categorization system also is... faddish? They tend to get powers because that system allows others to know that it's a power that is acquirable.
Kaelio: And it still leaves it open for the idea that some of them are getting actual -vampire- powers that they don't realize that they've been granted (again Lestat definitely has that love/charm power)
Kaelio: but if it were ever to actually be recognized as a "Charm Gift" others would start to get it because they would be communicating in some conscious or subconscious way that they would like to get it
Cactus: Yeah, as always the healing gift remains ignored and underexplored!
Kaelio: That one's foisted ðŸ˜
Cactus: Louis' magnetism could certainly be a manifestation of it
Cactus: His beauty area of effect, lol
Kaelio: absolutely a power he clearly has imo
Kaelio: He absolutely seems to have a glamor for those in his proximity
Kaelio: but maybe the Math Gift could be a thing but they don't realize so the Amel is never getting that subconscious request/"prayer"
Cactus: Louis' is more limited in that it won't absorb you your whole life
Cactus: Oh there's one user of the Math Gift
Kaelio: I forgot it was so pronounced
Cactus: You DO win stupid prizes playing stupid games (explode rats gift)
Cactus: Also the notorious insect speed reading
Kaelio: Oh my God, marius did get the explode rat gift
Kaelio: Underutilized against Santino, who just got the rats around gift
Kaelio: saw a rat one time and wanted it to come closer, and that got interpreted as "I would like to have rats around me constantly". Cooter burger moment.
Cactus: Summon Rat vs Rebuke Rat
