Vampire Rules

What are Vampire Rules? What should they be?

1) The vampires will be constrained by the "traditional" vampire rules, and not the Twilight type rules. They won't be able to survive direct sunlight, they'll be averse to religious objects, they won't have reflections, they'll need to be invited into another's home, and they'll sleep in coffins. A stake to the heart or beheading will finish them off, if necessary. We're not going to make them garlic-haters, as that's kinda silly. Also, no turning into bats.

2) The vampires won't have super powers in the sense of enhanced strength, speed, agility, or intelligence. The transformation will only enhance their phobias or neuroses. Remember, we don't want these characters to be cool in any way. That's been done to death. The more neurotic, the better.

A few other random notes:
~ When the vampires are sired, they'll all leave the meeting place in a daze and wander off, either winding up home or in a ditch or wherever. The first chapter will make it explicitly clear what's happened to them, so you can pick up their stories from any point, either right after the transformation, or a little later when they're aware what's happened.

~ We threw around the idea that there might be some vampires who can't handle what's happened and stake themselves or immolate themselves. Since they won't be at the meeting to tell their stories, feel free to include these side stories in your main narrative.

~ If your character doesn't have enough of a story to fill 5,000 to 8,000 words, feel free to write a shorter story. Don't feel like you have to pad for the sake of word count.

So no flying? I was told there would be flying...

I actually thought so too....with Speed...maybe we need Trib for a re-count...

A few thoughts going back to the origins; John Polidori's 1819 novella The Vampyre that established the archetype of charismatic and sophisticated vampire; it is arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century, inspiring such works as Varney the Vampire and eventually Dracula...

Many of today's standard vampire tropes originated in Varney: Varney has fangs, leaves two puncture wounds on the necks of his victims, has hypnotic powers, and has superhuman strength. Unlike later fictional vampires, he is able to go about in daylight and has no particular fear or loathing of crosses or garlic. He can eat and drink in human fashion as a form of disguise, but he points out that human food and drink do not agree with him. His vampirism seems to be a fit that comes on him when his vital energy begins to run low; he is a regular person between feedings. This is also the first example of the "sympathetic vampire", a vampire who loathes his condition but is nonetheless a slave to it.

Dracula introduced some of the following traits of vampires...

hypnosis
required earth to rest in from his native land
transformed into a wolf
required a beheading and garlic stuffed in the mouth
when stabbed through the heart, turned to dust (in the book it was a bowie knife)

There has to be BATS! Hense, there must be flying, if you're a real self-respecting old-school Vampire...ya gotta fly. Geez, guys...thats the whole backstory to being a vintage style " Dracula-type" vampire! They either leave a room by turning into vapor and wifting under a door or they turn into bats and escape through a window!