Editing Scions of the cursed blood (section)

== Masteries ==

=== Catastrophic morbidity === 

Diseases are the favoured weapon of many vampires and their kin. They can be terrifying weapons that eradicate cities and villages from huge areas or they can be very minor and also not contagious at all if a vampire wants to infect just one person. Plague lords who have mastered the diseases can create outbreaks and epidemias with a snap of their fingers making them an extremely dangerous foe who might wipe out you and your whole kind before you figure out what is causing it before it is too late.

=== Death walks among us === 

Being a descentant of an undead being such as a vampire means that a lot of your life is going to circle around death, whether you want it or not as your whole existence is basically walking on the edge between life and undeath. Even if a dhamphir hasn't found out his dark destiny he might see and hear things other people might not. When dhamphir starts to deal with harvesting and manipulating souls he gets closer and closer to death itself and might eventually cross the border. This closeness to death itself allows them to harvest soul fragments and use power inside them to enhance their own abilities. As dhamphir's power over souls and closeness to undeath becomes stronger he can manipulate collections of soul fragments that combine powers of multiple soul fragments together into one. Using the abilities that are enhanced by soul collections allows the dhamphir to learn to manipulate them faster and easier.

=== Erudition of the undeath === 

For some reason vampires seems to possess some kind of dominion over mortals. Their mere presence causes them to act and behave irrationally and not only just because of the fear what meeting such a powerful being strikes into them. Many of the vampires sport thralls as their servants who are totally under the influence of the vampire, a lot of them willingly. Some of the vampires even have almost their own private armies consisting of numerous thralls and other beings. One of the most famous effects of this dominion is over animals, such as bats and wolves for example, which allows the vampires to use them as their pets. Erudition of undeath specifically affects dhamphir's influence over living and undeath beings with his inherited vampire powers.

=== Everlasting pugnacity === 

When your life expectancy is practically eternity you need a driving force to keep on living through all those decades and centuries. For most of the vampires this quite easy as having lived long enough it is easy to build up multiple grudges; against certain people, certain races, towns, cities and even nations. For a someone who is undying few centuries of grudgebearing is a fleeting moment that can be used to hone and perfect your skills and also to build up that hatred. While some of the people might have died of old age while perfecting those skills there is always their children and grandchildren and their children's children to plot your vengeance upon. And even if they are long dead that doesn't really matter since there is always new things and people to bear grudge upon. All this accumulates into an impressive knowledge of how to fight and how people act in combat situations which can be readily exploited by one possessing such knowledge.

=== Paragon of dark arts === 

Certain ancient vampires possess knowledge of magical arts that predate even the elemental priesthoods. While most of the magic involves powers of the elemental gods these vampires have passed on knowledge to their kin that gains its powers from other beings and dimensions. This forbidden knowledge is outlawed by all of the priesthoods and its practioners are usually quite swiftly executed as heretics as playing with such powers can be extremely dangerous and lead to catastrophic consequences of epic proportions. While mortals dabble with these kinds of powers and the knowledge required to use them resulting from their relatively short life span a vampire has all eternity to spend on studying and learning every kink of the dark arts and to learn to make no mistake when acquiring the untold powers that such knowledge can grant to them.

=== Reminiscence of the cursed blood === 

While dhamphirs are not true vampires themself their blood relation grants them access to powers that mere mortals can only dream of. These powers vary from a dhamphir to dhamphir depending on his relation to the true bloodlines but most of them are able to perform supernatural physical feats, practice blood magic and to heal even the most grievous wounds almost instantly. Like their ancestors they cannot do this without taxing themselves and need to feed on the blood of the living and gorge on their life essence. While some dhamphirs refuse to not succumb to this dark legacy and try fight against their urges most of the dhamphirs gladly accept it to gain the strength they have always wished to possess. As a dhamphir drains blood from the mortals and practices his blood magic and uses his inherited abilities he recall reminiscences of their ancestors and learn more and more about their true powers and become every day more like them. They might even become one of the true vampires if one lives long enough and manages to find a patron to guide him one his dark path.

=== Reign over darkness === 

One of the main things that dhamphirs learn from their forbidden lore is to channel energies from the shadowy realm between the living world and nether that overlays both dimensions. Spells that they use gain their powers from this realm and when dhamphir becomes accustomed with the powers using them becomes all the time easier and less effortless. Darkness and shadows of the living world are connected to the realm of shadows and this gives dhamphirs massive power over them so that they can bend them according to their will to be used in combat both as offensive and defensive measures such as the instrument of oblivion of Swaizzone bloodline or shadowleap that allows them move from shadow to shadow between unimaginable distances.

=== Swordsman without peer === 

While Brelasean and Ilyuktuev have decided to use their eternity to meddle with mortal kindgoms the Swaizzones have decided to use theirs to become the ultimate melee fighters. Travelling through the lands they seek stronger and stronger beings to defeat in combat and to learn new ways of handling their blade. They are known to become mercenaries to even surprising masters in exchange of getting to try themselves or to get teaching. Some of the most important members of the bloodline carry specifically crafted vampire blades while others use powerful magical swords. There are even some who choose to use normal swords saying that using a magical weapon hinders your ability to become the ultimate swordman.