Well Serana looks normal aside from the eyes, and she's been a vampire for a long time. I'd much prefer my character looking like that.

I wouldn't think so if some vampires didn't look like that, but seeing NPC's get an option players don't always irks me, like how Karliah has purple eyes but Dunmer characters can't.

Jeezus, you have the ability to turn into a flying Bat-Demon from HELL and wield amazing powers in each hand, and people are complaigning they've ruined their make-up? I'm glad we have our Priorities. Beauty > Powers of Bat-Demons from HELL?

I'm a Werewolf, and even i think it's a silly argument.

I have a female VL dark elf with dark gray skin and red tattoos on the face. I couldn't tell if I had dirt on my face if I wanted to.

I'm not complaining about the Vampire Lord form, I'm saying I'm kinda gutted about the "tweaks" they made to the Vampire look not in the VL form. There wasn't a silly red line before down the face, and now there is. They changed the eyes, I always liked Babette's eyes.

I know some people just can't understand the whole importance with appearence when related to this game, my boyfriend doesn't care either. Bethesda can make Vampires look good, and blend in, like some NPC Vamps, but now they kinda ruined it.

Say, my character's Race is VL, I'm entering a town and want to go to the Inn, I enter the town in my normal form, so people don't know I'm the VL that has been causing havok across the other side of Skyrim. Also, I doubt people of the towns will be all comfortable mingling with someone who can turn into a hideous monster whenever he/she feels like it. D:

They ruined Sybille Stentor. Her vampirism was great as a thing hinted at through various dialogue, etc but now it's just in your face.

You know I don't know if people read anymore or if all of you are just playing dumb......its no this isn't suppose to happen. This is a bug in the game that was correctable through Falion's cure. Then contracting the disease again. Since 1.6 I believe that this work around has been bugged as well. So please Bethesda fix this.

Personally I'f I saw a Vampire Lordess (Mistress?) I'd still say "yep.... I'd still tap that" while drinking a flaggon of mead and singing songs about..... songs.... o,,o

Technically as vampires we aren't really dead, or the living dead (that's zombies), we are undead which is a different state of being entirely. That is why the disease is able to be cured by a simple ritual, and not some huge resurrection/curing fiasco.

I've always wondered why Bethesda made vampires look ugly. In Morrowind they weren't too bad, but in Oblivion you become a creature aged beyond reason and look terrible. And aside from the Imperials and Khajiit you look pretty bad in Skyrim as well.

in the human vampire form, as the stages change you get uglier, so feed on some cattle every once in a while if you don't want to look pure ugly

From what i've heard there a multiple different typed of vampire some are ugly some aren't.... you're best off asking an expert of the Elder Scrolls lore

Mine always look the same

I kind of consider myself to be one. lol That's why I mentioned the Imperials and Khajiit. The latter just become more feral in look, while Cyrodiilic vampires are one of the few capable of perfectly blending into society, which might be why they tend to look better as vampires than Nords do.

Morrowind's vampires, and those from the Iliac bay (I think) are the only ones we know for a fact can't blend in. Most people get their vamp lore from the book "immortal blood" but it's just a book and the author is not infallible (even if he was a vampire himself). From what the book says, however, there are many strains of vampirism that can blend in, but most have a weakness. Cyrodiil's can only do so when they're well fed. Some of valenwood's clans can always blend in unless seen by candlelight. Another valenwood clan eats children and shapeshifts into them, taking their place in the family for years.

I can probably say with certainty we will never run into the child eating vampires...

>8O Yet.... -dun Dun DUUUUNN!!!-

But seriously THAT is messed up..... awesome, but messed up

I agree with the TC. Beauty is important, especially if you need to seduce people in order to feed.

I'm also concerned about the burnt vampire face for females. Has this been corrected or is it now permanent? There was a fix before, where you would load a pre-vamp save.

We definitely will. We just wont catch them in the act (thank GOD!). Remember the poor kid who got mauled by the werewolf?

**While even folkloric vampires of the Balkans and Eastern Europe had a wide range of appearance ranging from nearly human to bloated rotting corpses, it was interpretation of the vampire by the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Church and the success of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire_literature,^{http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire#cite_note-Development-8http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire#cite_note-Lore-9} namely http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_William_Polidori's 1819 novella http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Vampyre that established the archetype of charismatic and sophisticated vampire; it is arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century**
quoted from wiki.

going back to the vampire scares of the middle ages on why people thought the dead were coming back to life as vampires is easy. people would dig up the suspected vampire and think they were alive on basic reasons.

bloated corpse (they thought it meant it had fed, actually its just a symptom of decomp.)
blood coming out of the mouth (obviously it had drank blood, actually just another stage of decomp.)
hair and finger nails continue to grow (must be alive then? nope happens when you die. )

but its hard to say one version is right or wrong when vampire are not real.
-classic good looking charasmatic vampires.
-classic evil demon vampires
-combinations of both (recent vanhellsing movie and i think inspiration for Skyrim change system)

its also silly to say that the skyrim vampires are not lore when. . .bethesda makes the lore, what they do in game is the new lore. im sure every book in game is not true, just as every book in life is not true, perhaps beth should start adding genre's to book titles? (fiction, non fiction, etc.)

vampires are buggy in game, and beth could have added fixes but didnt.
in the end its always the same reason:

Time - Law

Be glad that your vampire does not look like a oblivion one the cyrodil strain makes you age by 60 years the skyrim vampires look a lot better.

^Agreed those vamps in Oblivion looked terrible. At least we have a face-changer. Granted, you have to cure your vampirism before you use can use it. But its there.

Ugh good point about Oblivion, it was nasty. xD

I'm going to test some things today or tomorrow, with different races and see how they look as vampires.

let us know how it goes. i did alot of testing in beta and i found the best way is once you get your race to grab about 1k septims, contract the disease, then head to the riften face changer and make a save right before you transform. mess with the face as you see fit, transform, note results, rince and repeat.

i observed that:
-the jaw does a unique retraction that is un-reversable.
-red line from nose to chin that is most likely a texture glitch.
-burnt face is not based on eye liner, other makeup, or face color.
-glowing eyes dont change based on original color.
-lips turn red unless they were black in wich case they stay the darker color.

hope this helps - Law

Vampires i don't think are ment to be beautiful monsters, so i don't see how beauty is important. There are other types of monsters that can show beauty but vampires are not one of them.