Hey guys I'm on pc so I am left to do nothing but prep my character for dawnguard and currently I am thinking of outfitting the majority of my towns with some decent gear in case I run into a "vampire town infestation" problem. I really don't like the fact that these vampires can spawn in town but I guess the best thing I can do is outfit my town in the best gear possible to prevent all of them from getting killed.

Quick question though. I DO know that vampire drain can be completely negated by spell absorption but does Magic Resist work against it as well? I know its a destruction spell but I don't know what aspect of magic resist technically blocks vampire drain.

how are you gonna give gear to your people?

Reverse pickpocket everything on the old school way.

Tried that with some sleeping guards in Whiterun. Could not give them any armour, only weapons.

It's been made out to be bigger than it is, if you don't fast travel then you will barely see vampire attacks. I've had two in 30 hours of dawnguard gameplay.

Are you sure the DR of the equipment you gave them is higher than that of their regular equips? Also you can pickpocket their equipped gear as well.

Edit: Also if I remember correctly they don't wear anything you put on them until after you leave that loading cell and when you come back later.

Vampiric Drain is affected by Resist Magic. It's one of the only non-elemental, pure magic damage spells in the game.
You can also add equipment to NPCs on the PC through console.

I made them naked (took a few saves as they kept noticing me) and then tried to equip armour om them. Didn't work.

Also wearing a full DG armor set gives yu mass resistance against Vamps

Interesting it worked when I left the cell and came back later...
Then again this might be on account of one of the many mods I have on my PC that alter NPC and follower AI and behavior. It might be an unintentional side affect that no one really noticed until now.

High fire damage weapons would work well.