Two ancient curses, both drawn from the lore of Tamriel. How you catch them, how you survive the turning, what they give, and what they cost.
One sky for everyone
The server keeps the clock, the calendar, the moons and the weather. When it is night for you, it is night for every player in Tamriel.
Day and night
A day in Tamriel passes in four real hours. Night runs from 8 in the evening to 6 in the morning, and sunrise burns the same vampire on every screen at once.
Moon phases
The moons wax and wane together, three days to a phase. They are full for three days in every twenty-four, about twelve real hours in every four real days, and for the whole server at once. Type /time to see the phase.
Weather
Weather is shared by everyone in the same region. Cloud halves the sun's burn on a vampire, and rain or snow cuts it to a quarter.
Vampirism
Vampirism begins as a disease, Sanguinare Vampiris. Left alone, it ends in undeath.
- Infection
Bitten
A vampire's blow passes on Sanguinare Vampiris 3 times in 100. Being fed on by one while you are awake passes it 1 time in 20. Argonians catch it half as often, for the Hist guards their blood (see the Racial Guide). A rite you choose is not affected.
- 3 in-game days
Incubation
Three in-game days of your own play, about twelve real hours online; time logged out does not count. Your journal (F3) gains a tab named for the fever: how far it has grown, the play time left before it peaks, the trial to come and the cure.
- The fever peaks
Blood Fever
A trial of five rounds. In each you read the pulse of a slowing heart and choose the clearest mark. Three true readings and you rise. Fail and you die, and the disease burns out with you.
- Turned
Stage 1 vampire
You wake undead, but your gifts sleep until your first meal. Go six in-game hours of play without blood and your body begins to wither.
Breaking the fever
- Drink a Cure Disease potion, or eat food or drink a potion with a cure disease effect.
- An ingredient cures only when curing disease is its first effect.
- Complete a prayer at the shrine of your own god, if your god is one of the Divines. The shrine warns you first: pray again within a minute to go on. Praying to a Daedric Prince or one of the older faiths, or away from a shrine, does not cure it.
Whatever breaks your fever, you are told what it was. The same cures work for Sanies Lupinus, the werewolf's fever.
Reading the rite
The two fever trials and the rites at the shrines of Molag Bal and Hircine are all played the same way. Each round shows a few marks, and one is clearer than the rest; choose it. You have up to a minute and a half for each round. The rounds get harder: three marks at first and five by the last, with the false ones looking more and more like the true. Nothing depends on how fast your computer or your connection is.
Molag Bal's Embrace
A voluntary rite at a shrine of Molag Bal. Touch the shrine and choose Perform the Rite: the panel shows you what it can cost, and only Kneel begins it. It asks four true readings of five. Survive it and you rise a pure-blood, gifts awake at once, with half the sun's burn and half the weakness to fire. A turned vampire may kneel too. Not all who kneel rise again, as with the Daughters of Coldharbour: failing kills you, about one time in three it is permanent death for your character, and for 24 hours neither Molag Bal's shrine nor Hircine's will hear you.
The shrines' 24-hour waits belong to your account: they count for all your characters, and making a new character does not skip them. If your game crashes or your connection drops during a rite, the rounds you already played decide it. Behind, the rite is lost, but a disconnect never ends a character for good. Even or ahead, the rite is called off and nobody dies, though after Molag Bal's Embrace or Hircine's Great Hunt the shrines still wait 24 hours.
| Stage | Reached | Sunlight, outdoors by day | Weakness to fire |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Just fed | Slight | +25% |
| 2 | 1 in-game day unfed | Moderate | +50% |
| 3 | 2 in-game days unfed | Heavy | +75% |
| 4 | 3+ in-game days unfed | Severe | +100% |
One stage per in-game day without feeding; a higher blood rank slows the climb. A pure-blood takes half the sun and half the fire. The sun burns every vampire, fed or not: it wears you down to a sliver of health but never past it, and leaves you easy prey. Cover up: a hood or helmet, body clothing, gloves and boots together keep up to 80% of the sun off you (a circlet covers nothing). Silver strikes you 25% harder at every stage, and you can neither wear it nor strike with it. Since 13 October you cannot carry it either: silver weapons and arrows, silver ingots and ore, silver jewellery and silverware in your pack go to your own mailbox at the notice boards within moments, so nothing is lost. Quicksilver is a different metal and stays with you. Taking it out again sends it straight back, but once you are cured it is yours to keep.
Your gifts grow with your thirst: Vampiric Drain, Vampire's Servant and Vampire's Sight from stage 1, Vampire's Seduction from stage 2, Embrace of Shadows at stage 4. The thirstier you are, the stronger your gifts and the worse you burn. Ordinary food barely eases a vampire's hunger. Your thirst, rank and powers are on the Vampire tab of your journal (F3). Death's Chill still weakens you after you wake at a temple, though the undead never see it among their active effects: its time left is on the journal's Stats tab.
Passing for mortal
A vampire who has fed looks mortal: your own eyes and your own colour. The glowing eyes and the pallor show from the third stage of thirst, and feeding takes them away again. A vampire newly turned by the fever shows them until the first meal.
Restoration and the undead
The light of Arkay and Stendarr will not answer the undead. You cannot cast Restoration's healing spells, or read, buy or be taught one, and healing magic cast on you does nothing; a healing spell will not raise you when you are down either. Potions still heal you. Restoration's spells against the undead still burn you.
Feeding
Activate a fresh humanoid body, slain within the last ten minutes, or a player lying downed, to drink. A captive with bound hands you feed on from the X menu. When you drink from someone standing, a bound captive or a willing neck, the two of you play the bite together, and everyone nearby sees it. Feeding takes a few seconds and breaks if you move away or are struck. It returns you to Stage 1, and you can draw your weapon again the moment it ends.
A living person gives blood once per in-game day, loses health to you, and may catch the disease. Feeding can leave blood on your mouth and chin, most often on a young or hungry vampire; it stays until you wash it off in water.
Type /feed off and E searches a body instead of feeding on it; /feed on brings feeding back.
Asking for blood
Anyone awake who is not a vampire can be asked: choose Feed in the X menu. They have 20 seconds to Offer Your Neck or Resist / Flee, and no answer is a refusal. You can ask once a minute, and someone who refused you cannot be asked again for five minutes.
Blood and rank
Blood earns rank (type /blood): 5 for a fresh body, 20 for a living person, bound or willing, and 30 for a player's body if you brought them down yourself (nothing if someone else did). The same person counts once a real day, never a partymate or your own characters, and companions and summons give nothing.
- Fledgling0
- Vampire100
- Nightstalker300
- Mistwalker700
- Master Vampire1500
Each rank feeds faster, from 12 seconds down to 6, and hardens you: at Master Vampire the sun burns 40% less, thirst climbs 40% slower and your hits land 10% heavier at night. From Nightstalker you can Feed Deeply on a living person: twice as long, the thirst held off longer, faster recovery for six in-game hours and half again the blood, and your victim blacks out. A cure starts the next vampire at Fledgling again; becoming a pure-blood keeps what you earned.
The Blood Crown
Molag Bal grants the Vampire Lord gift to one champion at a time. When it lies unclaimed, the next vampire to rise pure-blooded from his Embrace takes it. Any vampire who slays the holder takes it and becomes pure-blooded, so the clans are always at war over it.
As a Vampire Lord you fly and drain, raise the dead, summon a gargoyle, and scatter into bats or mist. Other players see the Vampire Lord's body, though not your spells' effects, which still strike them. In the form you go only by Vampire Lord, never your own name; your race's gift is off and nothing you do trains a skill. Downed or killed in the form, you wake in your own shape.
The cure
- The rite of Arkay or Stendarr: carry a filled black soul gem to a shrine of either god, touch it, choose Perform the Rite, then Offer the soul gem. The gem drinks the curse and is spent, you are mortal again, and any rank you earned goes with it. A Blood Crown passes from you.
- The same rite lifts lycanthropy.
- Still in the fever? Pray instead: the rite is for those already turned.
The clans
- Cyrodiil Vampyrum OrderSecret
- Crimson ScarsSecret
- Bloodmist ClanSecret
- Clan VolkiharSecret
The hunters
- Vigil of Stendarr
- Dawnguard
- Order of the Virtuous BloodIn lore
Fire and silver serve a hunter well. The vampires you meet in the world take 50% more damage from fire and 25% more from silver; a vampire player's weaknesses are in the stages above.
Lycanthropy
Lycanthropy passes by bite as Sanies Lupinus. Those who survive it belong to the Huntsman.
- Infection
Bitten
A werewolf's bite in beast form passes on Sanies Lupinus 1 time in 200, far rarer than a vampire's, and to an Argonian half as often. Hircine's mark, below, is a choice, and the Hist does not stand in its way.
- 3 in-game days
Incubation
The same window of your own play, shown on its own journal tab, and the same cures (see Breaking the fever). Carrying the fever does not let you take the beast's form: only turning does.
- The fever peaks
Hircine's Hunt
The trial of the beast: five rounds, reading the track of the prey. Three true readings to survive. Fail and you die.
- Turned
Werewolf
The beast lives under your skin from now on, and your eyes turn gold, even in your own shape.
The rite of Hircine
Seek the beast willingly at a shrine of Hircine: touch it, choose Perform the Rite, then Run the Hunt. It asks four true readings of five. Outrun him and he may mark you with Sanies Lupinus, whose fever then runs its course as after a bite, but he marks only 1 in 10 who outrun him. The Huntsman does not forgive weakness: failing kills you, and about one time in three it is permanent death. Go unmarked, and his shrine will not hear you again for 24 hours; fail, and for 24 hours neither his shrine nor Molag Bal's will. These waits count for all the characters on your account.
Beast form
Change at will once per in-game day for 150 seconds. Activate a fresh body, beast or person, to feed: it takes a few seconds, adds 30 seconds, heals you and eases your hunger. Your claws are your weapons and strike with the beast's full strength, with the Howl of Terror and the Totem of the Hunt on your Shout key. Both howls work on everyone around you: the Howl of Terror frightens the people near you, though other werewolves in beast form stand unmoved, and the Totem of the Hunt senses the living around you.
Other players see the werewolf's body, and in beast form you go only by Werewolf, never your own name. Your race's gift is off and nothing you do in the beast trains a skill. If your game crashes or you log out in beast form, the time you had left is kept: your next change the same in-game day lasts that long and does not use up the day's change. Downed or killed in beast form, you wake in your own shape.
Drawbacks
- Weakness to silver, in beast form only: it strikes the beast 25% harder. In your own shape silver harms you as it harms anyone, but in either shape you cannot wear it, strike with it or carry it: silver in your pack goes to your own mailbox at the notice boards, and stays there until you are cured.
- Poison spells and venom strike the beast 25% harder. Poison on a blade does not count.
- No gear in beast form.
- Anyone close by sees you change.
- Your Howl of Terror is heard by everyone in the land, echoing through the region you are in.
- The beast can take you when you least want it (see the full moon, below).
Renown · the Great Hunt
A werewolf climbs by living as one (type /hunt). Feeding in beast form earns 5 for an animal, 10 for a person, 60 for a player's body, but only if you brought them down yourself, outdoors and away from the city (otherwise it earns nothing), once a real day per person, never a partymate or your own characters. A kill in beast form earns 2, though never a player, and so does each change, up to the day's allowance.
- Fledgling0
- Prowler100
- Hunter300
- Blood-Howler700
- Elder1500
Rank lengthens the change and every feed, lets it come more often, and hardens the beast. An Elder holds the beast for 300 seconds, gains 60 seconds from each feed, changes up to three times a day, takes 20% less and deals 20% more in beast form, and is forced into the change far less often. Companions and summons earn nothing, fed on or slain. A cure starts the next werewolf at Fledgling again.
Pack leader
Each pack has one leader. A packmate who brings the leader down, both in beast form, takes the place. The leader is also free of the daily limit and is never forced to change. A werewolf in no pack is a Lone Wolf, and a pack takes you in only by invitation.
Your rank, pack, changes left today and how restless the beast is are on the Werewolf tab of your journal (F3).
This follows the old full-moon curse of Daggerfall and the rule of the Ring of Hircine. But the moon is not the only danger. The beast can tear free at any time, indoors or out, and the hungrier you are, the likelier it is, more so at night and most of all on a full-moon night. A fully sated werewolf is never taken that way: only hunger and the full moon force the change. A pack's leader is spared both, and a higher rank in the Great Hunt holds the beast back better. When the beast is coming you get 45 seconds' warning, with the ground shaking, and it never comes in your first 5 minutes after logging in. Stay fed if you have secrets to keep.
The packs
- Hircine's Pack of FalkreathSecret
- Hircine's Pack of the JerallSecret
The Companions are not a pack. Their Circle once carried the beast blood in secret, until most of its members were cured, and the Silver Hand hunted them for it.
The hunters
- The Silver Hand
- Vigil of Stendarr
One curse only
No one is both vampire and werewolf. A bite from the other kind does not take, Molag Bal will not embrace a werewolf, and Hircine will not hunt the dead. To change sides, be cured first.