'Durkula'

[Pooflive]

I couldn't find if something similar to this had been asked, but, (other than plot reasons) was Durkon transformed into a vampire to make his character more...Dynamic? Would this be a good solution to a player who was bored of playing a blander lawful good character, and letting them be a chaotic evil? Or would the GM control the vampire and have (the hypothetical) Durkon's Player sit around being useless?

[Keltest]

I suspect that yes, it was to give Durkon more character development. As for an actual game, how it works depends largely on the DM and the setting. Personally I would make the player act as if his character died and turn it into an NPC until they can revive him if I were doing what Rich is doing, but other people are free to do what they want in their campaigns. If the setting allows for the vampire to be tagging along because it has nothing better to do, for example, theres no reason to make the player reroll unless they want to ditch the annoying vampire status.

[Jay R]

A. One of the earliest strips drawn was a joke about Durkon "turning undead". Rich couldn't use it because it would mess up one of his characters, so he saved it, and has been aiming at using it since the first three or four strips were drawn. So no, it wasn't "to give Durkon more character development". It was planned long before any character had any character development. If anything, you have it reversed - Durkon had little character development up to now in order to not get in the way of this.

B. In a game, giving somebody the vampire template is more-or-less equivalent to giving him 8 levels all at once. I do not recommend this as a solution to a bored player.

[Pooflive]

"A. One of the earliest strips drawn was a joke about Durkon "turning undead". Rich couldn't use it because it would mess up one of his characters, so he saved it, and has been aiming at using it since the first three or four strips were drawn. So no, it wasn't "to give Durkon more character development". It was planned long before any character had any character development. If anything, you have it reversed - Durkon had little character development up to now in order to not get in the way of this."

I forgot about the Turn Undead joke, do you think it was really planned that early? And thanks, I never thought about it that way.

[Gnoman]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?294096-The-MitD-outwitting-Xykon/page9&p=15709954#post15709954

The original joke was the second OOtS strip created.

[Jaxzan Proditor]

Turning Durkon into a Vampire definitely will make his character grow and develop. As The Giant has said before, developing Durkon is kind of difficult because he tends to be more passive than the other characters. Now that we are focusing on him so much, it is only natural that his character becomes more dynamic.

The reason why he became a vampire is what the others said; The Giant had come up with this idea many years ago and was probably just waiting for the right time to pull it off.

[Murk]

The "the Giant had it planned, so that's all there is to it" is really a oversimplification. He had it planned as a one-gag strip. It isn't a one-gag strip now. Meaning: something changed.
What changed was that the comic isn't a day-to-day comic anymore, so there are these things like a "plot" and "character development".
So, yes, even though it was "planned" (meaning: the idea has been there for a long time), the reason it is a plot arc and not something we forgot about after one strip is for Durkons (and the plots) development.

[littlebum2002]

Becoming a vampire can certainly make a character more interesting, but if you do out on a game you should use the Vampire Savage Progression (http://web.archive.org/web/20090601220810/http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sp/20030824a)

[factotum]

B. In a game, giving somebody the vampire template is more-or-less equivalent to giving him 8 levels all at once. I do not recommend this as a solution to a bored player.

If the only reason for turning them into a vampire is to force an alignment change, just give them a cursed Helm of Opposite Alignment (those are still a thing, right?)...job done without having to mess around with level adjustments or templates. Even better, HoOA is reversible via a Remove Curse, so if the player turns out to be unhappy with the change they're not quite as stuck with it as they are with being a vampire.

[Koo Rehtorb]

Letting the player play a vampire in the game really all comes down to what style of game you're playing.

[137beth]

Durkon doesn't have a player (other than the author), so I'm pretty sure it wasn't because the player was bored.

[Seto]

There's nothing suggesting he's Chaotic Evil now, in fact the evidence (Devil summoning) as well as 3.5 rules point towards Lawful Evil.
And Rich has explicitly said nothing was planned in the first 100 or so strips and they shouldn't be taken into account while interpreting the story and constructing theories.

[Jay R]

I forgot about the Turn Undead joke, do you think it was really planned that early? And thanks, I never thought about it that way.

Well, Rich thinks so. I'm not prepared to disagree.


However, as a result of that comic, it has always been true that someday, Durkon was going to turn into a vampire. At first, I was just going to save the joke for a day when they would have access to the means to undo it, and then later, I decided to drop the punchline and really make it a major part of what happens.... All of Durkon's characterization and plot, since 2003, has been leading to him becoming a vampire and the story that would spin out of that. It has influenced hundreds of decisions going back ten years of comic.