#Usher Talltree

[ascalon-club]

there's something deeply wrong with all of them.

bonus

[dalekofchaos]

Vampyr sequel idea

I thought of going the LIS route of having different stories for each story of the franchise. But after carefully analyzing the game, doing my Embrace everyone playthrough and noticing a certain portrait in the Ashbury Castle. I figured out the perfect story and perfect antagonist for Vampyr 2.

Jacob Blackwood.

For those who don't know, let me explain.

In The West End, you meet Carina Billow, a woman who's mind has been destroyed by a powerful Vampire. Manipulated into eating rats to gain immortality. At first I thought it was just the Ascalon Club fucking with a mentally ill woman. But it's worse.

Carina is being mentally manipulated by a powerful vampire, forcing her to do awful things. She will actually beg you to kill her to put her out of her misery, and will thank you for your kindness if you kill her.

Earlier in the game when Jonathan asks Lady Ashbury about the bodies that have been found in the streets and about how someone seems to be following him (before we know its Mary), she seems anxious and has someone in mind. Most likely she fears Jacob Blackwood has been watching Jonathan, taking an interest.

Blackwood only speaks through Carina Billow once, mildy warning Jonathan off his "toy" but he does not seem to care enough about his little game to actually stop her being embraced. Evidence of his presence occurs when you visit the grave of Carina and find he has piled dead rats all over the poor woman's resting place - one last act of disrespect. I tend to think that doing this is both for his own amusement and a message to Jonathan that he has taken notice. Carina Billow's information when she is embraced suggests Blackwood maybe a member of Ascalon, it might have been interesting to meet him there.

And when you get to the very end of the game inside the Ashbury castle, one of the paintings on the wall was of Elisabeth Blackwood (Lady Ashbury) and Jacob Blackwood.

And when you read William Marshall's old tome before you reach the end of the game, you can see that Marshall holds Blackwood in contempt.

Jacob Blackwood is an interesting character and I wish they had given him more space in the story because it fleshes Elisabeth out a bit, gives her a backstory you can learn about as you get to know her and makes her a more rounded person with her own motivations. So when you get the first of the bad endings and she says "you have betrayed me", you get an idea of why she might react that way - rather than a lot of players being confused.

He definitely has the blood of hate. Blackwood was created after Elizabeth was bitten by Marshal and the two ranged across Europe killing for their own amusement. Even if he was created before Elizabeth has the blood of hate, it is highly likely he would have contracted it anyway. There is the possibly that he was always a bastard though. Perhaps not all the frenzied skals in the city came from Harriet Jones, maybe a few came from him returning to London.

There is so much potential in Jacob Blackwood in a hypothetical sequel. Jacob has the blood of hate, while Jonathan and Elisabeth are working for a cure. So much potential.

So a way to go about it is this.

If you chose the Embrace no one path, embrace some or embrace everyone.

If Jonathan and Elisabeth travel the world. They hear horror stories throughout Europe. Jonathan thinks it's some Ekon gone mad, but Elisabeth knows the truth. Jacob is back and the potential for another Disaster is strong. Their mission is to kill Jacob and find a cure for the blood of hate

If Jonathan and Elisabeth lock themselves in the castle. They spend years working on a cure and that's when Myrddin appears. He tells Jonathan about Jacob and Elisabeth is horrified. They know what they have to do. End the blood of hate

Jonathan embraces one too many people and Elisabeth dies in the "betrayal" ending. Jonathan locks himself away, that's when Myrddin appears. He warns Jonathan of Elisabeth's loose thread. He is causing atrocities across the land and is on the verge of creating a new Disaster. Jonathan will end the blood of hate once and for all for Elisabeth

Jonathan embraces everyone. Jonathan's bloodlust knows no bounds. Jonathan intends to build an empire on blood and there is one person standing in his way, Jacob Blackwood. It's an all out war between Reid and Blackwood and World War II is their battleground. Reid uses the Allies, while Blackwood uses the Nazis.

Ideally I would set the game during WWII with Jacob taking a position with the Nazis or Vichy France, and he uses the war to commit atrocities and spread the blood of hate like a plague.

I'd also have McCullum return. The Guard is reestablished, but it's clear that Reid and McCullum have to put aside their differences to stop Blackwood. Plus I'd just love the idea of Jonathan and McCullum basically saying "Look we have our differences as a Vampire and Hunter, but we draw the line at fucking Nazis"

As for how the Brotherhood of St Paul would return. If you let Swansea bled out/embraced him, then Usher Talltree would be your main ally from the brotherhood. But if you turned Swansea, Swansea would return and would be a very questionable ally.

aka I just want a game of Jonathan killing Nazis and Jacob Blackwood using Nazis to fulfill his goals but also embracing their ideals.

Bonus points. Jacob wears a Vichy France uniform or SS uniform just to drive home the fact that he's a fucking monster.

[shit-the-vampyr-cast-never-said]

Usher: Priwen have blocked our access to the boat.

Edgar: That's what we get for docking in a bad neighbourhood.

[vampyr-game]

by the way i loooove usher talltree 🥰✨

DONTNOD made him the hint-dispenser with a silly off-brand tarot deck and yes i take that personally. i love a good application of tarot and this one is weak. BUT then again, the Rider-Waite tarot deck wasn't released until 1909 so I GUESS it's possible that usher's is from an older, non-standardized deck. tarot used to be done with just playing cards, after all. so perhaps he received his specific deck as a gift, or he acquired it as a novelty during his travels?

occultism grew popular among the bored upper class during the Victorian era; palm readings and seances and tarot readings in the parlor were common, and since the Brotherhood feels so well-established and socially exclusive in this way, it's possible Usher picked tarot up from his peers? maybe people asked HIM often enough that he was like "ok lol if u want ur silly cards so much here they are!"

there's ALSO a possibility it's an expression of his own beliefs. because without going into too much detail, some Sikhs do keep daily practices which resemble bibliomancy (flipping to a random page of a book as a form of divination); imagine a Christian flipping to a random page of the bible in search of daily guidance, or a solution to a problem they're facing. it's kind of like that, but a bit more formalized within the practice of Sikhism. from what I've read, a tarot deck would not be an inappropriate substitute for this practice. it would also be more portable, and more comprehensible to an outsider more familiar with tarot than Sikhism (such as Jonathan, who looks an awful lot like a bored Victorian upperclassman lol).

Usher's character model sports all the visual hallmarks of a practicing Sikh man: his skin tone and features seem to point toward Punjabi descent, and he wears a bracelet on his right hand, a brightly-colored turban on his head, and a dagger on his belt. yet his name is Usher Talltree, when Sikh men who come of age mostly take the surname 'Singh'. so is this only the Anglicized name he offers to Englishmen who he doesn't trust to pronounce his 'real' name? is this his one and only name? or does he simply have several (I personally go by several different names depending on who I'm speaking to, so I don't find this especially unusual)?

and also like, WHAT does this name mean? 'Talltree' feels fairly obvious; does this mean he sees himself as, hah, a pillar of the community? a source of stability and support for scholars of vampirism? and/or vampires themselves? looking at his letters, he DOES seem to view the Brotherhood's primary role and responsibility to be the custodianship of vampires who can't control their bloodlust.

also, The Fall of the House of Usher was published in America in 1839, so I mean. maybe he read that and chose that for his name, because the story touches on the undead? or maybe it is only DONTNOD making the E.A. Poe reference, and his name is not intended to be read as something HE chose. though I think either interpretation is perfectly defensible.

ok this post got long but suffice to say I love usher talltree. I think he and edgar take tea together during the day (and that's how usher heard about jonathan...) and that's SO cute of them... edgar calls himself the black sheep of the brotherhood for wanting to BEFRIEND vampires instead of merely study them... but usher still makes time for him and takes an interest in his research...! perhaps they are transforming the brotherhood together... i love them 🥺💓

[jackjolene]

BioShock/Sinking City/Vampyr: The Blood of Alex the Great

Liz and Lady Ashbury make their way to Fontaine Futuristics, aided by a map that Eleanor made for them from Delta's memories. Thankfully, they don't have to contend with Alex the Great controlling the building's security. Instead however, they have to deal with the numerous Mutants walking around.

Fontaine Futuristics was ground zero of the Mutant outbreak, as it was Orrin Lutwidge's original base when he arrived in Rapture, and where he gave the mutated ADAM to his new splicer recruits. The source of that ADAM is what they're here to investigate, as well as any leads on Lutwidge's plans.

Thanks to the large number of Mutants wandering the halls and floors of Fontaine Futuristics, Liz and Elisabeth have to use their stealth abilities to evade their notice. Evidently, Elisabeth has a Peeping Tom plasmid like Liz's, along with her teleportation plasmid. Something's off, though, but Liz can't tell what it is.

After getting through the main building, they don their diving suits again and venture out to the entrance to the secret lab. Outside, they find the bodies of a dozen or so Mutants who tried to make the walk outside without a suit on. What's frightening about this trail of death is the evidence of them evolving.

Each one is further along than the last, having survived the crushing pressure and lack of air longer. The very last one, a few yards from the entrance, wasn't crushed at all, but certainly drowned. On its neck is what appears to the beginnings of a set of gills. Liz can't help but shudder as they walk past.

Time is running out.

In the lab, they instantly become aware of a massive, living thing within the huge tank in the middle of the main room. Its movements and heartbeat suggest that it is asleep, and so Liz and Elisabeth make sure to move carefully and quietly around the tank. The red tinge of the water keeps them from seeing inside, and they're both thankful for that.

In the room to the left, they find out where Lutwidge got the mutated ADAM. Alex the Great wasn't killed when Delta electrocuted him, just very close to death. After Delta left, Alex regenerated, and that's how Lutwidge found him. After figuring out that Alex had essentially mutated into a giant ADAM slug, Lutwidge began extracting ADAM from him to generate new recruits.

Thanks to Alex the Great's mutations, his ADAM is corrupted. There's something more vile in its reactions, something primitive. Reading through Lutwidge's observations, Liz suddenly has another episode, seeing the same gothic city as before, witnessing ordinary people mutating into grotesque monsters, Beasts, like the Mutants.

"We are born of the blood, made men by the blood, undone by the blood. Our eyes are yet to open. Fear the Old Blood."

Those words echo through Liz's mind as the episode progresses. When she comes out of it, her nose bleeding again, Elisabeth tells her that she was saying that phrase. She's looking at Liz strangely now, and her eyes keep dropping down to the blood draining out of Liz's nostrils with something like hunger.

With the origin of the Mutated ADAM discovered, they head over to the room on the other side of the tank. They both can't help but feel like something is watching them, even when they're invisible.

After some searching in the labs where the Big Daddies and Little Sisters were bonded together, they find some notes of Lutwidge's. After the splicers who took Alex the Great's ADAM began turning into Mutants, Lutwidge came up with a plan on how to control them.

Using the same method as Andrew Ryan did to control the splicers and win the Rapture Civil War (mind-control pheromones distributed throughout the city via the ventilation), Lutwidge will take control of the Mutants and continue with his original plan. Blueprints for a prototype that would allow him to keep the Mutants docile in a single area are among the documents they find, explaining how he is able to keep them at bay wherever he sets up shop.

With Lutwidge in Arcadia, the source of Rapture's fresh air, he must be closing in on his goal to take control of the Mutants. Once he does that, he can kill everyone else in Rapture, including the survivors in Minerva's Den, and then plunder the city for its horrifying secrets.

With Lutwidge's plans now in hand, Liz and Elisabeth begin making tracks for the exit. In the main room, Elisabeth grabs a sample of Alex's ADAM, knowing that Jonathan and Tenenbaum will likely want some for analysis. Liz looks over at the tank, just in time to see the massive and distorted silhouette of Alex the Great charging at them, also noticing the huge cracks in the tank's glass for the first time.

The tank's glass shatters as Alex the Great smashes through, great gashes appearing in his skin only to heal in seconds, shards pushed out right after they impale him. His bulbous head appears to have no mouth, until it opens to expose a circular maw of razor sharp teeth like a huge leech's. Laughing, crying, and roaring all at the same time, he lunges at them, pulling himself along with two pairs of elongated arms.

Elisabeth grabs Liz and teleports them both to the airlock. As she hits the button to close the doors and begin cycling the airlock, Alex appears at the end of the corridor and begins pushing his way through the coral to get at them. Just as he's about to reach the airlock, the doors close in his face. Liz and Elisabeth hear his cries from behind the door as they race the rising water to get their helmets on.

Once outside, they begin making tracks away from Fontaine Futuristics. They'll walk until they find another airlock and then they'll find a bathysphere to take them back to the Den. They've both had enough of Fontaine's old stomping grounds.

As they walk amongst the ruins of Rapture, Liz begins to realize what's been bothering her about Jonathan and Elisabeth Reid. Not once has she seen them eat food, or drink water or alcohol, and despite the use of their strange plasmids, they don't use EVE hypos.

As she remembers the look in their faces whenever she's gushing blood from her nose after an episode, she recalls a story that Charles told them about his own adventures in Oakmont, about a Mayan priestess brought back from the dead with a taste for blood....

[10bugs-in-a-trenchcoat]

Swansea: Hi, I'm here for the cult stuff?

Talltree: How did you find out about that???

Swansea: I saw the add on Craigslist.

[tyrantwache]

part 24 Vampyr 40k Crossover Comic  

Translation:

Panel 18:"Hey peepz!"

Panel 20:"Don't be afraid, citizens! The Empire of Mankind sent us to protect you!"

Next part 25

Previous part 23

All parts

my Vampyr discords: Pembroke Hospital and Myrddin’s Troublemakers

[joshua-flipping-washington]

I finally met Usher Talltree! This conversation made me feel so happy. 🥺 Yes! Thank you for taking notice that Jonathan hasn't been munching on citizens, and being a good Ekon.( Because Priwen guards don't count, even though they are humans. )

Yes, I am really taking my time with Vampyr. I'm trying to make sure I have all the hints I can possibly get, and that all districts remain sanitized. ( They are killing me there, I get three districts sanitized and then sleep- And suddenly they go back down to healthy again because of sick citizens. )

[hcadology]

USHER TALLTREE

SECRET HISTORIES is the Principle that describes the unknown complexities of the world and its many pasts, the scar on the world’s skin. It represents all forms of Lore, including the Lore of the other eight Principles.

text source

[cursedbethechoice]

Vampyr Headcanon List

I ordered this according to districts and then put major characters like McCullum at the end. I don’t have every character on here, but I’ll update this list as I think of more. Enjoy!

I also have a lot of HCs for the Priwen bosses (like Jimmy “the Spark” Barlow) that you fight in the game but I didn’t post any here. 

Pembroke Hospital

Pippa is quite chatty at home. Milton keeps mostly to himself, but he likes to listen to her chatter.

Pippa loves flowers so every so often Milton will go to Whitechapel to buy some from Camellia. He’ll leave the flower pots in Pippa’s work locker so that she finds them after her shift ends. It’s one of the only things that can make her smile.

Pippa’s hair is quite short. It used to be down to her waist, but she cut it off and sold it to buy Milton a pocketwatch for his birthday.

Even if Milton is kept alive, Pippa eventually joins The Guard of Priwen.

Mortimer is secretly stockpiling his medication for another suicide attempt.

If Beatrice Goswick dies, then Mortimer becomes involved in educational reforms in England. It gives him a sense of purpose and he tells himself that his mother would have been proud of his efforts.

Before Pembroke got overrun with patients, Gwyneth Branagan and Dr. Tippets would have afternoon tea together almost every day.

If Dr. Tippets doesn’t take any steps to deal with his drug addiction after the events of the game, Gwyneth Branagan will absolutely follow him to Cypress and stage an intervention.

Dr. Tippets thinks that if he and Gwyneth Branagan were thirty years younger he’d ask her to marry him. But then he convinces himself that there is no way that someone as wonderful as her would accept him.

Harvey Fiddick’s children visit him every day. Harvey both hates and loves these visits because he wants to see his children but he can’t stand it when they cry and ask when he’ll come home. He has no answers and that makes his children cry harder.

If they survive Vampyr, Newton Blight and Oswald Thatcher run away to Scotland and find a cottage by the sea that suits them both. The wide, open space brings Oswald a modicum of peace and there are no rats to keep Newton up at night.

 Whitechapel

Richard Nithercott secretly writes the 1918 version of fanfics about himself and Camellia.

Clayton Darby unconsciously always looks around to see if he can spot Cristina Popa walking by.

Clayton thinks about how Cristina cried when she spoke of her homeland and has a million questions he wants to ask her just so he can watch her face and her expressions. It’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen in his life.

Harry Peterson mentioned that he went out without his father once. Joe came home to an empty house and nearly had a heart attack. Ran around all of Whitechapel in a frenzy until he found Harry lost in the graveyard.

When Harry was younger, Joe Peterson would carry him as much as possible. He loved being able to hold his small son in his big arms; it made him feel like a good father.

Harry spends a lot of time reading books. In a touching but misguided attempt to connect with his son, Joe has tried to pick out books for Harry but always gets genres/authors that Harry doesn’t like.

When he visited Dorothy Crane’s medical dispensary, Harry had to take off his shirt for his medical exam. He nearly passed out from embarrassment. The only woman he’d been unclothed in front of or even really spoken to was his mother, so having to unclothe in front of Nruse Crane, WHO DIDN’T LOOK AWAY, was unsettling for the poor boy.

The only reason Harry got a pass for Dorothy’s medical facility was because Camellia saw him looking out of his bedroom window, felt sorry for him, and left a bouquet of flowers on his doorstep with a voucher hidden in it.

Harry still has all the books that Barrett Lewis bought him for his birthday. He would re-read them every so often but stopped after Barrett scolded him for asking why he never came by the Peterson’s house any more.

Before his mother died, Harry’s favorite thing to do was go on walks with her. Since he is so frail he couldn’t go play with the other children, so his mother would take him to a park and keep up a comfortable walking pace. Sometimes Joe would go with them and if Harry ever got tired Joe would carry him on his shoulders.

Joe has an old, crumpled picture of Harry when he was younger that he always keeps in his pocket. He looks at it at least once a day.

Harry started carrying his dad’s pistol after that one disastrous outing he went on by himself.

Harry believes in the supernatural, just not any of the positive aspects. He found one of Clarence’s pamphlets on vampires, read it, and convinced himself that there are monsters waiting in the streets outside his house waiting to eat him.

Nothing made Barrett angrier than seeing Joe, Jane, and Harry together and happy. He’s forever bitter that Jane stayed with Joe after Harry was born and that the marriage didn’t suffer from the affair.  

Sometimes Barrett makes himself feel better by criticizing every decision Joe made as a husband/father and telling himself that he would have been better to Jane and Harry than Joe ever was.

Cadogan Bates once tried to make a pass at Camellia, but Darius Petrescue chased him off by screaming threats in Romanian.

 The Docks

Ichabod Throgmorton takes in stray animals.

Lottie Paxton has a slight crush on Sean Hampton. It makes her happy whenever he thanks her for her help around the Asylum.

Seymour Fishburn saw Lottie Paxton once and thought her pretty, although he never tries to talk to her. Lottie only knows about his terrible reputation. If he ever asked her out and she rejected him, he’d kill her.

Rufus Kingsbury always saves the best scraps of food he manages to find for Jack and Stella Fishburn. If he has to eat rotted food or go hungry so that they can eat, he will.

Dyson Delaney tried to confront Rufus about the car factory bombing. He saw the boy digging through the trash and was overwhelmed with guilt at being the reason why the boy was reduced to such circumstances. He went back to the Turtle and got so drunk that he vomited three times and passed out on top of the bar.

The only way that Tom and Sabrina end up together is if Sabrina makes the first move. Tom has too many doubts to do anything himself.

Archer Woodbead finds a Priwen patrol one night and tries to start a fight. The Brawler simply picks him up and moves him out of the way. Archer is so embarrassed that he leaves, thinking about the days when he was leader of the Wet Boot Boys and no one dared look at him the wrong way.

Ironically, Andrew Woodbead becomes a Priwen Chaplain.

Martin Nightingale walks with a slight limp because his father beat him so badly one time that he was crippled.

Martin tells himself that his extortion of Enid Gillingham is justified because he checks in on her every so often to make sure she has food. Cheating her out of her money is how he is paid for his services.

 West End

Russell Calhoun keeps snacks hidden in his pockets

Clarence Crossley often has nightmares about the vampire he saw in France and wakes up in a panic. When he first came home, Venus would always comfort him, but after he started embarrassing them in public with his talk of vampires she just pretended to be asleep whenever he would cry out.

The two biggest expenses in the Crossley household are Clarence’s pamphlets and Venus’ beauty products.

If Clarence dies without Venus having seen all the vampire lore documents, Venus relocates to North America just in time for the Roaring 20’s and parties herself into massive debt. She remarries an oil tycoon for his money.

Louise Teasdale eventually finds Ichabod Throgmorton and asks to be his apprentice. He agrees and she ends up being the one who always saves him from mishaps with the locals that he accidentally causes. (I low-key ship these two, tbh).

Although she says no man would be interested in marrying her, Carol Price dreams of her prince charming coming to rescue her one day.

Whenever he passes by the Price’s shop, Richard Nithercott always makes an exaggerated bow to Carol to make her smile.

Carolyn Price reads romantic novels and inserts herself as the heroine and Jonathan Reid as the hero.

Pericles and Agamemnon Baker are still waiting for Godot long after the events of Vampyr end.

Carina Billow has tried to take her own life multiple times. Every time, Jacob Blackwood lets her nearly succeed before forcing her to stop. And then she’s forced to eat more rats.

  Major Characters

Mary named her son after Jonathan.

McCullum is never at ease unless he has something to do. Whether it’s a goal to reach or having something to keep his hands busy, he feels antsy if he’s just standing around.

McCullum was a soldier during WWI. It’s how he learned about modern war tactics and weaponry and was able to bring this knowledge to the Guard.

McCullum actually has a pretty good singing voice and loves Irish drinking songs, but he only sings when he’s in a pub and has had a few drinks. Since he rarely has the time for such things, it’s quite the event to hear him break out into song.

The only thing that McCullum hates more than leeches is writing reports. He prefers to be out in the field, so typing away at a typewriter for hours seems like a colossal waste of time to him.

McCullum knew a lot about the supernatural before Carl Eldritch recruited him to the Guard. As the baby of the family, McCullum spent a lot of time with his mother who would tell him old Irish folk and fairy tales.

Over the years, McCullum has forgotten what his mother looked like. But he does remember the exact sound of her voice as she sang him and his brother lullabies when they were little.

McCullum knows a smattering of Gaelic. He unconsciously uses it when he’s frustrated.

Carl Eldritch, the previous leader of Guard of Priwen, never had his own family and so considered McCullum to be the closest thing he ever had to a son.

Geoffrey will never forgive himself for losing Barker, Carl Eldritch’s gun, right before the man’s funeral. He kept vigil by the grave the whole night after the funeral to make sure no vampire tried to dig his mentor up, since this was Eldritch’s greatest fear. He’s been trying to find the Barker ever since. He was not amused when Jonathan pulled it out during their fight. It enraged him even more. Pacifist!Jonathan ends up mailing it to him after he and Ashbury run off together. Yet another favor that McCullum owes him.

The Guard’s attack on the Ascalon Club wasn’t actually planned. A bunch of rookies decided to take matters into their own hands and were slaughtered. Geoffrey was furious, but he blamed himself for not being a good enough leader.

Edgar Swansea sneaks into Jonathan’s room while he’s out and about and reads all his stuff (thank God Jonathan doesn’t have an actual journal). He’s not trying to steal his research; he sees it more as an avid fan trying to get a sneak peak at his favorite author’s new work.

Edgar Swansea sweats a lot.

Usher Talltree strongly distrusts Edgar. Part of the reason why the Primate is in London is to investigate the doctor’s actions.

When she was a human, Old Bridget’s greatest desire was to have a child with her husband. Becoming a Skal tore this dream away from her, but she’s managed to cope by seeing the Skals she protects as her children.

Old Bridget and Lord Redgrave’s marriage was based on love, a rarity for their time period. They both genuinely cared for each other, but in the end it wasn’t enough for Redgrave to accept his wife after he turned her into a Skal.

Lord Redgrave justifies abandoning his wife after her transformation by telling himself that there must have been something corrupt in her, in all women, that caused her turning to go wrong. She never really loved me, he tells himself, she just wanted immortality.

There are times when Bridget remembers how happy she was with Redgrave, even though she knows his true character. In her worst moments, she aches for those days.

[wrenhavenriver]

Usher Talltree’s impressions of Jonathan

Ending spoilers discussed below, scroll to avoid as needed! 

[Jonathan: The cards told you to expect me?  Usher: Yes, they can tell me everything!..”]  

with no civilians embraced: “...They told me that you have not taken another life since your poor sister died.” Predicted future: “You’re on a path to redemption, Jonathan...but be careful. One single trip and you’ll fall.” (Ending: Jonathan and Elizabeth freely travel the world together.) 

with one (to a few?) civilian(s) embraced: “They told me that you struggle hard not to take too many lives.” Predicted future: “The walls of your prison have already been raised, Jonathan, but you will freely accept to be locked inside, full of hope for a better day.” (Ending: Jonathan and Elizabeth lock themselves underground to perfect the antidote.) 

with multiple civilians embraced: “They told me that you are a new Ekon who relishes his blood diet.” Predicted future: “Your heart will bleed back all the blood you drank...but it will not put out the fire your treachery has lit.” (Ending: Elizabeth casts herself into the fire, Jonathan despairs.)

with several civilians embraced: “They’ve told me of your unquenchable thirst for blood! Be wary, Ekon, I’ve heard such a rich diet can be bad for the heart...” Predicted future: “You’ll cast your heart into the fire without hesitation, Jonathan, for pain is only for the mortals.” (Ending: Elizabeth casts herself into the fire, Jonathan continues his rampage.) 

[winchesternova-k]

@bispecimen

This once and for all proves that I’ve got too much time on my hands. But that’s okay because I can spend some of it doing what I love and that is…

Edgar Griffith Swansea is the most fascinating character in Vampyr. Even more so than Jonathan (despite him being the protagonist) and Elisabeth (despite her well-rounded backstory). I suspect this has something to do with him being the de facto villain of the story, but this meta won’t be about how wrong or right he might’ve been or the ethics of it all – that’s an entirely different bag of worms altogether and it deserves a dissertation of its own. That dissertation may come as a separate analysis at a later date.

This particular meta is going to be more about Edgar as a character. He was purposefully shrouded in mystery by DONTNOD, but in this essay, I will endeavor to explain and justify a few of his unique ‘attributes’ that I’d observed throughout the years and across numerous playthroughs. All of the following is headcanon-y, but I will use as much of the established canon as I can to validate my claims. 

Call this the exploration of my biggest headcanon for him.

And it’s:

He’s not human/mortal.

Keep reading

[shit-the-vampyr-cast-never-said]

Usher: Oh, Jonathan. Only now do I see that your strong demeanour hides a troubled soul.

Geoffrey: That’s a lot of words to say “has daddy issues.”

[majjiktricks]

i dont know why i never realized some of the collectible documents were written by mccullum. like yeah weve got ones by redgrave and usher talltree and edgar. it simply did not occur to me.

[vampyr-game]

first of all, I appreciate you reading all of that, because it's a lot longer than I remember!

1 - I admit, in retrospect, that my frustration with Edgar being vilified by the narrative with no opportunity for the player to choose to forgive him in the moment or meaningfully reconcile with him afterward has made this theory post age poorly! I spent a lot of time belaboring many fringe cases of his potential innocence, and burying the lead to meander in theoretical secret society esotera (though I thought it sound at the time) when I would have sufficed to say: in the "Occult oculus"/Cure for Blindness quest, a member of the Brotherhood uses skal tissue to cure his blindness. And though he turns skal afterward, it seems evident that this is only because his test subject bites him.

This chemist may be embarking on a research venture to discover uses for vampire blood previously unknown to him, but he also mentions that his final recipe is derived from the Greek and Latin scrolls Usher Talltree recommends. This suggests, to me, that the curative properties of vampire tissue could in fact be well-documented elsewhere. And if that is the case, then I don't think Edgar is misguided for trying it. I didn't mean to imply that he would never experiment with vampire blood, though I see how my emphatic tone conveys that. What I hoped to express was simply that I do not think Edgar is an idiot, by venturing the possibility that he may have had good reason to believe in the curative properties of vampire blood, and that in the second wave of an epidemic with no end in sight he had just as much cause to feel justified as Jonathan did furthering his methods of blood transfusion on injured soldiers during wartime.

However, Edgar is also a character deliberately designed to be controversial. The Byronic hero archetype exists to challenge societal standards of human decency, and mad scientist characters in particular (amid such literary giants as Frankenstein and Jekyll) weigh that decency against the forward march of progress. It is not so much a matter of if they will offend our moral sensibilities, but when. So, I've decided not to agonize so much over him being "misunderstood". I daresay he is categorically unknowable, and liking or disliking him is a matter of preference.

2 - I concede this point; a few other people have addressed this, and I'm satisfied that Lady Ashbury is trying to mitigate her bloodthirst through blood transfusions.

3 - ... But Geoffrey turning vampire regardless of player choice is something I COMPLETELY overlooked?? I don't think I'm the only one--the fan-edited wiki (I know, I know) indicates his species as "Human/Ekon (determinant)". And I'll hardly cite a fandom wiki for its rigorous veracity, but it does feel suggestive to me of, at the very least, majority fandom impressions? There is certainly plenty of fic which asks, "What if Geoffrey turned after drinking King Arthur's blood?" (often the implication is that obviously he should have and canon is absurd for not making it so) But there is even more fic which seems to take his humanity post-canon for granted. Still, I see what you're saying--now that I'm scrutinizing the footage (Spare) (Turn), his appearance in the graveyard seems indistinguishable in both outcomes, and the minor visual cues I had initially overlooked due to the cooler outdoor lighting does seem to show more prominent dark veins, like Jonathan has. 🤔

... This may also explain why McCullum's Y-choice is the ONLY one which does not invite the possibility of a killing Embrace. If he is about to become a vampire, then he simply cannot be killed--although that WOULD be an amusing way to handle the reveal.

"McCullum? I thought I killed you!"

"Didn't take."

If Geoffrey turns regardless of what you do, then that does deprive this theory of much of its foundation! I still like it, and I think it makes sense as a broader goal for why the Brotherhood even bothers with vampires beyond academic curiosity, but the idea that Priwen and the Brotherhood had to have been working from the same sheet of music was largely what I was relying on to support this idea. So thank you for the peer-review! It was an excellent opportunity to revisit many of my old assumptions.

elixir theory aside-- WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE WAS GOING TO BE GEOFFREY DLC???????

Vampyr: The Elixir Theory

I suspect we would have received a more complete explanation of this in the game, if the hyped-up Ascalon vs. Priwen vs. Brotherhood conflict had actually culminated in anything more than empty threats and bursts of turf war violence

but one element I continually see critiqued by fandom (and rightfully so!) is the exact mechanical function of vampire blood. the mechanics of Progeny-making are convoluted enough on their own, so I'll leave them for another post—but I'd like to focus on two specific examples I suspect to be related (major plot spoilers follow):

namely, Geoffrey drinking King Arthur's blood, and Edgar administering Lady Ashbury's blood to Harriet.

why doesn't geoffrey turn into a vampire regardless of your choice, if he drank king arthur's blood without realizing arthur was a vampire? (and myrddin confirms arthur was a vampire in the epilogue) why does it work like a super serum? maybe he diluted it...?

but even just a drop or two of jonathan's blood was enough to turn mary, and he and arthur are both first generation ekons. so there has to be something else done to the blood, apart from reducing its amount.

and there are... several issues with the edgar example, to just name a few...

edgar was personally hired by ash and is admired for his competency by his employees (not least of all waverley ackroyd, whose respect seems like a thing particularly hard-won), he takes diligent notes and studies new research closely, so surely he wouldn't be so reckless as to use vampire blood for no reason? and i know, i know stephane beauverger's hormonal, temper tantrum-throwing version of Jonathan that shows up in every Y-choice scene tries to convince us edgar is a loathsome little bastard, but please bear with me and entertain for a moment the idea that, like so much else in this bullshit story, edgar's Y-choice scene is trash and should not be accepted at face value.

2) ash claims she submits to blood tests so edgar can "help her with her condition"; what condition, then, if not the blood of hate? are we on that "curing vampirism" nonsense from the epilogue? in either case, surely it's vital that edgar knows what he's working with if he's to make any meaningful forward progress on her cure? there's no world in which it makes sense for ash to give edgar access to her evil, fucked up, apocalypse-starting, jacob blackwood-Siring blood without informing him exactly what he's working with. for safety reasons at the very LEAST—if not because he is specifically trying to cure the thing which makes her blood so dangerous

if ash was somehow ignorant of edgar's experiments, she's seriously dating herself lmao. what did she think he was gonna do? toss it in a centrifuge and take notes? "oh i simply don't understand your convoluted mortal medicine" girl ok. the ONE thing this man wants most in the whole world is to be a vampire, and you give him your blood without any caveats about why turning himself (or anyone) would be a bad idea?

so, ok. ok. for the sake of actually addressing the similarity between these two applications of vampire blood, let's set aside points 2 and 3—for now. given an ash who asks edgar to treat her blood of hate, but who for some reason elects not to tell him any of the really vital details about why her blood is dangerous to handle...

why would edgar use ash's blood in harriet's treatment?

keep that question in mind, and let's go back to geoffrey for a second.

he calls king arthur's blood "the guard's most precious/sacred relic"; he gives it to jonathan in a small vial, yet when he drinks it in battle i believe it's in a flask? regardless, you don't throw back your Most Sacred And Precious Relic like it's shots at the local dive bar, and if he had he certainly wouldn't have any left to give Jonathan.

seems to me priwen has two things:

arthur's blood

some kind of super-strength-endowing, accelerated-healing elixir recipe which calls for "the blood of a king"

now. every relic and document priwen has which predates the brotherhood/priwen schism circa 1700s necessarily came from the brotherhood. and priwen left because they didn't like how the brotherhood let all these powerful vampires go on living, only calling the ban of the dragon (read: putting out a hit) on a vampire in really high-profile flagrant serial murder cases.

and why would the brotherhood give vampires a pass?

to spare you any more of my convoluted thought processes, I'll come right out and say it:

I think the brotherhood studied, tolerated, and built bridges with vampires, because they knew vampire blood could be distilled into an elixir that would increase human longevity.

the longterm goal here is to create an atmosphere of mutual respect and a base of knowledge to refine their concoction, so that at some indeterminate time in the far-flung future (maybe world peace? lol), humans and vampires can enjoy a fully symbiotic relationship which benefits both species.

but put yourself in the shoes of the top brass: you can't go around telling people that vampire blood can give you eternal life! there are already people in your organization who dislike vampires. what would they do with that information? vampires could become a slave race, or be hunted to extinction—people could be Turned just to be harvested in fucked up elixir farms!

so, okay. you just tell the primate and a trusted circle of high-ranking brotherhood members, then. problem solved?

well, now you've got this sort of internal divide—between the privileged and informed higher ranks, and the lower-ranking brotherhood members who are relatively new, who don't trust the vampires they're just now learning about—but who know just enough to participate in the ban of the dragon. and it's starting to piss that second group off, just how calm and smug all the higher-ups act about horrific acts of vampire violence, when asked why in God's name they've got to put up with that shit

maybe the recipe for the elixir trickles down to those lower ranks (in case they need to fight a particularly nasty Dragon), but it's modified. we don't want the haters knowing just any vampire blood will do, so just say that you need The Blood of A King, and wouldn't you know it, we just happen to have the blood of a king right here!

and he definitely wasn't a vampire!

thus: during the schism, priwen takes the blood of king arthur and the modified (unbeknownst to them) recipe. and after the first great hunt, the brotherhood is more sure than ever that the world isn't ready for the secret of vampire blood elixirs

but they still have it.

enter edgar.

he's currently in the brotherhood, which doesn't seem like a nomadic militia like Priwen, but an organization very firmly headquartered in London, with a library of secret knowledge.

and Usher insinuates he's something more than human. immortal, perhaps?

if we take all this as truth, then Edgar doesn't do a random act of uninformed medical experimentation with very dangerous vampire blood, contrary to everything we know about his character up until that point. he is working from a recipe that is a known, verified good. in fact, it's quite likely he used it on himself first.

(post-Turning, edgar gushes his enthusiasm about being "the next Henry Head"—a neurologist famous for severing his own neural connections to research neural pathway regrowth. edgar is 100% down for self-experimentation)

but it didn't work—either because the blood of hate has a more virulent effect on women, or because plague mommy interfered in the process personally (though it's really unclear how much the game conflates the blood of hate with Plague Mommy Possession, and how much blood of hate is just... regular bloodthirst. i told you this story makes no sense)

anyway, all the rigorous medical methods in the world won't do much to stop divine intervention, so that's why it didn't work.

the mason swanborough side quest also drops a lore document regarding the process of using skal tissue to cure blindness. so... yknow. it seems like the only reason this has to be inferred at all is the rushed production leading so much of the story fractured. but all the pieces are there.

[tyrantwache]

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