Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft introduces all-new character creation options, including lineages. These can be used in place of a race at character creation or can replace your existing player character’s race mid-campaign. For example, your goliath orc could become one of the following: a dhampir who has vampiric qualities, a hexblood who has gained power after an encounter with a hag, or a reborn who has been changed by death.
Here’s how lineages work, an overview of your options, and ideas for building around a lineage.
Choosing a lineage
Each lineage has the Ancestral Legacy trait, which alters your racial traits:
Ancestral Legacy
If you replace a race with this lineage, you can keep the following elements of that race: any skill proficiencies you gained from it and any climbing, flying, or swimming speed you gained from it.
If you don’t keep any of those elements or you choose this lineage at character creation, you gain proficiency in two skills of your choice.
Source: Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft
Regardless of the level of your character, you can select a lineage (at your DM’s discretion). Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft offers an example for how applying a lineage works: A dragonborn dhampir would lose the ability to use their breath weapon but would gain the Vampiric Bite trait, a natural weapon that can heal the dragonborn based on the damage they deal.
Lineages in Van Richten's
Dhampir
Dhampirs are creatures who have an unnatural hunger and have been granted a portion of vampiric power. They have increased speed (35 feet), darkvision, no need to breathe, and a fanged bite.
These lineage traits come at a cost, however. Dhampirs hunger for blood, cerebral spinal fluid (like vampiric mind flayers), dreams, or something else. Overindulging can lead dhampirs to lose control, as their inner beast takes hold and sees prey where they once saw allies. Although it is possible to resist their urges, it is a difficult challenge for even seasoned adventurers.
Key dhampir traits
The following are the most notable traits of this lineage. Not all of the lineage's traits are represented below.
Spider Climb. No cousin to the vampire would be complete without the ability to walk along walls. At 1st level, you have a climbing speed equal to your walking speed. At 3rd level, this lineage trait gets an upgrade, permitting you to move up, down, and across vertical surfaces and upside down along ceilings hands-free.
Vampiric Bite. When you want to restore hit points or just gain a bonus to your next ability check or attack roll, take a bite out of your enemies — or friends. Dhampirs gain a fanged bite as a natural weapon with which they are proficient in.
When rolling an attack or damage for your Vampiric Bite, you use your Constitution modifier instead of your Strength modifier. (Attacks made with your Vampiric Bite are made with advantage if you are missing half or more of your hit points.) The attack deals 1d4 piercing damage on a hit and, if you hit a creature that isn't a Construct or Undead, it can empower you in one of two ways: You can regain hit points equal to the piercing damage dealt or you can gain a bonus to your next attack roll or ability check, with the bonus equal to the piercing damage you dealt.
You can empower yourself in this manner a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, with all expended uses replenished after a long rest.
Building a dhampir
If I were to create a dhampir, I would create a male minotaur barbarian named Krannis. Minotaurs are intimidating as-is, so imagine one who can scale structures with ease using the dhampir's Spider Climb trait. Vampiric Bite is also a good fit for Krannis, as it scales off of Constitution — an ability score that is already important due to the barbarian's Unarmored Defense — and can grant a bonus to your next attack roll.
Krannis was created by a vampire lord who wanted an apex predator to defend her land from trespassers. After years of servitude, Krannis escaped with the help of strangers. He now spends his days fighting to protect the downtrodden in the hopes of redeeming himself for the time he spent viciously hunting down trespassers.
Hexblood
Hexbloods are people who have been infused with eldritch or fey energy or some form of witchcraft after encountering a hag. These people might have struck a bargain with a hag or drawn the eye of a hag for some other reason. No matter the encounter, hexbloods are changed by their lineage. Each hexblood has an irremovable living crown, among other physical characteristics that make their cursed nature evident. They also gain darkvision and a bit of the hag's power.
Key hexblood traits
The following are the most notable traits of this lineage. Not all of the lineage's traits are represented below.
Eerie Token. You can harmlessly remove a lock of hair, a nail, or one of your teeth to create a token that is imbued with magic until you finish a long rest. This token can be used for one of two purposes (each require an Action): You can send a telepathic message up to 25 words in length to the creature holding or carrying the token, as long as they are within 10 miles of you, or you can enter a 1 minute trance that permits you to see and hear from the token as if you were located where it is. While in this trance, you are blinded and deafened to your own surroundings. You can end the trance early without using an Action, and it automatically ends if you are incapacitated.
The token is destroyed when the trance ends. You can create a token once per long rest and you regrow any missing part used to create a token when you finish a long rest.
Hex Magic. Hexbloods gain access to two potent spells, disguise self and hex. You can cast each of these spells once per long rest using this trait. You can also cast these spells using any spell slots you have. When you gain this lineage, you choose whether your spellcasting ability for these spells is Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma.
Building a hexblood
My hexblood would be a female triton bard named Ariela who fell in love with a human female who lives in a town that fears tritons. Wary of how she might be viewed if she visited her partner in the town, Ariela sought the aid of a sea hag who could make her appear as a human for a short time. The magic worked, and Ariela had a blissful visit to the town. But that bliss turned to horror as Ariela found herself changing into a hexblood in the days that followed.
Ashamed of her new form, Ariela fled, never to be seen again by her partner. Now in her older years, she uses her hexblood gifts to help others embrace who they are. It is her hope that others might never become so desperate as she was in her youth to gain the approval of others.
Reborn
The reborn are creatures who have died yet have not passed on to the afterlife. Science or magic could have brought them back. All reborn bear scars or other physical characteristics that reveal their undying nature. They might have the scars of a fatal wound or bloodless veins, for example.
Memories from their past life linger, too, and their bodies are unnaturally durable. Reborn have no need to sustain themselves with food nor sleep. They simply exist as a shade of their former selves.
Key reborn traits
The following are the most notable traits of this lineage. Not all of the lineage's traits are represented below.
Deathless Nature. Reborn gain a slew of benefits: You have advantage on saving throws against disease and being poisoned, and you have resistance to poison damage; you have advantage on death saving throws; and you don't need to eat, drink, breathe, or sleep. Magic can't put you to sleep, either, and you can complete a long rest in 4 hours.
Knowledge from a Past Life. A reborn can see glimpses from their past, assisting them in their new form. When you make an ability check that uses a skill, you can roll a d6 and add that number to the number you rolled on the d20. You can do this a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus. Expended uses of Knowledge from a Past Life are regained when you finish a long rest.
Building a reborn
One of the most commonly killed creatures in Dungeons & Dragons has to be the goblin. They are small, weak, and oftentimes treated as simple-minded. That is why I would love to play a reborn goblin fighter named Pincushion. He bundles himself up to hide the scars from when he was maimed by adventures. Evil in his former life, Pincushion now seeks to be a mostly honest goblin.
He still has an unsavory attitude about life, but he is happy to hunt beasts that threaten nearby towns — for a price. His greatest desire is to earn enough gold to build a small tower from where he can mock passersby.
Building a character with a lineage
The lineages in Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft offer plenty of opportunities when building a character or modifying an existing one. Each can flesh out your character's backstory or — in the case of the reborn — allow you to bring back a beloved character who died. Have fun and discover what new dreadful adventures you can come up with by utilizing these lineages. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to beg my friends to let my minotaur-dhampir barbarian into their next campaign!
DeAngelo Murillo (That_DeAngelo) is a fourth-generation Mexican-American who helps bring more representation to the geeky community through storytelling, journalism, interviewing creatives, and more on his Twitch channel. In his free time, he enjoys harassing his peers into participating in TTRPG charity events with him and also dies quite often in video games.
The Dhampir race was fun to play when it was still UA. Also, shouldn't lineages be a feat? I mean you still gain some racial traits from your original race. Anyhow, I just thought of a new character that uses lineages. A half-elf warlock that was turned into a hexblood by an extremely powerful hag, and the warlock has the archfey patron.
Can we just designate this a no debate chat page? This was an excellent article, I love the idea of a Minotaur poised like a cat ready to pounce... vertically on the wall of a city! Also second.
dose this mean that playing it as a version of an existing race is something that is now or soon gunna be doable on the site?
This is nice! One of my players wants me to do a short one-shot so she can try out a Dhampir character. About a year ago, I could have just whipped out a quick, easy-to-run Encounter of the Week! Now, unfortunately, there isn't any :( (hint, DDB, hint).
Also, nice article, these are really cool, I'm gonna get Van Richtens now.
Does this mean that we can now play spirit beings? Sorry for asking, but I don’t have this book so I’m not sure what is classed as “reborn”.
Could you play a none corporeal entity, like a spirit, who can possess a willing host, or any beast who has a low enough intelligence/wisdom score?
Would a reborn be able to survive in space? No need for air, food, or sleep suggests very few biological processes are happening in a reborn's body, but would other problems like radiation and cold still apply?
I imagine extreme cold would still be a problem to them. As would extreme heat. Although heat might not be as much of a problem as cold. Just what I would think of the top of my head though, I don't actually know any rules to back that up, as I have never played in space before. At least not exactly.
I love this article! Gonna give some examples to get everyone's creative juices flowing (if you want em', I just take any excuse to make cool character concepts):
A reborn kenku who couldn't stand the idea of dying before they learned the secret of flight, and looked to a mad scientist to extend their life beyond their time. The process went terribly wrong, killing the kenku, but this mad scientist was rather reputable and wasn't about to give up just yet. She hooked the kenku up to a life-support machine and shocked him repeatedly until he came back to life as a storm sorcerer with a new name: gear grind. He has to channel his electrical power or risk getting fried, so he took up the adventuring life.
A dhampir lizardfolk who is completely unaware of his state as a demi-vampire. He really liked blood before his transformation, and he thinks he's got some gecko blood in him that would let him spider climb. He had a near-fatal encounter with a true vampiric lizardfolk, but his desire to drink the vampire's blood impressed the vampire, who transformed him into a dhampir. When asked why he's so pale and likes drinking blood he says "blood brings me nourishment and color doesn't come to me. Why do you not take blood to drink?" If told he's a dhampir, he'd just act very insulted and sulk in the corner.
A hexblood dwarf who wanted to escape the fate the elders who had told for him. He went to a hag, and asked to be transported far from his clan so that he could finally escape the rigorous and fixed destiny. He was transported to Ravenloft (go figure) as a hexblood. He learned then exactly how much he relied on his clan. Eventually, he had no choice but to learn self-sufficiency in the nightmarish forests of his domain, finally becoming a druid of the circle of the land. He is starved for companionship, and will join an adventuring party on sight. Poor guy...
These sound like amazing characters. I actually made a reborn Yuan-Ti. His name is Terika S’lithl, and he has a phantasmal arm. He was a pirate, with his own ship, when it sunk, and he was ripped apart by sharks. His crew found him, and stitched him back together, but couldn’t find his arm.
I suppose so. That seems like a great story hook, you could make the main bad guy a spirit who is possessing everyone, and he could possess the adventurers! Awesome idea!
Why must all hexbloods be female? There are two characters in my campaign touched by the magic of hags that would apply. One is a female human, a young princess who was almost turned into a hag but saved by the party after they bargained away a powerful magic item to save her. The other is a male firbolg Druid who used to be a spy for the hags, and had he not repented and cut ties with them, he might have been transformed. Also, Ariela is such an unoriginal character.
Does it say they must be? Well, you can always go ahead and change that... WOtC isn't the ultimate judge of lore, or even rules, you are. It's not that hard guys.
Edit: Also, there's nothing wrong with a cliche character if you're going to play it well (in combat, RP, whatever, just do it well).
No, because space is still extremely frigid. You wouldn’t have to breathe, but without immunity to cold and radiant damage, space would take a heavy toll on a reborn.
Thanks for the compliment! Love the idea of a sailor yuan-ti BTW. Maybe some sort of banded sea krait? They're really cool and poisonous.
I agree with you, unless you had immunity to cold and radiant damage, you would get hurt. Also, if you went near a planet or anything like that, the gravitational pull would either rip you apart or burn you
One of my players is already playing a Reborn which is lovely
There are no rules that says that hexbloods have to be female. People are just more inclined to think of female ones since hags are all female.
Space isn't cold, for the most part.
It isn't hot, either.
It's -mostly- depressurized and really well insulated.
The "instant freeze" effect only makes sense as a matter of depressurization, since liquids exposed to vacuum will instantly volatize and carry a fair amount of heat with them.
So "not realistic at all" would say that a dhampire or vampire can magically hold themselves together and handle space just fine.
More realistic would say that sunlight is a problem (but dhampires don't have sunlight problems) but otherwise a dhampire in a pressurized outfit would be able to handle space without any problems or need for oxygen supply, since the suit would keep the useful liquids and gasses in, and other than that, they just need a source of propulsion (as food and air are not a problem so they can just recycle the same stuff endlessly).
Obviously, cosmic rays are a long term threat. But they're not a short term threat.
The reborn lineage does not let you play as an incorporeal being. You are free to have something like a phantom limb replacing a lost limb of yours though, and the picture for the reborn in the book even shows a reborn with a spectral, skeletal arm. It doesn't give you any mechnical benefits though, it's just flavor.