Clearing up the vampire bride theory
There's a lot of misinformation surrounding this vampire bride fan theory. As someone who has the book the theory allegedly comes from, I want to provide important context that's always left out in posts about it.
Note: It's fine if you like this headcanon and want to use it for your own RP. But posts about this headcanon tend to present it as a factual and canon concept. I want people to have all the information so that they're fully informed when they decide to believe in it or not. There's a lot of evidence that it isn't canon. Everyone is welcome to see their character how they like. No one is saying you can't have fun. The problem is misinformation.
First, the 2e book this theory stems from (Van Richten's Guide to Vampires) is from 1991. That's over 30 years and three editions of DnD ago. None of this lore has been mentioned in the current edition of DnD, 5e, as far as I've seen. It didn't even appear in Curse of Strahd, where it would have fit in perfectly. DnD staff have officially said that each edition of DnD is its own canon. They don't want fans to need archaic sourcebooks to understand the current lore.
"The current edition of the D&D roleplaying game has its own canon, as does every other expression of D&D… Every edition of the roleplaying game has its own canon as well. In other words, something that might have been treated as canonical in one edition is not necessarily canonical in another…we don’t want DMs or players to feel like they must read a novel, play a video game, or buy a third-edition sourcebook to enjoy our game and get the most out of our current line of products."
Now, I'm not saying that every edition of DnD is completely different and doesn't draw from older versions. But it's clear that DnD staff don't want old sourcebooks to be needed to understand current products. That's why it's significant that vampire bride lore has not shown up again in a decade of 5e. There is an updated 2021 version of the Van Richten book: Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft. This 5e version still has no mention of vampire bride lore.
Ravenloft is also an entirely different campaign setting from the Forgotten Realms, which is where BG3 takes place. Their lore is not necessarily interchangeable. You cannot indiscriminately copy paste lore from different worlds.
While BG3 doesn't follow DnD 5e lore 100%: One can't use a 2e sourcebook to argue the vampire bride theory is true, and also say sourcebooks aren't important because BG3 is its own property.
Even if we accept what is in the 1991 Van Richten's Guide to Vampires: The Dark Kiss ritual states that the sire vampire's age must be AT LEAST twice Astarion's vampire age.
"Creating a bride or groom, although seemingly a simple process, requires an exhausting exercise of much power by the creating vampire. For this reason, only vampires of advanced age and capability can even assay this procedure. A bride or groom can be created only by a vampire of age category Ancient or greater, and not even all of those are capable of doing so." (pg 71)
The Ancient vampire age category starts at 400 years (pg 13). Astarion has been a vampire spawn for 200 years and an ascended vampire for barely any time at all.
If one argues Astarion can do this ritual anyway because he's a special ascended vampire… Well, the book's ritual is about normal vampires. If AA is this unique, it can be easily argued that he can't do the ritual and make a vampire bride, because he's not a normal vampire. This logic can be applied both ways. The idea behind becoming an ascended vampire is that things which affect a normal vampire won't affect him anymore. Not to mention, Astarion himself says it will take more time for him to come into his full power. So how can he be as powerful as an ancient vampire already? Alternatively: if he is this powerful and special, who says he can't compel and control a Vampire Bride anyway?
The book also describes the sire losing lots of blood to the bride, to the point that the sire is weakened. Astarion gives us "just one drop" and shows no sign of being weakened after turning us. Nor do we see evidence of a feeding frenzy.
"The vampire opens a gash in its own flesh—often in its throat—and holds the subject’s mouth to the wound. As the burning draught that is the vampire’s blood gushes into the subject’s mouth, the primitive feeding instinct is triggered, and she sucks hungrily at the wound, enraptured. With the first taste of the blood, the subject is possessed of great and frenzied strength, and will use it to prevent the vampire from separating her from the fountain of wonder that is its bleeding wound. It is at this point that the creator-vampire’s strength is most sorely tested. He is weakened by his own blood loss." (pg 72)
The vampire bride ritual requires the sire to make 3 bites. I believe this entire theory started because someone thought they saw 3 bites. The dev notes for the supposed first bite calls it a kiss on the neck. With some hairstyles, you can see there is no bite mark or blood on Tav's neck when he kisses the neck. There are bite marks and blood on Tav's wrist or neck later in the same scene, after the choice for Astarion to be gentle or make it hurt. So, there is only a maximum of 2 bites.
There's also no evidence of any telepathic bond post-tadpole in the game during the epilogue.
"One of the reasons “married vampires” are so difficult to defeat is that a vampire and its bride share a telepathic communication that has a range measured in miles. Regardless of intervening terrain or obstacles, the two vampires can communicate instantly and silently as if they were speaking together." (pg 74)
Even if we accept the outdated 2e lore of vampire brides, there's numerous ways that the Dark Kiss ritual in the sourcebook doesn't match what happens when AA turns Tav or Durge. Depending on how you count the bites, one can argue that nothing from the ritual matches what's in the game!
Great addition by @/nicsnort: "Let us also not forget that the very nature of necromancy and undeath changed between 2e and 5e due to the Spellplague and the destruction of the Negative Energy Plane. So, not only is the canon of the Bride ritual outdated, but this ritual very well may not work anymore for even 400+-year-old vampires because magic itself is different!"
This is without even talking about how something so major which goes against everything we're told about master-spawn relationships in the game... would have been clearly discussed in the actual game.
On the topic of what's in the actual game: AA himself and Karlach explicitly say the turned player is a spawn. Other companions express concern about the romance post-ascension. Just because the player can walk in the sun doesn't mean they are not a vampire spawn. Cazador gives some of his spawn the ability to teleport, and the companions express surprise. Yet no one denies they are still vampire spawn.
I hope this post gives you extra context on the vampire bride theory. Overall, it's clear that this is old lore which is not canon to the current edition of DnD. Whether you think Larian decided to apply it to BG3 or not, at least now that belief will be fully informed.
If this post was useful or interesting to you, please reblog so more people can see it! I've made updates to it a few times, so always check my original post for the latest version.
