How strong are vampires?

[MentPatient]

I was rewatching season 6 and I noticed that in season 6 Bargaining, Buffy seems to be able to take out a gang of demons. Yet, elsewhere she has a hard time taking on a single vampire.

Weren't vampires supposed to be weak or something?






(Eh, don't mind me and my retardedness. :vpleased: )

 

[Schillaci]

Rumour has it that vampires are in fact the second most powerful of all demon types. Mainly due to their adaptability, and lingering human sneakability.

Most fiercest demon there is, is the mighty bunny. Preternaturally strong, intellectually cunning, and most important of all..

Undeniably cute!

 

[nerd4hire]

I was rewatching season 6 and I noticed that in season 6 Bargaining, Buffy seems to be able to take out a gang of demons. Yet, elsewhere she has a hard time taking on a single vampire.

Weren't vampires supposed to be weak or something?

You're not confusing Buffy with the Buffybot are you? Doesn't matter, I still know what you're talking about. Doesn't just happen in the Bargaining does it? It happens in every season.

I just learned this cool word called fanwank. It means when you see something that doesn't make sense, you just create some background reasoning that will make it make sense.

For example, why was the original Turok Han so much more powerful than the Turok Han in Chosen? You need to make up a fanwank. You just say something like "Oh, the original Turok Han was created as a result of a magic ritual, with a special ceremonial dagger. It magically increased his strength." That's a fanwank.

I think when you see stuff like the unreasonable difference in the amount of difficulty it takes to kill one vamp as opposed to a group of them, you might have to create a fanwank.

* And yes PJ, I do know it's easy to make a dirty joke out of the word fanwank. It's where the word comes from originally actually - to wank. *

 

[Wicked]

Just cos she can take out a group of vamps one minute, doesnt mean she always can. She can be having a bad day. Like in the episode where she gets staked in the gut by a random vamp. Bad day. She was off her game. It happens.

 

[PrincessZombie]

Also, I'm sure some vampires are much weaker than others.

 

[Wicked]

Yeah, like Harmony. Not weaker as such, just less competant 🙂

 

[Tucker's Cousin]

Okay, here's my bit of fanwank. Actually, I'm so guilty of coming up with rationales like this that I hope it doesn't make me a fanwanker. 'Cause I really like the sound of that much less. Anywise, this is how I see it. The way any given battle might go down is governed by a number of factors other than just the combatants' given strength, skill, speed, etc. There's luck and whether one party is not at the top of his or her game while the other might be feeling like a world beater. There's also strategy, like fighting with the sun coming over your shoulder. Particularly handy when fighting vampires I'm told.

Please Fiver, bunnies?! Bunnies tremble at the sight of these ferocious bastards:

Did you see the way those frogs decimated that party in Category 7: The End of the World? I wouldn't wanna be on THEIR bad side.

 

[nerd4hire]

Come to think of it, I just remembered a couple of other fanwanks from something else that might apply here.

You know how Buffy dies, or near-dies sometimes, but comes back stronger? Like in Prophecy Girl, or Chosen. Well, one guy's fanwank for that was buffy came back stronger, as a result of her new inner confidence. In other words the strength boost originated psychologicallly.

Another guy said the strength boost was a result of Buffy's ability to tap into the source of slayer power. You could use either one of those here, I think.

 

[Wicked]

Come to think of it, I just remembered a couple of other fanwanks from something else that might apply here.

You know how Buffy dies, or near-dies sometimes, but comes back stronger? Like in Prophecy Girl, or Chosen. Well, one guy's fanwank for that was buffy came back stronger, as a result of her new inner confidence. In other words the strength boost originated psychologicallly.

I always assumed this was the case

 

[slayerpower]

I've always wondered why Buffy's knuckles were bruised after she punched her way out of her coffin, but vampires seem to have no trouble getting out of theirs.

 

[Wicked]

Maybe she wasnt at her full Slayer strength. She'd just come back from the dead. But Spike said he knew what had happened to her hands so maybe it happened to him too.

 

[nerd4hire]

Oh. I think I've got one for that. Don't bruises have something to do with blood? Vampires don't bleed the way we bleed, because their hearts don't pump.

 

[Wicked]

Well thats not true. Spike bleeds. As does Angel. In fact Spike and Dru used to suck each others blood.

 

[nerd4hire]

Very true, but if you read it again, I think you'll see it doesn't say they don't bleed, it says they don't bleed the way we do, because their hearts don't pump. You get there's a difference right? One is a pumping engine for human health. The other is either mysticism, or gravity.

We know their hearts don't pump, because we saw what happened when Gwen gave Angel's an electric jolt.

also there's stuff like -

Angel: I'm trying to do what's right here, okay? I'm trying to
think with my head instead of my heart.

Buffy: Heart? You have a heart? It isn't even beating!

 

[Wicked]

Yeah sorry, I read that wrong 🙂

Unless you sneakily edited it! 😛

But anyway, Buffy's hands werent bruised, They were actually bleeding. So vampires can still bleed that way.

 

[Wicked]

nerd4hire agrees: Actually I did edit it, but I did it more or less immediately. You must have been fast. :

Ha! I knew it 🙂 Thought I was going crazy 🙂

 

[MentPatient]

About the bleeding, is it not possible that the vampire doesn't have blood in it yet? Seeing as it just came back and Buffy was resurrected.. living and all.

Man... I barely understand myself at time.

 

[slayerpower]

Two points here.

-If it takes Buffy a while to get back her slayer strength (like we saw in Prophecy Girl and Bargaining P2), why doesn't it take vampires a while for their powers to kick in.

-When did we ever hear or see Dru and Spike sucking each other's blood. We saw Dru sucking Spike's finger which was covered in the blood of the Chinese slayer he offed, but never sucking each other's blood.

 

[Cordelia Chase*]

Hmmm...A vampire is as strong as a slayer that knows her strengths!

I think that a vampire can easily over take a Slayer if she is too cocky or if she doesn't know her true nature.

 

[WatcherWes]

I think the big thing no one has addressed is that different vampires have different strengths. Vampires seem to get stronger as they get older, and a large human who gets vamped could be stronger than an average human who gets sired.