Tips for RPing a Vulpera DK?

Trying to get into the headspace of my Vulp and figure out what her personality is. Vulpera are generally pretty upbeat from what I can see in game, but of course being undead isn’t exactly fun. She wasn’t dead for long and didn’t go through the Scourge conditioning that Arthas’s knights went through.

I’m sort of veiwing her as the survivor and scavenger traits Vulpera have taken to the extreme. I mean, her enemies aren’t using their bodies anymore. Would be a waste to not reanimate them.

Any tips or advice for rping a Vulp DK would be greatly appreciated.

Unfortunately, there’s not a lot to reconcile between “Vulpera” and “Death Knight”. Vulpera culture hasn’t been super well-defined, so it’s not incredibly intricate, and becoming a death knight doesn’t invalidate or synchronize with any of their values. Like, a night elf death knight might see themselves as an abomination, but an orc death knight might see themselves having received a second chance for honor. (An Orc Shaman raised as a death knight might feel abhored that their spirit was twisted, and that they might not be able to join the ancestors. An orc warrior might also see their honorable death taken away from them.)

Vulpera are about trying to band together, be resourceful, and try to survive the harshness of a desert out to kill them. To me, survival has always been their top priority. Does she like that it’s easier to survive now? She doesn’t need water or food or sleep. Or, does she seek out challenges, because now everything is too easy?

I think you’re going to have to think about your specific vulpera. What did your vulpera value in life, and why? If it’s being resourceful and clever, then it seems like you got it, to me. Perhaps they had a spiritual component, or a strong tie to their caravan? Does she know of G’huun? Does she have a negative opinion on undeath due to their neighbors in the swamp?

As for some aesthetic stuff…

Maybe go a little scant on the armor? Like, we don’t really see a lot of “walking fortress” vulpera, so… She might be bound to plate, but maybe something like this?

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/4a/c1/00/4ac10011d6c0fed9f34a82acfcbdd32b.jpg

I really like the scavenger idea. Maybe she uses blood magic to like… expedite the harvesting of bone/hide/flesh?

Vulpera have a rogue-ish/scavenger vibe. So, I could definitely see them brewing all kinds of potions. Maybe she makes her own little vials of disease which she carries on her?

Maybe she likes frost? Having lived in a desert, embracing a new unlife, she rejects her old way of living entirely and studies frost magic?

She could likely be a lot like her old self. Maybe a bit more gallows humor in there? Maybe instead of a “caravan”, she has a ghoul army? Undead alpacas lol

If you weren’t a slave, whipped, beaten and cowed to your liberation day(if, indeed, you had one-- You got killed, remember?) you probably lived a nomadic existence best described as desperate.

With virtually no fresh water available across the sandy hellscape, hostile wildlife capable of killing you very quickly(and very painfully at that) and your supplies constantly having to be foraged and scrounged for(or, depending on your group, stolen), you probably went a lot of nights without eating. Or drinking.

Your cast-off neighbors from Zandalar, including madmen, hardened serial killers, depressed Trolls or Akunda The (Write-In Here) are a hit-and-miss case of trust. Most of the time, you are hiding from the people you can’t trust and just making sure you have the supplies you need to stay alive another day.

All of this said, there’s a surprisingly strong case for Vulpera being gritty survivalists, but being culturally predisposed towards being kind and courteous as a matter of desert hospitality. We never meet any Vulpera who are hostile to us, but we see plenty of examples throughout the story that crossing Vulpera can be a fatal mistake.

As a Deathknight, you are driven by a constant hunger to inflict pain. On a good day, it’s really not that bad because there’s not a lacking of ways to hurt bad people. On a bad day, it is wracking and difficult to control without you being on or right next to a battlefield or other place of fighting to quickly scratch the itch. It is a pain described by Thassarian, if I remember correctly, as being unbearable and maddening. Don’t quote me, haven’t read that in a while. The point I’m getting to is,

Recently it was confirmed that as a Vulpera Deathknight, you were not trained to deal with this all-consuming anguish you get when you aren’t hurting people. The easiest way to sate it is to inflict pain indiscriminately, but that’s also the easiest way to get dogpiled by 25 Orgrimmar Grunts. Your character is sick with a disease they may or may not have figured out how to deal with.

Further, you died, probably violently. You might have family left, you might not. You might be all alone in the world, or you might be clinging to the last shreds of your mortality as a way of staying sane, as Thassarian does.

I’m rambling because I’m brain-dead, but I guess my advice is to ask yourself questions about the life your Vulpera lived and the death that they died. What does that death mean to them? Do they have family this affects? Did they have strong opinions of the Cursed Dead(there are certainly no shortage) in Vol’dun before reanimation? What kind of person were they before they were killed and how has the mental stress of reanimation affected them? How are they coping with a desire to inflict pain? Were they sadistic before they died, and now that they are by default, how is their mind holding up?

Do they realize, yet, that they’re a monster? Or are they in denial of their nature? Vulpera aren’t that fleshed out as a people, but they have, in my opinion, a surprisingly nice set of character development questions. I hope you have a good time with your character and many memorable stories to share!