Original Vampire

The Original Vampires, or simply The Originals, are a group of extremely powerful vampires that are known for being the first of their bloodlines and the first generation of vampires, which makes them the oldest, fastest, strongest, and most powerful vampires in the world. Their name is a term used to describe a progenitor in a vampire bloodline.

A number of characteristics differentiate an Original from the vampire bloodline that they begat, but the fundamental difference is that Originals became vampires through a spell, not by ingesting the blood of another immortal; and, unlike normal vampires, the Originals are indestructible and cannot be killed by anything on earth aside from the White Oak Stake. They also can only be temporarily neutralized by a White Oak Ash Dagger or one of the Cursed Stakes.

Powers and Abilities
Due to the nature and purpose of the spell that created them, the Original Vampire's powers and abilities are the most advanced and by far superior to any other species with the exception of Immortals in mental strength. Rebekah said herself that they are the strongest creatures in the world. This is no longer the case as when Lucien Castle was upgraded he proved to be able to overwhelm both Finn and Elijah with ease. It is unknown if Original Vampires grow stronger with age like non-original Vampires. These are their standard powers and abilities as the first generation of vampires.

Basic Powers

 * Super Strength: Original vampires are considerably much stronger than immortals, Supernatural Hunters, non-Original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-Original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans. They are able to decapitate other species with a single chop of their bare hands, shatter windows and doors with small objects, and single-handedly tear out the hearts of younger vampires and other creatures with little to no effort. Their strength has been used to break necks and spines, and break and move heavy objects. Their impact can send anyone flying. Their strength is also enough to rival that of their own kind. While Original Vampires are more powerful than werewolves in either form, transformed werewolves still rival enough of their strength to take down an Original Vampire in small groups as it was shown that four of them were capable of overwhelming Rebekah (although she managed to kill half of them), while two took down Elijah (these wolves were channeling the power of their werewolf forms through enchanted kyanite stones, and Elijah was taken by surprise and briefly passed out from their venom). Vampires of 900 years or more may present a slight challenge.
 * Super Speed: Original vampires are much faster than immortals, supernatural hunters, non-Original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-Original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans. They are able to stop other supernatural species in their tracks, run miles in mere minutes and can easily catch up to any species of creature, supernatural or not. Their reflexes are similarly heightened. It is unknown if they grow faster with time. Lucien was shown to be incredibly fast, more so than an Original.
 * Super Agility: Original vampires possess more superhuman agility, flexibility and dexterity than immortals, supernatural hunters, non-Original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-Original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans. They can move quickly, jump very high, climb and run incredibly fast without difficulty or exhaustion.
 * Super Senses: Original vampires have extremely keen senses of hearing, sight and smell that far exceed those of immortals, supernatural hunters, non-Original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-Original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans.
 * Super Durability: Original vampires can take far more trauma than supernatural hunters, non-original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans can, without much discomfort or injury. No Original vampire has ever been dismembered throughout the series, implying that their durability may be close to invincibility. Wood seems to be ineffective at weakening them, though being stabbed in the heart with it will often incapacitate them for several minutes until they recover. Ordinary bullets, knives and blunt objects can hurt an Original vampire as seen with Finn, Kol and Klaus. Rebekah once stated to Matt that she never feels cold. When running from Mikael, she also stated how her siblings and her ran through winter and autumn, sleet and snow.
 * Healing Factor: The injuries of Original vampires heal faster than those of supernatural hunters, non-original vampires, werewolves, evolved werewolves, non-original werewolf-vampire hybrids and humans. Original vampires also seem to heal much more quickly when exposed to vervain or wood. They can heal/recover/regenerate from any and all injuries in a matter of seconds. Even a werewolf bite is no threat to them, it is only painful to them and will cause weakness and hallucinations as they are not wholly immune to the bite, but it wears off. Vervain-laced liquid has also been shown to weaken them, though they recover from the effects much more quickly.
 * Immortality: Original vampires are immortal. They do not physically age and are immune to all illnesses, toxins, poisons and human diseases or physical conditions. The only physical weapon that can bring permanent death to an Original is the White Oak Stake, and the only other substance being poisons from the advanced strain of werewolf toxin contained in the bite of an Upgraded Original Vampire, as well as the similar toxin from the enchanted thorns grown by The Hollow from an Upgraded Original's blood.
 * Enhanced Emotions: Original Vampires experience emotions more powerfully than humans. Emotions like love, joy, and happiness are intensified for vampires allowing them to live life more intensely. This ability allows the original vampires to feel emotions at their peak regardless of their age. They have been shown experiencing emotions as powerfully today as they did 1,000 years ago.
 * Emotional Control: Original vampires have a limited degree of control over their own emotions. It has been stated that Emotional Control fades over time. It is unknown if the Original vampires still possess the ability to "switch off" their emotions completely.
 * Mind Compulsion: Original vampires can control and influence the thoughts, emotions, behavior, actions and memories of humans, non-original vampires and non-original werewolf-vampire hybrids. They cannot however compel witches, immortals, or werewolves/evolved werewolves.
 * Sire Bond: Although rare among them, Sire Bonds can be formed when a human is turned with the blood of the vampire whom they had strong human feelings for.
 * Telepathy: Original Vampires have the ability to enter the minds of others as long as theirs is stronger than them although, as Original vampires, they have one of the strongest minds in the world. Normally, this ability works in a tactile fashion and the vampire requires physical contact in order for it to work successfully. However, Elijah has been shown to mentally communicate with others from a short distance sending distress calls and mental images. Klaus and Elijah has also been shown sharing their memories with others.
 * Dream Manipulation: Original vampires can control dreams and subconscious. They can produce and modify dreams, bestow nightmares or lucid dreaming. Other effects of this ability is the ability to distort perceptions of reality and being able to trap someone in their dreams.
 * Illusions: Original Vampires have the power to trick the minds of others into seeing/feeling things that aren't actually happening.
 * True Face: An Original Vampire's true face is the appearance they are hiding under their normal human face. When an Original Vampire's true face is revealed, the sclera of their eyes turns blood-red, dark veins appear under their eyes as the blood pumps forcefully through them, and their canine teeth extend into razor-sharp fangs. An Original Vampire's true face can be revealed whenever they wish, but it will appear against their will whenever they are aroused by the scent of blood, or are feeling intense emotions such as anger, lust, sadness, etc. An Original Vampire's fangs are extremely sharp which gives them the ability to tear into almost any substance (including and especially flesh) and tear off limbs. With the fangs come the darkened veins under the eyes as well.

Weaknesses
Even though the Original Vampires are the first and strongest vampires in the world, they themselves still have weaknesses. However, these weaknesses are fewer compared to non-original vampires, and they recover faster from them. Original vampires are immune to most of the weakness of non-original vampires.
 * Animal Blood: Animal blood weakens an Original's strength, but can ease their hunger better than no blood at all.
 * Broken Neck: Breaking an Original's neck will not kill them, but it will render them unconscious for several minutes to several hours.
 * The Cure: If an Original Vampire takes the cure, they will revert back to being mortal again. Once taken, the cure prevents them from being immortal again, causing the body to reject vampire blood.
 * Desiccation: Being completely drained of blood or the heart stopping will cause an Original vampire to desiccate like any other vampire, losing most of it's strength and any ability to move. The desiccated body of an Original vampire will appear as a corpse and can only start functioning again once they feed on blood. This process can be replicated artificially by a witch casting a desiccation spell. It's unknown if an Original vampire would desiccate if their heart was torn out; however, it seems that an Original vampire's body is indestructible, therefore it is possible their hearts cannot be extracted.
 * Invitation: In order to enter any house owned by humans, they need to be invited in by a person that officially lives there or the person of entitlement. Once invited, the invitation cannot be revoked. If an original vampire lives in a house, other vampires can enter freely and if an original vampire is in the house without being invited in, it will become disoriented and will begin to suffocate. If the ownership to a house changes while inside, an Original, like normal vampires, would likely become disoriented and pulled from the house against their will.
 * Magic: It is said that a witch with enough power can kill/dangerously affect a being as powerful as an Original Vampire, but would likely kill the witch unless the Original vampire was in a weakened state. Its later revealed to have some sort of truth as both Bonnie and Davina while being empowered by extremely potent sources of magic (the violent deaths of 100 witches and the power of the Harvest) were able to cripple Klaus almost to the point of bringing him close to death. Julie Plec reveals that the White Oak Stake is the only physical weapon in existence that can kill an Original vampire, but an extremely empowered witch could kill one with magic. Bonnie would have succeeded in killing Klaus had Elijah not saved him. Dahlia may have the power to kill the Original vampires, as one of the strongest witches to exist, something Esther and Freya believe she can do. Dahlia could effortlessly desiccate Mikael and Klaus at the same time, nearly killing them both with a portion of her magic potential, however she was later seen having to use the dust from the destroyed white oak stake to kill Elijah, Klaus, and Rebekah at the same time. Witches can also do spells that can seriously harm an original vampire. Minor spells have little effect.
 * Physical Trauma: While any physical trauma can slow an Original down, minor ones such as cuts and bruises, are essentially ineffective due to the healing factor of an Original vampire. More significant injuries along the lines of broken bones and organ damage can incapacitate one due to the combination of pain and lack of their bodies proper function. However, the most effective way to neutralize an Original, albeit temporarily, is to inflict injury normally fatal to a human such as breaking their neck or ripping out their heart. Minor physical injuries such as gunshots, stab wounds and broken bones will cause an Original Vampire pain and also slow them down. However, this is momentary as they will heal completely within seconds. It seems physical trauma can hurt them anywhere on the body (ex-eye gauging, drowning).
 * Poison: There have recently been various poisons shown invented by people such as Dr. Wes Maxfield and Aya that are capable of incapacitate or desiccate a vampire when administered. Klaus also used a poison to kill Tim that not even vampire blood could cure. Davina used a spell that made her blood toxic to Klaus, paralyzing and rendering him unconscious. It is unknown what effect any of these poisons would do if ingested by an original vampire.
 * Sunlight: Sunlight will burn an Original vampire, but cannot kill them. All members of the Original Family possess lapis lazuli rings to combat this. Klaus is not affected by sunlight due to being a werewolf-vampire hybrid.
 * Vervain: Vervain prevents Original vampires from compelling anyone who takes it and burns them on touch. Original vampires will heal very quickly from vervain wounds however.
 * Werewolf Bite: While a werewolf bite can't kill Original vampires, it weakens them and causes hallucinations. The effects are temporary and only lasts for a few hours. This will not affect Klaus as he is a werewolf-vampire hybrid. Mikael overcame the pain of the venom and fought through the effects rather than suffer and hallucinate.
 * Wood: A wooden stake through the heart will desiccate an Original vampire and the Original vampire will appear as if they were dead, but will revive within a few hours. Klaus cannot be neutralized by wooden stakes, due to being a werewolf-vampire hybrid.
 * White Oak Ash Daggers: A group of enchanted silver daggers dipped in the ash of the white oak tree will neutralize an Original vampire when stabbed through the heart. If the dagger is removed, it must be dipped again in White Oak Ash to re-neutralize the Original vampire. Otherwise, it will have no effect and the Original vampire awaken within a few hours.

Trivia

 * When an Original vampire dies, all of the vampires created from their bloodline die along with them.
 * The Original vampires cannot be killed by the silver daggers, only temporarily neutralized for as long as the dagger remains intact.
 * Although they hurt him when he is stabbed with them, Klaus is not effected by the dagger because of his werewolf side.
 * As humans, each Original was killed by being stabbed in the heart before they transitioned, including Alaric. This may be why as vampires, they must be staked in the heart or daggered in the heart to kill them, though it should be noted that a vampire's heart still beats and so would naturally be vulnerable to impalement by something they are weak to.
 * The Original vampires can be considered the vampire equivalent of royalty, as they were the first vampires, the most dangerous, indestructible, and the most powerful. They demonstrate that the rules other vampires make for the vampire species does not apply to them and will do what they want. They demand respect and become violent and murderous if disrespected. In their minds, their rules are the true and absolute laws for vampires.
 * Original Vampires cannot be killed by heart extraction, or other ways. They can be killed only by white oak daggers.
 * [SPOILER] A new born original are stronger x1000 than a normal vampire, even if they were created on the same day.