D&D General Ravenloft: Monsters vs Darklords

Bedrockgames said:

Yeah, the dark powers are kind of the embodiment of poetic justice

Click to expand...

Voadam said:

No, not really the embodiment of any kind of justice. They feed off of self-inflicted torment and empower and encourage escalating horribleness and condemn innocents to suffer because of the darklords' trap and empowerment. They do not promote justice, just a mocking cruelty.

Click to expand...

Alzrius said:

The idea of the darklords is that they've damned themselves, through their own actions and choices.

Click to expand...

Minigiant said:

This is a part of me that wants to create a setting where the Evil God of Jailers and Prison usurps the Dark Powers and creates their own local Ravenloft.

He or She would be hated by evil gods because he snatched up people of great evil to create their personal torture hell and be hated by good gods because he catches innocents in his net when he does so AND be hated by neutral because they'd grab real land and souls to do it disrupting the natural cycle.

Then you'd have a good 3 part adventure.

1) Stop the BBEG due to their commitment to a terrible act.
2) Break the Domain as the BBEG has been elevated to Darklord and the Mists are sealing up.
3) With the aid of morally opposed allies, stop the Church of the Jailer God from restarting the Dark Divine Punishment after they rez the BBEDL.

Click to expand...

Minigiant said:

This is a part of me that wants to create a setting where the Evil God of Jailers and Prison usurps the Dark Powers and creates their own local Ravenloft.

Click to expand...

Alzrius said:

So basically, Masque of the Red Death and the "Living Death" organized play campaign.

Click to expand...

Voadam said:

All hail Torog, the King That Crawls!

Click to expand...

Minigiant said:

So me Ravenloft without darklord focus is just a generic grimdark setting.

It's the twist that makes the famous grimdark settings. Dark Sun has their sand, offense, and lack of religious focus. Ravenloft has it's darklords. The Old World has Chaos!


If the PCs can win without a full confrontation with a darklord, it isn't a Ravenloft campaign. It's like one of those Multiverse or Time travel campaigns.

Click to expand...

Minigiant said:

You don't have to do a "weekend in hell" adventure. You can do Ravenloft as domain natives, Ravenloft native, or a long term Mist-Grabee.

My opinion is that even if you are using some random monster, mage, slasher, cult, or vampire as your enemies, it's not Ravenloft if they aren't linked to a darklord. Tortured by them, created by them, funded by them, rivaling them (on their way to be one themselves)

Even in a darklord-less place like late Darkon, you are still dealing with nonsense the lich left behind and the fear that he comes back. And there is probably some idiot trying to bring the darklord back, call in other one, or transform into one.

Click to expand...

Remathilis said:

There were some 3e materials that tried to push the envelope regarding "no joy, only dark!" Style of design. I'll be honest, I didn't pay much attention to 3e era stuff (didn't own it, barely read it) to name names. I may also be mixing up some late 2e/ 3e era Netbook stuff that was a lot more casual in its pizza-cutter design (all edge and no point).

Click to expand...

humble minion said:

Some of my very favourite Ravenloft material was the 3rd Ed gazetteers which really made the place feel lived in and real. But there was some dreadful drek published in that era too - the players option books Heroes of Light and especially Champions of Darkness being right at the top (bottom?) of the list. There was a fair bit of turmoil and politics happening around the direction of the line at the time, some major personnel changes midstream, and this resulted in the editorial approach being inconsistent to say the least.

Click to expand...