Quote from: RPGPundit on October 30, 2024, 02:19:11 AMIt changes nothing; you can't have a Victorian Horror setting where the characters are half-monster hipster narcissists.

Pretty sure this is not a Victorian horror setting. It is Domains of Dread style Ravenloft which was a mish-mash of Victorian, fantasy, Renaissance and more. Every domain was its own era half the time.

I suspect the author was basing off the mess that was 5e's Van Richten Domain book which botched most of the domains.

Its the "Heirs" part that is bothersome.

Quote from: Bedrockbrendan on October 30, 2024, 10:06:03 AMThe dark powers were never defined though.

They could have been anything (from God, to the Devil, to D&D gods or even powerful spell casters).

And I don't think the point was that evil was more powerful than good, it was that evil is a seductive path that changes you and warps your soul.

In my box set the dark powers are never described. Merely noted as effectively prison wardens to make sure the monsters never escape. And as an almost policing system that captures and incarcerates monsters that grab their attention.

The point was never about evil being more powerful or even an easy path. Its about getting stuck in a prison built for supernatural horrors for no known reason and the prisoners, the monsters do not get to enjoy it because sure enough some heroes eventually come along to ruin their plans.

Quote from: S'mon on October 30, 2024, 05:33:19 AM>>Five strangers armed with steel and magic awaken in a mist-shrouded land, with no memory of how they arrived: Rotrog, a prideful orcish wizard; Chivarion, a sardonic drow barbarian; Alishai, an embittered tiefling paladin; Kah, a skittish kenku cleric; and Fielle, a sunny human artificer.<<

While this is utterly laughable, I never felt TSR had any real grasp of Victorian Horror either. It's not Gnostic, Evil is not Strongest, the Dark Powers make no sense within that Christian moral frame. The horror is in estrangement from God, not that Satan is stronger than God.

Well, I think that the premise is more that Ravenloft is a place where the powers of evil are particularly concentrated, and it imperils one's soul.

Quote from: Omega on October 31, 2024, 04:04:08 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 30, 2024, 02:19:11 AMIt changes nothing; you can't have a Victorian Horror setting where the characters are half-monster hipster narcissists.

Pretty sure this is not a Victorian horror setting. It is Domains of Dread style Ravenloft which was a mish-mash of Victorian, fantasy, Renaissance and more. Every domain was its own era half the time.

I suspect the author was basing off the mess that was 5e's Van Richten Domain book which botched most of the domains.

Its the "Heirs" part that is bothersome.

I don't blame the author. They are probably just writing a book according to whatever specs they were given. But raising Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft is a good point. One of the big changes they made was shifting Ravenloft from gothic horror to multi-genre horror. And I think that was a huge mistake (also people don't really talk much about Van Richten's guide to Ravenloft, despite all the fanfare and I think part of that is they made changes that a lot of fans didn't like). But shifting from Gothic Horror to Multigenre really just goes against what Ravenloft was about. And I love most horror genres (I even wrote a multi-genre horror game myself). Ravenloft stood out because it was all about not doing cool forms of horror. It was about a very particular vision of horror. 

I understand the reason they shifted to every domain being isolated. I get you can run a good monster of the week that way (this is why Isles of Dread were always so good). But Ravenloft needs a core. It just does. And moves the setting too much in the direction of the campaigns all being about confronting a particular domain lord each time IMO.

Still none of the changes in the Van Richten Guide require cover art that is this bad

Quote from: Omega on October 31, 2024, 04:04:08 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 30, 2024, 02:19:11 AMIt changes nothing; you can't have a Victorian Horror setting where the characters are half-monster hipster narcissists.

Pretty sure this is not a Victorian horror setting. It is Domains of Dread style Ravenloft which was a mish-mash of Victorian, fantasy, Renaissance and more. Every domain was its own era half the time.

I do think the newer Ravenlof tis drawing more off DoD. But I have to say even DoD was fighting against its Victorian roots a lot of the time. Barovia is listed as Medieval. And it has medieval trappings, but it is still ripped right out of Horror of Dracula and Dracula 1931. I always thought the DoD era of art was kind of crappy compared to the Fabian era (the layout also kind of bugged me). But I recognize why people like it. Still though. This is Strahd from DoD. Still rocking the Bela Lugosi look in his 'medieval' domain

Also just to be clear, the Black Box was also not being explicitly Victorian. The setting was clearly trying to have it both ways: there are domains that are clearly founded in the medieval but they have so many non-medieval trappings and the art really suggests hammer studios films set in the 19th century. Which I think is to Pundit's point that the source material is 18th and 19th century gothic novels and movies based on gothic novels, so the domains tend to reflect that (even when they are claiming the domain is chivalric, medieval or renaissance there is usually some anachronism in the setting detail or in the art depicting it)

Quote from: SHARK on October 31, 2024, 01:40:56 AM

Quote from: ForgottenF on October 31, 2024, 01:08:36 AM

Quote from: S'mon on October 30, 2024, 12:57:33 PMthink it's just a bit of a shame that the whole Ravenloft as a campaign setting construction, Ravenloft as the Demiplane of Dread, is fundamentally opposed to Gothic Horror. Gothic Horror very much requires the intrusion of Evil into a nominally familiar, relatively comfortable world.

I think I agree. If I wanted to make something like Ravenloft, I'd steal Terry Pratchett's conception of a "parasite dimension", a semi-conscious entity that drifts around the multiverse and occasionally tries to intrude itself into the material world. Of course then you run into the problem several comments have pointed out, that if Ravenloft comes knocking at the door of something like the Forgotten Realms, it's probably getting its teeth kicked in. The Realms are stuffed with super-powerful entities that would detect another plane invading their own and muster a disproportionate response to crush it.

Someday I'd like to play Ravenloft with a DM that "gets it", but at the moment I'm skeptical on whether or not horror and D&D can ever mesh well.

Greetings!

Hey there ForgottenF! I agree. I'm skeptical that D&D is really a suitable rule-set to run a Gothic Horror game. Then again, I bounce back to the idea that if you are initially establishing your milieu as a Victorian Age, 19th Century milieu, then Ravenloft would fit right in like a glove. If your milieu *isn't* that environment though, yeah. Likely to be trainloads of problems and friction.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

I think a Victorian-themed setting or a historical hodgepodge like Mystara would help in terms of Ravenloft not feeling like such an anachronism, but I don't think it gets you any closer to a Gothic horror tone. System dictates setting as I always say, and D&D is at its core a game of heroic fantasy adventure. Your own earlier anecdote ably demonstrates what happens when you take a group of D&D characters with D&D expectations and throw them at a supposed horror setting. Unless you're going to make substantial changes to the rules, I think the closest you'd get would be something like the 2004 Van Helsing movie. I love that movie, but it's not horror at all. It's action schlock with a gothic paint job.

Quote from: ForgottenF on October 31, 2024, 10:18:24 AM

Quote from: SHARK on October 31, 2024, 01:40:56 AM

Quote from: ForgottenF on October 31, 2024, 01:08:36 AM

Quote from: S'mon on October 30, 2024, 12:57:33 PMthink it's just a bit of a shame that the whole Ravenloft as a campaign setting construction, Ravenloft as the Demiplane of Dread, is fundamentally opposed to Gothic Horror. Gothic Horror very much requires the intrusion of Evil into a nominally familiar, relatively comfortable world.

I think I agree. If I wanted to make something like Ravenloft, I'd steal Terry Pratchett's conception of a "parasite dimension", a semi-conscious entity that drifts around the multiverse and occasionally tries to intrude itself into the material world. Of course then you run into the problem several comments have pointed out, that if Ravenloft comes knocking at the door of something like the Forgotten Realms, it's probably getting its teeth kicked in. The Realms are stuffed with super-powerful entities that would detect another plane invading their own and muster a disproportionate response to crush it.

Someday I'd like to play Ravenloft with a DM that "gets it", but at the moment I'm skeptical on whether or not horror and D&D can ever mesh well.

Greetings!

Hey there ForgottenF! I agree. I'm skeptical that D&D is really a suitable rule-set to run a Gothic Horror game. Then again, I bounce back to the idea that if you are initially establishing your milieu as a Victorian Age, 19th Century milieu, then Ravenloft would fit right in like a glove. If your milieu *isn't* that environment though, yeah. Likely to be trainloads of problems and friction.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

I think a Victorian-themed setting or a historical hodgepodge like Mystara would help in terms of Ravenloft not feeling like such an anachronism, but I don't think it gets you any closer to a Gothic horror tone. System dictates setting as I always say, and D&D is at its core a game of heroic fantasy adventure. Your own earlier anecdote ably demonstrates what happens when you take a group of D&D characters with D&D expectations and throw them at a supposed horror setting. Unless you're going to make substantial changes to the rules, I think the closest you'd get would be something like the 2004 Van Helsing movie. I love that movie, but it's not horror at all. It's action schlock with a gothic paint job.

The changes won't work for everyone. But in fairness The core rules (from Black Box to DoD) had substantial changes to the AD&D rules system. Many spells were altered. Some class abilities were altered. Powers checks are an enormous change. The monsters are fundamentally altered. And the GM is considerably empowered. There are also fear and  horror checks (later they would add madness---I think with the red box but can't recall). It is still D&D (honestly that is one of the things I like about it). But you can really hit a strong hammer studio vibe if you know how to run the setting. Mileage may vary of course. But it always worked very well for me 

I definitely agree that D&D has issues trying to support a variety of settings that make wildly different assumptions. There are too many assumptions baked into the core rules, which means that settings with different assumptions have to spend a lot of space on changing those assumptions and retraining players. You're probably better off playing a dedicated Victorian horror game like Stokerverse over playing a D&D setting like Ravenloft. I get that piggybacking off an existing system allows a setting to benefit from the network effect, but it comes at the cost of diluting what makes the setting distinct. Especially now, when writers don't even try to make settings feels distinct.

Nah, it is plenty Gothic in literary aesthetics of hidden grotesques under the majestic surface AND Victorian in redemptive and rectifying moral ethos and the imperilment of one's soul amongst such turbid environs (I mean, as modern as they were in Industrial Revolution Age their moral belief in Progress!, and Sanitation!, and even into Religious Pageant Plays which was very much de rigueur). Don't get lost in the setting domain trappings because that varies from Ancient Egypt to gaslight Industrial Age. The point is that wickedness lies underneath in just about anything you can imagine (including Bluetspur, perhaps some Illithid did something really unforgiveable to Illithid ethoi...?).

The setting strongly leans into "beware what you wsh for, you might just get it", a la cursed monkey paw wish. Thus wanting to Be the Nightmare was considered a moral failing threatening one into damnation. In fact there was at least one DragonLance NPC that became a devout black knight crusader, IIRC, and there was the Robespierre-esque Dementlieu constant revolution domain, the perpetual victim enchantress domain, etc.

Your own hero narrative without self control would be mirrored in one's PC developing into a Darklord's own private Idaho. Self-righteousness (pride), control issues (paranoia), and manipulation (turning people into things) were often key seeds to fail those powers checks tout de suite. Nah, Ravenloft was absolutely fine AND made perfect sense as an extension especially given Alignment already in D&D. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if it was partially developed as an in-game response to murderhobo-ism and a way to quarantine PCs who needed to be setting retired as a group-made legendary fallen NPC.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 31, 2024, 12:26:27 PMI definitely agree that D&D has issues trying to support a variety of settings that make wildly different assumptions. There are too many assumptions baked into the core rules, which means that settings with different assumptions have to spend a lot of space on changing those assumptions and retraining players. You're probably better off playing a dedicated Victorian horror game like Stokerverse over playing a D&D setting like Ravenloft. I get that piggybacking off an existing system allows a setting to benefit from the network effect, but it comes at the cost of diluting what makes the setting distinct. Especially now, when writers don't even try to make settings feels distinct.

Again it boils down to what you want. We played plenty of dedicated horror RPGs in the 90s. The thing that made Ravenloft great for me, was that it is built on D&D, which is a great system for long term campaigns. You can certainly go a more full emulation route. Call of Cthulhu was great for doing Lovecraft for instance, and more recent horror RPGs are even more focused on emulating genres. TORG's ORRORSH was another one I remember enjoying a lot. What I liked about Ravenloft was it brought the gothic stuff to a highly gameable D&D environment. There is something about D&D (or D&D adjacent games) that I think work well (from the preparation end, to the implementation and play end). I play mostly other games these days, but whenever I go back to D&D or specifically to Ravenoft, it feels so nice because I sit down and I immediately know what to do for a session. I ran several long campaigns all through the 90s and it was rarely the problem I see peopel complain about online (not saying it wasn't a problem for some people, or that some of these criticisms don't apply to peoples experience, but I never really had these issue). There were other issues but the core system did what I wanted for the setting. I think part of it boils down to do you like the Ravenloft setting itself or are you looking more for something else (if the former, Ravenloft under 2E worked pretty well, if the latter you probably want another system).

Quote from: Opaopajr on October 31, 2024, 12:27:29 PMthe perpetual victim enchantress domain

I don't have encyclopedic knowledge of Ravenloft, but they actually went there? They made the enchantress from Beauty and the Beast into a darklord? I always thought she was the fairy tale equivalent of a flopsy, especially in the Disney version. TSR actually called that out in the 90s?

Quote from: Opaopajr on October 31, 2024, 12:27:29 PMNah, it is plenty Gothic in literary aesthetics of hidden grotesques under the majestic surface AND Victorian in redemptive and rectifying moral ethos and the imperilment of one's soul amongst such turbid environs (I mean, as modern as they were in Industrial Revolution Age their moral belief in Progress!, and Sanitation!, and even into Religious Pageant Plays which was very much de rigueur). Don't get lost in the setting domain trappings because that varies from Ancient Egypt to gaslight Industrial Age. The point is that wickedness lies underneath in just about anything you can imagine (including Bluetspur, perhaps some Illithid did something really unforgiveable to Illithid ethoi...?).

The setting strongly leans into "beware what you wsh for, you might just get it", a la cursed monkey paw wish. Thus wanting to Be the Nightmare was considered a moral failing threatening one into damnation. In fact there was at least one DragonLance NPC that became a devout black knight crusader, IIRC, and there was the Robespierre-esque Dementlieu constant revolution domain, the perpetual victim enchantress domain, etc.

Your own hero narrative without self control would be mirrored in one's PC developing into a Darklord's own private Idaho. Self-righteousness (pride), control issues (paranoia), and manipulation (turning people into things) were often key seeds to fail those powers checks tout de suite. Nah, Ravenloft was absolutely fine AND made perfect sense as an extension especially given Alignment already in D&D. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if it was partially developed as an in-game response to murderhobo-ism and a way to quarantine PCs who needed to be setting retired as a group-made legendary fallen NPC.

I had a big long response, but basically I agree with everything you said for the most part

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 31, 2024, 12:46:17 PM

Quote from: Opaopajr on October 31, 2024, 12:27:29 PMthe perpetual victim enchantress domain

I don't have encyclopedic knowledge of Ravenloft, but they actually went there? They made the enchantress from Beauty and the Beast into a darklord? I always thought she was the fairy tale equivalent of an ambulance chaser, especially in the Disney version. TSR actually called that out in the 90s?

I am not sure who is referring to but I think it might be someone like Gabriele Adere. And I haven't seen Beauty and the beast so I can't weigh in on whether that character is someone who made it into Ravenloft. Generally they were pulling in hammer studios, universal and gothic horror story characters with the serial numbers filed off. Sometimes they took from Shakespeare and fairy tales or myth. Disney I don't recall being hugely on the table. The one domain that leaps to mind in that respect is the Wild Lands from the Islands of Terror supplement. It had a domain lord called King Crocodile. Most people I think found that domain silly (I never really understood why they did it, maybe I was missing some angle to it that made it useful). Generally though 90s Ravenloft didn't really call things out. Again, it was the uncool horror setting of the 90s and tended to embrace tropes rather than put a spin on them or fight the man

This is Gabrielle Aderre (I actually think she is one of the better domain lords from that era---though I wasn't a huge fan of where they took her in the meta plot: I liked leaving that stuff to the GM because it is all suggested in her background and the bloodlines)

Quote from: Bedrockbrendan on October 31, 2024, 08:29:46 AMAlso just to be clear, the Black Box was also not being explicitly Victorian. The setting was clearly trying to have it both ways: there are domains that are clearly founded in the medieval but they have so many non-medieval trappings and the art really suggests hammer studios films set in the 19th century. Which I think is to Pundit's point that the source material is 18th and 19th century gothic novels and movies based on gothic novels, so the domains tend to reflect that (even when they are claiming the domain is chivalric, medieval or renaissance there is usually some anachronism in the setting detail or in the art depicting it)

That's right. When I say Victorian Horror, I do not mean "horror set in the victorian era", I mean the moralistic genre of Gothic Horror later illutrated by Hammer Horror. It could be set in any era.