Quote from: Rincewind1;519836While let's face it, a personal tragedy is a perfectly valid (and quite common) reason for why you'd turn to a more...risky means of gaining power, to settle the score etc.

Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).

QuoteAnd a question remains if Dark Powers aren't some form of a multiplanar parasite, feeding off bad feelings. That'd be kinda cool I think - not perhaps as main lore, but as one of the possible explanations.

Leaving the Dark Powers undefined was one of the few times the TSR writers of the 2e era left something unexplained...thankfully.

Quote from: misterguignol;519840Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).



Leaving the Dark Powers undefined was one of the few times the TSR writers of the 2e era left something unexplained...thankfully.

2) Word. I think I'll use my "parasite" thingie from now on - that'd explain a lot to me, at least.

1) True - Dark Powers just """reward""" (triple quote marks, because well, reward, yeah right ) evil acts, eventually punishing you by granting your own domain and binding with a curse.

I am pretty sure that that Fascist - government guy had no personal tragedy. He is a walking tragedy though, as he's doomed to fail on his each conquest, while lusting after more power.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519842I am pretty sure that that Fascist - government guy had no personal tragedy. He is a walking tragedy though, as he's doomed to fail on his each conquest, while lusting after more power.

i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

Quote from: misterguignol;519846i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

That's pretty good, provided based on Blackadder from Season 2 on. Perhaps he is usually thwarted by his loyal but dumb general Henry and his foolish squire, Baldrick?

Quote from: Rincewind1;519849That's pretty good, provided based on Blackadder from Season 2 on. Perhaps he is usually thwarted by his loyal but dumb general Henry and his foolish squire, Baldrick?

Think about it this way: he's got a fanatically loyal military, right?  What if they are super loyal, just...dumb and incompetent?

Hmm, maybe we need a new thread for making Ravenloft cooler than it is in the books.

Quote from: misterguignol;519852Think about it this way: he's got a fanatically loyal military, right?  What if they are super loyal, just...dumb and incompetent?

Hmm, maybe we need a new thread for making Ravenloft cooler than it is in the books.

I always thought it was more because his one neighbour was a guy who could wipe out the entire armies with his own superliche powers, and the other...well, probably something similar. But the dumb and incompetent army is an idea . I'd however limit that to the High Echelons - so you can create the "Lions led by Donkeys" campaign. Trench warfare in Ravenloft, anyone?

It's an idea (the new thread) - keep us updated on your work on the material (and give me a smack if you need help with anything).

Quote from: misterguignol;519833You're actually wrong about this point though; I just checked the section on Powers Checks and there is nothing about personal tragedy in there; it's all just a gradual embrace of evil, in fact.

That is correct, but i think pundit has a point about the emphasis on tragic villains. In my opinion, this is a legitimate weakness of ravenloft, in that it plays that hand too strong. Like I said in a previous thread, tragic villains can be fun, but too much of it gets old. On the other hand, i dont think the tragic villain should be confused with the curse bestowed on each domain lord.

My view is this, it was the 90s, pretty much every horror movie, game, book etc was about the tragic villain. You had interview with a vampire and the 92 Dracula (which was more of a love story). It was in the air.

Also when you step back, and take Ravenloft a little less seriously, the tragic thing isn't so bad and becomes a bit humorous. I think the best example of this is Rudolph Van Richten (who is no villain but certainky painted as tragic).  In each of the guide books he describes his various monster nts in which the vast majority of his companions get slaughtered. It actually becomes a running joke (like red shirts in stae trek). In his past, van richten killed most of a gypsy caravan who had sold his son to a vampire lord. By the final van richten guidebook he realizes he has been cursed to see everyone he loves die at the handsof monsters. So if you accept the camp factor of ravenloft, the tragedy in it can be entertaining.

But on the whole this is one aspect of the game i comfortably criticize. It is easy enough to overcome though, and it really seemed to stem fom a desire to make fully fleshed out villains---the problem is they equated fleshed our with sympathetic. I actually touch in this point in Horror Show under e sympathetic villain entry.

Quote from: misterguignol;519840Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).
.

The Domains of Dread book is pretty free from that stuff (though if you look at the individual lord entries you will see a pattern of it. In the red andblack boxed sets though, they do talk pretty explicitly about tragic villains. In my opinion here is where they wemt wrong: instead of pointing out tyat memorable villains can als be tragic and sympathetic, they took the position that they should be those things. Showing that the monster from frankenstein wasn't just a mindless killg machine but sympathetic and eloquent (which they do in the black boxed set is great) but using it to say all villains should be like this (which they kind of did) isthe issue.

Quote from: misterguignol;519846i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

That is how i always saw him: maybe a good soldier but a less than capable general.

His curse was one of the better ones IMO.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;519924That is correct, but i think pundit has a point about the emphasis on tragic villains. In my opinion, this is a legitimate weakness of ravenloft, in that it plays that hand too strong. Like I said in a previous thread, tragic villains can be fun, but too much of it gets old. On the other hand, i dont think the tragic villain should be confused with the curse bestowed on each domain lord.

Oh, sure, I agree with that.  I'm positive I've said here before that the long backstories for each Dark Lord are 99% useless because they never come up in play.  And some of them are downright silly.

Quote from: misterguignol;519945Oh, sure, I agree with that.  I'm positive I've said here before that the long backstories for each Dark Lord are 99% useless because they never come up in play.  And some of them are downright silly.

Ok, so I take it you wouldn't be doing that in your setting?

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;520156Ok, so I take it you wouldn't be doing that in your setting?

RPGPundit

Oh, definitely not.  I have zero interest in writing backstories for potential NPCs or villains that won't come into play.  That seems like a waste of my time and smacks of the failed novelist!  I believe in only writing up back-story if it has bearing on the adventure (inasmuch as the characters learn something of the backstory as part of the adventure, etc.)

I am fine with having the backstory if it helps me run the character (evn if the players dont ever learn about it). It is also nice to have that info in case the pcs investigate the npc's history. Where i think it goes south is when the npcs recite their personal history to the characters. It can be useful as hidden architecture that occasionally surfaces.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520159I am fine with having the backstory if it helps me run the character (evn if the players dont ever learn about it). It is also nice to have that info in case the pcs investigate the npc's history. Where i think it goes south is when the npcs recite their personal history to the characters. It can be useful as hidden architecture that occasionally surfaces.

I can see what you mean, but there are a lot of Dark Lords in Ravenloft that have ridiculously convoluted backstories that in no way link in to any adventures or investigations.  Especially when the backstory occurred on a plane the PCs have no access to!

Damn right.  The guideline in writing a setting is whether the information will either be A) directly useful to the players or B) directly useful to the GM in how he presents stuff to the players.  If its neither, then its just failed-novelist wankery.

RPGPundit