D&D 5E D&D's Classic Settings Are Not 'One Shots'

In an interview with ComicBook.com, WotC's Jeremy Crawford talked about the visits to Ravenloft, Eberron, Spelljammer, Dragonlance, and (the upcoming) Planescape we've seen over the last couple of years, and their intentions for the future.

He indicated that they plan to revisit some of these settings again in the future, noting that the setting books are among their most popular books.

We love [the campaign setting books], because they help highlight just how wonderfully rich D&D is. They highlight that D&D can be gothic horror. D&D can be fantasy in space. D&D can be trippy adventures in the afterlife, in terms of Planescape. D&D can be classic high fantasy, in the form of the Forgotten Realms. It can be sort of a steampunk-like fantasy, like in Eberron. We feel it's vital to visit these settings, to tell stories in them. And we look forward to returning to them. So we do not view these as one-shots.

- Jeremy Crawford​

The whole 'multiverse' concept that D&D is currently exploring plays into this, giving them opportunities to resist worlds.

When asked about the release schedule of these books, Crawford noted that the company plans its release schedule so that players get chance to play the material, not just read it, and they don't want to swamp people with too much content to use.

Our approach to how we design for the game and how we plan out the books for it is a play-first approach. At certain times in D&D's history, it's really been a read-first approach. Because we've had points in our history where we were producing so many books each year, there was no way anyone could play all of it. In some years it would be hard to play even a small percentage of the number of things that come out. Because we have a play-first approach, we want to make sure we're coming out with things at a pace where if you really wanted to, and even that would require a lot of weekends and evenings dedicated to D&D play, you could play a lot of it.

- Jeremy Crawford​

You can read more in the interview at ComicBook.com.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

What are we even saving from the old ones?

Har'Akir has a city now, which was.... Basically implied by the number of Egyptian-themed critters in every single. Seriously, you could not find a place for all of those Egyptian critters in the domain as written in 2E
Falkovnia was trying to be Historical Vlad, where there really isn't any player facing horror other than 'Oh he's a jerk and oops your druid has set a bear on him but we buffed him to stupid levels and his whole thing is being grumpy that he can't invade other places, which are far more advanced and this setting does not logically function how are people not trading technology" which. How is the players suppose to interact with this? Whereas "Endless zombie apocalypse and a general endlessly sacrificing their people" is at least something the players can, y'know. Interact with.
I'Cath was a glorified advertisement for Kara Tur, and it was also just referencing the movie "A Chinese Ghost Story", because that's all Tsien Chiang was. Her ruining everything in an unobtainable dream at least does something rather than a reference to a comedy movie that, let's be honest, has a liiiiitle bit less pop-culture impact than say, Dracula
Sri Raji isn't around any more , which is frankly good given how it handles "Actually worshipped IRL goddess Kali". Just saying, actual IRL goddess who's thing is destroying Evil (and sometimes going a bit too far) is probably not the goddess you want involved in that. This one was unsalvagable and deserved to be destroyed, continuity be damned. Seriously, the whole gimmick of it was "Welcome to Ravenloft, they don't like outsiders" which was.... Oh, wait. Basically the gimmick of every other bloody domain. Except this time it was India and not pop-culture Transylvania
Urik was "Yup its another vampire (But this time there's a bit werepanther) just in a slightly different area. Changing it to "Congratulations its now the Deadliest Game" makes it unique and not just "Strahd but this time he's looking for a furry (to avoid that whole 'wife finds out about the werepanther curse and gets murdered' by her being into it)".
I don't even remember what original Dementleiu was, but the revamp has its whole themes of facade
Also like, Lamordia. Just a big case of "First time reading Frakenkstein and not realising that Frankenstein is the monster, not Adam", plus its weird anti-athiest tone it took. Viktra goes far more with the Hammer horror feel plus, y'know. Makes Frankenstein the monster and her creation somewhat innocent (i mean she stole corpses but, look)
The Dreamlands losing its, frankly, downright racist use of "Yeah those are entirely Australian Aboriginals" and, once again, actual IRL creator spirit the Rainbow Serpent being repurposed as "Spooky big bad nightmare creature" alongside a bunch of made ups was always One Hell Of a Look

I mean I gues you may want the Red Wizard flavour from old Hazlan as opposed to the "Weird magic" one it has at the moment. But what's worth it from these settings that the new ones won't do the trick? Did enough people care that much about a Ravenloft that isn't even big enough to support people with the farmland it was supposed to have?

Way to have not kept up with any Ravenloft product since 1990.

- Har'akir had a settlement, named Mudar, and by 1997 was in a mult-domain cluster that contained Sebua (also Egyptian themed) and Pharazia (Arabic themed). There was plenty of space for Egyptian themed monsters.

- Falkovnia was not trying to be "historical Vlad". Apart from impaling and a first name, Vlad had little in common with Vlad Tepes. He and Falkovnia were more the horror of a the Prussian-Germanic "blood and soil" terror. If you don't think 1930s-1940s Germany is horrific, then I have no words. (I have no idea what your stupid bear reference is about)

- Urik and Valachan had nothing in common with Barovia. Again, you didn't keep up with any Ravenloft material, and it shows.

- If you've read any material on Lamordia, you'd know that those that have written for it know very well that Frankenstein is the monster, but Mordenheim/Adam are not identical to the Shelley work. On a broader thematic note, making the scientist female severely undercuts the themes of the domain.

The core has hundreds of thousands of people and yes, enough farms to support its population. Its discussed several times in the sources and is indeed the whole reason for Falkovnia being able to cause trouble amongst its neighbours (it is the breadbasket of the core). Again you haven't read any of the sources, have you?

 

[QuentinGeorge]

Adding bards, sorcerers, paladins, warlocks, Dragonborn,Tieflings, sp spellcasting rangers, druids, monks, rewo king the t st of high sorcery, and that’s just off the top of my head are what you consider minor changes.

Bards have existed in Dragonlance since 2nd edition. Sorcerers since 3rd. Warlocks didn't exist in core until 4E so Dragonlance never had them but there's nothing thematically offputting about them. Rangers, Druids have all been spellcasting since 2E. Majere has had monks in his portfoilio since 1st edition. "reworking high sorcery" seems mainly mechanical. Most of the lack of fidelity was visual (strange cleanshaven knights) or thematic (women as knights, wizards of high sorcery not being tied to alignment, Soth suddenly having a dragon) and don't directly contradict anything already published.

But dropping a bunch of domains that no one has heard of, let alone played, is huge.

Please go to somewhere like Fraternity of Shadows and inform them that "no one has ever heard of" Darkon or Azalin. I'd like to see the reaction.

 

[Mecheon]

Way to have not kept up with any Ravenloft product since 1990.

- Har'akir had a settlement, named Mudar, and by 1997 was in a mult-domain cluster that contained Sebua (also Egyptian themed) and Pharazia (Arabic themed). There was plenty of space for Egyptian themed monsters.

- Falkovnia was not trying to be "historical Vlad". Apart from impaling and a first name, Vlad had little in common with Vlad Tepes. He and Falkovnia were more the horror of a the Prussian-Germanic "blood and soil" terror. If you don't think 1930s-1940s Germany is horrific, then I have no words. (I have no idea what your stupid bear reference is about)

- Urik and Valachan had nothing in common with Barovia. Again, you didn't keep up with any Ravenloft material, and it shows.

- If you've read any material on Lamordia, you'd know that those that have written for it know very well that Frankenstein is the monster, but Mordenheim/Adam are not identical to the Shelley work. On a broader thematic note, making the scientist female severely undercuts the themes of the domain.

The core has hundreds of thousands of people and yes, enough farms to support its population. Its discussed several times in the sources and is indeed the whole reason for Falkovnia being able to cause trouble amongst its neighbours (it is the breadbasket of the core). Again you haven't read any of the sources, have you?

Yes, Har'akir had one settlement that was always noted as being small and tiny, because that was . I know way more about the monster books than I do the main setting books, and let me tell you, there are way too. Like, the monster books are running under the assuption of multiple towns and Kar'akir being massive enough to have multiple places to stumble into tombs full of corpse scarabs, not just the one small town.

He absolutely was. That's the joke. That's why his domain was up next to Strahd's. Pop culture Vlad and Dracula chilling together in the same area. His domain absolutely exposes, plus it is one of the ones that is absolutely a slave to the 90s metaplot they required in everything

Urik is basically Blackula. That's the joke. Ravenloft has one iconic vampire and its Strahd, and all other vampires will be compared to him. I made a funny because his curse is tied to the werepanther aspect which, frankly, the modern internet would consider a turn on, so its clearly not a good sign of horror when a sizeable portion of the 'net is just going "Oh that's hardly anything concerning". Its supposed to be a horror setting and that's the best they can come up with. "He's a more different vampire who's also a panther". Look, I get Ravenloft is trying to be the Hammer Horror setting, but, c'mon. They can try better.

How does making her a woman change the whole theme of the region? Frankly I think the one thing they missed here was doing the "Its Frankenstein's relative!" thing like so many movies. But like, the theme of the region should be "Mad scientist goes too far in their creation of life", with the addition that the lost wife is the monster. See also how the original had to turn what should be regular people into absolute combat monsters and had to have the whole convoluted thing with Adam and "oh he got an EVIL SOUL that's SUPER EVIL because how dare you try to raise the dead without consulting with the dungeons and dragons gods!" because, shock, it turns out Dungeons and Dragons is very unsuited to actually doing a horror campaign in due to being built on being a heroic fantasy game where the one sub-system the game has for resolving problems is "Here is how to kill it". If the original Ravenloft wasn't as good as it is, the setting wouldn't have launched, and basically no domain lives up to Ravenloft

No, it turns out I haven't read many of these because Ravenloft was released 5 years before I was born and, when it was 1997, I was a lot more interested in Lost World and getting a Chasmosaurus toy, because frankly the only Chasmosaurus toy comparable to it in the years since is the Creative Beasts one. So everything I know I've picked up through osmosis. So tell me: Why should I care about these older versions of the settings as they just seem poorly thought out, inconsistent from day 1, absolutely bogged down in the meta-plot of the setting trying to escape from its 'weekend in hell' roots (which, frankly, it never did), dated to all heck or have absolute weird bents that indicates the writers at the time didn't even understand the original story? I notice you haven't even touched on I'Caith or Sri Raiji, which at least indicates you see the problems on those two. Why should I, someone introduced to this way later than you, not just assume the rest of the setting is as bad as those two awful early examples and not just say we should write the whole thing off?

 

[Remathilis]

Way to have not kept up with any Ravenloft product since 1990.

- Har'akir had a settlement, named Mudar, and by 1997 was in a mult-domain cluster that contained Sebua (also Egyptian themed) and Pharazia (Arabic themed). There was plenty of space for Egyptian themed monsters.

- Falkovnia was not trying to be "historical Vlad". Apart from impaling and a first name, Vlad had little in common with Vlad Tepes. He and Falkovnia were more the horror of a the Prussian-Germanic "blood and soil" terror. If you don't think 1930s-1940s Germany is horrific, then I have no words. (I have no idea what your stupid bear reference is about)

- Urik and Valachan had nothing in common with Barovia. Again, you didn't keep up with any Ravenloft material, and it shows.

- If you've read any material on Lamordia, you'd know that those that have written for it know very well that Frankenstein is the monster, but Mordenheim/Adam are not identical to the Shelley work. On a broader thematic note, making the scientist female severely undercuts the themes of the domain.

The core has hundreds of thousands of people and yes, enough farms to support its population. Its discussed several times in the sources and is indeed the whole reason for Falkovnia being able to cause trouble amongst its neighbours (it is the breadbasket of the core). Again you haven't read any of the sources, have you?

I will profess ignorance on Har'Akir. Like most of the islands of terror, it was so far removed from the mainland as to be a second-class domain. Which was a shame, the Core created a two-tier system where an important domain like Har-Akir was less important than a domain like Keening or a giant hole in the continent. But that's neither here nor there.

Drakov was absolutely a Vlad rip-off based on an incomplete understanding of Vlad the Impaler. Good on the Kargatane to try and mix in another historical monster, but there was no way Vlad Hitler was going to be sellable in 2023.

Urik was always a hodgepodge of bad ideas. The Red Wizards of That took a literal animal, turned him into a man (with black skin befitting his animal type), "civilized" him, turned him into a vampire because reasons, and gave him a Germanic name. With a curse of domestic violence. Was this domain designed by Mad Libs? Was the goal to create a domain with as many problematic tropes as possible? If ANY domain needed a clean up, it's THIS one. Even a surface level reading screams "the only black darklord was a civilized animal" makes orc debate look like a fan debate over the color of Elminster's cloak.

And Mordenheim was absolutely Frankenstein: build a creature, arrogant scientist, loved one pays for it, Adam is articulate and not a lumbering brute, etc. Even the name Adam is the one thing the Creature from Shelly's novel calls itself (I ought to be thy Adam...). Viktra isn't looking to create life, she is looking to preserve it. Elsie is a friend who is dying and her work saves her life at a cost. Viktra is a parable about medicine and obsession couched in the language of Frankenstein. I'll take that over CVS-brand Frankenstein.

The notion of trade and international politics in Ravenloft is almost absurd. Domain borders close at the whim. Several domains are highly isolated or even non-populated, the coast disappears on the Western side of the map randomly and there's a gaping hole where a country used to be. The average Barovian merchant is barely traveling from Kresk to the Village that is perpetually surrounded by choking fog, let alone heading to Nova Vaasa. Whole economies would be ruined if Strahd throws a hissy fit and closes the borders. You can't impose the rules of logical commerce (as much as it's logical by D&D's standards) on Ravenloft without resorting to nightmare logic anyway, so cut the pretense.

On the one hand, I give Arthaus and the Kargatane credit for trying to keep the Ravenloft setting alive during a time when WotC only found value in Strahd and his castle. But I think the setting needed a good pruning. Maybe WotC went too far, but there was some very badly done lore in it that needed sorting.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I will profess ignorance on Har'Akir. Like most of the islands of terror, it was so far removed from the mainland as to be a second-class domain. Which was a shame, the Core created a two-tier system where an important domain like Har-Akir was less important than a domain like Keening or a giant hole in the continent. But that's neither here nor there.

Drakov was absolutely a Vlad rip-off based on an incomplete understanding of Vlad the Impaler. Good on the Kargatane to try and mix in another historical monster, but there was no way Vlad Hitler was going to be sellable in 2023.

Urik was always a hodgepodge of bad ideas. The Red Wizards of That took a literal animal, turned him into a man (with black skin befitting his animal type), "civilized" him, turned him into a vampire because reasons, and gave him a Germanic name. With a curse of domestic violence. Was this domain designed by Mad Libs? Was the goal to create a domain with as many problematic tropes as possible? If ANY domain needed a clean up, it's THIS one. Even a surface level reading screams "the only black darklord was a civilized animal" makes orc debate look like a fan debate over the color of Elminster's cloak.

And Mordenheim was absolutely Frankenstein: build a creature, arrogant scientist, loved one pays for it, Adam is articulate and not a lumbering brute, etc. Even the name Adam is the one thing the Creature from Shelly's novel calls itself (I ought to be thy Adam...). Viktra isn't looking to create life, she is looking to preserve it. Elsie is a friend who is dying and her work saves her life at a cost. Viktra is a parable about medicine and obsession couched in the language of Frankenstein. I'll take that over CVS-brand Frankenstein.

The notion of trade and international politics in Ravenloft is almost absurd. Domain borders close at the whim. Several domains are highly isolated or even non-populated, the coast disappears on the Western side of the map randomly and there's a gaping hole where a country used to be. The average Barovian merchant is barely traveling from Kresk to the Village that is perpetually surrounded by choking fog, let alone heading to Nova Vaasa. Whole economies would be ruined if Strahd throws a hissy fit and closes the borders. You can't impose the rules of logical commerce (as much as it's logical by D&D's standards) on Ravenloft without resorting to nightmare logic anyway, so cut the pretense.

On the one hand, I give Arthaus and the Kargatane credit for trying to keep the Ravenloft setting alive during a time when WotC only found value in Strahd and his castle. But I think the setting needed a good pruning. Maybe WotC went too far, but there was some very badly done lore in it that needed sorting.

Arthaus sorted it as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Remathilis]

Arthaus sorted it as far as I'm concerned.

Arthaus's run was a mixed bag. Disregarding any mechanical elements* for a minute, they did the best they could with some really bad ideas that came from the TSR design paradigm. The core was a mess and missed a grand opportunity to fix it. Half-Vistsni has aged like curdled milk (and caliban didn't do so hot either) and while I applaud them for trying to make Falkovnia and Dementlieu interesting, they didn't fix the main problems with both.


* there 3e rules were atrocious, but most 3pp mechanics were in that era, so no slight against them specifically.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Arthaus's run was a mixed bag. Disregarding any mechanical elements* for a minute, they did the best they could with some really bad ideas that came from the TSR design paradigm. The core was a mess and missed a grand opportunity to fix it. Half-Vistsni has aged like curdled milk (and caliban didn't do so hot either) and while I applaud them for trying to make Falkovnia and Dementlieu interesting, they didn't fix the main problems with both.


* there 3e rules were atrocious, but most 3pp mechanics were in that era, so no slight against them specifically.

I was pretty happy with the  expanded (not replaced) lore in the Arthas era, thank you very much. Best version of Ravenloft for me. Agree to disagree.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I wonder if Innistrad (and the comingsoon Duskmourn: House of Horrors) shouldn't be promoted as a partnered franchise with Ravenloft. I love my little collection of World of Darkness books, and sometimes I tried to imagined a mash-up D&D version of WoD+CoD, with all those factions in a D&D world like Ravenloft or Innistrad.

How could be a modern version of Innistrad based in the 90's? Or a metropolis as a "brother" plane of Duskmourn.

WotC knew more one player would miss 3.5 Ravenloft.

Other point is the demiplane of the dread couldn't be only a "Jurrasic Park" for gothic horror monsters from Universal pictures. Ecology says there is a proportion among the number of preys and predators. If there aren't enough preys to be hunted, then predators can't survive more time without their hunt. Have you played any city-building videogame?

The original Barovia in the material plane could be a spin-off working as a horror reverse isekai in teslapunk age, where the D&D monsters are the invaders, or innocent refugees escaping the hell in their previous homes.

* I dislike the attitude "I am not happy with these changes". In the real life you will have to face worse things. You should wonder what changes could be done by you in your game.

* How would be if dusk elves could procreate with halflings to create the dusk elflings: cute faces but bad temperament, like Tiny Tina in Borderlands videogame. (All is laughts and they appear riding their treant-like construct mount!).

* I feel a lot of curiosity about how had continued the metaplot of Ravenloft (and Dark Sun).

If Hasbro wants a new metaplot for Ravenloft or other settings this should be written by a higher professional level, I guess people with enough experience in Hollywood productions.

 

[Stormonu]

I'd been irritated with Ravenloft ever since the Grand Conjunction had left the Great Rift in the middle of the Core and hurled Bleutspur off to an island of terror. I actually thought making each domain an island of terror was brilliant, so you could arrange them how you wanted for travel, though I wouldn't have minded a "map" showing tenuous links for a suggested route between domains.

Several of the reimaginings/new domains I did like - the change to Dementlieu and Falkovia most noted. Dementlieu "moving forward" interested me, and I never did like the old lord of Falkovia's story - instead of having his armies constantly decimated by Darkon and instead turning them into zombies in a never-ending battle against its own people struck me as far more interesting and differentiation from "Vlad Tepes as a failed Strahd precursor" into something that struck a chord with me - I actually ended up using the domain for a well-received one-shot.

Others - Lamordia, primarily - just made me facepalm. Luckily, I have my old books so I can just ignore any such changes and throw a real monkeywrench in on anyone who gets too comfortable that they know who's who and what's what.

In all, it's been a mixed bag. Ravenloft got all jumbled up, with some good and some bad, with Curse being the true standout. Spelljammer ended up missing half the mechanics and "setting" information I was hoping for, with the space eaten up by a subpar adventure. Shadows probably came out the best, with least bit of attempting to fit a square peg in a round hole. I had been really hesitant to consider Planescape, but I'm now waiting to see an "unboxing" video or two before I solidly decide. At this point, I do rather want them stay away from the classic settings for a bit, and give us some more new settings - Witchlight, Radiant Citadel, Phandelver and Strixhaven give us glimpses disguised as adventures, but I would like to see a really dedicated setting designed from the ground up for 5E, that isn't Forgotten Realms or a regurgitation thereof.

Anywho, I'm going to be running a Cyre1313 adventure next Monday, so wish me luck.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'd been irritated with Ravenloft ever since the Grand Conjunction had left the Great Rift in the middle of the Core and hurled Bleutspur off to an island of terror. I actually thought making each domain an island of terror was brilliant, so you could arrange them how you wanted for travel, though I wouldn't have minded a "map" showing tenuous links for a suggested route between domains.

Several of the reimaginings/new domains I did like - the change to Dementlieu and Falkovia most noted. Dementlieu "moving forward" interested me, and I never did like the old lord of Falkovia's story - instead of having his armies constantly decimated by Darkon and instead turning them into zombies in a never-ending battle against its own people struck me as far more interesting and differentiation from "Vlad Tepes as a failed Strahd precursor" into something that struck a chord with me - I actually ended up using the domain for a well-received one-shot.

Others - Lamordia, primarily - just made me facepalm. Luckily, I have my old books so I can just ignore any such changes and throw a real monkeywrench in on anyone who gets too comfortable that they know who's who and what's what.

In all, it's been a mixed bag. Ravenloft got all jumbled up, with some good and some bad, with Curse being the true standout. Spelljammer ended up missing half the mechanics and "setting" information I was hoping for, with the space eaten up by a subpar adventure. Shadows probably came out the best, with least bit of attempting to fit a square peg in a round hole. I had been really hesitant to consider Planescape, but I'm now waiting to see an "unboxing" video or two before I solidly decide. At this point, I do rather want them stay away from the classic settings for a bit, and give us some more new settings - Witchlight, Radiant Citadel, Phandelver and Strixhaven give us glimpses disguised as adventures, but I would like to see a really dedicated setting designed from the ground up for 5E, that isn't Forgotten Realms or a regurgitation thereof.

Anywho, I'm going to be running a Cyre1313 adventure next Monday, so wish me luck.

Oh, how is that? I've been debating picking it up.