Ravenloft Campaigns: What’s the meta-point?

[Aus_Snow]

The reasons for playing in a Ravenloft game are similar to the reasons for playing in a long-running Call of Cthulhu campaign.

Yes. And in that way, it also reminds me of Midnight.

Um, and my Forgotten Realms hack. But that's another story altogether. . .

 

[Thanael]

Ravenloft is basically the end result of applying Hammer Horror or Victorian-era monster fiction tropes to D&D. Transylvania, in both the real-world and in story world is kind of a marginal place; historically and in fiction, it's always being taken over by somebody. It's where the real Vlad the Impaler and Elizabeth Bathory came from. The realms of Ravenloft have a similar set of qualities. Each new realm is a new set of horror tropes, often from a different era in horror fiction; the BBEG that defines the sub-setting is themselves defined by the tropes they are supposed to evoke.

Thus, Ravenloft is less about a core narrative and more about a core set of setting tropes that are essentially unrelated to narrative.

This is spot on and essentially describes the setting.

But let's talk about how you use it, i.e. how the PCs can/should/might experience it. How do you play a campaign in RL?

 

[wolfkook]

IMO, the meta-point for a campaign in the dread realms should be something like this:

"Explore the land, get scared, discover that something's not right, delve into the secrets of the land, discover the Dark Powers, the Mists and the Darklods, get horrified, decide if you want to fight for the people or for yourself, find a way to battle the darklords, get enough XP, gold and loot to make the world a better place, striving to keep yourself pure and sane in the process."

In that way, your Epic Destiny becomes something like "Getting enough power to make things right".

Historically, Ravenloft has been seen as a some kind of hopeless setting, where nothing people do is really meaningful. In 3E, the concept shifted to make Ravenloft a setting "worth fighting for", and thus, somehow hopeful.

Now, relying on the five elements you point out:

Cliché: Nothing as cliché as gothic monsters. We all know about vampires, werewolves, ghosts, frankenstein monsters and such, and we all like to fight them in our fantasy campaig.

Combat: Fighting gothic monsters, especially in Ravenloft, is not your typicall combat scene. It requires much more previous research, and better tactics. This is not just a Brute or a Skirmisher, this is a character that requires a stake through the heart / silver weapons / cold iron (And probably to know the story behing it) to be really defeated.

Fellowship: Against overwhelming odds, the fellowship aspect becomes more important, and with lots of investigation, the characters have plenty of opportunity to interact. Furthermore, as the characters strive to protect the innocent / keep their purity / make the right choice, they become involved in moral dilemmas that create a sympathetic link to one another, and make them more three-dimensional.

Anarchy: Well, that's a common link in all D&D.

Enigma: Few other settings have such a strong dosis of Enigmas: Prophecies, mysteries to be sold, whodunits, ways to (permanently) kill a monsters, even the secrets of the mists, the dark powers, and the inner workings of the demiplane.

 

[gonzoron]

A lot of great responses so far, but I'll add my thoughts anyway. As DarkKestral said, Ravenloft isn't any one core story. Every domain has a darklord, but not every story in the domain is about that darklord. And every darklord influences the "flavor" of his domain, but not every adventure in the domain has to have that flavor. This was true even in 2e. (There's a Mummy in the "Jeckyl/Hyde" domain, and a sleeping demon in the "Frankenstein" domain, just off the top of my head.)

An horror-type story arc you can imagine can fit in Ravenloft.

My personal favorite is "ordinary people discover that something is very wrong with the world (usually when that "something wrong" ruins their ordinary lives) and take up arms against the darkness." The fight may be futile (or it may not) and they may know it (or they may not), but they fight because it's the right thing to do, and even if generations of victims fall to the forces of darkness, saving even one is worthwhile. In that sense, I find it more of a true heroism than any Epic Destiny could be.

For inspiration, I look to the X-files, Buffy/Angel, and LOTR, in addition to Dracula, Friday the 13th: The Series, Dark Shadows, etc.

This works especially well when the players give you good background to draw on. Fox Mulder fought because it was personal: Aliens took his sister. Van Richten became Ravenloft's greatest hero because a vampire killed his wife and son.

As an example, in my Ravenloft campaign (Which the curious can read about at www.themistway.com) the main PCs are:

1. A clockmaker's apprentice who fled when his mentor was killed by persons unknown
2. An half-gypsy spiritualist who, as a young boy, saw his mother killed by a spirit she was channeling
3. An herbalist, raised by her grandparents, who inherited her bard father's wanderlust and love of songs and tales of adventure
4. A miner's son, who discovered a trunk of unusual religious regalia that belonged to his mother, and found out that his parents fled a far-off land before he was born for reasons unknown

This has led to adventures revolving around those backgrounds such as:
1. Discovering his mentor's activities as a gunsmith smuggling weapons to rebels fighting a totalitarian regime (Falkovnia) which got the mentor killed. Taking up the fight again the Falkovnians to protect a town of refugees. Dealing with the amoral clockwork man his mentor built who wreaks havoc in his quest for a soul.
2. Fighting the spirit that killed his mother, which turned out to be the ghost of the vampire that killed Van Richten's family, along with the vorlog (incomplete vampire bride) that Van Richten accidentally created. Finding his long lost father and discovering that his mother bred him specifically to fight a prophecied enemy of the gypsies. (Malocchio, the Dukkar)
3. Finding that her father was embroiled in a secret society of vampires (the Kargat) loyal to the evil wizard-king Azalin Rex, and in fact has become a bardic lich in his service.
4. Finding that his mother was a priestess who fled because she found out too much about the corrupt paladin that led her faith and ruled her land (Nidala) and taking up the fight against the fallen paladin.

And just as Luke Skywalker went from farmboy to Jedi Knight, and Willow from awkward geek to kick-ass witch, the characters have grown into heroes, some with their own demons to wrestle

1. A swashbuckling gunslinger, who secretly is trying to rebuild his master's clockwork man, but with a conscience this time.
2. A powerful necoromancer, whose ever-growing spirit-powers threaten his sanity.
3. A bard who's gotten used to her influence on people getting her both into and out of trouble, now powerless against the lycanthropy she's contracted.
4. A quiet, troubled ranger, unable to trust nearly anyone after constant betrayals, more comfortable in the wilds with his wolf than with people, but dedicated to protecting the weak and powerless.



But that's just one example. Lots of other people have run successful Ravenloft campaign. Many of them have campaign journals online you can read for inspiration. Also, the 3e Ravenloft Dungeon Master's Guide gives some great advice in this area. The "weekend in hell" can be fun, but Ravenloft can be much more than that.

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

I believe one of the most important things about running a Ravenloft game is NOT to reveal to your players they're in Ravenloft.

Change the names of places and people around; leave them guessing. Let them "learn" naturally about the place they're in. Start them out in an idyllic place that would give no hint to the setting, and over time reveal the macabre nature of the place they've lived in their entire life. Perhaps the people slowly go mad, and the players are forced to roam the wilderness...and then begin to realize something is not quite right about the world their characters always understood.

Let there be some unspoken cosmological event that you NEVER have to explain, but let it seep into the world by introducing the basic elements of Ravenloft. Suddenly, gypsyfolk unseen in those lands travel by wains and portent terrible events that transgressed within their homelands (the Vistani). Leak little bits of information that seems to lead on that the world is changing in many unseen ways over the years, but has now approached the tipping point.


edit - inject Masque of Red Death into D&D, as Remathilis stated. It was a much better alternative.

 

[Remathilis]

I think some of Ravenloft's loss is that for a long time, Ravenloft was an artificial setting, not a natural one.

This has to do with two things: 1.) The Dark Powers as Omnipotent Overseer and 2.) The nature of the Demiplane. The first sets the PCs against an unobtainable goal: no matter how good and heroic they are, they are always checked by the Dark Powers who cannot be stopped, reasoned with, even comprehended enough to slow down, much less defeated. This creates a world where, in the end, the PCs can never win; the Dark Powers always hold the high-cards and at any time can swoop in and undo all the PCs had striven for.

Secondly, the artificial nature of the demi-plane (as prison for BBEGs) makes it not even a fight worth Fighting For. In most classic "hopeless" fights (such as LotR or Midnight) there was a world that was good and its return is what makes it worth it. Perhaps you won't see it, but if enough people do good over a long enough time, the darkness can be beat back and the goodness of the world can return (whether or not that's true...). Ravenloft has no innate goodness; EVERYTHING IS A CREATION OF THE DARK POWERS. Continents shift to their whim, islands move and drift at the leisure, even the seas themselves are recent creations of the Powers. Not only do the DP's have the high cards, you're playing at their house and eating their stale chips & cheap beer.

Both of these elements create a lot of Ravenloft player angst; why bother because it seems they can have no greater impact. They're plugging up leaks rather than trying to fix the broken plumbing. The ultimate goal "to make the world a better place" is not only infeasible, its literally impossible (there is no world to make a better place, and no way of making actually better).

Personally, I think Masque of the Red Death is a better example of how to do a setting like Ravenloft. MotRD is an alternate history of Earth (usually til the Victorian era) in which a powerful sinister entity (Red Death) appears during the time of Ancient Egypt and has slowly spread its taint across our Earth, creating terrible monsters and influencing wars, strife, and conquest. Few know it exists, and those are the chosen ones, hunters of the night. Red Death has many minions; some overt (Count Dracula), some covert (Prof. Moriarty). Still, at the end of the day, Red Death is a disease spread over a normal world; it can be checked since it can only subtly affect the world, it theoretically CAN be defeated, and the world returned to a state of natural goodness.

Ravenloft (the D&D setting) could do much to learn from its little cousin.

 

[Dimitri Mazieres]

[...]Ravenloft, more than any other D&D setting, was about fighting the good fight simply because it was the right thing to do. Fortune and fame rarely came into it at all, and often the most you could hope for was to make a difference in the lives of a few people and die a hero's death before you became jaded enough to become the monsters you battled. [...]

[...]Played straight, the core story is how people - perhaps with shadowy pasts and shaky holds on their sanity - can nonetheless triumph in the darkness simply by being the smallest of lights but refusing to be extinguished. The idea here is to somehow validate existence in the very face of the worst possible nightmare. [...]

These statements sum up quite nicely what Ravenloft is for me.
It seems to me that the popular conception of Ravenloft runs along the "weekend in hell" model (which was certainly the main scope of the setting's first editions) but, as it has been stated before, I think it's much more rewarding to run a campaign with native characters, with the focus of said campaign being the struggle against apparent overwhelming odds. Of course, for it to be successful there should be hope, and the perspective of achieving something. Maybe not totally vanquishing the enemy, but at least halting it, and sparing as many souls as possible.

To finish this post, I will leave you with a portion of the introduction from the 2e accessory Champions of the Mists, which I think it further illustrates the point:

There can be no doubt that the Demiplane of Dread is a place known for its villains. [...] Those who look deeper into the matter discover a handful of heroic souls who are driven to greatness by the evil that opposes them. The struggle against evils that are immeasurably powerful has been a crucible for them, hardening them into champions the likes of which no other world can boast. In comparison, taking up the sword against an evil king in a land where others will follow your example is not an especially difficult thing to do; crying out for revolution and justice in a land where no ally will stand beside you is a far harder thing to do. Many point out that this battle against the darkness is an impossible one, and they may well be right. Certainly, there are times when it seems as if the land itself conspires against the agents of goodness and light. Whether these champions of the Mists can ever truly triumph is a matter of some speculation. Impossible or not, however, the battle for righteousness in the Demiplane of Dread is one that only a few heroes are brave enough to undertake.

 

[gonzoron]

This has to do with two things: 1.) The Dark Powers as Omnipotent Overseer and 2.) The nature of the Demiplane. The first sets the PCs against an unobtainable goal: no matter how good and heroic they are, they are always checked by the Dark Powers who cannot be stopped, reasoned with, even comprehended enough to slow down, much less defeated.

See, here's where I disagree. First, you're making the assumption that the Dark Powers exist to be defeated, or at least to be pitted against the PCs. They don't. They exist as a plot device to allow for a world where all the horror archetypes exist side by side. It's deliberately not even established that they are evil. Competing theories peg them as good, or even neutral. But again, regardless of alignment, they aren't the enemy, they're just the basis of the world, like the Lady of Pain in Planscape. Ravenloft PCs can go an entire campaign without even knowing the Dark Powers exist.

This creates a world where, in the end, the PCs can never win; the Dark Powers always hold the high-cards and at any time can swoop in and undo all the PCs had striven for.

And how is this any different than standard D&D, where there are evil gods that can do the same? There's always a bigger fish.

Secondly, the artificial nature of the demi-plane (as prison for BBEGs) makes it not even a fight worth Fighting For. ... Perhaps you won't see it, but if enough people do good over a long enough time, the darkness can be beat back and the goodness of the world can return (whether or not that's true...). Ravenloft has no innate goodness; EVERYTHING IS A CREATION OF THE DARK POWERS.

Again I disagree. Firstly, not everything in Ravenloft is a creation of the DPs, some domains are ripped or copied from Prime Material worlds. Second, regardless of the circumstances of their creation, every person in Ravenloft has the same potential for good or evil as in any other world. There are great heroes as much as there are great evils in Ravenloft, and innocents as well.

Also, there's no guarantee that the darkness can't be beaten back in Ravenloft. The darklords are given great power, but also cursed and imprisoned. The Dark Powers don't like to see their pet prisoners happy, that much is clear. Enough good people rising up to fight could concievably carve out a nice safe place, even in Ravenloft, much to the darklord's chagrin.

why bother because it seems they can have no greater impact. They're plugging up leaks rather than trying to fix the broken plumbing. The ultimate goal "to make the world a better place" is not only infeasible, its literally impossible (there is no world to make a better place, and no way of making actually better).

I would disagree here too. If the villagers don't have to worry about being replaced by pod people tomorrow, the world is a better place. If the deranged ghost mother stops returning to nurse her son, the world is a better place. If Strahd is forced into hibernation for another generation, the world is a better place.

And what campaign setting has the possibility of permanently fixing the world? There's always another dragon to be fought, always another cult of Vecna springing up, always another band of roving orcs. If there wasn't, adventuring would get awfully boring, wouldn't it? Just because there's an infinite number of demons in the Abyss doens't mean it's not heroic to destroy the one that's taken over a kingdom. And just because there's another vampire in the next town doesn't mean it's worthless to stake the one in front of you.


Ravenloft's problems are pure perception, IMHO, not any fundamental flaw in the setting.

 

[Dimitri Mazieres]

I was going to address Remathilis' points, but gonzoron said it much better than how I was going to

However, I want to stress one point in particular:

[...] Ravenloft has no innate goodness; EVERYTHING IS A CREATION OF THE DARK POWERS. [...]

All the people in the world are real. There are as much good people in the lands of the Mist as in your next fantasy world, although they may not all go out and fight the darkness. They are worth fighting for.

And just a last nitpick, since you mentioned Midnight, in Eredane the chances of success are just as slim, or even slimmer, as in Ravenloft, since you're fighting against an evil god bound to the world (and with the world under its heel). Not only that, but Izrador is the only god.
That doesn't mean that it's an unplayable setting, does it?

 

[DarkKestral]

This is spot on and essentially describes the setting.

But let's talk about how you use it, i.e. how the PCs can/should/might experience it. How do you play a campaign in RL?

Well, my problem is.. it really depends on the theme. "Bram Stoker's Dracula" Strahd is going to be different from Hammer Horror Strahd and both are going to be a lot different than "Interview With the Vampire" Strahd. They're fundamentally different types of stories. The first is about a relatively normal man learning of a great evil and eventually challenging it and winning, the second is going to be a lot more bloody and gruesome and will feature more over-the-top fights between skilled opponents, and the third is going to be about a descent into darkness.

In some, the "monster" wins, and some, the monster loses. Likewise, in some, the monster's "defeat" comes through exploiting a weakness, and in others, it's simply a matter of surviving long enough for its wrath to be deflected elsewhere or to naturally abate of it's own accord. In some, the player is the monster, and the story is thus how they go from moral human to amoral monster, while in others, the player is the monster hunter, and the story is how they go from unaware nobody to heroic monster killer. In some, it would be a bad idea to go beyond Paragon or even Heroic tier; in others, starting at Paragon and finishing in epic might not be a bad idea at all.