D&D 5E Everything We Know About The Ravenloft Book

Here is a list of everything we know so far about the upcoming Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft.

Art by Paul Scott Canavan​

• May 18th, 256 pages
• 30 domains (with 30 villainous darklords)
• Barovia (Strahd), Dementlieu (twisted fairly tales), Lamordia (flesh golem), Falkovnia (zombies), Kalakeri (Indian folklore, dark rainforests), Valachan (hunting PCs for sport), Lamordia (mad science)
• NPCs include Esmerelda de’Avenir, Weathermay-Foxgrove twins, traveling detective Alanik Ray.
• Large section on setting safe boundaries.
• Dark Gifts are character traits with a cost.
• College of Spirits (bard storytellers who manipulate spirits of folklore) and Undead Patron (warlock) subclasses.
• Dhampir, Reborn, and Hexblood lineages.
• Cultural consultants used.
• Fresh take on Vistani.
• 40 pages of monsters. Also nautical monsters in Sea of Sorrows.
• 20 page adventure called The House of Lament - haunted house, spirits, seances.

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D&D 5E - Full Wraparound Cover Art For Ravenloft

We've seen the cover already, but here's a look at the full wraparound art by Anna Podedworna. https://www.enworld.org/threads/updated-with-cover-the-d-d-book-is-van-richtens-guide-to-ravenloft.678411/ https://www.enworld.org/threads/heres-the-ravenloft-alternate-cover.678414/...

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - Here's the Ravenloft Alternate Cover!

As usual, there is an alternate hobby-store exclusive cover for the upcoming Ravenloft book. Here's a look at it! And here's the full wraparound art. https://www.enworld.org/threads/updated-with-cover-the-d-d-book-is-van-richtens-guide-to-ravenloft.678411/...

www.enworld.org

D&D 5E - [Updated with cover!] The D&D Book Is.... Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft!

Yesterday's hints that a new D&D book would be announced today have born fruit -- we now have a product description and a title! It's a Ravenloft setting book, with tools and new rules for horror-themed games, and new horror-themed character options. I'll update this post with a product image as...

www.enworld.org

 

[QuentinGeorge]

The closest I can recall for this was The Eternal Order, the death religion that Azalin constructed whole-cloth as an experiment in social control. But it wasn't ever given much attention, mostly being spotlighted as a tool during the events leading up to the Requiem (i.e. Death Unchained, Death Ascendant, and Requiem: The Grim Harvest).

Please note my use of affiliate links in this post.

True, but it is also mentioned in later products that after the Eternal Order’s leadership are wiped out in the Requiem, only the sincere lower ranked dupes are left, transforming it into a normal faith after all!

 

[QuentinGeorge]

What’s with the “the core prevents me from having the PCs pop up in any random domain”. Um, no it doesn’t. The Mists could always appear anywhere, not just on the borders. You could be sitting on a toilet and be transported by the Mists.

 

[Guest 6948803]

Both concepts are viable - Core and no Core.
Having large and stable Core still lets DM to use Mists to manipulate PCs and throw them into unexpected and weird locales, that's true. BUT in my opinion, it creates more of a regular setting, sort of "Forgotten Realms with bats". When you need to think about religion, economy, travels, warfare, when you mix people from different domains freely... It loses a lot of its charm and weirdness.
I can perfectly see, why they went "all Domains are Islands of Terror" route. It certainly helps with establishing stronger identity of the setting.
Also, metaplot is sooo 90's and doesn't belong in modern TTRPGs (still, its great in any Netflix series!).

 

[Bedrockgames]

Both concepts are viable - Core and no Core.
Having large and stable Core still lets DM to use Mists to manipulate PCs and throw them into unexpected and weird locales, that's true. BUT in my opinion, it creates more of a regular setting, sort of "Forgotten Realms with bats". When you need to think about religion, economy, travels, warfare, when you mix people from different domains freely... It loses a lot of its charm and weirdness.
I can perfectly see, why they went "all Domains are Islands of Terror" route. It certainly helps with establishing stronger identity of the setting.
Also, metaplot is sooo 90's and doesn't belong in modern TTRPGs (still, its great in any Netflix series!).

But the core domains were still subject to the dark powers, and to the wills of the dark lords. And any trade, politics, etc that was all subject to the surreal and morphing nature of the demi plane. I mean one of the chief criticisms we've seen here about the core is it didn't provide enough for some folks in the way of a realistic setting with trade and politics. Personally I found you still had a lot of that strangeness and uniqueness, but there was just enough plausible real world connection that it was even more uncanny (and it forced you to think a little too, because relationships across domain borders (whether they be economic, or political), are a bit of a thought experiment, given the nature of the place. Also if it is a complete dreamsate like place, you lose any sense of rootedness and things mattering. At least with the core, there was some modicum of stability, so you can have NPCs like Van Richten arise and feel like their efforts have some kind of lasting impact.

I have to say though the desire for the game to just be islands of terror, this is a very new preference. It wasn't something I heard voiced at all back when Ravenloft was with TSR. If anything the islands of terror were often overlooked because of that (which is shame because they do have lots of potential).

A lot of this too probably swings on how you use ravenloft. Are you using it as a weekend in hell? Then sure, islands of terror are probably good. Are you using it for a longer campaign? Then you kind of need a core (I've tried running all island of terror campaigns and I found they just didn't work for me in that volume----the core really did provide a solid foundation, but Ravenloft didn't lose anything with it). I don't know, some of this feels like people projecting back new ideas on the old setting. I am sure not all of it is that. But much of what I have read in these threads just doesn't match my experience of play with Ravenloft at the table

 

[Bedrockgames]

What’s with the “the core prevents me from having the PCs pop up in any random domain”. Um, no it doesn’t. The Mists could always appear anywhere, not just on the borders. You could be sitting on a toilet and be transported by the Mists.

It absolutely doesn't. The mists were pretty versatile in that respect. The same with powers checks. Also, domains were not just these things that were meant to be conquered by players. They were backgrounds for adventure. The best adventures I ran were smaller scale things going on against the backdrop of a domain or two. If you liked that universal/hammer vibe, the core was wonderful for adventure. Honestly a little perplexed by the 'anti-core' sentiment here

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The moral nature of the Conquistadors is, frankly, contentious and open to some nuance outside the narratives of the Black Legend as well: band of insane pirates that they were, they were complex human moral agents in a strange situation. I don't think Maztica's heroic portrayal does that complexity any justice, mind, because it's insane.

It's not really contentious at all unless you're talking to certain white Americans specifically (and few people who consider themselves "pureblooded" and the like in South America, but let's not go there, that's all built on bizarre lies and being unraveled by DNA tests right now). And I'm going to go ahead and say I believe it's simple racism that makes even faintly contentious for that group, because I've never seen a rational argument that didn't eventually get to "Well they bringing the word of Christ to particularly ghastly heathens!" (something they actually tried to avoid doing, note) as a last-ditch defense. Straightforward racism - just placing no value at all on the lives of the people of the Caribbean and South and Central America. They weren't mere "pirates", they were sadistic rapists, slavers, torturers, murderers and pillagers of the darkest and most evil kind - they made most 1700s pirates look like very honorable and upstanding fellows indeed! Again, I refer you to the journal of the guy with Columbus, who noted very clearly that by his standards, by 1400/1500s standards, not modern standards, Columbus was a deviant psychopath monster. These were VERY bad people by 1400/1500s standards.

That they eventually crashed into the Aztecs, who were also ruled/controlled by completely insane mass murderers is just... CE vs LE.. or something. I mean for a while people treated the Aztecs as "contentious" until we found out oh yeah really did human-sacrifice sometimes hundreds or thousands of people at a time.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I probably am the target audience here (Gen Z, buy about 2 5E books a year) so it does feel like this is tailor-made for my style of DMing.

"Beware my friend as you pass by..."

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Well, any honest examination of your typical D&D adventuring party and the surrounding tropes will conclude that the adventurers themselves are power fantasy stand-ins for the conquistadors going out and slaughtering natives for gold and power.

Definitely agree that a lot of D&D games, especially in the early days, ran very much like that. But does the "typical" D&D party still run like that in 2021? I'm skeptical. We here aren't a good example. We're small, weird minority of aging/elderly D&D players. But my feeling is that for a long time, different modes have come to dominant D&D. I mean, I never ran D&D like that, because it just felt wrong. I didn't have the words for it, but I always preferred adventures where the PCs were "punching up" rather than "punching down", and where the main opponents were not normal flesh-and-blood people of whatever species, but undead, demons, animals, monsters and so on. Not that I never use the other ones, but like I'm pretty sure the very first time I killed some orcs and went through their stuff I got skeeved out, like I'd just mass-murdered some hobos or something.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Just to restate this: the original Ravenloft black box had both. There were lots of isolated islands in the mists (some of the best domains were islands). But why limit the tool box? The benefit of a core and islands is it gives the GMs more options. You can run campaigns set in a core, or you can run campaigns hopping from island to island. Also doesn't pinning it to the Shadowfell make it part of forgotten realms? (not 100% clear on what the shadow fell is).

personally I have to say the new Ravenloft material just hasn't really interested me much

The Shadowfell is pretty much the re-named Plane of Shadow from 3e which was pretty much the re-named Demiplane of Shadow from 1e and 2e (although it's a bit more complex than that). The Demiplane of Shadow existed well before the Forgotten Realms were a published setting.

 

[Stormonu]

As a “weekend in hell” Ravenloft DM, the island nature of the new realms intrigues me.
That said, I think it would have been a good compromise if they mapped up the realm like the old boxed set map, but instead of having the sharp red lines on the map that denote absolute borders they replaced the edge of each realm with a misty fade into fog between the domain islands (with perhaps thin red lines connecting dots at the edges to imply known travel routes between realms).

Something like this, but with a softer blend into fog