D&D 5E Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft Table of Contents

As shared by DMs Guild brand manager Lysa Penrose.

D&D 5E - D&D Van Richten's Guide To Ravenloft showing up in the wild!

Here's the first one I saw by the fantastic Lysa Penrose! Any others folks have seen?

www.enworld.org

 

[overgeeked]

Agreed, I think making it just an ability score is possibly the worst way to do a sanity/stress system. CoC’s Sanity isn’t my favorite either, as it feels mostly like a second health track, which... works, but I think there are just better designs for such things these days, like the Cthulu Hack’s Sanity system for example.

I don’t think I’m familiar with that. Would you be willing to give a quick run down?

 

[Charlaquin]

I don’t think I’m familiar with that. Would you be willing to give a quick run down?

It’s pretty simple. You have a die for Sanity, which starts at a d8. When you experience something that could be harmful to your sanity, you roll it. On a 1 or a 2, you have some kind of negative sanity effect (there’s a table you roll on) and the die permanently goes down a size (d8 > d6 > d4). If you roll a 1 or a 2 when it’s a d4, you get a bigger, long-term negative effect, and it resets to a d8 again.

Most investigation rolls work by basically the same mechanic, only your Flashlights die (for physical investigation) and your Smokes die (for social stuff) start at d12.

 

[Lieslo]

G'Henna as in the lower plane Gehenna?

 

[JEB]

THEORY

Darkon's Hour of Ascension is basically replicating the post-Requiem Darkon, but without the Necropolis elements. Azalin is around, but he's not the "Lord of Darkon" anymore as he's found a way to wander around the Domains (alternatively, he's locked out of his own domain and must watch it spiral into civil war, a sad curse for a king). So, he strikes deals with PCs to move chess pieces on the board. So Azalin will be in there, but in a way he can stir more trouble beyond his domain...

EDIT: So see the name "Firan Zal'honan" in the Mistwalker's section? Google it. I think that's settled.

DOUBLE EDIT: Also this.https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E0VOLhMVgAQb_vj?format=jpg&name=large

Your theory, or at least something very close to it, seems basically confirmed. Well done.

The question is, does this mean:

• They ignored 3E Ravenloft? (Wouldn't entirely surprise me, but ouch, sorry Kargatane.)
• Azalin spectacularly failed a third time?
• They retconned the entire setting's history, and just chose to integrate a version of Requiem into it?

Guess we'll see in a few weeks...

G'Henna as in the lower plane Gehenna?

Nope.

 

[JEB]

Featured domains:

• All but two are classic Ravenloft domains. All but six of those classic domains have the classic darklords as well. (Kind of interesting, then, that most of the promotional material focused on these revised domains. Guess they wanted to show them off more than the stuff that stayed the same.)
• The two exceptions are Kalakeri, which is apparently an update of Sri Raji, and the Carnival, which wasn't a domain before. (And I don't think I like that - it was more interesting that it was something different, a reality wrinkle. But this makes things easier, I suppose.)
• Tsien Chiang is still the darklord of I'Cath, surprisingly. Wonder how much they'll change her.
• So will Harkon Lukas not be a wolfwere anymore? As pointed out, there are no wolfwere stats in the book.

Other domains:

• All but five of these are also classic domains. One of those five is The Rider's Bridge, however, which could be an update of the Headless Horseman's domain.
• And there's Cyre, but just a chunk of it. Hopefully that's a satisfying compromise between the folks who wanted it in Ravenloft and those who liked the mystery.
• Klorr is presumably a nod to the Timepiece of Klorr. Assuming some kind of pocket(watch) domain.
• Curious on "Odaire" if that's a deliberate spelling change or a typo. Also, I wonder if the ties to Gothic Earth will remain...
• Risibilos! There's an obscure one.
• Wonder if the Shadowlands is one domain now, and no longer a cluster.

NPCs:

• Calling it now, The Caller can now be whatever gender they wish. (No objection, but they don't seem like the sort to carry a child to term themselves...)
• Anyone else notice the inclusion of Erasmus Van Richten - Rudolph's deceased kid? I wonder how he'll be portrayed.

Monsters:

• More a mix of old and new here.
• "Bodytaker" instead of "Doppelganger" Plant. Pretty good rename, both avoids redundancy and also nods to the inspiration...
• Carrion stalker - basically just a meaner carrion crawler - would not have been my first pick.
• I feel like we're overdue for dullahans and jiangshi.
• Betting the "Gallows Speaker" is the Valpurgeist.
• Curious how the 5E nosferatu and strigoi will differ from the core vampire. (The nosferatu's old schtick was being more like a "proper" blood-drinking vampire than the standard D&D vampire, with its energy drain, but the main version caught up.)

 

[imagineGod]

Markovia is in Other Domains of Dread, so not all of Innistrad, but part of it. Also, Ezmerelda is just Ez now.

That is a bit culturally demeaning because it plays to that discomforting encounter when you introduce yourself with a multi-syllable culturally rich but uncommon name, and mostly white people seek to shorten it to a monosyllable. :-(

The worst part is that uncommon long names are not that hard if you put just a little effort into saying them.

I really hope that Ezmerelda is not just called Ez throughout the book. Or I might just send it back. Almost like WoTC is tone-deaf to cultures that traditionally use multi-syllable names.

Sorry, this is a personal rant, but name shortenings really annoy me, because all too often that is an overlooked racist micro-aggression.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

• So will Harkon Lukas not be a wolfwere anymore? As pointed out, there are no wolfwere stats in the book.

Loup-Garou is pretty much the same thing (only this time: in French).

 

[Eubani]

I wish it had a bit more player side and as usual when there is only a small amount of players options its for magic users. I am sure martial types have adapted there ways to deal with some of the horrors they face.

 

[Eubani]

That is a bit culturally demeaning because it plays to that discomforting encounter when you introduce yourself with a multi-syllable culturally rich but uncommon name, and mostly white people seek to shorten it to a monosyllable. :-(

The worst part is that uncommon long names are not that hard if you put just a little effort into saying them.

I really hope that Ezmerelda is not just called Ez throughout the book. Or I might just send it back. Almost like WoTC is tone-deaf to cultures that traditionally use multi-syllable names.

Sorry, this is a personal rant, but name shortenings really annoy me, because all too often that is an overlooked racist micro-aggression.

Is this actually a problem? Or just in search of one?

 

[humble minion]

also a pity that Forlorn has gone from its own box to a ‘Other Domains’

I love Forlorn, but I don't really mind that one all that much. I think the detailed domain writeups are for domains where you could expect to run campaigns or have multiple adventures, travel through etc. Forlorn (despite the Kargatane's valiant efforts in 3e) remains a one-adventure kinda place. If you're not facing off against Tristan, there's not much else to do here. And the locals are all face-eating goblyns.

I find it interesting that neither Invidia nor Nova Vaasa are mainstream domains anymore.

I don't really mind either of those, to be honest. Unless you wind back time in Invidia to when Malocchio is a kid and do a Rosemary's Baby type story, it's not really emblematic of any particular horror genre. And most of its 3e incarnation was very focused on politics and war with neighbouring domains, which have all gone away in the 5e model. And Nova Vaasa is a mess. It's a huge domain with its darklord stuck up in one corner having very little to do and having very little thematic impact on the rest of the domain.

(also I just noticed, I dont see Paridon)

Zherisia is there in the 'Other Domains' section. That's the old name for Paridon circa Hour of the Knife, before it got renamed to 'Paridon' and clumped together with Timor in the Zherisia cluster.

What I would have preferred would be if they'd junked the adventure and spent the extra 20 pages of word count on doing a full page for all the 'other domains' rather than a half. But campaign setting sourcebooks wasting precious pagecount on miniadventures that'll get used once at most is a long-time pet peeve of mine.