D&D 5E Revisited Setting News: Its not the 2023 Classic setting, but rather for 2024

[Faolyn]

Most of the lore changes. A couple of the reimagined domains were decent to good, but I really believe you should be making new stuff instead of radically altering existing material and using the same names.

If they make just new domains, then people would complain that they are reinventing Ravenloft by ignoring the old stuff. Especially because the new domains would have to all be Islands or Clusters, or a brand new Core, in order for it to fit into the world physically.

If they make new domains and include the old domains, then many of them would be very redundant. And it's likely that the new domains would either be seen as pale imitations of the older ones, or would be seen as better, or at least cooler.

If they make the old domains and don't change them much, just update the stats, then there's absolutely no reason for any fan to buy the book, since we already have some or all of the 2e and 3e stuff. Converting things from one edition to another is pretty easy. Heck, I know that I was very much on the fence about buying anything Ravenloft for 5e, even though it's my favorite setting, until I found out that they were reimagining it.

And if you keep the old domains as-is but remove or improve the problematic things. Take Dementlieu. d'Honaire's entire shtick is basically mind-controlling people, especially women. Sure, it doesn't work on women he's actually attracted to, but I think it's obvious that he doesn't limit himself to just those he actually wants. Especially in the type of society that has a serving class and looks the other way if something bad happens to them. Or take Valachan. It was a domain of kind of simple, backwards, low-tech dark-skinned people--the only dark-skinned people in the Core--ruled by a dark-skinned, bestial were-vamp who murdered a new wife each year. These places are both flavorful, sure, and I liked them. But are they type of flavor that really needs to be continued? Removing the problematic issues from the domains would leave flavorless nothing left. Any surprise that they got changed?

 

[Micah Sweet]

If they make just new domains, then people would complain that they are reinventing Ravenloft by ignoring the old stuff. Especially because the new domains would have to all be Islands or Clusters, or a brand new Core, in order for it to fit into the world physically.

If they make new domains and include the old domains, then many of them would be very redundant. And it's likely that the new domains would either be seen as pale imitations of the older ones, or would be seen as better, or at least cooler.

If they make the old domains and don't change them much, just update the stats, then there's absolutely no reason for any fan to buy the book, since we already have some or all of the 2e and 3e stuff. Converting things from one edition to another is pretty easy. Heck, I know that I was very much on the fence about buying anything Ravenloft for 5e, even though it's my favorite setting, until I found out that they were reimagining it.

And if you keep the old domains as-is but remove or improve the problematic things. Take Dementlieu. d'Honaire's entire shtick is basically mind-controlling people, especially women. Sure, it doesn't work on women he's actually attracted to, but I think it's obvious that he doesn't limit himself to just those he actually wants. Especially in the type of society that has a serving class and looks the other way if something bad happens to them. Or take Valachan. It was a domain of kind of simple, backwards, low-tech dark-skinned people--the only dark-skinned people in the Core--ruled by a dark-skinned, bestial were-vamp who murdered a new wife each year. These places are both flavorful, sure, and I liked them. But are they type of flavor that really needs to be continued? Removing the problematic issues from the domains would leave flavorless nothing left. Any surprise that they got changed?

I wasn't surprised at all. And also, d'Honaire is the bad guy. He should be doing reprehensible things. Nobody is supposed to think what he does is ok. Have we decided that stuff that used to be ok for bad guys to do isn't anymore?

 

[overgeeked]

Right. When I play CoC, I'm perfectly fine with my character going insane and dying, and not necessarily in that order. It's practically CoC's entire purpose. You don't play that game to actually kill monsters. You maybe kill some cultists and some very minor entities and, if you're lucky, banish the more powerful ones, or prevent them from being summoned in the first place.

I was referring to D&D. It’s a game. There’s no reason for players to be so precious with their characters that they all end up as cowards.

 

[Marandahir]

I wasn't surprised at all. And also, d'Honaire is the bad guy. He should be doing reprehensible things. Nobody is supposed to think what he does is ok. Have we decided that stuff that used to be ok for bad guys to do isn't anymore?

I guess the point I'd bounce off from Faolyn's example above is that overfocusing on bad things targeting a specific demographic or gender, even by bad people IN NARRATIVE, can end up reinforcing the bad thing in real life. Abuse and discrimination on the basis of gender and sexuality is a lot trickier for D&D to tackle than racism because fantasy races give a milieu of distance from the real world issue while still being abundantly apparent that enslaving dwarves and breeding them to fight in your gladiatorial arenas is bad and slavery as a concept is bad. It's not an easy topic to explore and probably the most difficult one to tackle within a Dark Sun adaptation. But it's still miles away easier to gracefully deal with than sexual violence is, since gender and sexuality in D&D largely reflects that of our real world, even if historic and present gender dynamics and abuses and predispositions are swept aside for a more neutral and equal approach in most D&D settings. The legacy of the chainmail bikini still carries a lot of problems here, and so a Domain focused on a sexual predator is just as bad as Prince Xizor using his pheremones to manipulate Leia back in Shadows of the Empire. It's not something you want to bring forward into the new editions, even if characters like Kilgrave in Jessica Jones strikes some intense horrors for viewers and certainly for Jessica herself.

The difference between Xizor and Jessica Jones is that JJ the show, even if based on a male-written comic book, was strongly female-written and avoids the male gaze stuff like the plague. It doesn't devolve into sexist fantasies because it's about overcoming this horror.

It's hard to do that same justice in D&D in a way that isn't demeaning or immediately present for the players at the table because they've all got genders too (we're not all elves or hobgoblins or centaurs, though, so fantasy racism is a WEE bit easier). Sexism is perhaps just a little too close for comfort, and toes the line between fiction and reality, when roleplaying should stay on the side of the fiction.

 

[Faolyn]

I was referring to D&D. It’s a game. There’s no reason for players to be so precious with their characters that they all end up as cowards.

Oh. Well, in that case, it's because we actually care about these fictional characters we create.

 

[Faolyn]

I wasn't surprised at all. And also, d'Honaire is the bad guy. He should be doing reprehensible things. Nobody is supposed to think what he does is ok. Have we decided that stuff that used to be ok for bad guys to do isn't anymore?

Of course they're supposed to do bad things. But not every bad thing is equally fun to read (in a horror way). Many of the darklords that were replaced or changed--like d'Honaire and von Urik--were people who specifically manipulated, raped, and murdered women because they are women. Like, most of their backstories revolved around that fact. And Drakov was just plain racist and speciest, and was a rapist. This isn't actually fun for a large portion of the reading audience, both male and female.

 

[Remathilis]

Like it or not, Ravenloft was an homage/pastiche of classic horror tropes. They have gone away from that in the new work, and I miss it. Even if VRG has value in and of itself (and I believe it does), calling it Ravenloft convinced me that WotC and I have parted ways.

It's still that, it's no longer a 1:1 rip off. One of the biggest drawbacks to the setting was that so many Darklords were just Vic Lit/Universal Monsters with slight name changes. Victor Mordenheim is barely distinguishable from Victor Frankenstein. The same was true of Anktepot, Drakov, and even Strahd himself. They felt almost like parody-level derivatives. You can criticize how much liberty they took with the Old Cannon vs the new, but I absolutely believe the new setting is equally rooted in the same horror tropes the old one was.

 

[Remathilis]

Of course they're supposed to do bad things. But not every bad thing is equally fun to read (in a horror way). Many of the darklords that were replaced or changed--like d'Honaire and von Urik--were people who specifically manipulated, raped, and murdered women because they are women. Like, most of their backstories revolved around that fact. And Drakov was just plain racist and speciest, and was a rapist. This isn't actually fun for a large portion of the reading audience, both male and female.

Even removing the Cringe elements from each of those characters, you don't have a lot to work with.

Drakov is Vlad the Impaler. His domain is fascist Hell. Beyond escaping his secret police, there is painfully little to do. Even the domain itself was mostly berift of supernatural horrors. And yeah, being a Vlad clone in a setting with Dracula as a separate person does make him feel a little second rate.

'd Honaire was another "barely supernatural" domain where the bad guy has a bunch of normal dudes and a "save or you don't get to play" power. He's not even the most interesting part of his own domain, Von Aubrecker was far more interesting as a mastermind schemer.

Von Karkov was a weird hybrid vampire/panther that didn't consider a single element of his jungle domain beyond big cats. His story is nonsensical and removes agency from him and doesn't have much of a different MO than Strahd does.

Even in 2e, I considered these three some of the most boring domain lords in the core. I find their successors to be far more interesting characters.

 

[overgeeked]

Oh. Well, in that case, it's because we actually care about these fictional characters we create.

But you don't care about the other fictional characters you create. It's a bizarre stance to take. What makes the D&D characters special and worth caring about when the Call of Cthulhu ones are not?

 

[Faolyn]

But you don't care about the other fictional characters you create. It's a bizarre stance to take. What makes the D&D characters special and worth caring about when the Call of Cthulhu ones are not?

I said. It's because it's pretty much expected that your CoC character is going to go insane and die. Although I'm sure there are plenty of people who really care about their CoC characters.