Ravenloft: Heir of Strahd Cover, Synopsis Revealed

The cover and synopsis for Penguin Random House's new Dungeons & Dragons novel has been revealed. This week, Penguin Random House revealed the official title and cover for Ravenloft: Heir of Strahd, a new novel by Delilah S. Dawson. The new novel is due for release in April 2025. The new novel follows a group of adventurers who arrive in Barovia under mysterious circumstances and are summoned to Castle Ravenloft to dine with the infamous Count Strahd. This marks the first Ravenloft novel released in 17 years.

Penguin Random House has slowly grown its line of novels over the past few years, with novels set in Spelljammer, Dragonlance, and the Forgotten Realms released over the last year. Characters from The Fallbacks novel by Jaleigh Johnson also appears in art in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide.

The full synopsis for Heir of Strahd can be found below:

Five strangers armed with steel and magic awaken in a mist-shrouded land, with no memory of how they arrived: Rotrog, a prideful orcish wizard; Chivarion, a sardonic drow barbarian; Alishai, an embittered tiefling paladin; Kah, a skittish kenku cleric; and Fielle, a sunny human artificer.

After they barely survive a nightmarish welcome to the realm of Barovia, a carriage arrives bearing an invitation:

Fairest Friends,

I pray you accept my humble Hospitality and dine with me tonight at Castle Ravenloft. It is rare we receive Visitors, and I do so Endeavor to Make your Acquaintance. The Carriage shall bear you to the Castle safely, and I await your Arrival with Pleasure.

Your host,
Strahd von Zarovich

With no alternative, and determined to find their way home, the strangers accept the summons and travel to the forbidding manor of the mysterious count. But all is not well at Castle Ravenloft. To survive the twisted enigmas of Strahd and his haunted home, the adventurers must confront the dark secrets in their own hearts and find a way to shift from strangers to comrades—before the mists of Barovia claim them forever.

 

[Scars Unseen]

It's a funny thing though, isn't it - creating a Ravenloft party which has come from 'outside'?

The player knows in advance that their backsotry NPCs won't get used because they'll be on the other side of the Mists, and that any plot hooks they carefully lay are likely to go the same way. And then, the expectation is that your PC will be from a 'conventional' fantasy world and will be slowly getting exposed to how Ravenloft works over time. So isn't it, in fact, kinda metagamey to build a PC that WOULD be suited to a Ravenloft game? I mean, I'm kind of exaggerating for effect here, but there's a pretty strong argument that the best Ravenloft PC, in a really deeply I6-traditional sense, is a PC who not only doesn't know they're going to be in a Ravenloft adventure, but also was created by a player that doesn't know that either.

In which case the 5 'PCs' we've seen on the book cover and in the blurb are in fact perfectly appropriate - because they're the sort of party you'd expect to find in FR or Exandria. They're NOT deliberately Ravenlofty.

I think it depends on what sort of campaign you're running. If you want a modern horror setup, yeah, it's pretty common for the protagonists to be pretty stereotypical people who are brought into extraordinary situations. The Mist pulls in a bunch of randos and dumps them into Ravenloft. In that kind of setup, the protagonists presented on the cover are fine, though I still find the art an atrocious mismatch for the setting.

But just because the characters aren't from Ravenloft doesn't mean they aren't suited for it. One of the things about the Dark Powers is that they aren't necessarily random. Sure, they bring in a lot of strays to be victims, but they also grab people they feel will fit in as a more permanent fixture of the realm. Going back to the old novels, Jander Sunstar and Lord Soth were both tragic figures before they were brought in, with the latter eventually becoming a Darklord in his own right and the former put on track to become one if he had followed his anger to its conclusion. A party of characters can be created with the setting being used in mind even if they aren't starting out in that setting.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

But just because the characters aren't from Ravenloft doesn't mean they aren't suited for it. One of the things about the Dark Powers is that they aren't necessarily random. Sure, they bring in a lot of strays to be victims, but they also grab people they feel will fit in as a more permanent fixture of the realm. Going back to the old novels, Jander Sunstar and Lord Soth were both tragic figures before they were brought in, with the latter eventually becoming a Darklord in his own right and the former put on track to become one if he had followed his anger to its conclusion. A party of characters can be created with the setting being used in mind even if they aren't starting out in that setting.

The thing is, people judge these characters based on the cover art and one-sentence descriptions. And by those Standards Lord Soth is just "Darth Vader clone".

 

[Scars Unseen]

The thing is, people judge these characters based on the cover art and one-sentence descriptions. And by those Standards Lord Soth is just "Darth Vader clone".

Not really. Soth already had history by the time Knight of the Black Rose was published. His cover art was of a classic knight with glowing eyes, and his one-sentence description would be "undead cursed knight tortured by reminders of his past failure." Yes, you could draw parallels to Star Wars in the same way you can draw parallels to Lord of the Rings for most fantasy and classic horror novels for most of Ravenloft. Those things are foundational to a large bulk of fantasy, horror and any sci-fi outside of hard science fiction.

But let's take a look at that in context. What parallels can you draw from the cover and characters of this book? If Lord Soth is Darth Vader (and he's really not), then these characters continue WotC's recent-ish trend of "regulars from the Mos Eisley cantina given a glow up." If we're talking about who would have their fantasy expies fit into "knock off classic horror land" better, I'm siding with the guy in black armor with a haunted past. Any one of the characters in this cover could fit into a Ravenloft story with little difficulty. But as a group, they're the typical modern WotC traveling circus of a party wandering into a setting that, at least thematically, does not really support that setup. I don't have to know the details of the story to see that at the very least, this book is starting out at a narrative disadvantage compared to its predecessors.

 

[Bedrockgames]

But just because the characters aren't from Ravenloft doesn't mean they aren't suited for it. One of the things about the Dark Powers is that they aren't necessarily random. Sure, they bring in a lot of strays to be victims, but they also grab people they feel will fit in as a more permanent fixture of the realm. Going back to the old novels, Jander Sunstar and Lord Soth were both tragic figures before they were brought in, with the latter eventually becoming a Darklord in his own right and the former put on track to become one if he had followed his anger to its conclusion. A party of characters can be created with the setting being used in mind even if they aren't starting out in that setting.

There is such a thing as tonal consistency. Yes it might make sense that any character from any setting can enter into Ravenloft, but a GM is in their right to say no to something like a Thri-kreen. Same goes for the novels. I could certainly see these characters in a kind of hellboy urban fantasy or dark fantasy. To me, and maybe this is just my age, they give the cover a very YA look. But that is kind of a side issue for me. Ravenloft fans debate what races are appropriate for the setting constantly. The bigger problem for me is the tone of the piece. Again I would point to the old Ravenloft covers I posted earlier in the thread, and contrast those with this. For me those classic covers have a much stronger horror vibe than this one

 

[Vaalingrade]

I love how people try to use Mos Eisley as a lame, sad insult as if it wasn't an exciting part of one of the most celebrated fantasy stories ever created or that it wouldn't have been as engaging or effective if it were populated by the usual boring hairless apes.

Look, if WotC wants to lose money and not sell the book by making characters and a cover that bore their target order to sleep, the check will be in the mail.

 

[Scars Unseen]

I love how people try to use Mos Eisley as a lame, sad insult as if it wasn't an exciting part of one of the most celebrated fantasy stories ever created or that it wouldn't have been as engaging or effective if it were populated by the usual boring hairless apes.

I used Mos Eisley because the person replying to me used a Star Wars character themselves. The traveling circus one is my usual go-to for parties of characters that look tonally dissonant with their surroundings.

As for covers, I prefer ones that at least try to hint at the tone of the contents within. This one either fails to do that or it succeeds. Either way, it neither says "Ravenloft" nor "horror" to me, so in the best case scenario, it's convinced me not to buy it until I've seen reviews of the book itself. Given that the Ravenloft was my favorite of the old D&D novel lines, that's not a happy decision on my part.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Either way, it neither says "Ravenloft" nor "horror" to me

Hmm.

RAVENLOFT: HEIR OF STRAHD

 

[GreyLord]

"Oh no, pleasure!" ~ D&D fandom's reaction to any art these days.

It's a weekend romp through ironic hell with some Hammer Horror pastiche or another just like it always was. I doubt the Dark Powers would have fun pulling in the grimdork sad sacks people are demanding all Ravenloft kidnappees be.

Maybe, or thinking that this group of adventurers would last less than 12 hours in Ravenloft. One trip to the village and they'd either have to slaughter the entire village as the villagers take them (most rightly) for the monsters they are and want to execute them on the spot, or they die from a dozen other means.

Either they are killed by the actual monsters of Ravenloft (due to having no experience with true dark and grim monsters) or killed by the inhabitants that suffer under the grip of these monsters and instinctively kill anything remotely resembling a monster that comes their way if they feel they can kill it.

OR, this is not actually Ravenloft (possibility, as this is an heir scenario...maybe some heir to Ravenloft???) and everyone is happy and dory. Orcs are not monsters anymore afterall, and don't go out eating human flesh (or their favorite...elf flesh...or even that tender halfling flesh)...tieflings are not the children of the damned anymore (though still have that reminiscent reminder that they may have that outsider blood flowing in them...somehow), and Dark Elves are just normal elves with half of them worshiping a good deity these days...so...just a misunderstood branch of elves who have no chaotic or evil tendencies, don't go murder-hoboing to the surface and hate spiders...so...

Maybe it's that Heir to Ravenloft thing that's going on instead.

Things have changed in D&D (many would say for the better). Perhaps it has also changed in this Heir to Ravenloft (I know, it says Strahd, but the Ravenloft, even from a few years ago in the campaign setting would probably have murdered this group within said 12 hours stated above...so it can't be that campaign...can it???) as well.

That's where the disconnect between the old and the young is probably coming from. The Old know what the old Ravenloft was like, while the young have a different idea of what Ravenloft probably is or could be.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

but a GM is in their right to say no to something like a Thri-kreen

You realise you have just made thri-keen a hundred times more popular!

But I made it a plot point that the people of Barovia were oblivious that the player characters were not human (warforged, shifter and Tabaxi from Eberron).

 

[QuentinGeorge]

Hmm.

Do you have difficulty understanding subtext in people's posts or do you truly think he meant "not Ravenloft" in the literal sense of "I can't see the word Ravenloft."?