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.

​

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

 

[JEB]

That's kind of what the last parts of the 3.5 Ravenloft books did, though; we already had quite a few established children for multiple darklords.

Now, if they've advanced the timeline by decades (say, to the year 800 on the Barovian Calendar; though then we run up against that whole "Time of Unparalleled Darkness" that was prophesied to happen in 775, even if later products did walk that back to be less of an absolute) then it's understandable, but if this is still the late 750's or early 760's, then it's a bit more awkward.

It would be pretty easy to use the Time of Unparalleled Darkness as a justification to unleash any number of changes, actually, much like the Grand Conjunction did back during 2E.

Whichever harbors “the mummy” Anktepot (sp?) - I think that’s Har-Akir (again, my books aren’t nearby).

Kenreck confirms Har'akir as well.

Also, it appears Sithicus and Soth will be referenced, which would hint at this being the canonical Ravenloft, just advanced further, rather than a reboot. (But it doesn't rule a reboot out.)

EDIT: The first image in the teaser video also suggests Richemulot to me.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

If this is a reboot, I am not going to miss G'Henna and that (censured) churchcult of Zhakata at all. Do you imagine how would feel a Latinamerican if Yagno Petrovna was darkskin and his faith based in Mayan human sacrifices? Neither Elena Faith-Hold, darklord of Nidala.

Diamabel, darklord of Phazaria, would be perfect for a character with a touch of style as the antagonists from "Kult: Lost Divinity".

The complete divine 3.5 sourcebook talked about a prestige class, seekers of the misty isle. If this place is not in an infernal plane as Elturel (Forgotten Realms) then other optional fate may be...

* What does it happen with the shadowfell domains from 4th Ed but not linked to Barovian's continent? for example Monadhan, ruled by Arantor. This place is a good reason to explain where the dragonborns come from.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

"Kult: Lost Divinity

Whoa, I'd forgotten that game existed, despite it being on the shelf behind me. Cool reference!

I spoke to my brother this morning, he's the Ravenloft guy in the family, and he confirmed he's really excited about the whole thing, including the reboot/remake stuff for the domains and new domains.

I like the idea of a horror campaign taking place in a train, and the longer the PCs go without getting to the bottom of everything, the more the various cars of said train become demented/horrific/corrupted. Meaning if things REALLY hit the fan, there's only one car that is a safe haven, but that too runs the risk of being lost: Game Over if the whole train is "lost" at the end.

You know a good horror idea when it gives you the creeps slightly just reading the concept. "Horror train" has been done a lot but never quite like that I think.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Hollywood pitch: It's Horror Express meets Snowpiercer.


It's an awesome idea, but from experience railway carriages can be cramped for D&D combat.

Historical note: the first time I played D&D it was on a train.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It's an awesome idea, but from experience railway carriages can be cramped for D&D combat.

Yeah having played at least three adventures set on trains, I have to agree. RL trains are like 10ft wide, if that. Even if we go Snowpiercer-style with a giant mega-train, it's SUPPOSEDLY only 13ft wide, though that certainly doesn't seem to hold in the TV series. Even if we double that or more, as I believe the Eberron mega-train might, we're talking 20-25ft wide - which is kind of narrow for D&D. Such a train probably has multiple stories (even RL trains do sometimes, I went in an Amtrak one in the US that did) but that doesn't work very well with D&D.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Yeah having played at least three adventures set on trains, I have to agree. RL trains are like 10ft wide, if that. Even if we go Snowpiercer-style with a giant mega-train, it's SUPPOSEDLY only 13ft wide, though that certainly doesn't seem to hold in the TV series. Even if we double that or more, as I believe the Eberron mega-train might, we're talking 20-25ft wide - which is kind of narrow for D&D. Such a train probably has multiple stories (even RL trains do sometimes, I went in an Amtrak one in the US that did) but that doesn't work very well with D&D.

I did a fight on the roof of a train in Eberron (steeling from Solo). I think I made the carriages 20 feet wide. Several carriages where involved, so it was a very long narrow battle!

 

[Veril]

trains are simple. Ignore the real world scale and use the human scale. A train is 2 seats, 1 carriageway and 2 seats wide. That's 5 squares wide. That's your scale.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

trains are simple. Ignore the real world scale and use the human scale. A train is 2 seats, 1 carriageway and 2 seats wide. That's 5 squares wide. That's your scale.

I did play an adventure that did that, but the players started asking questions immediately (er, admittedly I was one of them), because the description of the train was very conventional and sort of implied the PCs were in not-the-best class area, with the PCs even having a couple of rooms, but then we were like, wait, I've got basically a sofa and a table the size of a smaller dining table to myself? That's insane luxury. We adjusted to it but it was a weird mental picture. I mean to be fair, maybe it's just because we're all British and thus extremely used to traveling on trains, but it seemed wild.

 

[IndigoTraveler]

Yeah having played at least three adventures set on trains, I have to agree. RL trains are like 10ft wide, if that. Even if we go Snowpiercer-style with a giant mega-train, it's SUPPOSEDLY only 13ft wide, though that certainly doesn't seem to hold in the TV series. Even if we double that or more, as I believe the Eberron mega-train might, we're talking 20-25ft wide - which is kind of narrow for D&D. Such a train probably has multiple stories (even RL trains do sometimes, I went in an Amtrak one in the US that did) but that doesn't work very well with D&D.

I'll admit that the idea of crampness is supposed to be there. As much as I enjoyed Snowpiercer the movie, the idea isn't a mega train. We're talking about the kind of train legit seen in Murder on the Orient Express, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, and Resident Evil Zero.

Plus I'll also admit that if the last car left scenario were to happen, the PCs have to push through from their safe zone all the way to the front, and that is pretty much imagined to be balls to the wall action(combat) during such a last push.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Now I am thinking about the domains, this time they don't talk about ones what were too linked to their dark lords. I mean the best option is low level adventures can face monsters many times without the encounter with the powerful dark lord. In a few words, not too "darklord-centric".

There are horror movies about trains, for example the midnight meat train, based in a Clive Baker's short story. In Ravenloft steam engines are possible, but rigging up and kepping a railgoal is harder when ecoterrorist druids and monsters can cause a lot of suffering and destruction. Let's imagine one of the passengers doesn't know yet to have cursed with the licantropy. Then the train becomes a lethal trap for the rest. And steam engines need lot of coal, and mining isn't very easy in Ravenloft. And those mines could become cursed because miner's lives are too hard, practically almost slavery. Machines using that "blood-tainted" coal could be cursed. Railgoalds between domains is impossible but when both darklords agree trade contacts, and this may be very rare. Nobody knows when the frontiers are going to be closed again.

But I like the idea of secret train stations from the demiplane of dread to other shadowfell domains.

* Could Ravenloft be visited by Sorin Markov?

* How would be a gothic horror version of Micronauts? Fallen heroes reincarnated into little action figures.

* Snowpiecer in Ravenloft? Better a ship or a underground stronghold.

* WotC wants the option of no-Rated horror stories, something like R.L.Stine's Goosebumps, to sell comics, books, and someday also a TV show. (Tales of the Crypt was also a cartoon).