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Everything We Know About The Ravenloft Book
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<blockquote data-quote="DEFCON 1" data-source="post: 8210188" data-attributes="member: 7006"><p>Thus far I've played in one Ravenloft setting campaign (although we used FATE while doing so), while also running two Curse of Strahd campaigns. And the impression I've come away with having done this is that I feel there is one really important thing that should happen to have any 5E game really work in the setting...</p><p></p><p>...the PCs should never level up.</p><p></p><p>Yep, I said it. In my opinion the characters should arrive at 3rd level and exist at 3rd level, and never gain XP. At no point should the PCs just get more powerful through your bog-standard "adventuring" while trapped there. Because to me, all that does is give the players the impression that if they just wait a bit... attack and kill a few more werewolves or zombies... they're going to gain extra attacks, fireball spells, the ability to one-shot monsters with divine smite, wildshape into animals that'll overrun everything they go up against etc. etc. That's how we've programmed D&D players to think, and thus it is much harder to frighten them that way.</p><p></p><p>So we can't let them. Keep them forever stuck with 20 or so HP, ACs that barely ever get above 20, nary a magic weapon to get past resistance to be found. That is <em>their</em> curse. And they will always feel like they are under-powered to deal with what is going on around them, thereby making everything they do truly scary.</p><p></p><p>But then the question becomes "how do the PCs become more powerful to either escape the domain or try and take on its lords?" And to me, the answer is using "plot leveling" rather than XP. In Barovia in particular (for example)... the way the Icon of Ravenloft and the Sunsword are built and designed as magic weapons... <em>they</em> are what allow characters to have what it might take to take down Strahd. Even if you were only 3rd level, the power of those items gave PCs the ability to actually harm (if not outright kill) the vampire lord. The problem though... at least when I ran CoS... was that by the time they acquired all the necessary items, the party that took Strahd on were like 8th or 9th level and at that point had so many martial and spellcasting options at their disposal that the Icon and the Sunsword <em>were almost superfluou</em>s. If I ran the game "as-is" using the standard D&D rules... the party really never <strong>needed</strong> to get any of the things divined to them from Madam Eva. They just needed to walk around Barovia and level up until they could take the vampire on through standard D&D.</p><p></p><p>To me... having now run these games the "normal" way... I've come to the conclusion that finding the Icon and the Sunsword should be ALL of the "leveling up" the players get when they are in Barovia. Two entirely story-based items that they have to acquire through whatever means they can while trying to survive. And only by getting those items do they gain the ability to actually have an effect on the land and the denizens within (IE have a chance to take out Strahd.)</p><p></p><p>Plot and story. Learning the domain and the curse of the Lord. Using those things to gain the slightest bit of upper hand while the PCs are trapped, as their "D&D abilities" never actually grow. THAT would make the Domain of Dread truly scary. And why it was rather genius of my GM to use FATE for our game there, rather than D&D. Because FATE is almost all story, and you don't gain much "mechanical power" over what you start with. So we never felt like we had what it took until we "solved the puzzle" of whatever domain we got trapped in.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="DEFCON 1, post: 8210188, member: 7006"] Thus far I've played in one Ravenloft setting campaign (although we used FATE while doing so), while also running two Curse of Strahd campaigns. And the impression I've come away with having done this is that I feel there is one really important thing that should happen to have any 5E game really work in the setting... ...the PCs should never level up. Yep, I said it. In my opinion the characters should arrive at 3rd level and exist at 3rd level, and never gain XP. At no point should the PCs just get more powerful through your bog-standard "adventuring" while trapped there. Because to me, all that does is give the players the impression that if they just wait a bit... attack and kill a few more werewolves or zombies... they're going to gain extra attacks, fireball spells, the ability to one-shot monsters with divine smite, wildshape into animals that'll overrun everything they go up against etc. etc. That's how we've programmed D&D players to think, and thus it is much harder to frighten them that way. So we can't let them. Keep them forever stuck with 20 or so HP, ACs that barely ever get above 20, nary a magic weapon to get past resistance to be found. That is [I]their[/I] curse. And they will always feel like they are under-powered to deal with what is going on around them, thereby making everything they do truly scary. But then the question becomes "how do the PCs become more powerful to either escape the domain or try and take on its lords?" And to me, the answer is using "plot leveling" rather than XP. In Barovia in particular (for example)... the way the Icon of Ravenloft and the Sunsword are built and designed as magic weapons... [I]they[/I] are what allow characters to have what it might take to take down Strahd. Even if you were only 3rd level, the power of those items gave PCs the ability to actually harm (if not outright kill) the vampire lord. The problem though... at least when I ran CoS... was that by the time they acquired all the necessary items, the party that took Strahd on were like 8th or 9th level and at that point had so many martial and spellcasting options at their disposal that the Icon and the Sunsword [I]were almost superfluou[/I]s. If I ran the game "as-is" using the standard D&D rules... the party really never [B]needed[/B] to get any of the things divined to them from Madam Eva. They just needed to walk around Barovia and level up until they could take the vampire on through standard D&D. To me... having now run these games the "normal" way... I've come to the conclusion that finding the Icon and the Sunsword should be ALL of the "leveling up" the players get when they are in Barovia. Two entirely story-based items that they have to acquire through whatever means they can while trying to survive. And only by getting those items do they gain the ability to actually have an effect on the land and the denizens within (IE have a chance to take out Strahd.) Plot and story. Learning the domain and the curse of the Lord. Using those things to gain the slightest bit of upper hand while the PCs are trapped, as their "D&D abilities" never actually grow. THAT would make the Domain of Dread truly scary. And why it was rather genius of my GM to use FATE for our game there, rather than D&D. Because FATE is almost all story, and you don't gain much "mechanical power" over what you start with. So we never felt like we had what it took until we "solved the puzzle" of whatever domain we got trapped in. [/QUOTE]
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