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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Irda Ranger" data-source="post: 3971630" data-attributes="member: 1003">Why? If the Gazetteers were re-released as rules-neutral setting books, anyone could play in the Domains they wish to.  The Core book would have enough of an overview to allow people to get started.Absolutely.  The Darklords, the Domains, the Vistani and the Mists are Ravenloft.  You can make a cool setting without them, but it wouldn't be Ravenloft.  And some good rules on Fear and Madness, of course.You do need to do something though to reduce what I think of as "the reverse-Elminster problem."  The Darklords are too powerful and too all-seeing.  The PC's can get despondent with the feeling of "No matter what we do, Strahd's going to waltz in and bust a cap in our asses, so let's not bother being heroes and go get a pint."  The Darklords also out-compete all other possible factions within their Domains, resulting in a fairly sterile environment.  I think they should be the most powerful power-broker within their Domain, but not a perfectly powerful Tyrant.I think the main way to do this is to give the Darklords something better to fear / do than bother the PC's all the time.  I think Toben's suggestion of allowing war between the Domains is a good one (not the only solution, but a good one).  Keep the Domains as (imperfect) prisons, but allow the Darklords to war upon each other absorb the Domains of the loser.  Whatever benefit they derive some absorbing a new Domain should be great enough that they'll spend 98% of their time either trying to absorb neighboring Domains (if in a strong position) or defending against any such attacks (if in a weak position).  To keep the Domains as prisons though it should be clear that Darklords can only enter Domains immediately neighboring theirs, and only for short periods of time.Occasionally however a Darklord may end up not being powerful enough to control his new Domains, and parts of it will splinter off into new Domains or be absorbed by neighbors.  This will allow for turnover within the campaign and explains why Azalan or whomever hasn't absorbed all of Ravenloft by now - he's reached the limit of what he can control, and he knows it.  But that doesn't mean he won't just kill one of his Darklord neighbors if they piss him off too much, so neighbors are still afraid of him.The best side-effect of preoccupying Darklords with each other is that this allows lots of lesser evils to pop up like toadstools after a rain storm.  Werewolves can take over whole villages, infernal cults can establish temples and low-order assassin guilds and blood-thirsty bandits can be a menace that low-level PC's can try to deal with.I'd also kill outright the idea of Darklord omniscience.  If the Darklord wants to know stuff, he should rely on spies.  This allows the PC's some space to plot, but also makes them wary of every raven, rat and peasant that wanders by.New CosmologyI'm tempted to place Ravenloft is a dark corner of the Feywild.  One infected by a "seed of Evil", as the Abyss was.  That would be my first choice.  My second choice would be to make Ravenloft its own mirror-world.  Just as the Feywild and Shadowfell are feral and dead reflections of the real world, respectively, Ravenloft would be an evil reflection of the real world.  The landscape would be the same, but the structures and people different.  The Mists would allow for travel between Domains and into Ravenloft.New RacesI wouldn't use Tieflings or Dragonborn, honestly.  They seem cool enough, but they don't fit the mood IMO.  Maybe Dragonborn would be OK as wanderers from a new Domain that just showed up.The new Eladrin and Elves are in though, especially as "Shadow Fey."   I would not use Drow, but instead have Elves and Eladrin prove themselves fully capable of evil. There should be a dark Eladrin realm ruled by the Morgause, the Queen of Air and Darkness.New Magic & ClassesI don't think this changes anything of note.  Warlocks may work as is, or maybe need to be slightly tweaked.  We definitely need a Necromancer of some sort, stat.I'd also like to see a new Core class (probably a Skill-monkey/Striker) like the Rogue (or maybe just a Rogue-variant), but with less emphasis on burglary and more emphasis on tomb exploring and undead/were-creature killing (think Van Richten meets Indiana Jones).  This could possibly be handled with Feats, Talents, Paths, Skill-specials etc. depending on how those work in 4E.</blockquote>

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