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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Messageboard Golem" data-source="post: 2008596" data-attributes="member: 18387">Ravenloft 3rd edition seems designed for someone who liked the setting in 2nd edition and wants it updated for 3rd.I knew very little about Raveloft before getting this product: my knowledge was limited to a couple of adventures in Dungeon.  Upon picking it up, mydistinct impression was that it was written for people who had already enjoyed the setting in some form.The physical design and layout of the book is substandard.  The cover is quite strange - it features a vampire in a red ellipse who seems to havejust been tapped on the shoulder.  It isn't very frightening at all.  I don't understand what the picture is meant to evoke.  In addition, the book isdesigned, like many d20 products, with a tome setup, but there are strange white flashes on the black tome, and I don't know what they are supposed to represent.  The interior art is mixed, with some good and some bad pictures.  A case in point are the race drawings.  The artist istechnically competent, but seems to have a fixation on wasp-waisted, large-breasted women, which doesn't seem to fit with the Gothic horror template at all.  The table of contents is laughable, containing only chapter entries, while the index is worse, since it has maybe 100 entries, and many of the page references are wrong.  There is simply no excuse for this level of incompetence.  The font size is large, and the margins are alsolarge, so the density per page is low.  In addition, the page numbers on each page are done in tiny print on a graphic and are difficult to read. Every chapter starts with the same full-page graphic and the name of the chapter, and then has a full-page short fiction piece.  The fiction istolerable, but wasting a full page for every chapter seems gratuitious.  The editing is substandard.  It is pretty clear that they ran everything througha spell-checker, and that was about it.  In several cases, headings were not bolded, so it made it hard to understand the organization.  The tablesare not set off from the text, so they are harder to find and refer to.The contents are a mixed bag.  There are six chapters.  When first looking at the anemic table of contents, it is not clear necessarily what is inwhat chapter, another sign of poor design.  Chapter One is "The World of Ravenloft" and it introduces the campaign.  It begins with adescription of the changes wrought to the setting.  The authors have attempted to make it more internally consistent and more Gothic.  The nextsection is a history of the Gothic tradition.  Following that is an overview of Ravenloft's general features, like the mists, the domains, etc.  One thingis important to keep in mind here.  The text mentions that domains are reflections of their darklords, but the book doesn't really describe thedarklords in much detail.  The next section is a history of Ravenloft that is fairly broad-brushed.  TSR/WOTC made a series of major changes to Ravenloft, and the history reads at some points like a soap opera gone bad - with darklords disappearing, then reappearing, then disappearingand several final apocalypses happening to Ravenloft in a row.  After that is an overview of the domains and a description of technological levels,but it isn't explained how different domains can make war on each other while having vastly different technological levels.  Finally there is a lexicon,which for some reason is at the end of this chapter, as opposed to at the end of the book, where any sane person not working at White Wolf wouldput it.Chapter Two is "Player Characters".  It discussed starting languages and then introduces the races.  The only real innovation in this chapter is theconcept of an Outcast Rating, which determines how much trouble non-human races have interacting with other races.  The Calibans are a newrace born of humans who were exposed to dark magic in the womb.  Of course, game-mechanically, they are just half-orcs.  Ho hum.  Half-Vistaniare another new race (which is a strange concept in itself, making gypsies non-human, with all the political baggage that entails).  They sufferfrom madness during the full moon and possess small mystical powers.  They also introduce the classes, whose main changes deal with the pervasive evil of Ravenloft and its effects on things like the paladin's detect evil and the weakening of the cleric's turning ability.  One interestingidea is the introduction of dread companions - animal familiars and special mounts that because of the evil of Ravenloft are always evil butloyal.  The skills section follows, with a treatment of changes to some skills, like Bluff, Craft, etc.  One skill is introduced, hypnosis, which allowsa character to mimic the hypnotism spell.  Following that is the feats, which are a mixed bag.  Some of them are imaginative, like Cold One, or Lunatic, or Redhead.  Others just give a +4 to Fear ot Horror or Madness checks.  Following that is a list of religions: many of which are somwhatquirky.  It never fails to amaze me that people think that they can make a very thinly-disguised Hinduism and put it in a gaming product whenthey wouldn't dream of doing that with Christianity.  Following that is a discussion of equipment, like firearms, bayonets, bombs, etc.  One nicetouch is a list of common items that might be used as weapons and their weapon equivalents, nicely title "Death by Pitchfork".  The section finishesoff with a series of questions that one should ask when creating one's character.  It's refreshing to see this in a D&D product.  This chapteraccomplishes its goals rather well.Chapter Three is "The Ways of the World".  This chapter begins with the Fear, Horror, and Madness checks.  These are lovingly detailed, thoughthe use of lots of tables usually not set off from the text very well make it harder to read.  In general the mechanics are good and seem to workwell.  There is also a long section on Curses and how they differ from standard D&D.  This system is quite nice and really evokes the magicalcurse in its literary form.  After this is the Powers checks, which describe a process by which characters can descend into deparvity and evilby making convenient choices.  Whenever a character commits an evil or unholy act, they may be noticed by the Dark Powers and step fartheron the path towards evil and depravity.  The last part of this section discusses the path and its six stages, ending as a Darklord.  Unfortunately,I didn't like the sample paths presented at all - they all seemed to make the character essentially unplayable and frequently seemed more troublethan they were worth.  The whole point of selling your soul is that you should get something for it, but many of the benefits gained were matchedwith such disgusting and debilitating weaknesses that they just didn't seem worth it.  After this is a long list of altered spells and how they work inRavenloft.  This spell list is I suppose necessary, but it is deadly boring.Chapter Four is "The Dread Realms".  This chapter describes the domains and paths between them.  Each domain is described in terms of itslandscape, its major settlements, its population, law, trade and diplomacy, and characters.  This is the part I don't really understand.  Thesedomains are cut off from each other by the mists; that's why they have such divergent cultural and technological setups.  On the other hand,there is thriving trade from domain to domain?  It just doesn't make sense.  Also, why have so many domains and describe them only in cursoryterms?  Finally, the darklord is described only very briefly, so that one has to make up much of the background oneself.  It would have beenfar preferable to focus on a single domain or set of connected domains and describe those in some detail, so that the DM has something to work with.  As it is, if this is the only book one has, one has to do most of the work oneself for whatever domain the PCs are in, unless oneplays a game where "It's Tuesday, so this must be Barovia" is the norm.  This seems like patently poor design for a campaign setting.  Finally, many of the domains are highly stereotypical.  Of course there is a stereotypical decadent Egyptian land, a decadent Indian domain, a decadentFrench renaissance domain.  Many just aren't that creative.  Coupled with the brief discussion on each one, this chapter doesn't give you enoughto really work with on creating viable adventures in a given domain. Chapter Five is "Horrors of the Night" and looks hopeful at first glance.  It gives ways to modify monsters and change them to reflect greater powerand versatility.  Unfortunately, most of the rules changes are pretty mundane and don't add much to the monsters.  Changes to the Vampire include a lot of spell-like abilities and default monster abilities, which frankly are pretty easy to add yourself if you are willing to spend 15 minuteswith the Monster Manual.  No attempt is made to create different types of vampires, just D&D vampires with more cool powers.  Ghosts are a little more interesting, with the idea of different levels of resonance governing their power, and more of their abilites are interesting.  Liches are justboring, with a few more powers based on their intelligence.  Yawn.  Lycanthropes are always evil and slavering with a few more cool powers.A new template is introduced for the Dread Golem, which gives it more powers and intelligence, which is a nice change.  Mummies get some cool new powers, as do fiends, but still nothing extraordinary.  The only real new thing is hags, which are a new idea of old women who gainpowers and magic that they can cast.  Teh idea is nice, and their powers are a little more imaginative.  The Vistani are also very new and moreeffort was put to make them more interesting, though it is still strange that they are considered inhuman - a problematic idea for even a fantasybook to indulge in.Chapter Six discusses a few things that can be done to construct a good Ravenloft campaign.  It discusses some techniques on creating the rightmood and the right kind of gothic themes to explore.  Of course, little of this is backed up by real rules changes aside from the fear, etc. checksand the curses.  The idea of rare magic for example, is not supported in any way by the rules.  It isn't harder to cast spells or create magic items,though they may come out cursed.  It's all very well to talk about what campaigns should be like, but there should be some effort to create arules basis for them in a system like D&D.  This chaper is overall very heavy on generalities and very light on specifics.  Why isn't there a shortsample adventure to give the idea of a Ravenloft adventure, especially since the coverage of the domains is so broad-brush?Some elements of this campaign setting are interesting, like the Fear, etc. checks, the Curse mechanics, some of the feats, the hags and Vistani,and a few other elements.  Much of the rest of it is very surface and not very interesting.  There just isn't enough in this campaign setting to reallyrun a Ravenloft campaign.  You know much of the rules, but there isn't enough on the domains unless you want to do the work yourself.  That'sok, but when I spend $30 on a campaign setting, I expect a little more.  Perhaps this book set itself overambitious goals, but after reading throughthe book, as a relative newcomer to Ravenloft, I had no desire to run a campaign there.</blockquote>

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