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ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Drinnik Shoehorn" data-source="post: 2010908" data-attributes="member: 16072">The first in, what one hopes, will be a long line of Gazetteers for Ravenloft opens with, rather unsurprisingly, Barovia, Forlorn, Kartakass and Hazlan. The book is split into six chapters, an introduction, a chapter per domain and an appendix of one new prestige class, some new magic items, new spells and NPCs including the Darklords for the four domains.The Intro. mainly deals with the outline of the book and lets us into the mind of our narrator, S. S's identity is a mystery and his/her employer a secret, although they suspect it to be Azalin. S tells us how the chapters will be laid out, then a sidebar explains what all the DM sidebars will contain.We start our tour in Barovia. S tells us about local Flora and Fauna, the history of the land (a good retelling, and playing on the fact that the ruler of Barovia has been named Strahd for the last four hundred years helps make the Barovians seem more naive than ever!), sites of interest including major settlements, and a round up of what would be gained/lost by invading the domain. Barovia is really the hook to get Old time Ravenloft DMs to buy the book. By having a more than firm grasp on the history of the setting, the author shows that Barovia is not the backwater it was portrayed as in the old 2nd Ed Domains of Dread, but is actually a more than adaquet setting for a beginning campaign.S then visits Hazlan. If Barovia was the Hook, Hazlan is the Meat of this book. Virtually everything written in this section is brand new material. Whilst the other domains have been covered in detail in previous incarnations of Ravenloft, Hazlan has barely been touched upon. It gives indepth views in the the Mulan and Rashemi society, the balance between the ruling humans over the poorer humans. The demihuman races are virtually unpresent here, except for the Halfling ghettos that seem to be everpresent around the Core these days. The history of Hazlan is not as well defined as the history of Barovia, but that is to be expected. Hazlan has not had the fanfare that Barovia has heard over the years. S continues in their breakdown of the domain is the same way as Barovia. Suffice to say, S does this with every domain.Next on S's travels is Forlorn. For those who don't know, back in 2nd Ed, the lord of Forlorn was kept secret when Ravenloft first emerged as a setting. Finally in 1993 Castles Forlorn came out and told us everything. The author of this section relies heavily on Lisa Smedman's boxed set as they retell the story of Forlorn. The only new appearence is the town of Forfarmax on the Hazlan/Forlorn border. Forlorn draws on alot of old 2nd edition products, Children of the Night: Created and CotN: Ghosts are both referenced in passing (Forfarmax first appeared in CotN: G).Finally we get to the singing domain of Kartakass. Whilst not as exstensively dealt with like Barovia, Kartakass has had its fair share of publicity in the past, with two novels and one full-length adventure set in its borders. S continues with the standard format that they have laid down with Barovia, telling the tale of Kartakass in deadpan style, as though they don't believe a word.The appendix includes two new monsters and two new templates: Aggie, the undead serpent of the Lake of Red Tears, Zombie Wolves, Strahd Undead (a template added to zombies and skeletons that makes them stronger) and the Werefox. There is a new prestige class for Barovia's fledgling religon, The Herald of the Dawn, a cleric obsessed with slaying vampires, some new domains for clerics, the Salvation domain and the Mora domain (exclusive to followers of the Ancesteral Choir of Kartakass) and the Bindings domain. There are new magic items such as the Ba'al Verzi dagger, which helps assassins, and spells, such as Create Faux Henchman (similar to the spell in The Standing Stone adventure by WotC). Finally there are a host of NPC's. There are the four Darklord, Count Strahd von Zarovich of Barovia, Hazlik the Red Wizard of Hazlan, Harkon Lucas, wolfwere lord of Kartakass and Tristen apBlanc, Ghost/Vampyre hybrid of Forlorn. There are also several classic NPCs such as Inajira the Arcanaloth, Eleni the Red, Halzik's apprentice, Jacqueline Montarri, an immortal woman cursed by the Vistani to never find her head and Tara Kolonya, a priestess of Ezra who may be the new Tatyana.So, THE GOOD: New information on Hazlan, good rewriting and understanding of the source material. The player stuff in the appendix is nifty too.THE BAD: Alot of it is reprinted material. Long term fans of Ravenloft will feel like skipping pages because they know their stuff already.THE RESULT: One of the strongest products on the Ravenloft line to date. There is hardly anything wrong with this. If you do not like Ravenloft, or don't game there, there are still plenty of plunderables in this product.</blockquote>

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