D&D General Ravenloft: Monsters vs Darklords

[Shardstone]

I guess, but I really like anything that makes resurrection magic difficult but not impossible, so I'm cool with no resses for the soulless.

Sure! I'm just saying there's options there to make it less complicated.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I wouldn't have the ability to look it up either as I don't have access to much of the older lore and absolutely no access to much 3e lore.

How much of the 2E material have you checked out? If you ever are curious they do have the black boxed set, Realm of Terror at DrivethruRPG. Not the final word on the early lore but I think it a good starting point. Domains of Dread is also available on drivethru as is the revised campaign setting boxed set (the red box)

 

[Bedrockgames]

I guess, but I really like anything that makes resurrection magic difficult but not impossible, so I'm cool with no resses for the soulless.

In the 2E era, Raise dead was one of the spells altered by the dark powers. I believe it had the person raise as an undead on a failure and triggered a powers check. Resurrection is similarly changed. It is pretty easy to adjust these changes and make something more desired if the GM likes

 

[Remathilis]

How much of the 2E material have you checked out? If you ever are curious they do have the black boxed set, Realm of Terror at DrivethruRPG. Not the final word on the early lore but I think it a good starting point. Domains of Dread is also available on drivethru as is the revised campaign setting boxed set (the red box)

I have a large chuck of middle stuff (Red box to DoD) up in storage. It's just not convenient to check at the moment.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I did a careful read-through of the Black Box about a decade ago, and while it states that buildings, etc. can be created by the Dark Powers, it never says anything about people--there are references to newly created domains being populated by refugees from elsewhere and the like. It should be remembered that Ravenloft, especially in the Black Box, is very tiny, young, and explicitly not very populated compared to other AD&D worlds.

I did a read through about a year ago of the black box and this matches my memory too. Always possible I missed something or some stray mention of souls slipped my mind, but this too is my impression.

The population thing is especially true. A lot of settlements are more village or small town sized. You don't really have anything approaching water deep in Ravenloft in the black box. I think Il Aluk was the biggest settlement with like 25,000. I always kind of liked the smaller population sizes

 

[Incenjucar]

They are made by the Dark Powers, and the Dark Powers supplement all godly magic in neo-Ravenloft, so you can easily say they are ressurected to keep the "illusion" running. I don't think it's that complicated.

If it doesn't do anything then what's the point?

It's like "Everyone in Ravenloft has blue eyes but the dark powers make them all have a normal range of eye colors".

 

[Remathilis]

If it doesn't do anything then what's the point?

It's like "Everyone in Ravenloft has blue eyes but the dark powers make them all have a normal range of eye colors".

I think it's a way to explain where the people of a domain come from a new domain is formed and why domains have specific cultures and almost no cultural bleed. A lot of Dark Lords have a "step into the mist and a new domain opens" origin, and if that's the case, where do all people, let alone plants and animals come from? Likewise, why do they not leave? Why is there a number of domains whose population is on the edge of disaster that never topple into extinction?

It's one part explanation, one part handwave. It says "don't focus on how the structure of the domain works, just assume the Mists make it happen." And personally I prefer the idea that domains are fairly artificial, it adds to the nightmare atmosphere.

 

[Shardstone]

If it doesn't do anything then what's the point?

It's like "Everyone in Ravenloft has blue eyes but the dark powers make them all have a normal range of eye colors".

Did you igmore my posts where i said it does something if you want to engage with it?

 

[Incenjucar]

Did you igmore my posts where i said it does something if you want to engage with it?

I don't see it?

You said the Dark Powers could just fudge it to make it look like they have souls so what's the actual visible-to-players difference?

If Soulless people are immune to X but cannot resist Y there's at least something players can see.

 

[Shardstone]

I don't see it?

You said the Dark Powers could just fudge it to make it look like they have souls so what's the actual visible-to-players difference?

If Soulless people are immune to X but cannot resist Y there's at least something players can see.

The point of the idea is for horror and for tables to build on it if they want. I like to use it purely for narrative reasons, and dont' worry about mechanical stuff; however, there's no problem IMO with making mechanical stuff based off of it, and I think it empowers the DM to do so. Saying "What's the point if it does nothing?" is facetious because no world-building detail does anything if you don't engage with it. What's the point of there being water? What's the point of there being a sky? What's the point of there being gravity? These are fictional constructs in a shared narrative to be played with or ignored at your table's leisure.