D&D General Reading Ravenloft the setting

[Paul Farquhar]

It would make more sense to lump together domains that have similar cultures and technology levels into clusters. So you could have an "1800" cluster of domains with a major city as the hub, and several other clusters with related culture and tech, rather than one big core. The original design of which was a nonsensical random hodgepodge.

 

[Remathilis]

I'm not sure they'd want a canonical Core that was so tightly coupled to the real world though. It got a bit close to that for my taste in the Gazetteer era, Darkon was obviously USSR-coded, Falkovnia had all the Nazi tropes, Lamordia was heavily Swiss and so on. It does tend to hamstring creativity a bit - and what do you do with places like Sithicus that have no real-world analog?

I think you could certainly do some improvement on the Core, and the lack of the big urban domain is #1 on the list but it shouldn't end up as Gothic Earth.

I think some of that was due to many/most domains being outlines to begin with, so they drew from the RW setting of the inspiration of the darklord. Kinda a making the best with what you got.

That said, I don't read Darkon as USSR, more Fascist Italy superimposed on generic D&D. YMMV.

 

[Faolyn]

I'm not sure they'd want a canonical Core that was so tightly coupled to the real world though. It got a bit close to that for my taste in the Gazetteer era, Darkon was obviously USSR-coded, Falkovnia had all the Nazi tropes, Lamordia was heavily Swiss and so on. It does tend to hamstring creativity a bit - and what do you do with places like Sithicus that have no real-world analog?

True.

In that case, they could stick with thematics. Sithicus is mostly woods, few settlements. Put it with Tepest and Valachan. Or, Falkovnia, G'Henna, and, I dunno, Vorostokov, where merely existing is difficult. Maybe throw Forlorn, Keening, and Verbrek together: do you risk the woods where the wolves are, or the open areas that are filled with undead and goblyns?

 

[Remathilis]

True.

In that case, they could stick with thematics. Sithicus is mostly woods, few settlements. Put it with Tepest and Valachan. Or, Falkovnia, G'Henna, and, I dunno, Vorostokov, where merely existing is difficult. Maybe throw Forlorn, Keening, and Verbrek together: do you risk the woods where the wolves are, or the open areas that are filled with undead and goblyns?

You could always combine Hazlan, Nova Vaasa, Valachan and Kartakass together as the Forgotten Rejects cluster...

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I imagine the demiplane with two layers, maybe even three. The first layer would be the dread domains, like islands. The second layer would be the "core", and the third would be the "otherside". If I used videogames as examples to explain it better the dread domains would be like a dungeon where the dark lords, the "bosses" can't exit. The second layer would be the "classic" core, something like a sandbox, a complete kingdom to be visited and explored by the rest of ordinary citizens. The third layer would be like the Umbra or Spirit Realm from World of Darkness, the "Metropolis" from Kult: Lost Divinity and the "Otherside" from Silent Hill videogames (Do you know the videogame "Painkiller"). Then the dark lords could sent secret agents to the other domains, there would be enough "hunt zone" for all those supernatural predators, and trade would be possible if you are enough brave to travel throught the mists.

I guess G'Henna will be rebooted totally.

 

[Faolyn]

You could always combine Hazlan, Nova Vaasa, Valachan and Kartakass together as the Forgotten Rejects cluster...

But think of the moons, man! How many moons?!

 

[Faolyn]

I guess G'Henna will be rebooted totally.

Almost certainly, if they use it at all. I feel it's a domain that could have been quite interesting if they ever bothered to really expand upon it. And maybe if they toned down slightly on the enforced starvation, which doesn't make sense. Eventually, you'd have a populace that couldn't actually do anything at all, including growing the crops that Zhakata demands. There are plenty of other things that can be sacrificed instead of just food.

 

[Tonguez]

It would make more sense to lump together domains that have similar cultures and technology levels into clusters. So you could have an "1800" cluster of domains with a major city as the hub, and several other clusters with related culture and tech, rather than one big core. The original design of which was a nonsensical random hodgepodge.

The original design was suppose to be a nightmare realm, bits snatched from throughout the multiverse, so the nonsensical nature is by design.
Its only later with people wanting to be natives and give some consistency that it needs to be mapped out. But yes clustering similar culture and tech is probably a good idea.

I imagine the demiplane with two layers, maybe even three. The first layer would be the dread domains, like islands. The second layer would be the "core", and the third would be the "otherside". If I used videogames as examples to explain it better the dread domains would be like a dungeon where the dark lords, the "bosses" can't exit. The second layer would be the "classic" core, something like a sandbox, a complete kingdom to be visited and explored by the rest of ordinary citizens. The third layer would be like the Umbra or Spirit Realm from World of Darkness, the "Metropolis" from Kult: Lost Divinity and the "Otherside" from Silent Hill videogames (Do you know the videogame "Painkiller"). Then the dark lords could sent secret agents to the other domains, there would be enough "hunt zone" for all those supernatural predators, and trade would be possible if you are enough brave to travel throught the mists.

I guess G'Henna will be rebooted totally.

I kinda like this idea, its similar to what I did in my version of Spelljammer mixed with Ravenlofts mists which I used to create a setting based on the game PC Pyrates.
Essentially reality had been ripped apart by a cataclysmic Nexus Storm which was enveloping everything except for a few scattered Zones (Islands). A World known as the Core Medula had discovered three stable portals which allowed them to sail Nexus Ships through the Portals to reach new Zones...

Anyway I like the idea of Ravenloft being made up of a relatively small Core each of which becomes the nexus of its own cluse
eg

• Mordent (Anglo cluster with Paridon, Forlorn, Staunton Bluffs, Bleakhouse etc)
• Dementlieu (urban) & Richemulot (Romance cluster with Paridon, Blaustein, Borca etc)
• Lamordia (Germanic cluster)
• Barovia (Carpathians cluster
• The Nightmare Lands (cluster everything else)

Then use the Mist ways, dark portals and Otherside to link it all together
Since time travel is a thing, you could even have the same geographies done at different eras and thus account for multiple domains and differing Dark Lords

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

G'Henna is one of the best examples of how some things may be too unconfortable now. And we can't explain how people would accept a new religion asking that stype of sacrifices. You can't "sell that type of goods". Even there is a potential conflict with the cancel culture if the villain is the leader of the "cult of the anorexy". Even if the character of Yagno Petrovna was retconned into a secular lay tyrant G'Henna may become an allegory of the Ucranian Holodomor or the hunger for the years of Mao's great step forwards. Other option would be unwilling thinnes caused by life-drainer magic or by some parasite what doesn't need direct contact but only to be enough near, usually for the night, for example psionic stirges. And Yagno Petrovna, the supreme leader of the lodge, would be the host of the secret hive queen of those parasites, the high priest of the legal religion, but also the leader of the forbidden secret sect (really a decadent society of rich children until was infiltrated and controlled by a hidden group of rebels). Let's imagine the cortical stacks from Altered Carbone as sentient living parasites searching host to be controlled. But their invasion of the body-snatchers fails when the victim has got enough faith to reject doing actions against their religious values. Then the parasites would try to destroy the faith of the potential hosts.

Troids

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Ganado

Ganado (ガナード, ganādo?) is the term given to a human victim of the Subordinate Plaga Species used by Los Iluminados. The word is derived from the Spanish word "ganado", which means "livestock" in general, but can refer to bovines in particular. Until Reconquista, Ganados were only found in one...

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[Bedrockgames]

I am definitely in the minority on what would be best for the core setting. What I'd like to see is expanding the setting on the existing core (and bringing back the weird domains like G'henna, Bleutspur and Nightmare Lands). Maybe get a nice desert in there after Bluetpur and Nightmare lands, with a bunch of pocket domain oasis in it; a much large sea on the coast as well, with a variety of islands. Include lots of islands of terror too, but include more concrete rules for what happens when people venture into the mists (methods of navigation, with their accuracy and where you end up when navigation fails). And bare bones entries