What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Dark Angel »

I do the same thing with everything getting boiled down to 2nd edition rules (and doing my best to make it work). I have seen enough 3rd and 3.5 to realize that it doesn't work for me and my group as well. Looking at Ivana and Ivan and seeing hit points closer to 100 than the 7 given in 2nd Ed, that doesn't work for me. High powered is not scary or intimidating. I have heard really, really good things about Pathfinder and that may be my next move as far as D&D purchases for the future.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Ocule »

Maybe in pathfinder doing something like 10 point buy, low wealth and slow experience track could help offset things a bit.. Last time i tried to play ravenloft was running 4e, it felt like the party were the freakin avengers or something.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Jester of the FoS »

5th Edition D&D looks really promising for Ravenloft. Low level characters are pretty fragile, magic is toned down a little, magic items are not assumed, and there's a lot of flexibility in the ruleset for things like fear and horror. And new options like Backgrounds really lend themselves well to a Ravenloft type setting.
And classes don't start as super heroes, which is nice.

I'm hopeful.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Dark Angel »

I have heard the same thing and will likely pick up the new supplements (like I wasn't going to anyway). But depending on how it looks and potentially plays, my group may be making a hard choice soon...
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Gynsburghe »

Howdy All,

At the risk of sounding strange, most of my Ravenloft adventuring has been done with Hackmaster 4e. It's weirdly gritty combat/skills/classes gave the games an unusual flavor, but sometimes... well... it just didn't feel right. I also always felt like my primary (home) group was being dragged into my dark delights...

So, pondering the question that is the title of the thread - I decided that it was time for fresh blood and a fresh game, purely set in Ravenloft. I'm an OSR guy - so the usual names came up in my mind - as did Chill (or Cryptworld as they call it now). But... then... I thought what's nastier than all that.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess, including the adventures possibly. No Dignity in Death's Pembrooktonshire makes me think of some backwoods Ravenloft village... would drop so easily in... I could see weaving the Grand Conjunction series into Raggi's misanthropic 16th century gunpowder and guts setting.

I'm surprised I haven't bumped into LotFP around these parts more.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by order99 »

Lamentations of the Flame Princess is indeed awesome-it has a great deal of niche protection for each class using some pretty simple tweaks, the return to the simple Law-Chaos Alignment (and the rationale behind it) really nice variations on classic Spells...the real treat are the Adventures though, really a bit over the top for Core Ravenloft or the Gothic Earth of Masque, but quite adaptable. Best of all, the 'No Art' edition is FREE, so you can sample and decide to buy the Illustrated version later...

As I mentioned some time ago i'm mostly an AD&D 2nd Edition Masque purist...but since my regular group is on hiatus with a new GM and genre, I might-just MIGHT-tweak some 2E Classes, replace the NWP system with the AWESOME LotFP Skill system and some Spells that actually deserve those Powers Checks!

I'll let you know how it goes, but it might be awhile...during the hiatus we're playing Heroes and Hideouts in a lovely Monty Pythonesque sendup of our previous Gothic Earth campaigns. And let me tell you, when the PC's are:

-A two-fisted Van Helsing Mysteryman with twin Pistols and smoke pellets (and has his own airship)
-An alchemical Vat Man who can stop a coach with his bare hands and toss electric arcs
-A demure schoolmarn who uses the power of Ancestral Regressive Mesmerism to transform into a screaming woad-covered Pictish War Goddess Made Flesh, and
-A curious eight year old scamp who ate Daddy's entire supply of Food of the Gods, growing into a rambunctious twelve-year old who routinely bounces shotgun blasts off his chest, leaps over most buildings and outraces the Orient Express for fun while carrying a full grown ox "just to make it fair" (this one's mine, it's soooo good to be a Player again!)

....well, i'm afraid it's currently the Monsters making Fear checks. :twisted:

I'm sure i'll be called upon to GM a more normal Masque campaign once we've got all of these silly, silly antics out our system... :mrgreen:
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Gonzoron of the FoS »

order99 wrote:-A two-fisted Van Helsing Mysteryman with twin Pistols and smoke pellets (and has his own airship)
-An alchemical Vat Man who can stop a coach with his bare hands and toss electric arcs
-A demure schoolmarn who uses the power of Ancestral Regressive Mesmerism to transform into a screaming woad-covered Pictish War Goddess Made Flesh, and
-A curious eight year old scamp who ate Daddy's entire supply of Food of the Gods, growing into a rambunctious twelve-year old who routinely bounces shotgun blasts off his chest, leaps over most buildings and outraces the Orient Express for fun while carrying a full grown ox "just to make it fair" (this one's mine, it's soooo good to be a Player again!)
Just want to say, I love these characters. Particularly the schoolmarm. :)
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Gynsburghe »

Those characters are great send-ups - must be a blast to play. I have run Masque in 2e only, though I had allowed certain amounts of demihumans in my mythohistorical dream/afterlife homebrew setting (hardly canonical...). Always loved that original box set... been dying to do "Bleak House" with it, but there is a certain amount of commitment to that one :azalin:

I absolutely adore the LotFP adventures, but my prior group was... umm... possibly dismayed.

I had always run things a bit dark, Lovecraftian in tone - but the absolutely corrupt Knight of the Church in Pembrooktonshire (not to mention the creepy townspeople) might have been too vile for them (at least as I interpreted them). They were in shackles within ten minutes for reacting to them negatively, being my usual mouthy PCs, in order to 'teach them respect' - mocking threats of torture and relentless taunting with his slimy toad of a sidekick (I think they eventually flat out murdered that one). I fear that I really got under their skin, running amok with the 'evil that men do' - too close to home and reality, I suppose. After several years of gaming, often in spurts, this was the adventure that we closed on (there is always talk of new campaigns, but the ambition is lacking).

There are a lot of folks who say that these adventures break a certain social contract between players and GMs - campaigns should be fair, fun and not so ruthless and evil. I don't agree with this, I can see the viewpoint however - I think there is room for differing styles. Certainly a module like "The Monolith From Beyond Time and Space" could completely sever any chances of the players ever trusting the GM again.

"Death Frost Doom" would make a very interesting mash-up with the core of "Night of the Walking Dead", or stand on its own. It's over the top, sure, but it reads like a horror movie. "The God that Crawls"... yup, that could work. "Vornheim", "Weird New World" or "The Red and Pleasant Land" could almost be Domains - albeit weird places to visit...

I followed a blog about an old school, homebrew, low fantasy version of Greyhawk awhile ago (http://oldguardgamingaccoutrements.blog ... laugh.html) - and that made me think that Ravenloft could be seen much the same way...
order99 wrote:Spells that actually deserve those Powers Checks!
Yes. 'Summon' will get you noticed, and the creature might not be amused to find itself stuck in Ravenloft... Poor first level character who tries that...

I have a short break from work coming up, and I'm a bit RPG deprived these days - so I suspect I will be trying this out soon. New FLGS seems to be OSR friendly and has a pretty decent regular crowd. A couple of my old players will likely come along for the ride.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by order99 »

Yes, I can see the breaking of many assumed social contracts with LotFP-which is why I would never spring something like that on fellow gamers cold-the Rules tweaks on the other hand are easily explained and carry little unexpected bias...

Now if I DID want to run some of those awesome Gonzo adventures in pure and uncut form-well, Ravenloft has Uncharted Islands for a reason, as does Masque with its Sinkholes of Evil, some large enough to encompass lonely villages and moderate sized woods...

" Dear sweet Jesu, how do you explain something like...like THAT THING running about?"

" I told you Dennis, there are places where the World is...thin, and in places like that, sometimes there visit such creatures as we must deal with ere they come close enough to ...remain. At any rate, i'm sending a telegragh straight to the Holy See itself-meanwhile, you find this Carnaki fellow you're always boasting of and tell him I want one of his vaunted Electric Pentagrams at each end of that canyon-and enough batteries to keep them running hot for at least a WEEK..."
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Guardian of Twilight »

For me, I feel that Ravenloft runs best with 3.xE rules. It just seems to flow seamlessly. I will admit that I also feel that 5E could be a good system for our beloved setting. It just seems like they brought the spirit of the old editions back in 5E, and they are working hard to keep power levels balanced as compared to other editions.
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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

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Re: What is the best game system to run Ravenloft

Post by Lord Loren Soth »

I will leave this here....

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... and walk away slowly...
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