15th Anniversary of the Book of Souls Netbook!

[Zilfer]

I think you mean Zilfer but that's ok. XD

Yeah, I think there'd be a bit more of a mix. Though I hadn't considered that ignorance explains things in many different ways. I can see someone coming up with that somehow a human and bear mated somewhere in the past to forge this creature. (obviously someone just made that up to scare people but it could easily become part of the lore)

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

I'm a bit late chiming in, but here's my take: I favor different approaches in different locales. I like the idea that "everyone knows" there are monsters out there in Barovia, even if they've never seen one. Folklore is rampant, some true, some false, but most people believe some of it. Enough to know not to go out at night. On the flipside, in Dementlieu, such talk is seen as silly rural peasant superstition. Maybe there are monsters like that in the wilds of the less civilized places, but not here in the modern jewel of the land. But in both cases, most people can go a lifetime without seeing a supernatural creature. The PCs are "special" only in that they've seen the threats that lurk out there and lived to tell about it. For them, it's not a matter of belief anymore, but they have proof, even if no one believes them.

With that said, I don't like the general populace to be artificially deluded or mind-fogged into logic that makes them sound foolish, like the Mordenheim example. That seems to me to only further the idea that Ravenloft's people are artificial (and thus not important to save): The "holodeck" argument. I like native PCs, and I don't like the friends and family of those PCs to act like hypnotized slaves to the status quo, while the PCs themselves "wake up". (a la Dark City) I know Ravenloft is an artificial world, and there's the "fishbowl" argument, but I think it's vitally important that Ravenloft's people be real people living in an artificial world, not part of the artificiality.

That sort of brainwashed populace is ok for a quick visit to an island of terror, but I can't see building a long term campaign in the core around it.

[Joël of the FoS]

What Ron said to complete what I wrote the other day.

Maybe that could work extremely well in some places, and be in fact extremely creepy, but not in others.

The best example of that is I do not see Barovians like that. They know for sure it's a bad idea to be out there at night, even if they do not know why with full accuracy.

Same for most places in the Core. The way I see it, Borcans know there is something wrong with ermordenungs, ans stay respectfully away if they can. Darkonese know there are monster out there, the rumors on those talking zombies! Those Invidians must have heard the rumors of their Gundar neighbour, or about the blood thirsty elves in the wood south of Invidia. Same for Sithicus. you can't never have heard a rumor about something. People in Mordent know about haunted manors and those sinister places. Tepest people fear the feys and evil that lurks within. People in Verbrek are dead if they are not cautious

Where it could work? Lamordians could indeed be deluded, as Dementlieuse, and some other places. Falkovnians can be too concentrated on survival in this regime to think of other things. I see Hazlani as could-be-deluded too. Perhaps Kartakans too. And Nova Vasaans. People in Richemulot too, their mind is elsewhere. Perhaps Valachan.

That said, I understand the need to have PCs (and darklords) more aware that something is going on, but they can't be the only ones.

Interesting discussion, by the way.

Joël

[Ryan Naylor]

The best example of that is I do not see Barovians like that. They know for sure it's a bad idea to be out there at night, even if they do not know why with full accuracy.

I think this is probably the crux of the issue. They know it's a bad idea to be out at night, but have a garbled idea of why. Barovians are teeming with folklore about vampires, some accurate, some not. If I remember Gaz I correctly, they've conflated werewolves and vampires in folklore, for example. Can you imagine how difficult it would be to be a natural philosopher in a world where you have humans that can turn into wolves and other types of creatures and only come out at night (vampire); humans that can turn into wolves but not other types of creatures and only at certain times (werewolves); humans that can turn into wolves but not other types of creatures whenever they like (werewolves, and wolfweres); wolves that can speak and understand human languages and might turn into humans (worgs), wolves that can't speak but can understand human languages and might turn into humans (afflicted beasts, and wolves controlled by any of the others)... None of which are easy to study, and none of which give interviews. In fact, all of which will probably try to kill you. While these creatures exist in the world, they don't come in neat, understood packages the way they do for us.

Having said that, the sorts of things that I see as separating PCs from the vast majority of NPCs is the true nature of the world: that there are darklords, and domains, border closures are willed unnatural events rather than fate or bad luck or fell influence, that the world is artificial, and so on. It's these facts that NPCs are ignorant about, and perhaps kept ignorant about. The control rats are kept unaware of the experiment; the experimental rats have some idea they're in an experiment, but not what the experiment is about.

And it's not just the PCs: NPCs who have managed to "peel back the veil" include the Fraternity of Shadows, van Richten, the twins, most darklords, Our Hero...

[Zilfer]

^Nice summery and good point.

[alhoon]

I think you mean Zilfer

Yeap, Typo.

Since I'm kinda tipsy right now, I'll refrain from typing much except that I agree with Gonzoron's view over the mindfog and that it makes the people less... people.
Lamordia? Heck no, they don't even believe Adam is a magical construct even if he arrives and tells them himself.
Tepest? They're more prone to believe that the pies from the window were stolen by fey than believe that the village kids stole them. A woman dies giving birth? Curse. Not malnutrition or exhaustion.
That kind of thing.

What Ryan (the real one this time ) meant I think is, the PCs and a few NPCs can often tell the truth from the bullcrap whether it's pro-normal or pro-paranormal explanation.
The "enlightened" PCs and NPCs are far more prone to realize that a man that aged 10 years in a night and has been locked in the attic in Lamordia screaming about ghosts isn't hit by a special malady of the mind but has been actually attacked by a ghost.
They are also far more prone to realize that the rich merchant in Tepest that was found in a pool of his own blood, stabbed in the back with his pouch and golden ring missing... was actually murdered for his money, not killed by fey because gold offends them as many of the populace will think.
Another example, very common in stories we read is ... the witch. It's far, far more possible that the "respectable" husband and father of 2 children fancied the redhead outsider with the big bossom than she, the pretty "witch" to place a spell on him to seduce him, as he claims.

Or by any means, that's what I use in my Ravenloft. The PCs can see the truth easier, but that does mean (as the weathermay twins point out) looking for the natural cause when people scream "monster" as well as looking for the supernatural cause when people say "tragedy"/"accident".

Can you imagine how difficult it would be to be a natural philosopher in a world where you have humans that can turn into wolves and other types of creatures and only come out at night (vampire); humans that can turn into wolves but not other types of creatures and only at certain times (werewolves); humans that can turn into wolves but not other types of creatures whenever they like (werewolves, and wolfweres); wolves that can speak and understand human languages and might turn into humans (worgs), wolves that can't speak but can understand human languages and might turn into humans (afflicted beasts, and wolves controlled by any of the others)... None of which are easy to study, and none of which give interviews. In fact, all of which will probably try to kill you. While these creatures exist in the world, they don't come in neat, understood packages the way they do for us.

Good point too.
Aside from VRGuides... I doupt anyone in Verbek cares if the thing that turns to wolf and wants to eat you is a wolf that turns to man (wolfwere) or a man that turns to wolf (Werewolf) and whether he knows what he's doing (natural) or he's been accursed/diseased (afflicted).

[The Giamarga]

I would not say that all PCs know about domains, darklords, border closure and the artificiality of the world. Hasn't this secret knowledge always been in only a few hands? Sure most PCs would know some of it but surely not all of it. OTOH the in-game Fraternity of Shadows, some darklords, Van Richten and many other NPCs know more details about this then most PCs.

As for the normal (i.e. core d20) fantasy monsters I would let most folks be aware of some of them, often getting it wrong of course but often right too. Folklore (literally the folks lore!) about werewolves, vampires, magic etc exists. 3e has rules for knowing about monsters by types tied to the different knowledge skills. Many NPCs don't have any knowledge skill ranks thus possibly know only basic info (low DCs) while some scholars might have higher ranks and know more.

Embrace the fantasy! Use the same rules for all (3e or PF) !

Heck you can study magic in universities there and get a Th.D.! Theoretically anyone can multiclass into wizard. And even the smallest Thorpe may have an adept wise woman with some more arcane knowledge than the commoners. And Lamordians would of course clothe their knowledge scientifically and have interesting explanations for supernatural abilities but the facts would still be mostly accurate.

Now the ravenloft specific rules modifications pertaining to monsters are another thing. I would tie these too knowledge (the planes) similar to the other RL specific rules changes. This skill being cross class to most (all?) would regulate this knowledge nicely enough.

Speaking of which: Mangrum, would you retain Knowledge( the planes ) being cross class for all or go with the core rules?

[herkles]

well Giamarga, that does not work that well for me, since when I run ravenloft I use BRP not d20 but i that system allows for alternative ways of identfy something. For instance one could use natural world, occult, library, folklore or even theology and other skills. thus alternatve ways and also different information. Natural world might explain how something fits into the local ecology, occult well occultish/magical stuff about it, Library is what people wrote about, folklore is just that, and theology is how things fit into the theology.

I also do not have magic being common, hell IMC most priests are not capable of divine powers save on a rare occausion, thus making the idea that a cleric at level 2 or so would be looked upon as a saintly figure by most people, similar for wizards not being common at all, it does exist and people can learn it but it is not something that every joe can become.

[The Giamarga]

And more power to you for that variant/adaption. For me RL is intricately tied to anachronistic fantasy hodge podge that is D&D. And IMO it should embrace the core rules assumptions per default and also the pulp gothic pastiche / kitchen sink character of the setting.

I was also alluding to point 6 of Mangrum's design manifesto upthread. In fact let's talk about 2 of those points again:

Okay, so, how I'd approach Ravenloft these days in eight beats.

[...]

6. Lighten Up: I'd abandon the pretense of Ravenloft being a particularly magic-poor world. It's not, and in practice it never really was. I'm not talking about adding magic item shops here; just an acknowledgement that yes, there's a fair amount of spellcasters running around, and and adventures in Ravenloft will include as much loot as they would in any other world. In addition, I'd pull way, way back on modifying class abilities, spells, and so forth. Admittedly, this goes against bullet point 3 to an extent, so we're looking for a balance. I'd reduce Ravenloft's alterations to magic to a few basics (can't detect alignments, undead are resistant to necromancy, etc.) plus the basic additions of individual domains. Alterations to spells worked fine in 2E, when the spell pool was fairly limited, but in 3E we had to try to tackle the issue with a broad framework that just produced endless grief for poor ol' Ask Azalin. It's impossible to keep up with every intricate detail of the ever-expanding 3E/Pathfinder ruleset, so stop trying to fight the tide. It's Gothic Adventure! Go out there and stake some vampires, fall in love, and have some fun!

And why no magic shops pray tell? I would go the other way and include them but in the ravenloft way. Make items interesting, not bland. Make the shop make sense but add a few gothic twists.

I imagine Van Richten's shop had a few potent trinkets to sell. It had lots of magical security measures in the Dragon article and a few new lesser items. Dementlieu's museum has magical items even relics!

Again: you can study the arcane arts at university and get a Th.D in this world! So for me some well designed magic item shops are a must have!

8. Codify Darklords and Sinkholes: Without getting into every last detail, I would insist on finally, fully codifying powers checks as a rule system, meaning that failed powers checks would apply to NPCs in exactly the same way as PCs.

It seems Ryan already did most of the work on this. I'd really like to see this as a netbook. Perhaps with a final polish of Nathan's Power Check rules and an appendix on sinkholes. It'd make a great and almost system neutral supplement.

[herkles]

in a weird way I would kind of agree with you. There would certainly be people passing stuff off as magical rare items, weather they are or not is up to me. But there would be people in Borca or Dementlieu pawning off items going "see, good sir, look at this. this is a relic of the ancient terg empire from the eastern core. For a measly 4,000 solars this one of a kind sword can be yours!" of course it could really be a relic with a curse attached to it or just a fake

[Mangrum]

Speaking of which: Mangrum, would you retain Knowledge (the planes) being cross class for all or go with the core rules?

Core rules. Really not a fan of any of the new rules added in the 3.5 Ravenloft Player's Handbook.

[Mangrum]

Point 9/14: I would reinstate the Common language. The existing languages would remain, and suspicious villagers would naturally revert to their native tongues to discuss the strange newcomers. The more I plan domain-hopping campaigns, the more I find myself bending over backwards to justify having PCs capable of converse with NPCs.

[Joël of the FoS]

Point 9/14: I would reinstate the Common language. The existing languages would remain, and suspicious villagers would naturally revert to their native tongues to discuss the strange newcomers. The more I plan domain-hopping campaigns, the more I find myself bending over backwards to justify having PCs capable of converse with NPCs.

That is what I do too in my campaign.

Otherwise, life is too complicated for players and DMs.

But that idea can be kept for a specific domain where isolation is key to the atmosphere, or for that village in the hills where they do not speak common.

Joël

[herkles]

Point 9/14: I would reinstate the Common language. The existing languages would remain, and suspicious villagers would naturally revert to their native tongues to discuss the strange newcomers. The more I plan domain-hopping campaigns, the more I find myself bending over backwards to justify having PCs capable of converse with NPCs.

well I generally divide the core up into lingua francas. the west is largely mordentish speaking so most people can get by without needing a common language. If you go to the East, Balok becomes the language that is the lingua franca, even if people prefer other languages.

To me a common tongue is silly, as it should be a pidgin tongue, not a tongue used for anything but getting the point across. "me friend" sort of speak; not holding long dialogues in IMO. a lingua franca is an actual language that just happened to become widely spoken, ie latin, french, and english all were or are lingua francas. plus the name common bugs me.

[Zilfer]

Speaking of which: Mangrum, would you retain Knowledge (the planes) being cross class for all or go with the core rules?

Core rules. Really not a fan of any of the new rules added in the 3.5 Ravenloft Player's Handbook.

Is there any Clarification of that.... I think I got the 3.5 but curious as to what the changes were.