Café de Nuit

I read these when Rucht sent them our way last Friday (thanks again Rucht, that was cool).

What struck me is his thoughts on Natalia Vorishkova - never realized she could be so mean and dangerous. Of course, we knew her as a dangerous foe, but her proposed background in the VRGttSK is quite cool.

Other thoughts?

Joël

His take struck me as quite similar to the character Johan from the Japanese anime Monster. A man who can sense killers and prod them into action.

I would have loved to see that book, and if it weren't for the legal questions it brings up it would be possible to do it ourselves.

Yes such a book would really be something new and refreshing... I mean every guide more or less, deals with monsters and supernatural evil. What about the more mundane evil that exists in RL? What about the human monsters that make this place a living hell?

Could we possibly cover something like that (along with more conventional , supernatural horror) in what was proposed by people in this forum as Alanik Ray's Casebook?

You're welcome, Joel.

As far as Natalia goes, I sort of "backwards engineered" her story and thought of the kind of character she would be if she were a real person.

We see alot of that backwards engineering approach to character development in today's media. Comic books are a great example. Alot of new comics are written with the characters backwards enigneered from their previous history.

With Natalia, a few big things stuck out to me:
1) She's been around for a while. Since the Black Box.
2) She escaped from Van Richten and basically outlived him.
3) She duped George Weathermay big time. She even duped his whole family, because she showed up at their house long enough to attack Gennifer.
4) George Weathermay hunted down her family in revenge and apparently didn't have too hard a time taking them out.

All that told me that she was a very dangerous person, probably one of the more dangerous villains in Ravenloft.

The way I see it, Natalia probably did have real emotion towards George. And by real emotion, I mean something akin to love. In actuality, Natalia is probably not capable of true love as we know it.

The whole thing probably started as a trap, but Natalia may have gotten sucked down into her own lie. Why do I say that? Why wait so long to spring the trap? And why do it in front of so many champions of light? Did she just have her bad idea jeans on?

When she arrived at the Weathermay estate, seeing Van Richten again probably snapped her out of it. Natalia's attack on Gennifer was probably not just for vengeance, but a self-destructive urge as well. It was her subconsciously sabotoging her own relationship.

In my mind, Natalia has a kind of affection for Gennifer. She sees Gennifer as a sort of "daughter figure." Someone who led the kind of life Natalia could never have. Which would have made the VRGttSK really sick in some ways. Natalia would have written to Gennifer in this sort of affectionate way, hoping that Gen would "find herself," or "realize her true potential."

It's great stuff, Rucht. I wish we could have seen that short story, as well as the book.

Now, I was under the impression that she had used George to get to Van Richten, but I do like your version of her getting to deep into her ruse.

That and you have an example of George becoming a mission serial killer because of it (killing her entire family after all).

I guess there's no chance of us getting a fuller version of your vision of her background? Eh? Eh?

I like that interpretation a lot, Rucht.
It just smacks of the kind of psychotic usurper-type villian that really chills a person.
Natalia would be like a virus, invading the weathermay family. She thrusts her insane affections upon the family. Though they resist her, they cannot help but be hardened by her intrusions, and thus they become warped by her presence - transformed into the killers and hunters that she wanted them to become.

Thanks for the Author notes Rucht! ! !

I also would like to say thank you for sending in the notes for us to peruse. I am often suprised at how well the stories are woven and interwoven together. Even the smallest thing can have a great bearing on the future of other writings. I should like to say also that I am impressed at how the characters seemed more 3 dimensional than 2 dimensional because of your writings and fleshing out more of their story. I believe you stated that you are currently in the process of working on another project and I would like to send you my best wishes on it.

Rucht Lilavivat wrote:When she arrived at the Weathermay estate, seeing Van Richten again probably snapped her out of it. Natalia's attack on Gennifer was probably not just for vengeance, but a self-destructive urge as well. It was her subconsciously sabotoging her own relationship.

Well indeed it is in caracter. The BBox describes her as loving pain, even her own. That's a little self destructive indeed.

She made a cameo in my campaign as a friend of Nathan Timothy in the Evil Eye events. I had the PCs learn that a lady werewolf was hunting the twins. The twins, when they heard of it, fled for Levkarest. But before, they gave a few informations to the PCs about Natalia's past relations with their family.

With these new info in mind, she will make a great villain in my campaign.

In my mind, Natalia has a kind of affection for Gennifer. She sees Gennifer as a sort of "daughter figure." Someone who led the kind of life Natalia could never have. Which would have made the VRGttSK really sick in some ways. Natalia would have written to Gennifer in this sort of affectionate way, hoping that Gen would "find herself," or "realize her true potential."

That's quite scary If they ever do a RL movie, that would be a thriller scenario!

Another question: so Gennifer missed a power check. How do you see it affect her personality in the future? More cautious or more reckless?

Joël

Well, I didn't say whether she failed a powers check or picked up a Mist power. I'll leave it to you all to suss that out.

Anyhow, as far as the direction of Gennifer and Laurie, I envisioned Gennifer becoming more cold and aloof. She'd be obsessed with getting the job done, and Laurie would be the one who would be the voice of temperance and reason.

Hopefully, this would have lead to enough tension to keep their relationship interesting, but hopefully the books would have remained one of the "light" spots of Ravenloft.

Hi,
I've been really out of the happening, so please, can anyone tell me if the Guide to Serial Killers has been published at all?

Thanks.

Btw, I'm planning to use Natalia Vorishkova in my campaign since one of my players started as a werewolf (only completely revealed at last in game session 33, the last one) and Natalia is at the top of the infecting line. Of course I'm putting George and the Weathermay twins, so these notes by Rucht and the Guide to Mists will come just in handy.
Thanks a lot

Ail

Unfortunately not, Serial Killers was only a planned release.