Café de Nuit

Religion, and the growing secular movement both play huge roles in the backdrop of Gothic-Romantic fiction. I feel like having the faiths of Ravenloft be disjointed and largely irrelevant is an unneeded relic from the 2e days when the crossover nature of the setting was more more prominent. Actually...

Yeah, the BoS series pretty much seems to lay out what the Kargatine had planned for Bluetspur; not dissimilar to how the Far Realm works in 4 and 5e, an almost parallel reality that can invade and influence the rest of Ravenloft if invited in. This suits the Illithids's traditional role in D&D ...

That's not a bad idea, though I run into the wall of "Gabrielle's right next door." again. Maybe she'd just work way better for me if she was the high speaker's bratty kid or something, or played at being a dark knight while she was really a clueless kid playing dress up. Something to tie ...

My general approach to archetypal characters like van Richten is to stick to the basics; what you need to convey the character's essence, while leaving the messy details up to individual DMs. This can kind of run counter to Ravenloft's tone, since this is a setting that loves its intricate backstori...

Van Richten opposing a legitimate romance between Ermasus and Metius totally throws off the cadance of van Richten's origin. I dunno if he even needs Metius, but he needs a lost child to drag him from his comfortable life into the world of monster hunting. That seems exactly the kind of revisionism ...

Falkovnia makes sense if you do away with the Core and everything is Shadowfel Domains or Islands of Terror, which seems to be the inferred idea here. Drakov is reliant on his neighbors for his curse to function and without neighbors you need a new enemy to fail against. Zombies could work but I fee...

So I've been trying to like Inza for ages and it just hasn't been working. Part of it, I feel, is that it's super weird to me how little the elves of Sithicus had to do with the adventures; i might like Inza way better if she was the spoiled daughter of an elven high speaker instead of another corru...

The "peaked at 8" element would put an interesting twist on Dominic, playing that up would kind of give him a Dr. Venture vibe- middle aged has-been holding onto the reigns of power through parasitic chicanery. It would also make sense with all the Dementlieuse born d'Honaires gaining imm...

To be fair, dropping the mod while you're in the mix is a ***** move. In cases like that, where the mod is directly involved, it's more respectful for all if another mod mediates. Otherwise it's a reacharound mic mute, or, can be taken as such. Getting back to VRGtR, I'm still scratching my head ab...

Wow this exploded. As far as boundaries go, to experienced DMs it can feel like a waste of wordcount, but it's important to remember that every DM's guide is someone's first and a lot of these ideas can be useful to talk about. Good DMing, especially good horror DMing, is all about trust. Your playe...

Man that'd be a cool thing for Gabrielle Adierre to find; the lost notes of generations of Gundar wizards would be a hell of a trump card against Malocchio.

In the interest of keeping the convo going, what are some fun terrain features you think could make Castle Hundora special? When I think of Gundar, I think of how he's actually way more of a people person than Strahd, keeping a family of monsters close to him and training up distinctive minions like...

It's been, what, twelve years since I last posted? Wow, time flies. My Dark Heresy game's finally winding down and I was thinking of what I wanted to run next and Ravenloft was in the top three, so I wanted to take a look at the old place. Imagine my shock that my account's still here! So I've been ...

Don't mean to necro but a frillion words came out so here they are. Lets talk about Dementlieu. D’Honnare is a favorite of mine, and I feel like he’s gotten kind of a bad rep over the years as a joke of a Darklord burdened with a Domain more interesting than he is. I think Dominic is actually a fant...

(OOC: I am an idiot. Fluff later.
Action: Move to I31
Standard: Majestic Halo vs Phage: to hit: 30 damage: 2+7+7+6+2: 24 Radiant
Minor: Divine challenge vs Phage)