Domain of the month - Gundarak!

[Joël of the FoS]

Esteemed members of the Fraternity,

Another month, another domain ! The land of the vampire and its insane son ... Gundarak!

Second edition: Black Box (Realm of Terror)

Adventures: Feast of Goblyns

Novel: Knight of the Black Rose

Was a canon domain (created in 593), now absorbed by Barovia and Invidia during the Grand Conjunction (year 740).

Darklord: Gundar

I choose this domain as one of the great ex. domains, now absorbed. Many people want to play in it before year 740, but it has never been really described in lenght. I'd like to expand our adventure hook data bank into something larger for this lost domain: what do we know about Gundarak? Don't forget to write the source for your info, or say so if you invented the information.

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From now on, in these monthly adventure hook requests, we will eventually cover all domains, but will also offer brainstorming opportunity about famous NPCs of dread.

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So post here your adventure hooks or stories.

Reminder: This thread is not just for adventure hooks, it can also be to host short verbatim of local sayings or fireside tavern conversations, à la Gaz 1 web enhancement... or your DM thoughts about this domain.

This thread is for posting adventure hooks or comments / suggestion / improvements on another poster's hook. Other comments will be deleted.

Joël

[Joël of the FoS]

I start:

From the Black Box :

Gundarak included two cities, Zeidenburg and Teufeldorf (now in Barovia), plus Castle Hunadora (now in Invidia).

The taxes were heavy: even firewood was taxed. The harshest tax was on born girls: a heavy tax that the family had 15 years to pay, otherwise the girl was seized and brought to Gundar.

Once, a mob killed Gundar’s tax collector and stormed castle Hunadora. However, this night, all rebels were killed and their corpse suspended to orchard trees near the castle.

From Knight of the Black Rose

There is a portal in Castle Hunadora leading to an unknown place in the mists. It is opened when the blood of a Gundar family member is splashed on the marble.

Gundar had a son, the insane wizard Medraut.

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Please feel free to enrich this with canon or your imagination.

Joël

[Joël of the FoS]

Adv hook - something I used in a campaign (adapted from KotBR) :

It works best if the players are outsiders. An undercover Strahd agent informs the players of a “secret” gate leading outside Ravenloft. Its trigger is the blood of a Gundar family member in the Hall of castle Hunadora. The Gundar family is depicted as evil, cruel and insane.

Many layers of intrigue can be used: Strahd is using the undercover agent to sent the possibly dangerous PCs outside Barovia; Strahd uses the PCs to annoy Gundar by killing his son; Gundar is pleased to be rid of his insane dangerous son.

[Charlatan]

No adventure hook, just mentioning that the novel Tapestry of Dark Souls had some characters (Ivar and Dirca) who were escapees from Gundarak, and that some of the wretchedness of their lives there is described in a flashback.

Hmm, I guess I have a vague idea for an adventure, based off the description in Gaz I of a road in former Gunderak/ currently Barovian territory haunted by 'screaming spectres cleaved nearly in twain'. Prehaps a ghost who dismembers his victims with phantom weapons, killing them in the exact manner that he himself died; the ghost is himself little more than an upper torso and pair of arms. Reuniting his scattered remains and blessing them will lay the spirit to rest. Maybe the premise is a bit more gory horror than spooky horror, but it was a spur of the moment idea...

[Ragdaj]

please, execuse my english, it is not my native language:

so, the adv hook.
As you know Gundar, unlike all other vampires was aging and that scares him. What if Duke Gundar orderes to the black mages of Twisting Tower in Teufeldorf to find the secret of youth? What if the children, wich was taking from parents for their inability to pay taxes, were used in the horrible experiments to prepare an essence of youth? The real heroes must try to stop it

[Faust]

Did lord Soth killed the son of Gundar?

[Joël of the FoS]

Yes, he did. It's told in Knight of the Black Rose.

Joël

[Manofevil]

Did he STAY dead?

[Gorthaur]

How about this (after Strahd annexed Gundarak): It's kinda heavy fighting dungeon crawl with horror elements!

Castle Hunadora is held by Malocchio's Soldiers and Gabrielle Aderre seeks brave heroes, who conquer Castle Hunadora in her name.

After much fighting and bleeding the heroes succeed and get the castle into the hands of the barovian/invidian freedom fighters.

But there is a locked door in the cellar of the castle. Behind it, stairs lead down into the darkness. In the dungeons of Hunadora are the experiments of Duke Gundar. Undead, aberrations and other monsters live and crawl in the tunnels benath the castle.

[Cole Deschain]

Duke Gundar's skeleton is in the possession of a certain weregorilla (Children of the Night: Werebeasts). If his stake is removed, he could easily try to reclaim his lands...

[Drinnik Shoehorn]

Duke Gundar's skeleton is in the possession of a certain weregorilla (Children of the Night: Werebeasts). If his stake is removed, he could easily try to reclaim his lands...

According to the adventure, the stake IS removed. It's DM's perogative if Gundar gets away at the end.

[vipera aspis]

so, what do you guys/ladies think would happen if the Duke wrenched back his lands from Strahd? and how would that effect the core as a whole? Malocchio's Soldiers would certainly have a nasty time. that could be an awesome twist for pc's trying to take over the castle for Ms. Gabrielle Aderre.

[cure]

Kartakan merchants would surely not refrain from selling weapons to the desperate sort of men who would run them into Barovia.

I have long imagined a small Kartakan hamlet a little east of the main road and very near the frontier. The Gundarkan resistance has caused a boom in the cottage industry of weapon manufacturing, has brought in a flood of stolen Barovian goods to pay for supplies and arms, has created a niche for poison manufacturing, perhaps with ties to Forlorn and its flora, and has filled the hamlet and its bar/inn with unsavory types, resistors, profiteers, guides, spies, and of course bards, which is to say wolfweres.

A party could be hired to run weapons in and to bring refugees out. They could be hired to pull off a spectacular theft that would line the coffers of the resistance if only they can pull it off and make it back to the border. A darkling, who cannot of course cross the border himself, has always seemed to me to be one of the ideal central figures. And of course where Strahdt's spies, the Vistani come, Lukas' will go.

[The Lesser Evil]

Once, a mob killed Gundar’s tax collector and stormed castle Hunadora. However, this night, all rebels were killed and their corpse suspended to orchard trees near the castle.

The blood of the rebels and the tainted emotions of their desperation could have seeped into the soil that feeds the orchards, turning them into dimly sentient plants with a hate for Gundar and his men. Perhaps it spawns a slew of dread plants, including blood roses, crawling ivys, and lashweeds, or even dread treants.
The original orchard trees could have merged to form a abnormally intelligent, Gargantuan Death's Head Tree, bent on plaguing anyone who seems to support Gundar. Its favored targets for seeding are Gundar's soldiers. In addition to the normal cries for help, the death's heads can utter curses involving "Gundar" and "death".

[Rotipher of the FoS]

Given all the teenage girls who were dragged off to be blood-chattels by Gundar's men after their parents failed to pay up -- plus the infanticide, child abandonment, and so on that no doubt resulted, as callous parents tried to dodge the "daughter tax" -- it seems that Gundarak would be an ideal place for LOTS of female ghosts, wraiths, and other vengeful spirits of all kinds. For that matter, now that being born female is no longer a criminal offense for Gundarakites, plenty of LIVING females might be up for a little payback; imagine the sort of mayhem that a nasty villainess -- Lyssa von Zarovich, for example, or Gabby herself if she's finally fed up with all those pesky males who keep complicating her life -- could encite amongst the Gundarakite women whose daughters were taken away (or suffocated at birth by a cruel and misery husband), merely by spreading ideas and a few handy poison recipies.