False Histories

[Baduin9]

Treat false history sometimes as false, sometimes as true. If everyone knows false history to be false, and then sees some ancient undead from it walking about, it creates so called "cognitive dissonance" - and it is one of best sources of horror. Nothing terrifies men as knowing that understanting reality is impossible - that is the main idea of Lovecraft's horror, for example.

[Band2]

It seems I am not the first to struggle with this. Here is this entry from the Revised, Annotated, and Totally Unofficial Ravenloft Timeline by John Mangum:

684 The Black Duke starts organizing a militant cult, the Brothers of the Whip, in the extreme north-eastern corner of the new domain of Nova Vaasa, a region known as Ehrendton. The Black Duke’s actual headquarters may have been located in Arak. The Black Duke’s goal is nothing less than the conquest of Nova Vaasa! [VRGtF: 62 indicates a date of roughly 541. Sadly, this places the event some 140 years before the creation of the domain it takes place in, and I don’t like using false history when it comes to fiends. Thus, this date is simply a compromise, placed near the creation of Nova Vaasa.]

[Mangrum]

Here's the thing about Ravenloft's "false history":

Darkon never had an Arcane Age. There never was a Nightmage. He never built a citadel called Nartok Keep and ruled over the region that is now the city of Nartok. He never created broken one servants, or filled the hidden catacombs beneath his home with his magical creations.

In reality, one moment Nartok did not exist, in any way, shape, or form, and then a moment later it did.

And yet, Nartok Keep stands, old and crumbling. It does hold long-forgotten chambers, and those chambers are home to both the Nightmage's treasures and the descendents of his broken one servants.

None of it happened. As a matter of factual record, it's completely false.

Yet it's all just as completely real as everyone else in the Lands of Mist.

The only reason I don't like having fiends, specifically, originate in false history and then have their existence extend into "real" history is that it means the Dark Powers created them, one way or the other. And I don't see the Dark Powers purposefully creating creatures by their very nature that powerfully disrupt their intricate designs.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

The only reason I don't like having fiends, specifically, originate in false history and then have their existence extend into "real" history is that it means the Dark Powers created them, one way or the other. And I don't see the Dark Powers purposefully creating creatures by their very nature that powerfully disrupt their intricate designs.

You can always rule that the DPs mucked with the memories of a fiend they actually captured quite recently, however, making it think it's been there for centuries.


For that matter, in the specific case of the 'Black Duke', you could rule that the entire incident is 'false history' and/or fiction. If you don't plan to use that individual fiend IYC, you can decide that its history is as fake as that of Nova Vaasa itself. If you do, you can assume that the author of The Beast of Ehrendton back-dated the occurance, to protect the privacy and identity of the Duke's human foes, some of whom might still be alive (especially if they've got Hiregaard blood and longevity!) at the time of the tale's publication. If that's the case, Van Richten's citation of the events described is simply -- and understandably -- mistaken about the date.

[Lord Cyclohexane]

The only reason I don't like having fiends, specifically, originate in false history and then have their existence extend into "real" history is that it means the Dark Powers created them, one way or the other.

You can always rule that the DPs mucked with the memories of a fiend they actually captured quite recently, however, making it think it's been there for centuries.

Actually, I'd planned on using that idea exactly. What happens when you have a fiend, trapped in Ravenloft, burning with the desire to get back home. Its every waking moment spent plotting, planning, manipulating, killing, all focused on its attempt to break out of the Mists and get home.

Only, after decades or centuries of failed attempts, by Fate or by Chance, the fiend runs into a group of fiends also hailing from same plane, who came from the same city, following the same ruler, and who have NEVER HEARD OF THIS FIEND AT ALL. Who let him scan their minds and know for once and for all that this fiend, who's spent several centuries trying feverishly to get home, has NEVER BEEN THERE AT ALL, who can never get there because it is a creation of the Mists itself. That it is trapped, forever denied its dreams of home, because that place had never been home at all...

That would be a menace to be feared.

[Band2]

Well after some more reading I found some justification for using false history for long lived villains such as the ancient dead.
Where did I find it? In Van Richten's Guide to the Ancient Dead.
In the guide, van Richten gives an example of one of his hunts, the Bog monster of Hroth. This creature is from Sithicus which only appeared in 720. If van Richten wrote the guide in about 740 that is not much time for the bog monster to have become an "ancient dead."
I then searched Mangrum's timeline and founded this:

"724 Dr. Van Richten battles the Bog Monster of Hroth, and meets Jameld the Sithican ranger. This is also Van Richten’s first visit to either Kartakass or Sithicus. The original minotaur raid was probably just part of Sithicus’ false history."

[Luke Fleeman]

This seems to be a largely metaphyisical argument.

No one really knows for sure that their histories are false. The only way it become pertinent is if someone has a divergent memory. IN that case, you have to figure what exactly that means for said person. In the case of the ancient Terg, if he realizes things are off, what does he do? Does he right things, make a new Terg people, or try to escape?

I like the Sachmet situation really. Sometimes other things get tugged in too, and bad stuff may follow. Then again, the mists may cooperate with superstition. Someting may be false, and then the superstition gives it life, and it remembers things as it should.

One could also look at the situation in Paridon. One realm over another. You could have an ancient dead ruling a tiny area or fragment inside the domain of another DL.

I realize this may seem like babbling, but I am trying to say that you should use it however is necessary to propel the campaign. Let the metaphysics be pushed aside for the story.