Why players don't like Ravenloft...

[Rucht Lilavivat]

It sounds to me like the player is responding to how alot of people feel about Ravenloft. I remember talking to one person at a convention and they mentioned that they would never play one of two games. The first was Call of Cthulhu, the second was Ravenloft. And that response was one that I heard alot. "Ravenloft? Oh...um. Nah, I don't want to play that."

I think that this attitute was prevalent because Ravenloft, when it first appeared in box form, was seen as license for DMs to go power-crazy. If you look at the original box set and think about it in terms of what was out at the time, look at what the campaign had to offer:

1) Monsters like vampires, werewolves, and ghosts were not much more powerful.
2) Not all of the PCs abilities worked. So many of the comfortable "toys" the PCs were used to having were taken away.
3) Powers checks could mean that your PC might get deformed in some way. Alot of players hate to have their characters deformed or mutilated.
4) Things like closing the borders of domains meant convenient way for DMs to railroad the plot.

Now, keep in mind that none of these things were the heart and soul of what made Ravenloft the awesome setting that it was. But these were often the focus of what some DMs did when they ran Ravenloft. I've heard so many stories about how DMs took their players to Ravenloft, and basically screwed over the whole party. That's not much fun for anyone except perhaps the DM.

I think that the campaign has definately evolved much beyond this, but some people still have that negative view-point. And that negative view-point has been exaggerated now, as well. For example, I remember numerous conversations with people who thought that the Darklords of Ravenloft couldn't be killed for some reason. This is definately not the case, but that's the perception that alot of people had - The Darklords are unkillable, no matter what you do.

However, I think that this view-point is kind of fading. When I go around to conventions nowadays, I don't hear so much of this anymore. I think as nostalgia for the Ravenloft setting grows, it will be seen in a much more fond light.

[Jakob]

1) Monsters like vampires, werewolves, and ghosts were not much more powerful.
2) Not all of the PCs abilities worked. So many of the comfortable "toys" the PCs were used to having were taken away.
3) Powers checks could mean that your PC might get deformed in some way. Alot of players hate to have their characters deformed or mutilated.
4) Things like closing the borders of domains meant convenient way for DMs to railroad the plot.

Well, here in Italy Ravenloft is known as "Oh, god, that place full of undead!"

There has never been a good publishing project, here, for Ravenloft...

[yergerjo]

Interestingly this past Sat night, I had four players over to do character creation for the Ravenloft game which I shall soon be running (1 XPed Ravenloft Player, 3 Unfamiliar) First Level, low powered etc.

More on the game to be posted elsewhere.

Anyways, after we did my CC, another of our player's/my fellow DM who is currently running a Forgotten Realms game, walked in saw my Red Box map hanging up and just said "Hell No, glad I'm not playing that." Now I know he has played/ran Ravenloft in the past (notably the Death series) and he should know the real roleplaying experience available here, yet wouldn't want to play.

As a player he is excellent with roleplaying, and he isn't a bad DM, (I never had wanted to play in FR but this works fine) but in his game the players are all trying to roleplay and such but get almost no XP out of it, myself I reward more for roleplaying than combat, his is semi-hack.

But back to the point, obviously this wasn't an isolated incident but something we all seem to encounter at one time or another, but I find it interesting that he'd run Ravenloft, but wouldn't play it...

[mettem]

Listen, Chuck, I love you to death but I don't want to play Ravenloft. EVER. Call of Cthulhu has more meaning to it's struggles. The setting is broken. REALLY broken. If you kill every monster in the setting then more will just be brought in and nothing your player character will do will make any damn bit of difference to the setting. It's a hopeless moross where you don't even get the dim satisfaction of saving reality for a couple of more years. Instead, it's a setting that mocks heroism and pretty much renders any attempt to compare it to the good vs. evil stories of old as wrong.

Hmm, I actually like RL for the latter reason. I mean, it's probably not as popular because many seem to just want to play a plain fantasy setting with heroes adventuring to stop some large scheme to save the world or questing for some great loot to stop some great evil. In Ravenloft, it's more like "evil" has already won, and has stayed on top of the chain for many years, with the survivors being included in limbo with the dark lords.

However, I think Azalin and Strahd should have their levels or powers bumped up a bit.

[alhoon]

I have asked some of my players that say "Ravenloft? Nope. I don't like it" every once a while and they just said:

The responces are as like I remember them and they are not from the same player.

- Ravenloft is a PC grinder.
- You do the right thing and the evil of the world hits you with injustice instead of a reward. We don't like to be in such an unfair campaign world.
- Ravenloft? The place is ran by monsters instead of humans! They have the true power even if there are other leaders.
- I want my neutral character to sink in some not-good stuff and the PChecks are problematic.
- I know very little about that world, while I have read novels etc about Forgotten Realms and I like them.

[Dion of the Fraternity]

IMC, I've found out that my players somehow found Ravenloft better when I stopped playing in d20 and transposed the entire campaign setting over to the Storytelling System.

Justa thought.

[Le Noir Faineant]

IMC, I've found out that my players somehow found Ravenloft better when I stopped playing in d20 and transposed the entire campaign setting over to the Storytelling System.

Justa thought.

Was the same with my group.

[Scarycount]

what is this "storytelling system"?

[Undead Cabbage]

IMC, I've found out that my players somehow found Ravenloft better when I stopped playing in d20 and transposed the entire campaign setting over to the Storytelling System.

Justa thought. Confused

Embarassed Was the same with my group.

Although I haven't totally abolished d20 in my games, I find the more I break away from conventional D&D rules for the sake of story and game play, the more my players have fun, the more the game plays out like a Ravenloft campaign.

Of course, I'm under the opinion that if you want to be a good GM, you can't be afraid to go against the canon or the rule book, so I guess I'm admittedly biased on this topic.

[Dion of the Fraternity]

what is this "storytelling system"?

The system used in The World of Darkness series by White Wolf. I prefer the new one.

[alhoon]

While the ST system has its advantages, I would take the D20 everyday. I like the ST system, I play/DM in that too, but let's face it... I play D&D since... 10 years old? 9? 11?
I used to have the D&D basic set and and think it had too many rules and I couldn't use them all. It had about 100 pages total of rules BTW.

Now I probably have around 100 rulebooks and still I have to make dosens of house rules.

EDIT: SPeaking about rulebooks... reminds me I have to fish out Races of Destiny and complete adventurer to find a single feat that VAN wants to know about.

[Lord Cyclohexane]

what is this "storytelling system"?

The system used in The World of Darkness series by White Wolf. I prefer the new one.

I realize it's a bit much to ask, but at some point Dion, for a USS or QtR, could you write up a short article about using the Storyteller system for Ravenloft? Like how you do fear/horror/madness checks and Powers Checks, a few extra skills (or modifications to attributes) that you've added to make it work better, which current skills you've removed that might *seem* like they'd work but not for Ravenloft (for example, Computers is obviously gone, but would you remove Drive or just modify it to being carts or hansom cabs?)

Actually, out of curiousity, what dice pool *do* you use for Fear, Horror, and Madness checks? I figure the typical Wits + Composure is too typical, as that covers even just keeping your cool in normal situations, but am not sure on any alternate combinations for it.

But yeah, could you be tempted to write an article on it?

[Korumil]

I live in a community with a fair number of roleplayers and whenever I describe the RL game I play in I usually use the phrase, "Welcome to Ravenloft, where EVERYTHING sucks.."

My GM doubles the costs for most things, especially hard to come by or strange things like unworked beryl or a cold iron axe head. I tell them that the basic goal is to see how much good you can do in one place while surviving to do more. That's the fun of RL, knowing that no matter how much you get done there's always more you can explore and do. Other roleplayers think it's dumb that I get excited when our party gets attacked by a pack of completely ordinary, if exceptionally ravenous, wolves on our way around Mordent. They think it's just some pathetic attempt at a random encounter but at such a low level wolves can be quite a problem, and in RL you never know if they're just wolves.

[kottakinge]

Last session i had a new player.
He told me i already play RL and don't like that.
He explained and i understood what:the DM was using ravenloft for "week end in hell" scenario.
This was meaning lost of magical items,lost of levels, monsters u can't turn/destroy and spells that don't work.
Our Ravenloft is a well detailled world with a low fantasy setting, the human specie is weak, but that's not a game for lowering the character.
He saw that and now he likes RL.

[hidajiremi]

Where I live, Ravenloft used to have a very bad reputation thanks to a specific bad GM. He did all the old cliches: railroading, uber-NPCs, meatgrinder mods, the whole nine yards. So when I showed up wanting to run Ravenloft (been a fan of the setting since middle school), there was a lot of initial opposition, even from people who generally considered my games to be solid. Their only experience with Ravenloft was through a bad GM who ran every adventure as a "weekend in hell" deathfest, so they distrusted the setting by association. It's not an uncommon reaction, really.

When I was finally able to explain some of the basic concepts of the setting to people, though, they became very interested. One particular reaction I remember well was, "A gothic horror setting for D&D? Wow, that's like mixing chocolate and peanut butter... and then adding a nice slab of wasabi." I was able to intrigue the WoD players with the gothic romance aspect of the setting and the traditional D&D'ers with the idea of these powerful but approachable villains.

The big draw of Ravenloft for me in particular is it's stark contrasts: beauty versus horror, nihilism versus hope, grandeur versus decay, and so on. No, the heroes may not be able to get "the big win," but they can make a difference, even if it's for just one or two people. As Angel says in his eponymous series, "If nothing we do matters, then in the end the only thing that matters is what we do."

Currently, I'm running my fourth Ravenloft campaign, and I'm happy to note that there's a waiting list to get in, as there's been since the second one. Above and beyond the ego-stroking goodness, it genuinely pleases me to see that people have become interested in Ravenloft locally where once they were repulsed even by the idea of the setting.

And as far as WoD Ravenloft goes, I've already written a fairly major conversion myself. I'd be cool with sharing it with anyone that's interested. My mechanic for madness and horror saves is based around the "hierarchy of sins" system for Morality. Basically, you have to make a Morality check for things that would cause fear, horror, or madness saves; as your Morality drops, it becomes easier for you to fail such checks but fewer and fewer things actually provoke them. I think this does well at representing the idea that morally bankrupt people are detached and numb to real horror, but that when something gets past the surface it messes them up worse than people who have a system of virtues to fall back on.

Jeremy Puckett (Hida Jiremi)