Café de Nuit

Rotipher wrote:One thing that might help is if we reorganize the way information is laid out on this website, perhaps by adding an "Atlas of Ravenloft" section to its resources. There, each domain could have an entry in which we can compile fan-created material on that location -- possibly including reprints of netbook articles, given their authors' permission -- so that domain-specific information is centralized instead of scattered. There could be chapters within the Atlas: Core, Clusters, Islands, and "New Discoveries" (for fan-created domains).

Just a thought. That's how the Vaults of Pandius organizes its Mystara content, and it seems to work well.

Interesting. Indeed, if we reformat the Adventure Hook salon section to include all domain, and we add the info from the list of fan-made netbook. That should not be very difficult to make.

Joël

If it's not too much trouble to do, that is. I suppose some things (like netbook entries whose authors no longer participate in the Ravenloft online community) could be included as a citation and hyperlink, rather than acutually moving their contents to a new locale. But even that will make it a lot easier to find the material we're looking for at short notice: it's hard to recall that NPC X came from Issue Y of Netbook Z, especially five minutes before the game starts!

Among other things, pulling domains' information into one place might be a little more "short item"-friendly than the current emphasis on netbooks and larger submissions. Certainly at the Mystara site, there are a lot of little submissions that find their way onto the web that might otherwise go begging as being too trivial, like essays on the origins of campaign-setting languages or fans' versions of a given country's national anthem. More homebrew campaign-variant ideas seem to fit in there, too, so it'd be the place to submit your "Azalin Conquers The Core" version of the Ravenloft setting: something that doesn't have a place in a Gazetteer (though it'd have to be clearly flagged as a variant; hmmm, "Cartographic Errors" for a section-heading, if we go with the "Map Room" idea...? ;-D).

would also be interested in more VR Guides such as VR Guide to Eldritch Horrors (Mind Flayers?).

When reading over this thread again, I realized that this actually sounds like a pretty good idea. Now naturally, this book would go hand-in-hand with some gazateers for the clusters/islands.

But for Eldritch Horrors, you can take some of the really nasty creatures that seem to have something 'superior' about them, without them being undead/lycantropes/fiends etc.

It would be cool to see some 'Ravenloftesque' material for:

Mind Flayers (as previously stated)
Rakshasa, as if they weren't cool enough (good for Shri-Raijan campaigns)
Doppleganers (embedded within the highest circles in Paridon)

And maybe some new dread versions of Monsters. Maybe somewhere, isolated in the sea of sorrows, there might be a Dread Beholder (Taking the beholder from more of a 'folklorish' approach than fantasy).

A lot of it might be taking horror stories from different cultures and turning them dread.


Since with isolation comes variation, some Gazateers for the Islands and clusters, as well as a Guide to some of these 'Elderitch' horrors may spark a huge new interest in Ravenloft's. Naturally, having more information on the Rakshasa would make a Shri-raijin campaign that much better. The only problem being that I don't know how the W-F twins would go about studying Mind Flayers or Rakshasa. I doubt they'd appreciate it, nor let them get away with it. Some help from another source, maybe?

I like that phrase - Guide to Eldritch Horrors. I don't know if Rahshasas would fall into the same category as mindflayers and dopplgangers. Rahshasas are outsiers, complete with a planar origin. Mindflayers and dopplegangers are much more like earthly mutations.
Not to say that Rahshasas aren't cool, but they should be placed in the category of fiends.