If they were going to re-release a demiplanes of dread?

[HuManBing]

That's an interesting point but then again "Expedition to Undermountain" was a module I bought and returned because it left way too much unfilled space for me to deal with.

Also, anybody know where I can get that Feminine Hygiene Eberron handbook? It sounds like just the sort of manual my players can use when rolling up characters.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Azalin walks into the mists and Darkon is created, whole cloth, by the Mists.

And, for me, this is the one thing about Ravenloft that should be written to be used or ignored as the DM sees fit. Is RL an artificial world or not ? That should be up to the DM.

I'm always of the opinion, "If it works for you, go with it." But I think you're probably in the distinct minority with that opinion. Most RL DM's seem content with the artificial nature of RL (and love to debate endlessly on the reason and ramifications thereof.) Again, if it works for you, great, but I wouldn't want such a big departure from canon in a published book.

(As an aside, if I may ask, did your RL once have no darklords? When a new darklord is created, is his domain carved out of existing domains? Or does he have to usurp an existing one? Either way, does the land and people in it change to match his personality? How do you explain stuff like the grand conjunction? These are a few of the problems I see with a non-artificial world approach, and I'm curious how you solved them.)

Generally speaking, I'm tired of the approach that game publishers take today. It seems that all they want to do is sell you a highly detailed base product (i.e. campaign world) and then sell you more products that fill in even more details for you. ("Getcher Eberron Feminine Hygiene Manual here !")

I prefer the Old School approach where game designers provided you with a solid framework and left the players and DM to fill in the details on their own. I mean, that's what the process of playing the game does -- players filling in details with the actions of their characters within the framework the DM provides. And if the game company provides ALL the details to the framework, what fun is it being a DM ? Where's the chance to be creative ?

There are two issues here: First, game companies, like all companies, exist to make money. If they don't keep making new product, they have to close up shop. And each new product, by necessity, fills in details of previous voids. I suspect your nostalgia of Old School is because those older products had a clean slate to work with.

Secondly, you're clearly not the target audience for a super-detailed game world, but that audience exists. The whole point of a detailed game world is to give DM's something to work with that they didn't have the time, ability, or energy, to put together themselves. People who like to make up their own worlds like to make up their own worlds. I add my own stuff to RL all the time and never felt constricted, but I rely on that backdrop to inspire me, and to use as is when I don't have time to make my own stuff. And I know that a lot of the stuff the writers came up with is worlds more interesting than what I could do.

Basically, detailed supplements don't hurt you and they help me, so what's the problem? You don't need more than a DMG, PH, and MM (if that!) to make up your own stuff. And I don't see the point in paying for supplements that are deliberately vague. I was just reading the 3e MotRD book section on the world's cities, and sadly most of the "forbidden lore" there is stuff like "people speak of foul secrets in the dark corners of the city." And I found myself screaming (internally) "WHAT secrets? I could've told you the city has secrets, but what kind? Why did I pay for this book again?"

From what I've seen of other products, I think Ravenloft does an excellent job usually of balancing details versus freedom. In part, precisely due to the artificial world nature that you don't like. In what other setting could you say, "if you don't like any of the existing realms, make one up! Either floating in nothingness, or attached to the edge of the map." It's not only allowable, but encouraged by the nature of the setting.

[Jester of the FoS]

Generally speaking, I'm tired of the approach that game publishers take today. It seems that all they want to do is sell you a highly detailed base product (i.e. campaign world) and then sell you more products that fill in even more details for you. ("Getcher Eberron Feminine Hygiene Manual here !")

Funny that you're picking on Eberron. It's actually rather restrained. The original campaign setting had massive gaps. Of course, those gaps were left purposely empty to be filled by later products. But there are still long, long stretches of mysterious places and gaps.
What have they released so far? The main book. One on magic, one on religion, three for the continents indescribable in the main book, one for races, a history book and a book on the main 5 nations. And a player's guide.

The Realms is the world that has all the gaps and holes firmly plugged.

I prefer the Old School approach where game designers provided you with a solid framework and left the players and DM to fill in the details on their own. I mean, that's what the process of playing the game does -- players filling in details with the actions of their characters within the framework the DM provides. And if the game company provides ALL the details to the framework, what fun is it being a DM ? Where's the chance to be creative ?

I think that was less stylistic more lack of skill. When I look back at the oldest of campaign settings (Greyhawk) the book is more a pamphlet and is crazy un-detailed. There's a paragraph for each nation and a short history that's 1/2 a page.
You pretty much have to do everything but make-up names.
Other old-school products are equally unsatisfying. Not due to a style but because people were making a new type of book and were unsure what and how to do it. So you end up with these worlds where there are no trade routes, you have no idea how half the continent eats, and have to make-up 90% of the world's history or political situations.

I applauded White Wolf when they rebooted the World of Darkness. The core books (WOD rulebook / Vampire: The Requiem) took the Old School approach. There were plenty of tools, both crunchy and fluffy, to help you build good characters; But the game world background was about tone and was general rather than specific. In short, they weren't there to tell you how your world should be. They gave you the tools and the room to build something of your own. I'm not sure if White Wolf stuck to this philosophy with all the covenant books they've published but I appreciated it when the core books were released.

Ah, like Eberron I'm sure these blanks were purposeful. True, WW has been a company that thrived on a slowly building metaplot, mysteries and the unknown. But this time they likely knew enough to give you enough information to play but leave out enough that you'd still want to buy another book.

In short, rather than writing product that fires up the imagination, game designers are writing minutely-detailed pre-packaged stuff that replaces imagination. ("World's Largest Dungeon" anyone ?) And I'm getting bored with game designers telling me their stories rather than giving me tools, hints, and help to create my own world and tell my own stories.

Adventures and dungeons have always been pre-packaged and released. But I like having the choice. If I feel up to designing a massive dungeon on my own (and have the copious free time to do so) then I will. If I don't I can pick up something pre-written and just tweak it for my group or run as-is.

Back in the "old school" there wasn't a choice. It was "play our way" by spending vast amounts of time designing worlds or filling vast gaps.

[Bluebomber4evr]

I say a big fat NO to retconning. If they were to do that, I wouldn't buy it. Streamlining the history is okay, but I hate it when they rewrite the history for a campaign setting. This means I'd really hate it if they based it on Expedition to Castle Ravenloft.

Second, I don't understand the rant about making vague sourcebooks. That makes no sense. If I'm going to shell out the money for a sourcebook, it damn well better have all the details! If I have to make it up myself it's a waste of money. Leaving the Dark Powers and the Gentleman Caller's motivations vague is okay, though.

I agree on the demand for more accurate maps with definite sizes (I dislike the "it's as big or as small as you like" schtick from 3rd ed.).

Also agree on one book with ALL the darklords' stats, not just "popular" ones or Core darklords. I'd also like to have full maps for each Darklord's lair somehow, but that's probably asking too much

One thing I'd do as well, would be to make sure to note for certain that Lord Soth WAS the darklord of Sithicus, Hickman and Weiss be damned!

[Igor the Henchman]

My wishlist:

Drop the Ban of Secrecy. Put everything in one book, from player options to darklord identities. Unveling the secret lore might increase the setting's popularity with the player crowd.

Make Vistani a playable race.

Include Fear, Horror and Madness saves, Powers checks, Powers checks for spellcasting, Curses, Taint, Incantations and Sanity as optional mechanics, to be used as the group wants, depending on the feel of a particular campaign.

Include optional mechanics and tips for playing without miniatures - the changes it means to rules and encounter building.

Make the Clusters larger and more compelling. Allow to play entire campaigns outside of the Core.

Touch upon non-human race cultures, with race-specific feats or prestige classes.

Introduce the concept of Cursed Items Worth Keeping - magic items with a unique history that combine useful powers with disturbing after-effects.

[NeoTiamat]

My wishlist:

Drop the Ban of Secrecy. Put everything in one book, from player options to darklord identities. Unveling the secret lore might increase the setting's popularity with the player crowd.

You know, I think Igor might be on to something here. Right now Ravenloft is a *very* DM-centric setting, to the point that there is very little you actually *can* tell PCs. But why?

The whole surprise/scary unknown factor only works once, and if you really want something the PC's don't know about, make it yourself. While on the flip side it might make people appreciate the setting more.

[cure]

That brings up the difference between outsiders and locals.

For locals things work as they have always worked, unless the the history of their particular land clearly documents the entry into the Lands of Mists, for example Nova Vaasa and the notion of the "False World."

For outsiders geography, changes to magic, and the distancing of the gods are prominent things that are not as they are supposed to be.

For locals the secret nature of the realm is unobvious and indeed is obscure knowledge of little obvious usefulness. For outsiders the secret nature of the realm is manifest, if confusing, and very obscure as to its significance.

[Nathan of the FoS]

Shameless plug: I'm working on a project that may be relevant to this discussion on the Worlds in Development board; basically, I'm redesigning Ravenloft to mitigate or eliminate what I think of as the design flaws. (The beginning of the discussion can be found in the "Current Projects" section of this site; the basic idea is to make Ravenloft something that could pass as a "real world"--spherical, no bizarre geographical discontinuities, etc.--to an outsider.)

[Drinnik Shoehorn]

My wishlist:

Drop the Ban of Secrecy. Put everything in one book, from player options to darklord identities. Unveling the secret lore might increase the setting's popularity with the player crowd.

You know, I think Igor might be on to something here. Right now Ravenloft is a *very* DM-centric setting, to the point that there is very little you actually *can* tell PCs. But why?

The whole surprise/scary unknown factor only works once, and if you really want something the PC's don't know about, make it yourself. While on the flip side it might make people appreciate the setting more.

The flipside is some players like a game where they don't know what's going on. See Paranoia for a prime example.

[nothri]

There's a few problems with perception of Ravenloft that could perhaps be dealt with. What do the players object to about Ravenloft? Clearly, its not simply that its a horror game. There are many popular games that stack the odds against the PCs (Call of Cthulhu, arguably, is more stacked than Ravenloft). A few thoughts:

1. There's a tendency to view the "good fight" in Ravenloft as hopeless. Darklords have immense power, can conjure up whole armies of night creatures, have several ways to "get out of jail free" if they are killed, and even if they do die...what then? They are the heart and soul of the domain. I think there's a tendency to protect the Darklord a little more than one might another villain. Simply put, if he dies, the land dies. Whole countries and borders get rewritten. Friends and family might dissolve into mist. Or, the victory was pointless as another evil entity takes over where the last one left off.

2. We still suffer from a second edition tendency to screw over the players for no real reason. Border closures offer no hope of escape, mists toss the PCs around wherever the DM desires, and too times the adventure called for the PCs to die horribly to progress the story. Its little wonder Ravenloft got the reputation of being a playground for the DM to torment his PCs.

3. One highly unfortunate side effect of the small size is the perception that the world is simply teeming with monsters. One player asked me squarely "why would anyone want to live here?". And in some areas this is an unfair assessment. But RL places its emphasis so much on the doom and gloom that its hard to answer that question. Add to this the fact that Ravenloft is so small that its hard to imagine how the good can stay away from the bad. Take Kartakass for instance. Its folk seem pleasant enough, hardy and sturdy folks with a strong bardic tradition and spirit. But the realm is so cramped I can't escape the idea that the wolfweres are constantly knocking at the door. On top of that, the folk of a region are as a rule a xenophobic bunch of a-holes. Does any good deed go unpunished in Ravenloft?

Despite that I think the two book system works best. First and foremost, I will note that never, in the history of Ravenloft, have we ever managed to cover every Darklord. The Black Box omitted lords, the Red Box eliminated domains, DOD failed to cover all the clusters, and 3rd edition never got around to detailing every darklord either. The main reason. Space! I think its been sufficiently proven at this point that a single book will always fail to cover every pertinent domain AND its darklord. I mean no disrespect to the authors, its simply a fact that RL has gotten BIGGER. I honestly believe the only way to cover both Domain and Darklord is to divide them up.

What we need to do is spend time in the PHB (a lot of time!) emphasizing the bad and the good about Ravenloft. We paint the setting in a way that emphasizes the pride and ideals of each domain as well as their fears and faults. We need lists of equipment to make the players go "eww, cool, I see what might be fun about playing in a high (or low!) tech level". We need a call for champions brave enough to face the shadows of the world. We need to drive home the idea that for all the darkness of this place there is innocence and light here. Emphasize that this is a horror game, speak on mood, but offer as much signs of the good as the evil.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

For those who haven't seen it yet, JWM posted an interesting summary of a for-personal-use idea the Kargatane had kicked around, just after the Arthaus line was discontinued:

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=896310

Check out what the "director's cut" dream-version of the Big Three RL core books might been like, had trivial issues like budget, time, copyright restrictions, page count, and/or lack of precognition about what would or wouldn't be required not intervened.

[cure]

For those who haven't seen it yet, JWM posted an interesting summary of a for-personal-use idea the Kargatane had kicked around, just after the Arthaus line was discontinued:

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=896310

Check out what the "director's cut" dream-version of the Big Three RL core books might been like, had trivial issues like budget, time, copyright restrictions, page count, and/or lack of precognition about what would or wouldn't be required not intervened.

A creation of utter beauty. It would move Azalin himself to tears . . . if only he had tear ducts . . . .

[nothri]

Well, that pretty much sums it up, doesn't it?

Some thoughts:

1. Intro to the players guide should still summarize in poetic terms the feel of gothic horror in such a way that it grabs you as it did back in the Black Box.

2. I wonder what chapter 1 was supposed to be. The summary Mangrum gives sounds kind of thin, like it should be the introduction of the chapter dealing with classes.

3. No gnomes? Oh well. I will say that I would love to see some history, legends or traditions on the individual races if space allowed.

4. I like the "variant" idea a lot, we could use a bit more advice on how to make a given class fit into a Victorian game (or a horror game in general). As an aside, any idea what a "Cloistered Cleric" means?

5. Skills, along with equipment, I'd like to see expanded to reflect the various progress levels....if I had everything I wanted for Christmas, I'd go so far as to ask for a watered down version of what we get in MotRD. ANd of course, end with some rules on High Alchemy!

6. Not much to say about feats, loved what we got in the original Core and VRA!

7. For the record, the prestige classes I'd like to see:
Anchorite
Arcanist (likely heavily modified)
Witch (I'd like some happy middle ground between the excellent class from 2e and the heavily prequisited class from VRA)
Monster Hunter (ala Secrets of the Dread Realms)
Alchemist
Voodan

8. Equipment: Again, just more extensive stuff for the culture levels...some "high tech" ships would be nice.

9. Excellent. I applaud the idea of keeping fear/horror/madness in this book and saving the powers checks for later. I'm conflicted about whether new magic should be in here or saved for the DMG.

10. I approve of listing all the domains of the Core in detail. Its what they deserve.
- as long as we're doing a "wish list" let's let the clusters grow a bit. Hammer on that desert realm from the Tales of Ravenloft (the name escapes me...lord is apparently an efreet, guy in the story is an SOB and gets cut apart by a storm of knives?), maybe add Malkavia to the Shadowlands simply for the off hand reference from Forged of Darkness.
-while we're at it, let's find a better name than "cluster"...the name lacks any sense of atmosphere or sinister overtones to me (the Core? Cool. Islands of Terror? Awesome. Clusters? Not doing it for me)
- The Scattered Lotus? Fabulous name! I approve whole-heartedly. I would definitely make it bigger, make the Poison Sea its own domain as one member of the kargatane suggested, and add an island or two (or a mainland?).

For the second book, I approve and disapprove.

1. The Mists are kind of important to have already talked about. Its not as if you can keep them a secret. Mist Navigation and such should already have come up.

2. Definitely talk about the Darklords and Dark Powers here, and by logical extension the Powers Checks. Maybe include a table to tell us which PHB spells require them.

3. Dunno if its necessary to discuss the Near Ethereal and "Near shadow", though it perks my curiosity. Sinkholes of Evil were amazingly fleshed out in the past RL DMG and should be given the same treatment here. Reintroducing pocket domains might be fun (maybe we should just meld the two concepts and call them Oubliettes? They are virtually identical, and the latter is more evocative). But Nosos is a pocket domain?

4. Rules for nightmares? Righteous.

5. Hmm....going back over the domains? Seems a little redundant. Seems like any dark secrets you just had to keep from the players could be gone over in the Who's Doomed Section, in sidebars if necessary.

6. Secret Societies we will always like.

7. One definite inclusion for the Arcane and Profane section should be the Tarokka deck, along with the better parts of Forbidden Lore.

The monster book I'll be brief with. I think it is a stroke of genius to put the Van Richten's Guide rules into the monster books and discuss the miriade of vampires, werebeasts, and so on in gruesome detail in the same spots you give a basic rundown of VR's writings. Problem is, space might be an issue.

[Jester of the FoS]

3. No gnomes? Oh well. I will say that I would love to see some history, legends or traditions on the individual races if space allowed.

Gnomes are hard. They've never had a good role in D&D and lack a solid basis in myth and folklore to draw on in Ravenloft. Very little that's gothic about little people in pointy hats.

[Mangrum]

Apparently I just forgot to include gnomes in the outline.